The Pakistani piledriver

 In a previous post (The hopeless future of slow building), a Dutch machine for laying brick paving triggered thoughts of whether increasing mechanized efficiencies in the building industry represent desirable directions in social sustainability.  Or at least that was what I was trying to say; in the simplest terms, asking whether it's such a good idea putting people out of work?

I don't want to be irresponsibly simplistic, and I don't want to advocate the continuation of menial or unsafe work practices and environments.  These are serious issues.  But sometimes you do get humorous examples of situations that make the point about pragmatically employing people, without automatically suggesting lesser efficiencies.  These two examples do that.

The images at the top of the post are actually a 'floor excitation team' from a Dubai project.  A colleague of mine was doing the instrumentation for a structural damping job. He reports that they did have trouble getting the team to jump simultaneously.   Bollywood music was suggested.

The Pakistani pile driver had that problem licked.  See it at

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/cFb0nLCKypg?rel=0