All humans are seen as equal before the law, but their respective needs and requirements carry varying weights in terms of shaping technology and society.
Generally, only a few requirements are explicitly considered when developing a product, and these usually originate from people who use, engineer, or profit from the resulting product. However, it is important when designing any technology to consider all people who may be affected by its use, production, etc., regardless of whether they have different or conflicting requirements, such as the conservation of nature or humane working conditions.
Club bosses, owners and sponsors worth millions, TV broadcasting rights worth billions, and the top players from FIFA, UEFA and the national football associations are all exerting their full
Weight of Requirements
on football. Though inferior in number to the fans, the volunteer youth coaches, the field managers and players of small clubs as well as the people who bake cakes for the Sunday game fundraiser in the village, it is still the former who assert their demands on the sport while the latter look after them. However, fans all over the world are increasingly articulating their protest against Monday games, 'English weeks', commercialisation, and so on.
Society's global acceptance of the automobile brings with it its full
Weight of Requirements
and oppresses almost all other concerns. As a result, cars are putting more and more weight on the road. While the Volkswagen Golf I weighed a lean 805 kg in its first year of 1974, the current Golf VII weighs 1615 kg. In the same period, the global passenger car population more than tripled from 314 million to over 1 billion. The ten largest automobile manufacturers thus achieve an annual revenue of 1,391 billion euros with a profit of 86 billion Euros, while the ten largest suppliers generate another 288 billion Euros and a profit of 16 billion Euros. And to ensure that cars can drive at all, the ten largest oil companies are turning over another 1,730 billion Euros with a profit of 81 billion Euros.