> open source furniture design for an office and having staff contribute to building it could influence the culture in a positive way.

Found Ron Swanson's hackernews account.

I worked briefly for a startup. The new guys all were handed parts and were expected to build their own computer. It was fun.

Hah, reminds me of 1990 Sun where I was handed several boxes of parts and told to make a sun4 VME workstation and bootstrap it from tape. I think it was part hazing, part can this person ask for help when they get stuck and partly where is our documentation lacking. (Sun had excellent docs at the end)

I think making your tech company staff make furniture is about as sensible as if the people who make furniture were also building their own software.

But as to open source furniture design ... I thought furniture was basically in the same position as fashion, where you can protect trademarks etc and particular patentable innovations, but that designs in general are not protected.

Tell that to Bezos https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nB25pTM7Ytw

You can always opt out for a simple wooden chair instead of aeron. Just plain wood, no plastic, no fabric.

My home office chair is what might be called a "jury chair." Simple wood armchair, similar to these:

https://www.kpetersen.com/jurychairs.htm

Solid, easy to clean, nothing really to break or wear out or fail, and reminds you to get up and walk around every so often :)

> having staff contribute to building it could influence the culture in a positive way

I hate this idea. That is not my job

as mentioned, it could influence the culture in a positive way.

I encourage you to try sitting in a wooden chair for 8 hours a day every day and reconsider

I do have an Aeron in my office. But since I largely stopped having video calls I confess I mostly work at my kitchen/dining room table in a wooden chair.

I do! I genuinely find it much more comfortable than any office chair I ever had.

Up until say 70 years ago, wooden chairs were probably the norm everywhere.

I use a wooden chair for my home office and I find it more comfortable than office chairs, although it may not be a fair comparison since I spend most of the time squatting on it.

Have you forgotten what primary and secondary school was like?

At the expense of your insurance premiums and general staff whininess.