June 21, 2007
Bingo
Open Innovation and Other Foolish Ideas
by Richard Watson
The best ideas are often conceived of by trial and error, or even just by accident. Open source innovation can be the best path to discovery -- if you aren’t afraid to take the plunge.Posted by PJ at 08:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackOpen source or distributed innovation is all the rage at the moment, but the hype glosses over one important fact -- most open source projects are total failures. But this fact is precisely why the open source innovation movement is so important.
Within traditional innovation models, the cost of failure is very high. As a result, stage gates, red lights, and funnels are introduced to control the number of new ideas that are developed and introduced in to the market. And that's the problem.
Nobody can ever know for sure what will work and what won't, until an individual makes a leap of faith and a surge of innovation is unleashed. Moreover, nobody can tell what’s silly and what isn’t without the benefit of hindsight. But with open innovation, researching and worrying about whether something will work or not is unnecessary because of the low cost of trying. Just do it and you’ll find out.
My own experience of open innovation within large organizations is relatively modest. The reason for this is that the idea is too new and unproven. Organizations like the sound of it in theory, but in practice relinquishing control to scores of unknown individuals scares the pants off them. Business, after all, is about order and control. But if they’re right then why do only 40% of major technical innovations come from large corporations?
Anyway, I’ve been playing with the idea myself of late. My first experiment was a little online trends newsletter called What’s Next. This isn’t openly created, because I create all the content myself, but I do receive a tremendous amount of user feedback so the business model is openly filtered. As a result the idea has been revamped several times, and while the current version isn’t perfect, it’s one hundred times better than when it started.
The key learning here is that the innovation process has been inverted. Previously, I would have worked up a handful of promising ideas and put them into focus groups to establish which concept was 'right.' I would have then polished up the winning concept and put it on the market. In other words, I would have created something, edited it, and then ‘published’ it. But these days you can also do it the other way around. You can create, then publish, and then let your customers edit the concept for you, especially if your product is digital or if it’s a service innovation.
My latest collaborative experiment in home-brewed innovation is something called Homepage Daily, which is an online newspaper. Will this work? I have no idea but the users will undoubtedly let me know. The point here (and most large organizations outside of the US at least really don’t get this) is that there is no lasting humiliation in giving it a go. You can fail like crazy and still keep going until you eventually stumble on success. Of course this presents big organizations with something of a problem. How can they fail like crazy without looking like idiots? The answer, in open innovation terms, is to facilitate and empower every employee, customer and stakeholder to become part of the innovation team and to then encourage them to perform small experiments.
For example, Mozilla Corp is the company behind Firefox, the wildly successful Internet browser. The company has 70 employees and almost 200,000 volunteer helpers. Moreover, Firefox 1.0 was developed, not on purpose, but by two renegade young programmers that went off in the wrong direction just because it felt right.
The idea of open or distributed innovation obviously links with other ideas like the wisdom of crowds, but the link I like the most is with James G. March’s idea of foolishness in organizations. March is a professor emeritus at Stanford Business School and one of his key insights is that companies need to mess around more.
What I think he means by this is that people should try more things out even if rationally they seem like silly ideas. For example, people should incorporate more ideas from outside their domain, or even make mistakes on purpose just to see where this takes them. It’s a bit like going on holiday. You can follow the guidebooks but often the most interesting and useful experiences come when you put the guidebook down and walk down an unknown street for no particular reason.
Of course, the idea of setting up an innovation process focused on making deliberate mistakes is itself a silly idea. At the moment, most organizational innovation strategies and processes are too sequential and too rigid. But moving to some kind of ‘anything goes’ system would be equally disastrous.
What’s needed is a balance -- a combination of tight and loose, where 85-90% of internal resources are spent on internal innovation that is tightly planned and controlled. The remaining 10-15% of time and money should then be spent on unplanned ideas that are developed by simply releasing them into the wild and seeing what happens.
March 21, 2007
Attack it’s weak point for massive damage
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
It’s reality for anyone doing anything in this day and age: no matter how strongly you intend for your product to be used in a certain way, your users can decide how it will actually be used. Viagra was created to treat heart problems. MySpace came about as a way of promoting bands. But eBay was not created to sell Pez dispensers, no matter what their PR department says.
With the growth of YouTube and other collective media sites, and the decreasing cost of good quality photo, sound, and video editing software, users and critics can now also take presentations and use them for other things. Here’s a great example, from the E3 conference in 2006: A horrible presentation from Sony on the PlayStation 3 was reedited and distributed online to mock the Sony producer who gave it.
And here’s a little background from YTMND:
Giant Enemy Crab
At one stage of the conference, a Sony producer gave out a presentation for the game Genji 2. During this demonstration he made a complete fool out of himself by first explaining that the entire game was based on Japanese history, before adding "so here's this Giant Enemy Crab". He then proceeded to flip said crab onto its back and attack its weak point for Massive Damage (it should be pointed out that no historical evidence for such events actually occurring in ancient Japan has ever been brought forward). As if this wasn't ridiculous enough, the producer went on to outline some of the mind-boggling next-gen features his game would include: features such as "real-time weapon change" and "real-time character change", which - of course - "could only be made possible with the power of the PlayStation 3".
YTMNDs on this subject vary greatly in scope, but usually have some manner of Enemy Crab appearing in unusual places. Sometimes a Giant Enemy Crab is photoshopped into ancient Japanese tapestries or onto the blackboard in Japanese history classrooms. There was also a spate of vandalism on the Wikipedia entry for crabs, with people inserting references to certain large, malicious, ancient Japanese varieties.
The lesson here isn’t to step out of the limelight. A great presentation can make you just as easily as a bad presentation can break you. (For example, check out this post on the best presentations ever, most of which are available on video sharing sites like YouTube and Google Video.) But if you’re stepping out and making presentations, or moving your company into new territory, realize that you will be mocked and criticized, and it’s not always a bad thing. In this case, the old cliché “there’s no news but good news” is true – you’re getting exposure and publicity and name recognition. And you’re also getting market feedback that 10 years ago you would have had to pay a ton for.
There’s also a chance you’ll get ideas to move in a direction you didn’t consider – a new market, a new product, or a new service. And at the very least, you’re also learning to avoid the giant enemy crabs…
Posted by PJ at 09:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackFebruary 09, 2007
It Was Only a Matter of Time...
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
In one of the highest profile innovative marketing schemes to go astray, blinking, electronic advertisements in Boston for Aqua Teen Hunger Force were thought to be explosive devices. Roads and subway trains were closed down, the bomb squad was called out in force, and merchants are claiming losses more and more each day.
The Cartoon Network might have thought they were finding a cute way to get market share, but for most Bostonians, the advertisements seemed to be saying something quite different:
Today, two weeks after the incident, the general manager and executive vice president of the Cartoon Network has resigned in an internal memo to staff, and the parent company, Turner Broadcasting, is paying Boston nearly $2 million to cover costs related to the scare.
In his memo to staff, Jim Samples wrote that, ''It's my hope that my decision allows us to put this chapter behind us and get back to our mission of delivering unrivaled original animated entertainment for consumers of all ages,''
He said he regretted what had happened and felt ''compelled to step down, effective immediately, in recognition of the gravity of the situation that occurred under my watch.''
This is a prime example of a Type 1 error in innovation, when a company fails because of an action it took, as opposed to failing because it didn't take action at all (a Type 2 error).
(Eric Mankin at Babson's Innovation and Corporate Entrepreneurship research center, has a good overview of Type 1 and Type 2 errors, framed around television and movies. Check it out here.)
This situation is also a prime example of why you should be humble and contrite in the face of failure, and not arrogant and argumentative. As CNN reported on 01 February 2007:
Peter Berdovsky and Sean Stevens were released on $2,500 bail, said Mike Rich, their attorney. The next pretrial hearing is scheduled for March 7.
Both men were cooperative with authorities, and neither has a previous criminal record in Massachusetts, Grossman said.
At a news conference after the hearing, Stevens and Berdovsky stepped to the microphones and said they were taking questions only about 1970s hairstyles.
When a reporter accused them of not taking the situation seriously, Stevens responded, "We're taking it very seriously." Asked another question about the case, Stevens reiterated they were answering questions only about hair and accused the reporter of not taking him and Berdovsky seriously.
Reporters did not relent and as they continued, Berdovsky disregarded their queries, saying, "That's not a hair question. I'm sorry."
Their attorney said the two were putting on a "performance," and noted that he had told them not to discuss the case.
That could have been handled better. Would it have solved the problem? Would Jim Samples still have a job, and Turner still have $2m? I don't know. But when you innovate--in marketing, in product development, in sales or service--you risk failure. And people are always more accepting of someone who says "I tried, I failed, I'm sorry" rather than appearing like they are trying to skirt admitting failure.
Posted by PJ at 05:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackJanuary 15, 2007
Germs, Germs, Germs...
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
Doctors are smart people. They save lives, improve the general wellbeing of a population, and even get to wear cool white lab coats.
Washing hands is common sense. You get rid of germs and dirt. When you were little, your mother probably told you to do it a dozen times a day. It’s an easy way to avoid passing germs around.
It wasn’t until 1850 that people realized that germs caused infections and illness. A Hungarian doctor, Ignaz Semmelweis, was working in a Viennese hospital with two maternity wards. In one, midwives delivered babies. In the other, doctors did. The doctors had a mortality rate three times higher than the midwives. It turns out that the doctors would deliver babies immediately after working on cadavers, and didn’t wash their hands between medical acts. They were transferring the germs from the dead bodies to the mother and the newborn child. When the doctors started washing their hands, the mortality rate plummeted.
So how come so many doctors—smart people in cool white lab coats—don’t wash their hands between seeing patients? Do they not understand the benefits? Have they never seen an episode of ER or Chicago Hope, and never learned that it’s what you’re supposed to do? Did they not teach this in medical school?
Amazingly, even today, some doctors don’t do it enough.
According to “To Err Is Human,” the Institute of Medicine reports that each year, between 44,000 and 98,000 American die because of hospital errors, and one of the leading errors is bacterial infections.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins Medical School took this a step farther. From the Baltimore Sun:
A study by Johns Hopkins researchers offers strong evidence that careful adherence to a few simple and cheap procedures - as basic as hand-washing - can drastically reduce the spread of infection in hospitals.
The Hopkins researchers tracked infection rates in Michigan hospitals that had agreed to institute strict safety practices for catheters, which are small tubes inserted into patients' veins. Used to administer medication and nutrients to some patients, the tubes can also be the source of life-threatening infections.
A year and a half after the changes were made, the rates of catheter-related bloodstream infections dropped by 66 percent, according to the study, published today in The New England Journal of Medicine.
“The results are pretty breathtaking,” said Dr. Peter Pronovost, the lead author and a professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine. “The numbers of infections went down quickly and they stayed down.”
(The report, “An Intervention to Decrease Catheter-Related Bloodstream Infections in the ICU,” was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.” The abstract is available here, and the full report here.)
Do doctors realize they’re not washing their hands? Yes and no. According to “Selling Soap: How do you get doctors to wash their hands?” a September 2006 article in the New York Times by Steven Levitt and Stephen Duber, “in one Australian medical study, doctors self-reported their hand-washing rate at 73 percent, whereas when these same doctors were observed, their actual rate was a paltry 9 percent.”
Now that we know they’re not doing it enough, how can we get them to change their behavior?
In “Selling Soap,” the authors demonstrated two attempts to improve hand washing rates at Cedars-Sinai hospital:
For the next six weeks, Silka and roughly a dozen other senior personnel manned the parking-lot entrance, handing out bottles of Purell to the arriving doctors. They started a Hand Hygiene Safety Posse that roamed the wards and let it be known that this posse preferred using carrots to sticks: rather than searching for doctors who weren’t compliant, they’d try to “catch” a doctor who was washing up, giving him a $10 Starbucks card as reward. You might think that the highest earners in a hospital wouldn’t much care about a $10 incentive — “but none of them turned down the card,” Silka says.
When the nurse spies reported back the latest data, it was clear that the hospital’s efforts were working — but not nearly enough. Compliance had risen to about 80 percent from 65 percent, but the Joint Commission required 90 percent compliance.
That got them part of the way there, but it wasn’t enough.
These results were delivered to the hospital’s leadership by Rekha Murthy, the hospital’s epidemiologist, during a meeting of the Chief of Staff Advisory Committee. The committee’s roughly 20 members, mostly top doctors, were openly discouraged by Murthy’s report. Then, after they finished their lunch, Murthy handed each of them an agar plate — a sterile petri dish loaded with a spongy layer of agar. “I would love to culture your hand,” she told them.
They pressed their palms into the plates, and Murthy sent them to the lab to be cultured and photographed. The resulting images, Silka says, “were disgusting and striking, with gobs of colonies of bacteria.”
The administration then decided to harness the power of such a disgusting image. One photograph was made into a screen saver that haunted every computer in Cedars-Sinai. Whatever reasons the doctors may have had for not complying in the past, they vanished in the face of such vivid evidence. “With people who have been in practice 25 or 30 or 40 years, it’s hard to change their behavior,” Leon Bender says. “But when you present them with good data, they change their behavior very rapidly.” Some forms of data, of course, are more compelling than others, and in this case an image was worth 1,000 statistical tables. Hand-hygiene compliance shot up to nearly 100 percent and, according to the hospital, it has pretty much remained there ever since.
Interesting problems call for interesting solutions.
Bringing about change in an organization is never easy, and certainly harder in places like hospitals with highly-educated, highly-driven Type-A performers. The problem with not washing hands was clear: increased medical issues for patients. Rekha Murthy at Cedars-Sinai knew that, in addition to proving the problem, she had to show absolute proof that the doctors were the cause.
She did. There should be little doubt that she proved to the doctors that success or failure was… in their hands.
Posted by PJ at 04:11 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackDecember 20, 2006
Innovation From Monday Night Football to Monday Morning Quarterbacks
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
It’s the holiday season: Spending time with family. Eating a flightless bird. And, if you’re like so many others, watching football on TV. In the 86 years since the first NFL game was played between the Dayton Triangles and the Columbus Panhandles, a lot of innovation has taken place in professional sports (not the least of which is the creation of much, much cooler team names).
Two recent articles, one from MSN and the other from FOX Sports, provide a great overview of the changes that have taken place, and the impact they’ve had on the game.
MSN took a look at the “Five Ways Technology Changed Football,” noting that:
“Instant replay. Sky cams. Radios transmitters in the quarterback’s helmet. Statistical analyses by the screenful. All are now taken for granted as an indispensable part of today’s sports scene. But it wasn’t always so.
Pat Summerall, who began his pro football career in the 1950s as a kicker with the New York Giants, and later became a broadcasting legend with CBS, Fox and ESPN, remembers the “low-tech” pre-replay days.
“I was actually in a room underneath Yankee Stadium [where the Giants used to play] with a Polaroid camera taking pictures of the television sets that were available,” Summerall recalls. “They would isolate on one individual and I would take a Polaroid photograph of that picture and take it back to the director in the control truck. That was the beginning of instant replay, the isolated camera and the replays that we have today.””
Their five picks for the most impactful technological innovations?
1. Instant Replay
2. Statistics
3. High-Tech Medicine
4. High-Tech Coaching
5. Technology for Fans
Check out their full explanations for their decisions here.
FOX Sports also reminds us that in professional sports, like most everywhere else, innovation doesn’t always occur smoothly:
“In the summer of 1994, when the NFL introduced a helmet-radio system that enabled coaches to send plays directly to the quarterback, Los Angeles Rams' QB Chris Miller stood in the huddle during an afternoon practice session in training camp and heard in his ear-piece not the gruff voice of head coach Chuck Knox, but an order from the drive-thru window at a nearby fast-food joint.”
Oops.
In their article “Techno-sport: Big changes for players, viewers,” FOX looks at changes across a number of sports, and how they impact not only the quarterbacks, but the Monday morning quarterbacks, too.
”Unlike the inventions of the 19th Century, today's changes occur at DSL speed. In the age of Google and YouTube, computers lead the way. Baseball players like Jeter analyze their at-bats — and scout the next day's starting pitcher — from DVD compilations they play on their lap-top computers. Then, they download their favorite tunes to iPods for their workouts.
During NFL games, technicians photograph and then download images of the opposition's defense so that their team's offensive unit can better identify and attack those schemes.
On the NASCAR circuit, computerized electronic devices probe every facet of engine and tire performance during training laps in an effort to boost performance and speed. Pro golfers use computer-enhanced club design — along with sleek graphite shafts and titanium faces — that enables even the Fred Funks on the Tour to blast the ball 300 yards down the fairway.
No surprise, then, that sports are now played in modern-day engineering wonders. The NFL's newest facility, the Arizona Cardinals' University of Phoenix Stadium, debuted this September in Glendale, Az.
The venue boasts a retractable roof, but that's not what makes this state-of-the-art stadium so special. The all-grass field is North America's first retractable playing surface; it is contained within a 17-million pound tray that, powered by electronic motors, can be rolled in and out of the stadium within 45-60 minutes. (The $355 million stadium will host the annual Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, the first-ever Bowl Championship Series title game in January of 2007, and Super Bowl XLII in February of 2008.)”
The article has an interesting ending, worth reading even if you don’t like sports that much:
What's certain is that technology will continue to influence and change sports in every imaginable way — and, frankly, in ways that are unimaginable to us today.
The 10-year-old kid who endlessly plays "Madden" will concoct the next generation of video games (except that the term "video game" will no longer exist). The assistant manager of the high-school track team will invent a sneaker with interchangeable soles for every imaginable running surface. Skateboards of the future will use recycled compounds that enable riders to jump incredibly vast distances. NASCAR vehicles will be powered by electricity. TV networks will cover sporting events with cameras in space (and maybe even cover events in space)
It’s a good reminder of a few things: (1) The people who use your product today are the people most likely to come up with a better use for your product tomorrow. (2) Nothing stays in the silo it started in. Football started on a grass field, moved to a TV screen, and then to a video game box. Innovation in any one of those places will likely impact the others. (3) Change, for both good and bad, is inevitable. (4) We’re likely to be disappointed and feel shortchanged by changes that occur in the short term. And we’re likely to be blown away by the changes that occur over the distant future. It’s the nature of innovation.
Posted by PJ at 08:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackDecember 04, 2006
SPARC'ing Innovation
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
The Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota is known for a number of things: With regard to performance, it is consistently ranked second among best hospitals in the United States. It’s operations make it one of the largest non-profits in the United States, if not the world. And the number of people it services each year is stunning: In 2004, the hospital handled:
- 513,377 unique patients
- 2,271,484 total outpatient visits
- 130,093 hospital admissions
- 599,002 hospital days of patient care.
It is also becoming one of the hotbeds of medical innovation, starting with the brand new SPARC lab, a “clinical innovation lab that operates like a design shop and that specializes in the ‘patient experience.’” From Fast Company magazine:
Doctors, nurses, and other staffers do what designers do: They interview, shadow, and observe customers (in this case, patients) to uncover their needs, brainstorm with abandon, and engage in rapid prototyping--hence, the paper kiosk.
Despite its status as one of the best known and most respected medical facilities in the world, Mayo is wrestling with the same issues that designers routinely tackle: In an increasingly competitive field, how do you differentiate yourself? How do you generate fresh ideas and implement them in a timely fashion? And how do you make sure those ideas actually benefit customers?
Mayo's program is "definitely unique, and it has enormous implications," says Dr. Samantha Collier, vice president of medical affairs at HealthGrades, which rates the quality of the nation's hospitals. "Medicine has long been embedded in tradition. But just because this is what we've done since the days of Marcus Welby doesn't mean it's still the best way. [Mayo] could find disruptive ways of practicing medicine better. This isn't just about customer service but about quality."
SPARC is not simply a research lab or a medical clinic. It's both. Real patients see real doctors and, in doing so, participate in experiments (they're briefed and asked for permission). Instead of being shunted off-site, the program is based in the Mayo Building like any other clinic; it occupies a corridor that used to house urology. The acronym, which stands for "see, plan, act, refine, and communicate," is meant to remind participants of the design-oriented methodology so they'll continue to employ it when they return to their departments.
The idea grew out of the realization that outpatient care is overdue for fresh ideas. "Medicine has changed, people have changed, technology has changed, but the exam room isn't so different than it was in the 1800s," says Dr. Michael Brennan, an associate chair in the department of medicine, where the program originated. Mayo wants its doctors to apply the same experimental approach to clinical innovation that they apply to scientific innovation.
It’s a great idea: Use your strengths in one area (scientific innovation) to another areas (clinical innovation). Host the facility right in the midst of the operating environment (the former urology department). Create an open environment, both in the facility itself (with the Steelcase materials) and with the lines of communication between patient, doctor, and administrator.
What lessons can be taken from this and used in your company?
Posted by PJ at 08:22 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackNovember 22, 2006
Update on the Nextflix Prize
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
In an earlier post ("No one knows your product better than your clients...") we looked at the Netflix Prize, which will award $1m to any team that can improve the Cinematch recommendation system by 10%.
Five weeks into the competition, one team is already more than half way there. Here's the leaderboard results as of this morning:
wxyzconsulting.com - 5.48% improvement
ML@UToronto A - 5.18% improvement
NIPS Reject - 5.05% improvement
Another five teams have already had a 4.0% or higher imrovement in the ranking system.
Now, we all know that past performance is no indicator of future results, but this is looking good for Netflix, and for the top teams in the competition. Netflix could end up paying out $1m to a team for innovation that could put them heads and tails above any competitor. For the teams, who are probably working on this because it interests them and it's a good challenge, they could end up $1m richer, and with a great item on their resume.
Posted by PJ at 08:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackNovember 17, 2006
I got quoted!
Not all good news, though: he did use my full first name.
Posted by PJ at 11:22 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackOctober 29, 2006
Putting The Future On The Line
Companies often base their future on one piece of new technology, new division, or new strategic direction. When things go well, they go down in history as a success. When things go bad, they simply become history.
Airbus is trying to figure out which of those two is happening to them right now.
While I generally hate to quote from Wikipedia, they have a good summation of the delivery problems plaguing Airbus over their new, $300m A380 aircraft right now:
Airbus announced the first delay in June 2005 and notified airlines that delivery would slip by six months, with Singapore Airlines receiving the first A380 in the last quarter of 2006, Qantas getting its first delivery in April 2007 and Emirates receiving aircraft before 2008. This reduced the number of planned deliveries by the end of 2009 from about 120 to 90-100.
On June 13, 2006 Airbus announced a second delay, with the delivery schedule undergoing an additional shift of six to seven months. Although the first delivery was still slated before the end of 2006, deliveries in 2007 would drop to only 9 aircraft, and deliveries by the end of 2009 would be cut to 70-80 aircraft. The announcement caused a 26% drop in the share price of Airbus's parent, EADS, and led to the departure of EADS CEO Noël Forgeard, Airbus CEO Gustav Humbert, and A380 program manager Charles Champion. In the wake of the new delay, Malaysia Airlines and ILFC were reported to be investigating the cancellation of their orders. Launch customers Singapore Airlines, Emirates and Qantas also were reported to be angered by the delays and expecting compensation. However, on July 21, 2006 Singapore Airlines ordered a further 9 A380s and stated that Airbus had "demonstrated to our satisfaction that the engineering design for the A380 is sound [and that] it has performed well in flight and certification tests and the delays in its delivery have been caused more by production, rather than technical, issues."
On October 3, 2006, upon completion of a review of the A380 program, the new CEO of Airbus, Christian Streiff, announced a third delay. The largest delay yet, it pushed the first delivery for Singapore Airlines to October 2007, to be followed by 13 deliveries in 2008, 25 in 2009, and the full production rate of 45 aircraft per year in 2010. The delay also increased the earnings shortfall projected by Airbus through 2010 to € 4.8 billion. The customer with the largest A380 order, Emirates, saw its first delivery pushed back to August 2008 and said as a result that it was considering scaling back its order, potentially in favour of the rival Boeing 747-8. Virgin Atlantic deferred its deliveries by four years, to 2013. Initial deliveries for the A380 freighter were delayed into 2010.
So, in practical terms, what does this mean for Airbus? Earlier this week, Virgin Atlantic, one of the initial buyers of the A380, decided to defer their purchase for four years.
Virgin Atlantic has said that they are deferring their order for the new Airbus A380 by four years. The company had ordered six of the new superjumbos for delivery in 2009 but they now want them delivered by 2013.
A380 plane has been a problem for Airbus as it has already suffered too many delays. Market had been speculating that Virgin would ditch the plane altogether but they have responded by stating that they still are confident about this plane.
Virgin added that they now want the company to prove the worth of this craft in commercial service and they would wait for a couple of years before putting its own A380s into operation. The company had originally wanted the deliveries of the plane in the current year itself.
Airbus is now aiming to deliver the first of the units to Singapore Airlines in October 2007.
Speculation had arisen that Virgin would pull their purchase order completely, but it seems as thought they’re willing to go into a “wait and see” period for the time being. With a development cost of over $11 billion, Airbus will be eager to sell aircraft and start getting a return on their investment. A delay on delivery, combined with debt from the cost of delivery, could allow competitors Boeing (passenger aircraft) and Antonov (cargo aircraft) to try and maneuver around Airbus, and chisel away at their market.
Only time will tell if the A380 will put Airbus in the history books as an amazing success, or an amazing failure.
Posted by PJ at 10:27 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackOctober 04, 2006
Does Innovation Drive Profitable Growth?
(Cross-posted from HedgeStop.com)
An interesting study from Accenture on innovation, asking if effective innovation really drives profitable growth:
Does effective innovation drive profitable growth? The link is hard to prove, but the evidence is mounting. Let's define innovation as the implementation of new ideas in an attempt to create value. Innovation can be narrowly focused—for example, on the creation of appealing new products or services—or it can tackle the big picture, as in the crafting of effective new business models.
Over the past decade, research in different industries has shown that effective innovation—at least to the extent it can be measured—is correlated with better total returns to shareholders and thus to high performance; similarly, Accenture's research into the components of high-performance business confirms that innovation is critical to an organization's ability to continually renew itself. Consider the following:
1. Spending on research and development, which is not the same as innovation, but is measurable, returns 25 to 30 percent.
2. Companies that own widely cited patents and that are quick to commercialize those patents outperform stock market averages by 1000 percent over 10 years. In seven industries that generate large numbers of patents, a patent cited 14 times by other patents is worth 100 times more, on average, than a patent cited only 8 times.
3. Each new product introduction announced in the Wall Street Journal between 1975 and 1984 resulted in an average return to shareholders of $115.7 million beyond the industry norm (in 2004 dollars).
Executives find these tidbits of research provocative, but not terribly useful. To see whether their own innovations are translating into corporate success, executives need measures they can trust and track.
The executive summary can be found here. The full report can be found here. Information on the author, Dr. Jane Linder, can be found here.
Posted by PJ at 11:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 28, 2006
Small Innovations
(Cross-Posted from HedgeStop.com)
Innovation doesn’t have to be huge, it doesn’t have to revolutionize an industry, or change the strategic direction of a company. Sometimes the most striking innovation can be a small thing that simply shifts the traditional thinking.
Here’s an example:
An article in the New York Times earlier this week, "Behind the Wheel: 2007 Porsche 911 Turbo: Kinetic Art That Really Moves You," reviewed the new Porsche 911 Turbo:
(For those of you wondering: at $124,000 base, I’m a few dollars short.)
The review was a normal car review, until the author, Ted West, wrote the following:
"Central to harnessing the Turbo’s explosive thrust is all-wheel drive, and that was never truer than with this new model. With all four wheels driving, the Turbo’s 3,572-pound curb weight (with the Tiptronic S five-speed automatic, or 3,495 pounds with a six-speed manual) zaps to 60 m.p.h. in 3.4 seconds. [...] Startlingly, the automatic is quicker than the manual, which reaches 60 in a turtle-ish 3.7 seconds."
Most of you probably aren’t car nuts, (I’m not either, but the automatic/manual debate is a running argument in my family), so here’s The Big Deal: Automatic transmissions have never been faster than manual transmissions, and it’s one of the main reasons auto enthusiasts are usually huge proponents of manual over automatic.
It’s a small component of a large product, but the innovation is apparent, and likely shifts the way cars will be manufactured for the rest of time.
What other "small innovations" can you think of?
Posted by PJ at 12:33 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 20, 2006
Shooting The Moon
(Cross-Posted from HedgeSpot.com)
Orteig got us across the Atlantic, and created the airline business in the process. The X PRIZE got us into space, and Richard Branson is looking to keep us there. What's next?
Governments are using this type of open source innovation, too. It's a way to save money, advance science, and help the general welfare of the people. NASA is getting on the bandwagon now with Centennial Challenges. They are paying out between $50K and $250K for each innovation. "Centennial Challenges is NASA's program of prize contests to stimulate innovation and competition in solar system exploration and ongoing NASA mission areas. By making awards based on actual achievements, instead of proposals, Centennial Challenges seeks novel solutions to NASA's mission challenges from non-traditional sources of innovation in academia, industry and the public."
(Don't laugh. These are the people who brought us Tang, Velcro, and astronaut ice cream.)
So what's NASA looking to do?
Astronaut Glove Challenge
The Astronaut Glove Challenge is designed to promote the development of glove joint technology, resulting in a highly dexterous and flexible glove that can be used by astronauts over long periods of time for space or planetary surface excursions.
Beam Power Challenge
The Beam Power Challenge is designed to promote the development of new power distribution technologies. These technologies can be applied to many aspects of space exploration, including surface- or space-based point-to-point power transmission or delivery for robotic and/or human expeditions to planetary surfaces. This challenge may also support the development of far-term space infrastructure concepts such as space elevators and solar power satellites.
Lunar Lander Challenge
The Lunar Lander Challenge is designed to accelerate technology developments supporting the commercial creation of a vehicle capable of ferrying cargo or humans back and forth between lunar orbit and the lunar surface. Such a vehicle would have direct application to NASA’s space exploration goals as well as the personal spaceflight industry. Additionally, the prize will help industry build new vehicles and develop the operational capacity to operate quick turnaround vertical take-off, vertical landing vehicles, which will be of significant use to many facets of the commercial launch procurement market.
MoonRox Challenge
The MoonROx Challenge is designed to promote the development of processes to extract oxygen from lunar regolith on the scale of a pilot plant. These processes have the potential to contribute significantly to the Vision for Space Exploration and space exploration operations.
Personal Air Vehicle Challenge
The Personal Air Vehicle (PAV) Challenge is intended to promote the popular use of self-operated, personal aircraft for fast, safe, efficient, affordable, environmentally-friendly, and comfortable on-demand transportation as a future solution to America's mobility needs.
Planetary UAV Challenge
The Planetary Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Challenge is designed to promote the development of fully autonomous Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) capable of conducting scientific expeditions on other planets and moons within our solar system. In addition to the application of this technology to space science, there are secondary applications to Earth science, homeland security, and humanitarian and commercial endeavors.
Regolith Excavation Challenge
The Regolith Excavation Challenge promotes the development of new technologies to excavate lunar regolith. Excavation is a necessary first step towards lunar resource utilization, and the unique physical properties of lunar regolith make excavation a difficult technical challenge. Advances in lunar regolith extraction have the potential to contribute significantly to the nation's space exploration operations.
Telerobotic Construction Challenge
The Telerobotic Construction Challenge is designed to advance the development of robotic technologies for construction and assembly. NASA hopes to use these robotic technologies to efficiently build structures on the Moon or other remote destinations for astronauts to live or work in them.
Tether Challenge
The purpose of the Tether Challenge is to develop very strong tether material for use in various structural applications. The competition requires a 50% improvement in breaking force from year to year, starting with a commercially available tether in 2005. Additional requirements (such as operating temperature range, vacuum compatibility, and controlled electrical conductivity) will be added in future years.
Private individuals are creating this technology. The government is paying for it. But people like you are the ones who will figure out how to profit from it. So what do you say, young industrialists: How will people find ways to make a profit from these innovations?
Posted by PJ at 09:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 19, 2006
From Lindbergh to X
(Cross-Posted from HedgeStop.com)
In the last post, we looked at open source innovation efforts that companies are using to advance themselves: Offering money to people who can innovate to solve YOUR problem. Today, we’re going to look at how people are supporting innovation to advance mankind: Offering money to people who can innovate to solve EVERYONES problem.
In 1919, a gentleman named Raymond Orteig offered a prize of $25,000 to the first person who could fly an airplane non-stop between New York and Paris. Sounds easy, right? Today, we just hop on Expedia, book a ticket, and cross the pond in about seven hours. But early in the 20th century, it wasn’t that easy. The Wright Brothers had left the earth 16 years earlier, but flight had been limited to short flights, and certainly not across the Atlantic or Pacific oceans.
Orteig thought it was time for that to change.
You know how this ends: In 1927, eight years after Orteig offered his reward, Charles Lindbergh climbed into the cockpit of the Spirit of St. Lewis and flew solo for 30 hours. But he wasn’t the first to try—Hubert Julian, Rene Fonck, Charles Nungesser, Francois Coli and others tried and failed. Nine teams in total spent around $400,000 to try and win a prize that was 1/16th of that amount. Hardly cost effective.
But Lindbergh succeeded. He promptly became a national hero. Air flight took off. The value of aviation companies skyrocketed. And on 16 June 1927, Lindbergh collected the $25,000 prize personally from Orteig:
Seventy years later, in May 1996, Peter Diamandis created the X PRIZE for the first group that could launch a ship into space (62+ miles up), and then repeat it within two weeks. The prize eventually grew to $10 million. Just like with Orteig, it took eight years before someone claimed it. But, in October 2004, Mojave Aerospace Ventures flew SpaceShipOne for the second time in two weeks, winning the award.
The comparisons to the Orteig Prize don’t end there. The cost to build and fly SpaceShipOne? Estimated at about $30 million, three times larger than the prize. Again, hardly cost effective. But like the Spirit of St. Louis, SpaceShipOne might be standing at the doorstep of a new industry. Richard Branson and Virgin Galactic will be offering space flights based off of the SpaceShipOne model as early as 2008.
A closing thought: Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic Ocean in 1927. That year, applications for pilots licenses in the US increased 300%. The number of licensed aircrafts in the US increased 400%. And airline passengers went from 5,782 in 1926 to 173,405 in 1929.
When we look back on SpaceShipOne in two decades, what numbers will we be quoting? Will we be amazed that “back in 2006,” getting into orbit wasn’t as easy and common an occurrence as crossing the Atlantic is today?
I think we will.
Posted by PJ at 02:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 11, 2006
10,000 Heads Are Better Than One
(Cross-Posted From HedgeStop.com)
Chris Reidy, a writer for the Boston Globe, ran an interesting piece this week called "10,000 Heads are Better Than One," talking about InnoCentive, “an exciting web-based community matching top scientists to relevant R&D challenges facing leading companies from around the globe. [Providing] a powerful online forum enabling major companies to reward scientific innovation through financial incentives.”
InnoCentive, in non-PR speak, allows companies to post innovation problems that they are facing, along with a reward for the solution. The postings, which are anonymous to prevent competitors from linking specific innovation work to specific companies, are then read by a community of scientists, engineers, and others. If an individual thinks they have a solution, they can submit it for the prize.
As Mr. Reidy illustrates in his article, it saves the company R&D times and cost, and can be very financially rewarding for those individuals who participate:
This posting caught Ed Melcarek's eye during one of his regular visits to InnoCentive.com, a Web site that offers bounties of up to $100,000 for solving scientific problems: Devise a more efficient way for getting toothpaste ingredients into a tube.
The Canadian engineer sent an e-mail that suggested putting a positive charge on fluoride powder and then grounding the tube. Colgate-Palmolive Co., the InnoCentive client that had posted the problem, liked the idea, and he earned $25,000 for a few hours of work.
"It's a beautiful way of doing business," he said.
It's also one of the latest innovations in research and development.
The world is full of experts, and a company will always be limited in the number of people they can employ. With services like InnoCentive, and their competitors yet2.com and Nine Sigma, Inc., companies can tap into a network of experts without the initial financial outlay that comes from hiring and training full time employees.
This open source innovation can save companies millions of dollars in innovation costs, not to mention the profit to be made by the end product.
As Mr. Reidy illustrates again, the “experts” aren’t always who you would assume. Many people who have a career in one area have an expertise in a completely different arena, either through formal education, past careers, or just a deep level of interest:
Another solver identified by InnoCentive was David Bradin, a North Carolina patent attorney with a master's degree in organic chemistry. In 2002, he spotted a challenge seeking a more cost-efficient way to mass-produce a certain acid. Based on a reaction he had observed as an organic chemist, Bradin thought he knew the answer. A few months later, InnoCentive told him his e-mail solution had been accepted.
"It was the easiest $4,000 I ever made," he said.
Bradin never learned the identity of the company.
A Procter & Gamble Co. executive described how a North Carolina patent attorney solved one of the company's challenges.
"He's a lawyer by day and a chemist by night," P&G's Larry Huston said. "He did chemistry while his wife read romance novels."
I think his hobby wins.
Posted by PJ at 10:11 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackJuly 19, 2006
Happy Birthday, Album Chart!
50 albums that changed music: Fifty years old this month, the album chart has tracked the history of pop. But only a select few records have actually altered the course of music. To mark the anniversary, Kitty Empire pays tribute to a sublime art form, and our panel of critics argues for 50 albums that caused a revolution...
A longside film, the pop album was the defining art form of the 20th century, the soundtrack to vast technological and social change. Once, sets of one-sided 78rpm phonograph discs were kept together in big books, like photographs in an album. The term 'album' was first used specifically in 1909, when Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite was released on four double-sided discs in one package. The first official top 10 round-up of these newfangled musical delivery-modes was issued in Britain on 28 July 1956, making the pop album chart 50 years old this month.
Singles were immediate, ephemeral things. Albums made pondering pop and rock into a valid intellectual pursuit. Friendships were founded, love could blossom, bands could be formed, all from flicking through someone's album collection. Owning certain albums became like shorthand; a manifesto for everything you stood for, and against: the Smiths' Meat is Murder , Public Enemy's It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.
Before lasers replaced needles, albums had sides. They were a game of two halves, building towards an intermission; more than the sum of their constituent songs. At least, the good ones were. Some of them still are, except they can now last 70-plus minutes, over twice as long as their vinyl forebears. Is this bloat, or value for money? The debate rumbles on.
The list itself can be found here.
I was quite happy to see that Blue Lines by Massive Attack made the list. I've long said that the album, and specifically Unfinished Symphony, was one of the best pieces of music every made.
37 Massive Attack - Blue Lines (1991)
Obliterators of rap's boundaries, Massive Attack pioneered the cinematic trip hop movement. After graduating from one of Britain's premier sound systems, the Bristol-based Wild Bunch, Andrew 'Mushroom' Vowles and Grant 'Daddy G' Marshall joined forces with graffiti artist 3D. Massive Attack's debut LP spawned the unforgettable 'Unfinished Sympathy' and remains a modern classic.
Without this ... no Roots Manuva, no Dizzee. In fact, there would be no British urban music scene to speak of.
It's interesting to see how one innovation in music impacted others, and the Guardian was wise to note that. It's one thing to say "hey, that was a great song/album" but it's something else completely to say "this was so influential that it caused this, this, and this."
Posted by PJ at 01:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackMay 18, 2006
Fantastic Voyage(r)
Still, the idea that you would stumble onto creating the largest cruise ship in history by accident almost defies belief -- it certainly defies modern corporate mythmaking, not to mention reasonable business practices. But there you have it: Royal Caribbean says that while everyone was busy trying to make Voyager a great vacation spot, building the ship got a little out of hand -- a case study in strategic innovation, tactical improvisation, and relentless execution.Posted by PJ at 07:25 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 15, 2006
Finding Topics at the New York Times
Where do the ideas for stories in The New York Times originate?
Beyond the breaking news about events of the day, of which there is generally a lot in The Times, most articles are hatched from an idea. While I'm still fascinated after 40 years of newspapering by where the ideas originate for these enterprise stories, there are two aspects of the process in which readers have a serious stake.Posted by PJ at 01:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The complaints of some disgruntled readers imply that the process is to blame when they think an article shouldn't have run or view its concept as inherently biased. They often suspect that the process was contaminated by the influence of some powerful special interest or the political leanings of a top editor.
Then there are all the readers who expect added value in The Times. It's the ability of reporters and editors to come up with ideas for enterprise articles that determines in large measure how much added value The Times delivers to readers — by anticipating future developments, providing insights into complicated situations or entertaining, among other things.
April 13, 2006
The Cost of Failing to Innovate
An excellent piece from Passport, the Foreign Policy magazine blog, about the American auto industry: "American Auto Industry: 'Healthy As It Has Ever Been'":
In fact, as of this month, Japan now builds more cars in North America than General Motors. And they build an average new car in 18 hours, compared to GM's 20. Don't they hire the same workers as GM and Ford? (and pay nearly the same wage?) Why aren't Honda and Toyota laying off tens of thousands of employees?
The answer is simple. US companies spent the 1990s trying to recover from a legacy of producing poor quality automobiles, and they let innovation fall by the wayside. And on top of that, quality is still job #2. It's no wonder there isn't a single American car among Consumer Reports' top 10.
The shortsightedness is staggering. It wasn't until a few months ago that GM dropped its boneheaded moratorium on developing hybrid cars, a segment expected to "outpace sales of sport utility vehicles, pickups and luxury models" in the next five years. We just finished a period with historically low interest rates, when U.S. cars should have been selling themselves! And we're having to lay everyone off.
It also contains a wonderful quote from this Business Week article:
"The domestic auto industry is as healthy as it has ever been," says Eric Noble, president of Car Lab, an industry consulting firm in Santa Ana, Calif. "The names on the plants are just changing."Posted by PJ at 08:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 31, 2006
Wrong Assumptions and Best Learning
"Everybody talks about their successes, but the failures, the mistakes, are the most interesting things. Our wrong assumptions lead to the best learning." -- Alex Lee, President, OXO
That learning has made OXO, founded in 1990 and now owned by Helen of Troy Limited, one of the most respected design shops around. Thirty of its products are part of the permanent collection at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York. "By bringing design back to the basics--efficient and comfortable performance--they've elevated it," says exhibitions curator Matilda McQuaid. The payoff from that elevated design: OXO has been profitable since its first year; revenue has increased steadily, at a compound annual growth rate of more than 30% since 1991, to more than $100 million in 2004. Here are a few of the company's most memorable missteps--behind-the-scenes stumbles that ultimately led to smarter, more-intuitive products.
Great Fast Company article here.
Posted by PJ at 08:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackMarch 28, 2006
Eric Mankin on The 2006/2007 Video Game Wars
Eric Mankin of the Innovation and Corporate Entrepreneurship Research Center at Babson College sent out his weekly ICE Update newsletter yesterday, and it's a great one. I've posted it below. If you're not currently a subscriber to the newsletter, you can sign up by sending him an email.
Game Wars 2006 (and 7)Posted by PJ at 05:48 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
27 March 06
The major videogame battles coming up in 2006 and 2007 will be in consoles, the computer-like boxes that plug into your TV set. While Sony and Microsoft pursue a highly publicized product development strategy focused on massive computing power and multi-functionality, Nintendo’s approach is based on new kinds of game play.
My prediction: Nintendo will be the surprise winner in the battle between Microsoft and Sony.
Game Console Wars 2006 – three companies, two strategies
This battle has not yet begun. Both Sony and Microsoft have experienced significant start-up problems, so none of the systems are currently available at retail.
The Xbox 360’s scarcity
The Xbox 360 launched on November 22nd, 2005. Microsoft spent about $100 million promoting the product, to good effect -- PR firm Schneider & Associates found in its annual survey of most memorable product launches that the Xbox 360 was one of the top two most memorable launches of 2005.
Unfortunately, Microsoft hasn’t been able to produce enough consoles to meet the demand.
"[Microsoft] created demand for 5 million [units] and they delivered 607,000..." Michael Pachter, an analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities, in The New York Times, Feb. 06
Production of the Xbox 360 has been slowed by persistent component shortages. Microsoft won’t specify which components are causing the problem -- the device has more than 1700 components supplied by over 200 manufacturers.
As a result, the product is currently unavailable at retail. If you want to buy one, you can pay 20-40% above list price on eBay.
Sony delays the launch of Playstation 3
On 15 March, Sony announced that it was delaying the launch of its competing game console, the Playstation 3, by about six months, from April to November. Ken Kutaragi, the head of Sony’s Game Division, said the delays were caused by problems in developing copyright protection technology for Sony’s new Blu-ray DVD format.
Like the Xbox 360, the Playstation 3 will be packed with technology. A Blu-ray DVD player will be included, as will a 60 gigabyte hard drive, wireless connectivity to other Sony devices, and a camera. The Cell processing chip at the core of the console, jointly developed with IBM and Toshiba, is capable of processing at speeds more than twenty times faster than its predecessor.
A “Red-Ocean” battle of the giants
Sony and Microsoft are pursuing similar strategies in their new consoles. As Reggie Fils-Aime, Exec VP of Sales and Marketing for Nintendo, noted in February:
"Microsoft is ... trying to get you to put a PC in your living room because they are fundamentally a PC software company. Sony is trying to get you to put an entertainment hub that has Blu-ray technology because that’s important to their movie business and the rest of their entire electronics business." Reggie Fils Aime, Interviewed by Peter Rojas, Engadget.com, 20 Feb 06
Both companies are pursuing “Trojan horse” strategies – they sell their consoles at a loss with the hope of making profits by selling additional products and services that use these consoles over the next several years.
The Industry’s Stalled Growth
In the meantime, growth in videogame consoles has stalled. US revenue in the industry overall grew about six percent from 2004 to 2005, due to strong growth in handhelds, like the Nintendo DS. But sales of videogame consoles declined by 12 percent, according to market researcher NPD.
And sales of videogame software for those consoles declined as well, by six percent. Electronic Arts, the market leader in videogame publishing, has warned that its sales will fall below expectations in 2006. At the end of January, the company laid off about 5 percent of its workforce.
Many analysts expect this kind of slow performance in a “transition period” between game systems. Consumers are reluctant to buy new games or hardware when a new generation console is on the horizon.
Nintendo’s management sees the problem as a more profound one -- the videogame industry has not expanded beyond its core market of boys and young men.
“This industry can no longer rely simply on more and more young men coming of age to try gaming, and being in the … “ten to twenty year old” demographic. The fact is that that demographic is shrinking and the next cohort, their younger brothers, is even smaller.” Reggie Fils-Aime, Feb 06
Nintendo’s Revolution
Nintendo’s new Revolution game system will probably launch in June 2006. The company acknowledges that it will not be as technology-laden as either Microsoft’s or Sony’s offerings. While Sony and Microsoft consoles are designed to be multi-functional entertainment hubs, Nintendo’s Revolution will focus on game play, with a newly designed wireless controller that contains motion sensors.
Nintendo hopes that the Revolution will enable it to expand the appeal of its videogames to new customers who currently don’t own any system at all.
The console wars of 2006 will offer two competing strategies across three companies. But these battles haven’t started yet -- both Microsoft and Sony must first overcome the technical and logistical problems that are plaguing their sophisticated systems.
More Information:
1. The New York Times story on videogame sales lagging was from 6 Feb 06.
2. The Business Week article on Sony’s delay of its PS 3 system ran on 16 March 06.
3. The interview with Reggie Fils-Aime was posted on 20 Feb 06 and comes from the engadget blog.
4. I wrote about Microsofts’ Xbox 360 in an ICE Update from May 05.
5. I also did an Update in Sept 04 on the previous round of game wars, between the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP.
6. The April 2006 issue of Wired Magazine, edited by Sims creator Will Wright, is devoted to an aesthetic appreciation of video games.
March 23, 2006
The House That Edison Built
"At General Electric's Global Research Center, America's favorite blue chip is teaching inventors to think like businessmen--and businessmen to think like mad scientists"
Best Life magazine profiles the GRC in "Welcome To The Magic Factory," a fantastic article available here.
Posted by PJ at 08:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackMarch 17, 2006
Project Origami
KUOW, Seattle's public radio station, has done a fantastic piece on Microsoft's Project Origami. The interview, with Todd Bishop of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Brier Dudley of the Seattle Times, can be downloaded here.
For weeks, the internet buzzed with news, rumor, and speculation about something from Microsoft called Project Origami. While people were confident that it was not a paper folding program, no one knew quite what it would be. Now that it's been revealed, some folks are still not sure what it means. The product is a new category of computer called the Ultra Mobile PC, a sort of hybrid of laptop, PDA, and iPod. Will it change the way we use technology or will it be a gadget without a home? We'll unfold Origami with the reporters who cover Microsoft for the Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer.Posted by PJ at 08:37 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 08, 2006
Internet Marketing At Its Best
Musicians looking for a break are increasingly turning away from conventional forms of promotion and toward the more populist venue of the Internet. MP3 blogs, Web-based music magazines, and online record stores all offer small-time bands a chance to reach a wider audience.
Here's the timeline of how one group, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! (aka, Alec Ounsworth, Lee Sargent, Robbie Guertin, Tyler Sargent, and Sean Greenhalgh) got noticed:
June 9: Dan Bierne writes about the band on his MP3 blog.
June 14: Pitchfork Media posts a review of the song "In This Home On Ice."
June 15: Blogger Gothamist posts an interview with the band.
June 20: Blogger Stereogum announces the band's show at the Knitting Factory.
June 21: Gothamist reports that David Bowie was in the audience at the Knitting Factory show.
June 22: Pitchfork posts one of a slew of reviews of Clap's first album.
Now? They're being named to "Best Of" lists left and right, they played Letterman at the end of last week, and their CD has jumped into the Top 100 sales list at CDNow.
February 06, 2006
Rinse and Repeat
Lego isn't alone in looking to their customers for innovation. "Lush Cosmetics is a fast-growing $100 million brand, thanks to founder Mark Constantine's contrary product-development philosophy: Innovate like mad, then start over again."
To keep fresh innovations pouring in, Lush often turns to its customers for input. At its Web site, Lushies swarm the company's forums by the thousands to chat online with Constantine and his staff. They flirt with him, insult him, and debate him -- yes, about soap. (Long, curse-laden posts about shampoo are not uncommon.) Last year, Lush picked a group of forum members to actually help manufacture products. It flew them in, put them up in a B&B, took them out for dinner -- the works.Posted by PJ at 08:31 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 04, 2006
Outsourced Innovation at LEGO
Great WIRED article on oursourced innovation at LEGO here.
But the boldest part of the Mindstorms overhaul is Lego's decision to outsource its innovation to a panel of citizen developers. Relying on the MUP is a gamble that Lego hopes will lead not only to a better product but also to a tighter, more trusting bond between corporation and customer.Posted by PJ at 10:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
