5 common "lean" misconceptions

Eric Ries wrote "The Lean Start-up", a book that has hugely inspired people from all sorts of industries and backgrounds. His Lean Start-up methodology is pretty much world famous by now. "Do one important thing: make better, faster business decisions. Vastly better, faster business decisions. Bringing principles from lean manufacturing and agile development to the process of innovation, the Lean Start-up helps companies succeed in a business landscape riddled with risk." (Eric Ries)

There are however a lot of things that get misunderstood, so I decided to list here the top 5 that I encounter most commonly (not necessarily at work, but also with friends).

1. "Lean" means "cheap"

Lean is about reducing waste and being super efficient, it has nothing to do with your budget. If you have $50 to invest in your new product, then it might not be enough depending on what the problem is that you're trying to solve. Then again $500,000 might not be enough either! This is far more about learning quickly what works and what fails. If you hire a cheaper, inexperienced team to build your MVP, it will cost you more later down the road. It might be cheaper in the long run to hire in a very experienced, much more expensive team to do the work. You're more likely to get something you can test much faster with them, plus it'll be high quality and this is important.

2. Lean is only for software start-ups

You can apply this methodology to any industry and any size of company. The bigger your company is and the more history it has, the more you are going to have to think about change management of course. People love a fresh idea and usually get very excited about thinking about a new way of working. What tends to happen is when the reality of it sets in, there can be resistance. This is only natural, change is described as the root of all human suffering after all. Don't underestimate the change that your organisation may have to go through. Factor that in early and use lean to figure out a way to proceed.

3. Minimum viable product (MVP) is quick and dirty

It is simply a product with the minimum features required for it to function as intended. It needs to provide enough value to users/customers, and your code needs to be good enough to maintain and build upon. Otherwise you are setting yourself up for problems and high costs later on (i.e. you'll need to rebuild the entire codebase.) You are not going to be able to test hypothesis in a timely manner if it takes 2 weeks to make a change. This will slow down the whole process and before you know it you'll be in an unhappy place. You are still going to need to think about branding, SEO, communications and all that stuff too, or whatever is applicable to your solution. It is not a case of "build something crappy and they will come". Think high-quality and high-discipline, but only on the minimum features required for you need to test your idea out. There's a whole bunch of stuff that will still need to get done that has nothing to do with features too.

4. "Customer Development" is just feedback

If you are going to use Lean, then you need to get on top of proper user testing methodologies, and apply them effectively. You can't invite 3 people in every week and just ask them what they think. You have to test by seeing how they interact with the solution. You will also need verbal and emotive feedback. There are a lot of ways to do this well. Throwing down some poorly thought through questions in an email and calling it a survey is not going to fly. The point here is not always to validate your hypothesis, but also to find out what you don't know. A user interview is not a chat. You need to plan and prepare for this so that you can rely on the information that you are getting out of it.  A focus group is not usually the most effective way of getting information. Get users in regularly to work with the team on what a good solution looks like from the beginning, and vary the types of users you invite. See extreme users as well as those who fall in the middle and those who don't see the point in your invention. Don't spend all your time talking, get them to draw, prototype, role play the solution and watch and listen attentively. If you have never done this, either step onto that learning curve or hire someone in who knows how to do this.

N.B: It's also not just about what the user wants, but also about what's viable financially for you, and what's feasible technically too.

5. "pivot" means throw the baby out with the bathwater

You need to validate your idea properly and accurately. You should do everything you can to check your assumptions, and if they prove to be wrong, you need to drop the bits that are not working…not the whole thing. If you decide to abandon the entire project and start an entirely different one…that's not a pivot. It may be exactly what you need to do, but it's  new start. An important bi-product of lean efforts is learnings. Make sure that you use your new knowledge effectively, this is valuable stuff. Ensure that your analytics are set up properly before using them to make business decisions, and ensure that you are not misunderstanding what they are showing you. As a rule of thumb, I think that you should always make business decisions based on at least 2 different sources of data (e.g. your web analytics and also real user testing).

6. Bonus number 6: "Just start and we'll figure it out later"

A lot of people are eager to jump in and start laying down code or drawing up  solution straight away. In some cases there's nothing wrong with this (in fact in one case it was the only right thing to do), but for most of those I have witnessed, it was not the right thing to do at all. You need to make sure that you understand the problem space as much as possible before investing further. Resist coming up with solutions until you have thoroughly understood the entire problem. This is going to either save you time and effort, lead to an even better idea, or/and save you a lot of unnecessary expenditure.

What you are trying to understand is whether the problem is worth fixing or not. It takes as much time to solve a bad problem as it does a good one. Don't waste your time.

Ways to keep your smart team innovative

  Is this you?

I've seen teams start out by making big long lists of tasks and deliverables at the beginning of a project. This assumes that they know exactly what the product is going to end up being. I think that this kind of way of thinking goes entirely against a culture of creativity and innovation, and of the Agile philosophy. By deciding on all of the tasks up-front and by setting up an infrastructure for the team to work in (process, tools, tracking, tickets...), we actually restrict the potential for innovation.

What it takes to innovate:

Innovation requires serendipity and creativity. If we impose a tonne of rules and processes, we throttle both. Before deciding on what the product is and how to get there, you should start with a creative brief and well thought out elevator pitch, that allow the team to think for themselves, and have focus without being dictated to. If you have a team of very smart people, they will most likely feel disengaged if you give them requirements and impose goals and a path to follow. Each of them come with a wealth of expertise and experience that should be allowed to flow through the product, fully. To do this effectively and to set yourself up for the highest likelihood of immense success, you need to get comfortable with the gaping voids that inevitably exist in projects, and in fact allow them to be much positively palpable. When you set up processes and tools, you are filling up the void, masking it with man-made certainty that doesn't really exist. If you are after a cog for your machine, then this will work fine, but if you are after a whole new dream machine, then this won't do. Drop the rituals and face the discomfort of the unknown square in the face. If you are feeling uncomfortable and so is your team, then you are in a good place. If chaos ensues...then this is extremely good news.

The voids on a project are like unchartered territory, which can lead to great discoveries. There were those that thought that the earth was flat and there were those that wanted to check. The latter were forced to innovate simply to make the trip possible. They had a starting point and went from there. This is often how the most inspiring projects are started. Even the most mundane projects can be fertile ground for innovation if you allow for the circumstances to be exist.

A quick checklist:

• Make sure your team has mastery around the work you are planning to do (everyone)
• Only set up enough structure around the team to allow them to gain focus and begin to be productive
• Don't use Agile tools and methods to minimise uncertainty and discomfort
• Trust your smart team to be in charge and self-organise
• Give a creative brief to provide focus
• Impose frequent playtime on the team and make sure they stay fit, rested and healthy
• Be clear about constraints (budget, time, resources...) - constraints are conductive to innovation
• Be prepared to be surprised and to bend your mind into different shapes
• Don't get attached to your idea of the product - the team is going to shape that
• Remember, there is no such thing as an end-product - there is never an end.
• Be brave

Stick these up to keep you clear:

"When all think alike, then no one is thinking." — Walter Lippman

"It's easy to come up with new ideas; the hard part is letting go of what worked for you two years ago, but will soon be out of date." — Roger von Oech

"The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas." — Dr. Linus Pauling

"We shall not cease from exploration, and at the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." — T. S. Eliot

"The essential part of creativity is not being afraid to fail." — Edwin H. Land

"The achievement of excellence can only occur if the organization promotes a culture of creative dissatisfaction." — Lawrence Miller

"Every act of creation is first of all an act of destruction." — Picasso

"Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats." — Howard Aiken

"Creativity is thinking up new things. Innovation is doing new things." — Theodore Levitt

Happy doing...

Creative briefs for developers

photo credit: erix!

If you want your development team to be autonomous, rapid and creative, then you need to ensure that they have the room to move so that can occur. Often teams are given a very tight brief, which leads to the group of smart people you hired taking time to convince you on an alternative solution, or actually just not being in a mindset which drives innovation and excellence. You'll get good functional software for sure, but getting what you asked for isn't always a blessing. If you want the best solution for the problem that you are hiring them for, don't go into solution mode just yet. Articulate your problem to them in a creative brief, which will allow you to inspire the team, and get the most form them.

What Steve Jobs did very well:

Luke Williams  (in his book Disrupt) tells the story of when Steve Jobs came to Frog design to brief them on the work he wanted them to do on the (then called) personal computer. They were expecting a fat document full of restrictions and "must's" and "must not's". But Steve came empty handed and instead asked the team to "Give me Bob Dylan songs". Steve Job's genius was really in how he briefed teams. Giving enough context that they are on the right path, but expressing his need in a way that the teams could get a good sense of where his head was at with the work at hand.

Give a creative brief to the whole team, not just the designers:

Brilliant developers should be briefed in the very same way. I say "brilliant" because they are the ones that really benefit from creative briefs. If they are amazing technically, and that they positively become the code when they work, then you should trust these people to know what to do. If you don't have those kinds of people, you might be asking for trouble by leaving the brief open like that.

Really great thinkers will appreciate your open brief and will do awesome work for you. They are so good technically that they can work fast and produce high quality work. This does not mean that they should be treated like "code monkeys" with a designer in the mix to ensure that something creative results from the effort. You put the designer in a tough place with a lot of responsibility for the innovative and "fun" parts, and leave a very talented group of innovators to just build and not think creatively. Put the creative brief to the whole team, and you will get good results.

Pitch your idea to yourself first:

The creative brief forces you to listen to your idea yourself first. If you are struggling to write it out in a succinct and simple way, then you likely have more thinking to do before briefing a team to work on it. You can get help with this, there are a whole load of methods designed to get this out of you. Check out the book Thinkertoys for more information on these. If you have written your brief out and it doesn't inspire you or leaves you flat, then you;re also not ready to brief the team. Go and think some more until it's clear to you what exactly you are looking for the team to do. They don't need instructions or a checklist, they need a brief. They probably know more about technicalities and design and how to incorporate the two than you do, or you wouldn't need to hire them. Give them your great idea, your vision, or even your gut feeling.

The Brief:

You should put a brief together that you are comfortable with but it should be:

- Creative: resulting from originality of thought - Brief: short

Call it an "Idea sheet" or a "What I want" sheet...whatever you want to call it, and then decide on the best way to communicate your vision to your team. There are thousands of examples of creative briefs on the Internet, so a good scour might be in order, but this is the one I have used recently:

1 - Name your idea: (one idea per brief)

2 - Elevator pitch: (describe your idea)

"The_________________ is a __________________ For_____________________ who need ______________, that allows _________________unlike_____________.

3 - End users: (Say more about who it's for)

4 - Why they should care: (What is going to make end user want this solution)

5 - Why this solution will answer their needs: (make sure you are succinct here)

6 - Draw your idea out: (You don't have to draw well, but you should be able to represent it simply either with stick people or a quick diagram)

Your brief should spark enthusiasm, excitement, loud conversations, passionate disagreements and wonderfully happy teams. You will also be very happy because you will probably have at least a few  unexpected twists and a really awesome product. The most important thing for you to do is to trust them. Once you've hired them, you feel comfortable enough to let them make decisions and mistakes too. Innovative products usually come from a place of great heart, chaos and a few counts of failure. Let it happen quickly and you'll have a better result than you ever imagined possible.

Are you really being innovative?

A lot of people talk about innovation, and a lot of people describe themselves as innovative. You probably know some too: "innovative problem solvers", "innovators", "innovation machines", "creative problem solvers", "Creative innovators"... but few people actually do innovate. What was your last innovative act? Was it an idea? If it was that's good, but realising that idea is just as important, and sometimes where your greatest chance at innovation lies. If all you have is a big list of ideas that never became reality...you're dreaming. Imagination is a really important part of innovation, so you are part of the way there, but innovation comes from making it happen. That's where it gets really interesting.

A few places to start:

Creativity is "the defeat of habit by originality". How often can you be original in your every day work? How often are you? Do you think you can be? Whether you fit kitchens or speak in court for a living, you can be innovative.

Here are a bunch of ways you can be invite innovation in:

- See the bigger picture; Step away, then step away some more...

- Flip the problems around to see different perspectives

- Stop colouring inside the lines

- Solve the problem rather than being right

- Deconstruct first, then construct

- Start with the desired effect/outcome (rather than the minimum requirements)

- Throw out the obvious

-  Rebel Intelligently against rules; those you set yourself and those imposed on you.

- Let go of what you know (and be ok with the uncertainty)

- Have vision, don't change things for the sake of change

- Hang a question mark on all of those things you take for granted

- Change lives, not companies, businesses, products or processes

- Have great ideas and execute them ; Get it done

- Challenge complacency around you and your own

- Demand innovation: "What if..."

- Disrupt habitual thought patterns

- Question why, when you do things the same way as last time

- Be curious and excited about challenges

- Try new things all the time

This will open your mind and your life in ways that you never imagined possible. It's easy to read this list, and easier to not attempt any of the things on it.

Treasure the limitations:

A lot of people talk about innovation in ways that seem elusive. It's almost as though you need to wait for the perfect alignment of the stars, the perfect team, the perfect conditions to be able to create something, or hatch an idea. Remember this quote when you start to think that way:

"Whom the gods wish to destroy, the give unlimited resources" (Twyla Tharp)

The more money you have in the bank, the more control you have, the more time you have, the more everything you have, the less you are likely to innovate. Innovation is borne out of limitations, out of need. Constraints mean that you have to be creative, that you have to find a solution. The best thing to have in the world if you want to innovate, is a good set of limitations. A chance to really dig at something and keep at it until you have it solved in a way that will surprise even you.

If it feels unsolvable, walk away. Mix it up and do something completely opposite to what you think you need to do. It'll change your perspective and cheer you up. When you least expect it, you'll see a few more ways to solve this one.

Persuasion and vulnerability:

If you're really innovating often, you're probably ok feeling vulnerable. When you're breaking new ground, you have a lot of people to convince before you can get your idea actually built or created. A lot of people will tell you it's too expensive, too insane, too "out-there", "nobody will like it". You need to be a master in persuasion and thick skinned at that. Howard Aiken rightly said:

“Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats.”

If lots of people are agreeing with you, and you're not getting enough pertinent questions, it should send your alarm bells ringing. Anything truly original looks ugly at first, so be sure to watch for that strange weird idea that doesn't sit quite right. That stands out. Give it some time, look at it again. Picasso knew how to do this really well. Something really original can be unsettling, Be sensitive to that.

Move in unfamiliar circles:

It's pretty tough to invent something completely novel. Sometimes great innovation comes from applying some method to a totally new field or combing a few things together that have never really been thought of in that way before. That's why it's so important to learn things outside of your field. That's why great innovators have passions in many fields. Steve Jobs loved art, Richard Feynman loved music, as did Einstein, Benjamin Franklin influenced physics, Isaac Newton, Isaac Asimov..where do I even start? Move in unfamiliar circles.

Leonardo DaVinci (another awesomely productive and curious mind) said:

“Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason.”

And that my friend, is a good place to begin and end :)

Seriously, play.

photo credit: desbiens_jean "The essence of serious play is the challenge and thrill of confronting uncertainties...The challenge of converting uncertainty into manageable risks or opportunities explains why serious play is often the most rational behaviour for innovators". (Michael Schrage)

As a society, we are finally beginning to give play time the attention it deserves. It is being recognised as serious business, and so it should be. Play is how children learn social skills, make sense of the world they live in, discover new things about it, and invent, create and dream. There's nothing childish about those things. In fact all of that stuff is fundamental to innovation in businesses, factories, studios, hospitals, schools, banks...everywhere. There's even a conference for it.

Play for teams:

If you think that playtime is for kids, go out and buy a box of lego play dough and set an hour aside to re-discover the joy and importance of play. Then bring it into your workplace. It will make staff more productive, happier and more relaxed. It also leads to learning better team skills like voicing an opinion,giving feedback,taking the lead,letting someone else take the lead, for example. It gives permission to think without boundaries, considering weird and crazy ideas that end up making a lot of sense, and others that don't but were fun to play with. It gets people who don't work well together to address their differences and to learn to celebrate them. It's productive time.

I have often turned a workshop into playtime, and seen 40+ year old depressed, tired or annoyed looking C-level executives light up at the sight of lego and coloured pens. The meeting is then productive because we have a common language to work from. Because we can explore ideas without asking for permission. Because we can discover personal traits about each other. Because we can connect. If people in your meetings are not connecting, they're not productive. A whole host of hidden problems is about to rain down on your project. Get everything out in the open, all of the ideas, all of the concerns, all of the opinions. Address them all. And do it in a positive and fun environment.

"Being playful means taking risks, and risk takers sometimes fail". (Jon Kolko)

Ah yes. It does come with a price. Sometimes you will pick the wrong idea. Sometimes you will fail. This is why it's important to fail as quickly as possible and as efficiently as possible. We can't help that we will fail sometimes, but we can get better at it. It means not having a culture of blame and dealing with things as a team. It's about learning from every mishap and adding to the body of knowledge and experience of the team. In fact trying things is often the only way to grow and improve. A bad idea can out to be a real winner in a different context. Be open. Be brave. Dare to try things. Prepare well. Set yourself up for success, and work fast. If you fail, recover quickly. Learn to do this, rather than being too afraid to try.

Play to be healthy:

“If we don’t take time to play, we face a joyless life of rigidity, lacking in creativity. The opposite of play isn’t work, but depression. If we’re going to adapt to changing economic and personal circumstances the way that nature armed us to do, then we have to find ourselves having some play time virtually every day.”

This is serious stuff. It can help clear your mind and give you perspective. If you have lost yourself in drawing silly little aliens for 20mins or modelling a car out of blu tak for an hour, you have probably succeeded in calming down. That in itself is a great thing. No pills required. No special method. Nobody else. If you play often enough, you can start to practice creativity, having new ideas, and being happier. There's no question that it will improve your life. It will help you think about things in new ways. And the best thing is, you are already an expect at it, you just have to remember how to play. It's beautifully easy and rewarding.

Play for innovation:

"Serious play is not an oxymoron; it is the essence of innovation." (Michael Schrage)

Lego has created "Serious Play" which is described as "an innovative, experiential process designed to enhance innovation and business performance. Based on research that shows that this kind of hands-on, minds-on learning produces a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the world and its possibilities, Lego serious play deepens the reflection process and supports an effective dialogue – for everyone in the organization". It's well worth a look. At ThoughtWorks we use a variety of games we have invented ourselves, or adapted to a situation. The "lean Lego game" is used to teach the Agile methodology, for example.

Play is fundamental to innovation and creative thinking. The principles of play behaviour and development can be directly applied to business. Check out the Stanford class on play and innovations, the handouts are pretty cool, and easy to use in our own environments.

Play for effortless work:

"When we engage in what we are naturally suited to do, our work takes on the quality of play and it is play that stimulates creativity. So play with your intuition". (Linda Naiman)

It occurred to me after working very very hard for a few years, that I wasn't shining despite all the hard work. More importantly I wasn't enjoying myself. I took some time out and thought things through. It became apparent to me that there is no "play time" and there is no "work time". Both of these things need to overlap, more or less at different times, for me to be at my best. My yoga practice includes fun postures to explore, I doodle often, I make stuff out of other stuff, I take the time to go "wow" when I see something beautiful. I climb on top of things. I make faces at my friends.

And some days when I need more inspiration than usual, I'll skateboard instead of getting the train.

I'm a 33 year old woman with a Ph.D in computer science and a job as an experience designer that I take very seriously.

Play is serious stuff.

If you're not convinced (and if you are), Tim Brown has more food for thought - Enjoy.

Experimental social psychology rocks

photo credit: lilongd

Social psychology is all about researching how social groups interact, and how the individuals interact with each other within social groups. Experimental psychology is "the study of the mind and mental operations by the use of experimental methods." (Miller-Keane Encyclopedia and Dictionary of Medicine, Nursing, and Allied Health) - Experimental social psychology is what you get when you mix both of the above together.

It has found its way into the popular bookshelves, in the pages of Gladwell's Outliers, for example (there are many more others of course), and although those books are quite remarkable and entertaining, there's nothing quite like hearing it form the horses mouth. There's some brilliant (and weird) research papers out there, and you can access most of them through Springer and Elsevier and the other usual suspects. You can also read more experimental social psychology research at the SESP.

Here are a few that I liked (note that the links take you to PDFs):

"On being liked on the web and in the “real world”: Consistency in first impressions across personal webpages and spontaneous behavior" (Max Weisbuch, Zorana Ivcevic, Nalini Ambady - Tufts University)

"With recent growth in the use of personal webpages and online social networking, people are changing the way that they meet and form impressions of each other. The current research examines the correspondence in impressions formed from face-to-face interaction and personal webpages. As expected, people liked by interaction partners were also liked on the basis of their Facebook^® pages."

"Chronic violent video game exposure and desensitization to violence: Behavioral and event-related brain potential data" (Bruce D. Bartholow, Brad Bushman, Marc A. Sestir - University of Missouri-Columbia)

"Theoretically, violence desensitization should be reflected in the amplitude of the P300 component of the event-related brain potential (ERP), which has been associated with activation of the aversive motivational system. In the current study, violent images elicited reduced P300 amplitudes among violent, as compared to nonviolent video game players. Additionally, this reduced brain response predicted increased aggressive behavior in a later task. Moreover, these effects held after controlling for individual differences in trait aggressiveness. These data are the first to link media violence exposure and aggressive behavior to brain processes hypothetically associated with desensitization."

"When what you say about others says something about you: Language abstraction and inferences about describers’ attitudes and goals" (Karen M. Douglas, Robbie M. Sutton - Keele University)

"Research has shown that language abstraction conveys information about the person whose behavior is described (Wigboldus, Semin, & Spears, 2000). However to date, little research has examined the information that language abstraction may convey about describers themselves. In this paper, we report three experiments demonstrating that describers who use relatively abstract language to describe others’ behaviors are perceived to have biased attitudes and motives compared with those describers who use more concrete language."

"How long will it take? Power biases time predictions" (Mario Weick, Ana Guinote - University of Canterbury)

"People tend to underestimate the time it takes to accomplish tasks. This bias known as the planning fallacy derives from the tendency to focus attention too narrowly on the envisaged goal and to ignore additional information that could make predictions more accurate and less biased. Drawing on recent research showing that power induces attentional focus, four studies tested the hypothesis that power strengthens the tendency to underestimate future task completion time."

Running your own social psychology experiments:

You might be in a place where you're ready to run your own experiments, or at least you'd like to. A few tips for these will come in handy, because if you plan it properly and understand how to analyse the data you have captured, it won't be useful.

Experimental social psychology is a science. Something is called "science" when it abides by the "scientific method". To run these experiments, you need to do so as well, or the findings won't be deemed valid. I already wrote about the scientific method but in brief:

1 - Ask a question (This can take a long long time, because you need to check nobody else has asked it)

2 - Do background research (Find out what everybody else has done, so you don't reinvent the wheel)

3 - Construct a hypothesis (This is where you suggest a possible answer to your question)

4 - Test with an experiment (This is where you put your money where your mouth is and collect data)

5 - Analyse the results (This is where you criticise your own work)

6 - Report the results (Now you can go through peer review)

You need to be really careful about introducing bias into your experiments, and you must call them out when you do. "Bias" refers to anything that might affect the results of the experiment. In usability testing for example, the fact that we put the person in a test situation introduces bias. You should be able to use statistical analysis to work out how that has affected the results. Bias can also refer to the fact that you only observed 1000 people for example. How far would your results change if you observed 100,000 people? You need to take all of this into consideration because you're trying to report the truth as far as possible. Peer review is important because it allows for research to be shared and also further critiqued, meaning that it can be further improved or proven to be wrong. This avoids a lot of time and energy going into something that isn't working.

It's a really interesting process, which allows us to learn new things about our world. I am a human factors devotee, so I love to do these experiments. They take quite a bit of time but you learn some really interesting things that lead you to some even more interesting things. Admittedly, you do also discover a lot of very uninteresting things too :)

Enjoy experimenting!

The business formerly known as Ad

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="...cross pollination is the key..."][/caption] photo credit: derekkeats

Unless you have been asleep underneath a comfy rock for the last few years (or in a totally different industry - both perfectly acceptable btw), you will know that the world of advertising is on the move.

"Going digital"

Adland used to be all about intellectual capital, idea creation and mostly revolved around print and TV. I can't tell you much more than that because I have only spent 14 months in Adland and can really only comment on the changes I've been observing. And they are big changes. The digital agencies have been gnawing at the big traditional ad agencies legs for a while now, taking away clients wanting to position themselves as web savvy brands. The Ad agencies decided to fight back and "go digital"...

...whatever the hell that meant! Many when asked will lump anything "below the line" as "digital". Below the what? That's what I thought too, so I found out what it all meant:

• Above the line (ATL): promotions are tailored for a mass audience
• Below the line (BTL): promotions are targeted at individuals according to their needs or preferences
• Through the line (TTL): advertising strategy involving both above and below the line

I think that "digital" can quite easily be ATL as much as BTL, as much as it can be TTL, no?! Actually this is all a bit antiquated. Any campaign should be aimed at the demographic the product or service is intended for. I would wager that 9 times out of 10 those people are online. If that is true, then practically all campaigns will be "digital" to some extent.

The thing that quite a few Ad agencies (and some digital agencies) didn't realise, was that they were becoming software houses, creative technology shops, computing companies...whatever you want to call it. Some will disagree with that statement, but making iPhone apps, Facebook apps, online games, and websites requires computational skills first and foremost. Being an "integrated agency" essentially means that you have figured out how to be a really creative, technologically astute and able shop. And that's hard, really hard. In my opinion, it's also where all the real magic happens.

Technology and creativity:

Google and Yahoo both have defined themselves as "Ad agencies" in the past. We'll likely all agree that they look a little different to what we formerly called an Ad agency. Their culture and philosophy is dramatically different. Traditional Ad agencies are mostly creatively led. In places like Google and Yahoo, the rockstars are the developers and the companies are technologically led. Technology shops are used to getting something out there fast, and then tinkering sometimes forever, until it fulfills all the needs and desires of the end user. On top of that, this way of working allows them to adapt to an ever changing space. This is an "Agile" way of working. Creative agencies are used to polishing something and launching it. They then chalk it up as "done" and move on to the next thing (like a TV ad for example). This sort of way of working (closer to waterfall), isn't adapted to a fast changing digital space. You can't launch an online campaign and then call it finished. In light of this, changes are afoot, and I am hearing more about Agile processes being implemented in traditional Ad agencies.

The new business of Ad:

The business of Ad (imho) should be more centered around service design, customer experience, redesigning business models, helping companies and brands speak but also listen to consumers effectively, rather than making great software. It's also about creating a little wonder and awe as well. There's nothing quite like a well adjusted business solution with social mechanics in tune with the consumer, that is also beautiful or fun or even both!

It's not about using the lastest technology for every client and every campaign, because doing that leads to gimmicky things that don't speak to people and aren't useful for the brand. Using augmented reality, for example, to show off the fact you can use the technology, is fine. If it isn't well adjusted to the campaign,however, it says exactly that to the end user ("The ad agency just wanted to show they can do this"). If you can make use of new technology in a way that isn't gimmicky, and really is useful to people, like the UPS augmented reality postage box by AKQA, then you are doing a good job. It's not about technology for technology's sake.

People

To achieve this level of brilliance, I think it's time for Ad agencies to hire from a range of disciplines, sometimes including and not restricted to:

• Computer science (UX, HCI, games design, graphics, data visualization and manipulation, physical computing...)
• Social sciences
• Psychology
• Creative arts
• Anthropology
• Business (MBA, economics...)
• Statistical sciences and maths (for serious analytics)
• Electronics and mechanics (to make prototypes and fuel imagination)

Hire experts, because they have greater potential to also be generalists. Good generalists are almost always experts at something, and they're really hard to find. To be a generalist, you have to be awesome at learning a lot about lots of things, quickly. Those skills come from practice and a sharp mind. Let's look at some definitions from WordNet:

- Expert: A person with extensive knowledge or ability in a given subject - Generalist: a modern scholar who is in a position to acquire more than superficial knowledge about many different interests (Renaissance man)

I often hear people confuse the term "Generalist" and apply it to mean something like "A person who has superficial knowledge about lots of things". That is incorrect.

The people in charge of your wonderful teams (management) should be chosen for the job because...they're really good with people first and foremost. They should be trained in performance optimisation (techniques to help teams be more innovative, creative...), counseling and other people focused skills. If you can create a sane, pleasurable and practical environment for these great minds, and you look after them really well, your business will boom, no doubt about it. And of course really smart people will be silly happy working for you.

A few last words to Adland residents:

Roles that will be in high demand in 5 years time don't even exist yet. Put yourself in good stead by hiring the best people from a range of disciplines. They will adapt to a changing technological ecosystem, and learn new things easily. The collaboration between different disciplines ("cross-pollination") will lead to fresh and unusual ideas emerging, award winning ideas, and more importantly, useful ideas.

I think that this cool little video explains it in a fun way:

My creative technology toolkit

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="...and so this is how someone might use my spaceship to get to work."][/caption] photo credit: pasukaru76

You don't really need anything at all to come up with an innovative or interesting idea, but if you're going to make a habit of it, then it's probably a good idea to get comfortable. I make sure that I'm exposed to a large number of different types of ideas by reading news ranging from electronics industry breakthroughs to new health fads to software releases right through to newly published research papers. I want to know what's new, what's cool, what works, what doesn't and how to do new things.  Once I've consumed and digested all this new stuff, I go for a walk, meditate, practice Pranayama...whatever I need to do to let it go. It might seem counter productive, but I want to retain the knowledge and not the detail. I don't want to copy something by mistake or get too focused on one thing. Once I'm ready to go, I like some quiet time to work on whatever my problem is today, and having access to my "toolkit" helps this somewhat unpredictable process. If it were predictable, my output probably wouldn't be very innovative.

You might find something I use below to be useful to you too. I wonder what tools others in the business of innovation like to use.

Inspiration & Reference:

For me this section is about books, because the web is too distracting at this stage in the process. Sometimes if I'm stuck or just I need of a little lift, I'll read a few paragraphs from one of these. I also refer back to practical book for reference quite a bit too.

Amazon kindle - it was a birthday present and I really cannot part with it, it's awesome and gives me access to all the following books anywhere I go. The eInk is far better for your eyes that the backlight of the iPad. I prefer it for reading.

Materiology - This book is for creatives who "rely on materials and technologies architects, designers, stylists, artists and the like, from students to experienced practitioners."

Sketching user experience - Probably my favourite UX book by one of my favourite UX people.

Processing for visual artists - A good book on Processing with an emphasis on being creative with it.

Making it: manufacturing techniques for product design - It's good to know how stuff is produced and this book covers over 90 different processes.

Gamestorming: A playbook for innovators - A little bok full of brainstorming ideas for when you feel stuck.

Resonate: present visual stories that transform audiences - A book about how to present your ideas. Never underestimate this part of your project.

The 10 faces of innovation - IDEO labs gives us a nice little book on innovation and how to encourage it in your organisation.

The lego minstorms NXT 2.0 discovery book - A "How to book" for making cool little robots from Lego

We are the real experiment: 20 years of FACT - The book from the Foundation for Art and Creative Technology, beautiful.

The art of innovation - The story of IDEO labs, I'll write a summary for you on of these days.

Getting started with Arduino - This one is new for me, but I think it's important to make things beyond software so this is a good place to start.

Work materials:

These things are absolutely indispensable for me. I need to be able to get my thoughts out and into the world in a quick and simple way. I try to stay away from the computer or any technology until I sort of know where I'm heading. The following have been really useful during my PhD research especially.

Index cards - one card per idea

Marker pens -lots of different colours

Blutack, glue and sticky tape - to put index cards up on my walls

Post-it notes - the more colours the better. I use them to write caveats on idea cards or warnings

Whiteboard - good for diagrams

Lego - nice way to bring to life a user path. Check out Lego's Serious Play.

Hardware:

Basically you'll want to be able to get your hands on and play with anything that's relevant to your current project, business area or idea. It's nice to be able to have access to anything that's new and interesting, so that you get to learn how to use the technology, how to program for it, and can start to imagine new uses for it. A current hardware list might look something like this:

Laptop, iPad2, iPhone 4, Android phone, Kinect (+ FAAST and the SDK), Camera, Projector, Earphones / Headphones

Other stuff:

Samples (RFID tags, circuit board, LED, bottle caps...) - it's good to have bits and pieces to play with to hand, but you should spend time contacting hardware manufacturers asking for samples when you have pinpointed something you'd like to use. There's nothing quite like making a proof of concept to find out of your idea is feasible.

Software Development Kits (all sorts) - these are like gifts for geeks.

My yoga mat - It's good to move around and get some breath in my body, and it's important to just stop what I'm doing sometimes and give myself a break. Yoga allows me to rest my mind quite effectively, and then the ideas come flooding in afterwards. It just works, what can I say!

What I aim for each time:

1 - To design an innovative and effective solution for a problem

2 - To make a proof of concept

3 - To communicate the solution clearly

I'm hugely passionate about Human Factors, so (almost) all my solutions have the user at the center. The technology I choose to work with s not incidental, but rather one that I think my user will appreciate. That doesn't necessarily mean that I only pick things that they already use, but I do make sure it's going to be an easy transition for them. If the current technology is a bit too geeky but still very cool, I'll work on improving the layman's experience with that. Sometimes really innovative things come exactly at that juncture.

Happy making.

Lessons in innovation: Sydney Opera House

photo credit: Stuz?

The Sydney opera house was completed in 1973 and is one of the greatest architectural works of the 20th century. It brings together incredible creativity and inspiring feats of innovation. It's an awesome urban sculpture but also a really functional and smart building. In fact, it's one of my favourite places to hang out in Sydney. I never get tired of photographing its lines and curves, and the cafe is pretty good too. Seeing as we're all in the business of innovation, I thought it would be interesting to find out what the Sydney opera house has to offer in the way of lessons in innovation.

A little history make all the more interesting. Danish architect Jørn Utzon was awarded the Sydney Opera house project in 1957 by an international jury.  There were 200 entires. Ove Arup, a very innovative engineer, allowed the vision to become a reality.

The Sydney Opera House has 3 groups of interlocking vaulted "shells" which act as a roof  to two large performance halls and a restaurant. These shells are on top of a large platform and are surrounded by terrace areas that you can walk around.

Innovations:

• The pioneering use of computers to calculate the stresses and loads on the two-way curved roofs
• The development of a way to build the roofs in concrete
• NSW government met the $103 million price tag by appealing to the Australian love of gambling, through the profits from a series of Opera House lotteries
• The Sydney Opera House became a testing laboratory and a vast, open-air pre-casting factory
• The pipe organ in the concert hall of the Sydney Opera House was designed and built by self-taught organ builder Ron Sharp between 1967 and 1979. When the organ was finished it was the largest mechanical organ in the world, with innovative features such as electronic stops control and a computerised playback system

Lessons:

1. The competition brief was purposely very broad

This allowed the project to attract the best design talent from all over the world. The lack of design parameters or budget meant that the sky was the limit and architects could think really really big. The only requirement in the brief was a design for a dual function building (sculpture and opera house) with two performance halls.

2. The Government’s decision to commission 38 year old Jørn Utzon as the sole architect was brave & visionary

They chose the design that they found the most inspiring and the most appropriate for their needs. They didn't focus on who Jørn was, or what he had done previously. They chose his design, his work, his inspiration. Not him. There would have been many reasons why picking him could have been considered risky. He had limited experience, his design was rudimentary and very very unique. Additionally, it had been drawn up in the absence of any engineering advice.

3. The drawings submitted were mostly diagrammatic, and the design had not been fully costed

They had no idea whether this project was even feasible, but they all felt it had something really special and stood out. They were willing to accept the very basic documentation, and to be sold into the dream of this incredible idea.

4. Jørn Utzon’s design concept included unprecedented architectural forms and demanded solutions that required new technologies and materials

They were prepared to take it on, regardless of how tough it would be build. They used it as an opportunity to learn new things and to break new ground. Being undaunted by this sort of thing is essential if you want to make something really really innovative. Every project is a chance to innovate at a micro and macro level. The opera house even became a testing laboratory and a vast, open-air pre-casting factory.

5. The Government was under public pressure to select an Australian architect

They didn't break under peer pressure, they insisted on choosing the right design and would settle on nothing less. It is important to stick to what you believe in, however hard it gets, and not settle for less.

6. Design and construction were closely intertwined

Utzon’s design together with his radical approach to the construction of the building allowed for an exceptional collaborative and innovative environment. This was completely unprecedented in architecture to date. A collaborative environment is essential to a very fertile innovative environment.

7. The Sydney Opera House took sixteen years to build. It was six years late and ten times over budget from its original estimated cost.

Ouch! I guess this is the material cost of innovation. Very innovative projects are not always late and over budget but I reckon I'm not the only one to be able to name more than 5. If you feel that the innovation is worth this enormous financial cost, and that you can afford to pay up...then do it.

8. People still argue about how well Utzon managed the project. The building was finished in 1973 without him.

I think that this is the cost of not having a "grown up" in charge of the project management. The creative and strategic minds should be able to think huge, but at the end of the day, someone needs to manage the whole thing sensibly. A good learning here is to pick an experienced pm.

9. In 1999, Utzon formally (prompted by Premier Carr) ire-engaged with the project by setting down design principles outlining his vision for the building and explain the principles behind his design.

This means that this masterpiece of inovation can be protected and looked after by future generations. It is important to document what you need to, to ensure that your innovation has a life beyond you and your team.

Oh yes....and #10 would be about how they funded it. Using imaginative ways to fund your project is also an essential part of being an innovator.

These lessons show us that innovation requires inspiration, courage, determination, vision, and an appetite to innovate beyond what you think the innovation is. Oh yes...and money. Most of the time.

Happy innovating :)

Kinect hacked, sliced and diced

Released in November 2010, Microsoft's Kinect has created a bow wave amongst the more technically minded communities. Most computing departments in Universities own one and they're doing very cool stuff with it. You will have all seen the long stream of videos under the tag "Kinect hacks" and you will have all seen it do some things it wasn't intended to do. In this post, I want to talk about why it's actually such a complicated device, and where it's going next. If you read this blog, you more than likely not only know what it is, but you know the gory technical details too. I won't spend too long on that as a result, but just in case this post goes "mainstream", lets introduce ourselves to the box before we talk about thinking outside of it:

Microsoft have introduced it like this:

"Kinect brings games and entertainment to life in extraordinary new ways without using a controller. Imagine controlling movies and music with the wave of a hand or the sound of your voice*. With Kinect, technology evaporates, letting the natural magic in all of us shine...Controller-free gaming means full body play. Kinect responds to how you move. So if you have to kick, then kick. If you have to jump, then jump. You already know how to play. All you have to do now is to get off the couch...Once you wave your hand to activate the sensor, your Kinect will be able to recognise you and access your Avatar. Then you’ll be able to jump in and out of different games, and show off and share your moves."

The technology isn't all Microsoft. It uses range camera technology which interprets 3D information from a  continuously-projected infrared structured light. This was made by Israeli developer PrimeSense. The 3D scanner system uses a variant of image-based 3D reconstruction. Its motion and voice sensitive, make it a "Natural User Interface", because no controller is needed. The depth sensor has an infrared laser projector together with a monochrome CMOS sensor, which captures video data in 3D under any ambient light conditions. GamesRadar has a nice techy review of it that you might like too.

"Think Tom Cruise in Minority report" is another way I've heard it described. A big thank you to MIT for making that a reality, but it wasn't really made for this either. It was made to play Xbox games. Microsoft have however embraced the hacking of its newest offering and have made available an SDK (thank you for this MSFT).

There are other options to the SDK, and until very recently there wasn't one. Adafruit ran a competition for Kinect drivers and Hector Martin won, releasing the code available at OpenKinect. There's also a Google Group if you're interested and loads more support online. PrimeSense made available their motion tracking middleware NITE, which is worth noting. Kinect-Hacks is a great site if you want to get hands on.

Anyway...now we know what it is, back the point of this post.

It occurred to me how different the user experience has become. I don't have any insider information, but I reckon MSFT spent a small fortune in the user experience for the Kinect.  I can well imagine how much testing much have been so that when a child places itself in front of it, all of the expected things happen. This makes for a really easy gameplay and allows someone to really "be the controller". There have been some really useful usability reviews such as the one by Jacob Nielsen, one by Steve Cable and the comparison by Sheryl Yu Lin. They show that although it's a good product, the overall opinion is "could do better". The proof is in the pudding though, and I reckon that most people would be able to:

1. Grasp what they're supposed to do
2. Understand what's happening
3. Understand where it's happening

When we move to the land of Kinect hacks and away from the purpose built environment it was designed for, we lose 1, 2, and 3 for many people. Most of the hacks, be it the Shadow Puppets or the Optical Camouflage, are at proof of concept stage. They're fun and are a nice example of how you can "leave the box" and think outside of it. I haven't yet seen any hacks that are beyond proof of concept or that are genuinely useful. There are many reasons for this, but mainly, the technology is very new and so is the whole idea of hacking it. I reckon more interesting things will emerge later down the line.

What I'm finding interesting though is that once you remove the context (the Xbox), you are left with a lot of work to do for the non-geek to grasp what's going on. I ran a creative technology workshop recently with a group of business people. We looked at Kinect specifically, and after spending time understanding the technology, we looked at a series of hacks too. They were all amazed, and in awe like little kids at a candy store. I then asked them to get into small groups and come up with some ideas for hacks of their own. Bearing in mind that none of them were technical people, I was hoping to get some interesting insight into usage. Interestingly, what I found is that they struggled to come up with anything new. Having run quite a lot of these workshops before, with the same kinds of people, I was puzzled. Normally, they always come up with a few things I would never have thought of. More interestingly...they (all sort of) presented the same idea, and none of them noticed. Mostly thoughts revolved around using it to do something that is already possible without Kinect but with it. Seeing we are talking about a technology that allows you to speak to the computer and interact physically with a virtual environment, I was stunned. When the technology is then safely placed back into its Xbox environment, there is a lot less struggle with it as a technology or even as an idea.

MSFT are already investigating what comes after Kinect:

For a long time we investigated (or obsessed about) putting ourselves into a virtual world. We did this with avatars, through games, through virtual worlds and so on. Now, we've flipped it on its head and we're more interested in integrating the virtual into the real world. This changes the whole user experience and I don't think we've given it a lot of thought as yet. I'd be interested in hearing about any projects or testing happening in relation to this.

In the meantime, check out this very cool video, taking us further down those futuristic paths:

Empty your cup

photo credit: époque

There is a very well shared Zen story that goes something like this:

"The Japanese master Nan-in gave audience to a professor of philosophy. Serving tea, Nan-in filled his visitor's cup, and kept pouring. The professor watched the overflow until he could restrain himself no longer: "Stop! The cup is over full, no more will go in." Nan-in said: "Like this cup, you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup."

You might empty your cup and then call it "empty". It is now full of emptiness. This is still not good enough, in fact, it is said that you need to crush your cup. (There's a nice essay on this here)

"Evolving" something gives you a starting place, be it tools or a concept. Innovation requires you to reinvent the world (or part of it) from the ground up. If your cup is full, you will never be able to find that beautiful pattern, that simple association of ideas, or that full on crazy hypothesis that leads to a brilliant invention. In order to innovate, we need to adapt very quickly to new and emerging concepts. It's not about gorging yourself with everything blasting through your news feeds, but rather having the ability to notice a reoccurring theme, an overall pattern, and apply that thought or insight to your own immediate environment.

We create personas in our minds that we then identify with. Many of us even cling to the ideas that we have decided define us. "I am a thinker", "I am a runner", "I am a yogi", "I am an innovator", "I am a scientist", "I am a geek", "I am a parent", "I am a t-shirt art enthusiast"...whatever you call yourself...stop it. By defining yourself you are setting solid partitions between you and the rest of the world. You then begin to live within these limitations.

Jono Fisher told a story about an experience he had at a zoo where he was working. A white tiger was kept in a 4x4 cage and he paced all day long. Jono and his friends petitioned the zoo and were able to build a huge enclosure for the tiger with trees, a pond, grass and everything he needed to be happy. When they released him into the new enclosure, he headed for the corner and then paced in a 4x4 pattern. Nobody could get him to venture into the rest of his enclosure.

We become exactly like this when we assign labels to ourselves. Identifying with being a geek might prevent you from ever discovering a real passion for watercolours or classical music for example. These discoveries may lead to new skills or perspectives that will offer you a great vantage point for truly innovative ideas. If you're a strategist and you feel like you need to be inspired, don't read a book on strategy. Read about ballet or watch a movie on marathon running for example. Anything that takes your fancy.

Listen to heart not mind. Mind is responsible (along with the ego) for all those labels you give yourself, and all those limitations you think exist. It has its place, it is a tool. Trust your instincts and use them to navigate your way around a problem. Close your eyes and feel the world around you, literally. We need to experience a solution not intellectualise it. This is why getting hands on pays off. This is why having an empty cup allows you to fill it with new and exiting things for the mind to work with. Just remember to empty it regularly, no regrets.

Alvin Toffler said it well:

"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn".

5 innovations you need to know about

One consequence of innovation is that the technical landscape is in constant flux. Creative technologists need to stay on top of new technological developments and inventions. It's part of the job, and it requires technical ability and understanding and research skills. For everyone else, it can be a stretch to stay on top of such a technically challenging and ever changing space. This post is designed to focus in on 5 really interesting innovations that you should know about, whatever your role. (This is not an exhaustive list of course, there are a lot of cool things happening right now.) 1. Mobile payments

2. RFID in everyday life

...and in social media

3. Electronic skin

4. Graphene

...this is what it means for consumers

5. Augmented reality

Also check out Michael Schrage's top 6 innovative ideas for this year, good post!

What are you looking forward to?

Onkalo

photo credit: James D. Schwartz

I've just watched a brilliant documentary called "Into Eternity". It's about the finnish nuclear waste repository Onkalo, and I am fascinated by the level of thinking required to design and build it. Onkalo is being designed to last 100,000 years, which is the length of time necessary for the nuclear waste to become harmless. Nothing man-made has ever been made to last such a long time. To get some perspective on what this means, the pyramids are only 5,000 years old. "Onkala" means "hiding place" and this facility is exactly that. It will be a very very dangerous place, and the greatest threat is humans finding it and opening it. A lot of thinking is going into how to communicate to them. They may not have our language, our symbols, our technology. One idea is to convey a feeling using "The scream" by Edvard Munch, another to create a landscape of thorns. We have found symbols from civilisations long gone, and we still can't understand them all.

Facts:

Positiva is the agency responsible for constructing Onkalo.

There is about 250,000-300,000 tons of nuclear waste in our world right now and the number increases daily.

The European security standard for isolation of nuclear waste is 100,000 years.

The US standard is 1,000,000 years.

The human species has existed for about 50,000 years.

Permanent nuclear waste storage must be located in very stable environments.

Onkalo being constructed in a granite bedrock, because scientists believe that burying the waste deep underground is the safest place to put it.

Phase 1 (2004-2009) involved excavating a large spiralling access tunnel that is 420 meters deep.

Phase 2 (2009-2011) involved further excavating to reach 520 meters.

Phase 3 (about 2015) the construction of the repository will begin.

Phase 4 (about 2020) the facility will begin encapsulation and burial.

Onkalo will be able to receive canisters of nuclear waste for 100 years until it is full in 2120, when it will be backfilled and sealed.

Once sealed, it must never ever be opened again.

Humans:

The worrying thing is that humans of  future civilisations may stumble across Onkalo and think that it is a burial ground, or a hidden treasure. We have little in common with the Neanderthal man who hunted mammoths with spears, so we may also have little in common with a civilisation thousands of years in the future. How do we warn them about the dangers of the place they have found? Will they drill and open it anyway, even if they do understand our message?

Should we seal Onkalo and:

• forget about it?
• or "remember to forget about it"?
• or leave documentation?
• or tell our children and grand-children so they can do the same?
• ...?

It's so hard to plan for something that is designed to last for such a long time, and the scope of the project is huge, bigger than just the physical construction of the facility.

"As a species, we are good at forgetting. So maybe the best, ultimate, defence against people messing with Onkalo would be simply to forget that it is there. The best way to keep a secret is not to let on that there is a secret at all.

But what about the ethical duty to warn those future generations with some kind of marker that would survive the scouring of Finland by glaciers and evolution of language? If, in fact, the canisters are rediscovered a few hundred years or a few thousand years from now, we can imagine our descendants’ reaction at having been left such a nasty surprise". (Michael Madsen)

Geological change:

Scientists say that geological change predicts another ice age within the next 100,000 years. The facility is therefore being designed to withstand the weight of a 2 mile thick ice sheet. How will civilisation be affected by an ice age?

The documentary:

It is was made by Michael Madsen and produced by Lise Lense-Moller. It's brilliantly made, beautifully shot, and what I find most interesting is the avalanche of questions that emerge from it. Deeply philosophical and complex questions. I highly recommend you watch it, you'll like it. You can also visit the online home of the documentary.

Bacteria Data Storage

photo credit: shawnleishman

I was really excited to find out about a group of students at Hong Kong's Chinese University successfully storing data in E.Coli.

E.Coli is not normally something you'd welcome, seeing as it is responsible for most UTIs and for food poisoning, but with this new technique it can be used to store vast amounts of information. One gram of bacteria can store 900,000 GB of data (or 450 hard drives, each with 2 TB  storage capacity). This means that you can keep all your data in the fridge. It has the advantage of being hack-proof, and won't let you down with electrical faults and the like. You just need to keep it fresh.

The students have also developed a way of overcoming storage capacity limitations by splitting it into chunks and distributing it between different cells. They have made a nice little interface on their site which allows you to try out their models and see a simulation in action, give it a go.

It's really not a new concept, featuring heavily in sci-fi and also labs for some time now! The exciting part is seeing something like this actually work, even though it is very early days. In 2007, researchers at Keio's Japan University encrypted Einstein's E=MC2 into the common soil bacterium. Because bacteria constantly reproduces, a group of single cell organisms can store a piece of information for years and years.

Idly daydreaming, I see a vast number of technological innovations that need to be invented or transformed to support this type of data storage.

Get more details about the Hong Kong iGem biostorage project

Innovative stuff

CES 2011 just finished yesterday, and looking through all of the tech on display, it was well worth the visit for those of you who went along. We're at a really interesting juncture right now, with technology being so accessible to so many, and with it going all social and mobile too. We tend to talk about mobile when we talk about technology innovation, but there's some really really hot stuff going on in other area right now. I thought I'd give you a round up of the things that I think are suuuuper exciting. The university of Tokyo's professor Takao Someya is always up to interesting things, and I've been following his research for a little while now. I really liked his printing of flexible electronics on plastic sheeting. It means that you can start to play with (RFID) tags in new ways. This years big prize, however goes to the Nobel prize winners Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov for Graphene. This is going to revolutionize technology. IBM has already made some Graphene transistors. The arms US army is experimenting with graphene wristbands as well, and there's already a good few companies putting it all to commercial use.

One nice application is "electric skin" which I read about in Nature a few months ago. I can't find the article, but Physics Buzz covered it well. It tries to mimic human skin with a "new tactile sensor can detect the gentle touch of an alighting insect."

One of my favorite people in science is professor Warwick from Reading University in the UK. He is up to some really interesting human cyborg experiments. No joke here. I met him to talk about the chip he had implanted in his arm a few years ago and I know he's working on one for the brain next. It's interesting because although it's not accessible to us yet, you can't get more cutting edge than that. It's bold, provoking research.

One of the coolest conferences last year was UIST 2010 (that I also failed to attend!), it's an ACM conference and is well attended by the most exciting people on computing. I mean it doesn't get much better than Marvin Minsky now does it?! The most interesting paper for me to come out of that conference was "Soylent: A Word Processor with a Crowd Inside", it won best student paper so I think lots of other people liked it too. It's a Microsoft Word plug-in utilizing Mechanical Turk:

"Soylent aids the writing process by integrating paid crowd workers from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform into Microsoft Word, a popular word processing interface. Soy-lent is people: its core algorithms involve calls to Mechani-cal Turk workers (Turkers). Soylent is comprised of three main components: 1) Shortn, a text shortening service that cuts selected text down to 80% of its original length on average without changing the meaning of the text or introducing errors. 2) Crowdproof, an augmentation of Microsoft Word’s spelling and grammar checker that finds problems that Word cannot, explains the problem and suggests fixes. 3) The Human Macro, an interface for offloading and automating arbitrary word processing tasks such as formatting citations or finding appropriate figures."

Get the code here.

It's interesting however to notice that although our tools get more efficient, and more intuitive, the fundamental questions don't change. Soylent for example uses real people as opposed to an automated solution. Should everything be automated? From the list 0f Grand Challenges for computing, my favourite is this:

"The Architecture of Brain and Mind Integrating Low-Level Neuronal Brain Processes with High-Level cognitive Behaviours, in a Functioning Robot"

"What is the most powerful and most complicated computer on the planet? Wrong! it’s not a machine you can buy for millions of dollars, it’s the amazing system that we all own, the few kilos of grey and white mush in our heads...."

Enjoy :)