Innovation is about finding a better way of doing something. Like many of the new development buzzwords (which many of them are over-used on many business documents), the concept of innovation originates from the world of business. It refers to the generation of new products through the process of creative entrepreneurship, putting it into production, and diffusing it more widely through increased sales. Innovation can be viewed as t he application of better solutions that meet new requirements, in-articulated needs, or existing market needs. This is accomplished through more effective products, processes, services, technologies, or ideas that are readily available to markets, governments and society. The term innovation can be defined as something original and, as a consequence, new, that “breaks into” the market or society.
Innoveracy: Misunderstanding Innovation article points out that there is a form of ignorance which seems to be universal: the inability to understand the concept and role of innovation. The way this is exhibited is in the misuse of the term and the inability to discern the difference between novelty, creation, invention and innovation. The result is a failure to understand the causes of success and failure in business and hence the conditions that lead to economic growth. The definition of innovation is easy to find but it seems to be hard to understand. Here is a simple taxonomy of related activities that put innovation in context:
- Novelty: Something new
- Creation: Something new and valuable
- Invention: Something new, having potential value through utility
- Innovation: Something new and uniquely useful
The taxonomy is illustrated with the following diagram.
The differences are also evident in the mechanisms that exist to protect the works: Novelties are usually not protectable, Creations are protected by copyright or trademark, Inventions can be protected for a limited time through patents (or kept secret) and Innovations can be protected through market competition but are not defensible through legal means.
Innovation is a lot of talked about nowdays as essential to businesses to do. Is innovation essential for development work? article tells that innovation has become central to the way development organisations go about their work. In November 2011, Bill Gates told the G20 that innovation was the key to development. Donors increasingly stress innovation as a key condition for funding, and many civil society organisations emphasise that innovation is central to the work they do.
Some innovation ideas are pretty simple, and some are much more complicated and even sound crazy when heard first. The is place for crazy sounding ideas: venture capitalists are gravely concerned that the tech startups they’re investing in just aren’t crazy enough:
Not all development problems require new solutions, sometimes you just need to use old things in a slightly new way. Development innovations may involve devising technology (such as a nanotech water treatment kit), creating a new approach (such as microfinance), finding a better way of delivering public services (such as one-stop egovernment service centres), identifying ways of working with communities (such as participation), or generating a management technique (such as organisation learning).
Theorists of innovation identify innovation itself as a brief moment of creativity, to be followed by the main routine work of producing and selling the innovation. When it comes to development, things are more complicated. Innovation needs to be viewed as tool, not master. Innovation is a process, not a one time event. Genuine innovation is valuable but rare.
There are many views on the innovation and innvation process. I try to collect together there some views I have found on-line. Hopefully they help you more than confuze. Managing complexity and reducing risk article has this drawing which I think pretty well describes innovation as done in product development:
8 essential practices of successful innovation from The Innovator’s Way shows essential practices in innovation process. Those practices are all integrated into a non-sequential, coherent whole and style in the person of the innovator.
In the IT work there is lots of work where a little thinking can be a source of innovation. Automating IT processes can be a huge time saver or it can fail depending on situation. XKCD comic strip Automation as illustrates this:
System integration is a critical element in project design article has an interesting project cost influence graphic. The recommendation is to involve a system integrator early in project design to help ensure high-quality projects that satisfy project requirements. Of course this article tries to market system integration services, but has also valid points to consider.
Core Contributor Loop (CTTDC) from Art Journal blog posting Blog Is The New Black tries to link inventing an idea to theory of entrepreneurship. It is essential to tune the engine by making improvements in product, marketing, code, design and operations.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
4 Simple Remedies For Burnout Backed By Science
Feeling burnt out? Recharge with these four proven—and doable—strategies.
http://www.fastcompany.com/3038545/4-simple-remedies-for-burnout-backed-by-science
After working on a demanding grant application for a charity for several weeks, I was exhausted. When my boss asked me to perform simple tasks it was all I could do not to snap at her. And when my colleagues and friends asked how the new job was going, I made cynical jokes about how it was a waste of time.
I didn’t know it then, but I was burnt out.
Here are four scientifically proven ways you can avoid burnout and recharge.
1. Become More Selfish
In 1943, the American psychologist Abraham Maslow explained an individual can only be happy if they are able to express themselves and achieve their potential.
He called this self-actualization and cautioned that “the story of the human race is the story of men and women selling themselves short.”
If you spend your working day responding to the demands of other people or if you work only on projects only because you are told to, burnout is inevitable.
2. Tame The Monkey
Meditation has been around for thousands of years, but if the weight of history isn’t enough, a 2009 study from Denmark concluded long term meditation is associated with increased gray matter density in the brain stem.
If you struggle to include even 10 minutes of meditation into your day, there’s another trick you can use. The next time you find yourself working on a monotonous chore—like updating a routine spread sheet—avoid doing or thinking of anything else but the task at hand.
3. Purge Your Toxins
Exercise increases your heart rate, which in turn pumps blood faster and clears toxins from system. After a rigorous run or workout, you will naturally feel better about yourself and the project or colleague that’s raising your blood pressure.
4. Review The Battlefield
According to Heather Stuckey and Jeremy Nobel from the Foundation For Art & Healing, writing has “positive consequences” and can even produce “long-term improvements in mood and health.
You can experience these benefits by keeping a professional journal. At the end of the week or during a quiet moment take thirty minutes to evaluate your progress and difficulties you encountered over the past few days.
Record your accomplishments, what you’re working on, and what’s holding you back. You should also write down any open loops (things you’re unsure of) or questions about your ongoing commitments.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The last mile
The last mile or last mile is the term used for the operator in the world to describe a piece of it with wire will the consumer up to the porch.
The last mail of bloody competition will take place as the previous one thousand, since it is the visible part of the consumer. All of the above 999 miles above the threshold will be in vain, because their role is to support the living room in the corner of the socket.
User interface or experience is the last mile, through which the service or product the goodness is valued.
I believe that too many software and on-line global product and service interface is glued on top of the counter at the time when the pieces of the code is arranged in place and bolted to the architecture of the final floor. To design it, then smooth service experience and a flair for the user experience.
Source: http://summa.talentum.fi/article/tv/11-2014/108695
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google produces outrageously number of patents – acquiring a new company almost every other week
Google has turned towards today’s Rank Xerox. If in the 1970s wanted to know what the future holds for the technology, supported by Rank Xerox to follow the famous Parc laboratory was doing.
Google is the equivalent of Parcille, California is Google X laboratory where the scientists normally deal through the prism of development issues. Range from the self-managing events neural networks and robots, tears to measure the sugar content.
The technology company has two ways to develop a new one. The second is to do as much for yourself, the second is to buy promising companies.
Google’s focus is on the latter. It has acquired this year for the 33 companies, that is, the pace is almost the shopping per week.
The majority of purchases are small. Such is Google the only Finnish target, in the summer of acquired software drawElements.
Many of Google’s major development projects to establish acquired through acquisitions.
One example is the development of robots. Google acquired last year by six robotic companies, of which the best known is the US military robots developed by Boston Dynamics. It is the most interesting product is a four-legged BigDog. It is intended for the transport of goods terrain where vehicles are unable to move.
Google’s best-known project, the self-directed robotic vehicle development, is an exception to the rule: it is based mainly on self-development.
Google purchases may not be found in a clear coherent logic, the shopping industries vary from side to side. However, this year the shopping cart has been a striking number of AI-companies.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/uutisia/google+tuottaa+hillittoman+maaran+patentteja++hankkii+uuden+yrityksen+lahes+joka+toinen+viikko/a1029104
Tomi Engdahl says:
The New-ish Technologies That Will Alter Your Career
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/14/11/17/181202/the-new-ish-technologies-that-will-alter-your-career
Over at Dice, there’s a discussion of the technologies that could actually alter how you work (and what you work on) over the next few years, including 3D printing, embedded systems, and evolving Web APIs. Granted, predicting the future with any accuracy is a nigh-impossible feat, and a lot of nascent technologies come with an accompanying amount of hype.
5 Technologies That Could Alter Your Career
http://news.dice.com/2014/11/17/5-technologies-that-could-alter-your-career/
Internet of Things
Yes, “Internet of Things” is one of those marketing buzz-terms, but there really is a technological movement behind it.
Parallel Programming
Parallel programming has been around for some 50 years, give or take.
We now have technologies such as Intel’s Many Integrated Core (MIC) and Nvidia CUDA. Multicore programming is a much-needed discipline by software shops that want to create high-performance software that runs on desktop computers or even smaller devices.
3D Printing
While early versions of 3D printing drifted around labs for decades—a company called 3D Systems launched in 1986, on its way to building some core components of the industry a decade ago—the last two years have seen a huge boom in 3D printers, as the hardware’s become more affordable to startups and individuals in addition to huge companies with a lot of cash to burn.
Web APIs
Right now a site called ProgrammableWeb is tracking over 12,000 Web APIs. Many of these are RESTful APIs that can exchange data in JSON or XML. Why would you need these? Mobile apps and Web-based software need to communicate with different services.
Embedded Systems
One of the big things we’re seeing among makers (besides the growing popularity of Maker Fairs) is System-on-a-Chip technology. New “prototyping systems” such as Arduino, which allow people to tinker with ideas before building dedicated circuit boards, include SoC technology sophisticated enough to permit controlling, monitoring, and networking devices without the need for a full-fledged operating system.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Electric shock study suggests we’d rather hurt ourselves than others
http://news.sciencemag.org/brain-behavior/2014/11/electric-shock-study-suggests-wed-rather-hurt-ourselves-others
Tomi Engdahl says:
Rent-a-Geek
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/11/rent-a-geek/382770/?single_page=true&google_editors_picks=true
Vodafone Germany is testing out a new crowdsourced tech support that delivers tech support to your door in the form of other users—for a fee. Will U.S. providers adopt a similar model?
Germany, the country that brought us intricate trash-sorting and car-sharing programs featuring slick BMWs, has a new innovation: peer-to-peer tech support. The program, launched this autumn by mobile phone provider Vodafone, basically aims to give less savvy users access to cost-effective tech help delivered right to their doors in the form of other users. Remember that time your mom called you and asked, “How do I transfer my photos from the iPhone to my computer?” Now, instead of calling you, Vodafone will refer her to somebody else’s tech-savvy kid for support.
The platform is called “Vodafone Service Friends” and it’s designed to both help customers and shift work away from Vodafone store reps. Nearly all of the tech support members currently signed up are teens or people in their 20s. The idea, says Anastasia Albert of Mila.com—a Berlin-based startup similar to Angie’s List that’s running the program for Vodafone and charging its users for the service—is to offer support for a price of 10 to 25 euros an hour delivered right to users’s doors.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Scientists use Wikipedia search data to forecast spread of flu
http://www.baltimoresun.com/health/la-sci-sn-wikipedia-flu-disease-predictor-20141113-story.html
Can public health experts tell that an infectious disease outbreak is imminent simply by looking at what people are searching for on Wikipedia? Yes, at least in some cases.
Researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory were able to make extremely accurate forecasts about the spread of dengue fever in Brazil and flu in the U.S., Japan, Poland and Thailand by examining three years’ worth of Wikipedia search data.
Accurate data on the spread of infectious diseases can be culled from a variety of sources. Government agencies typically get it from patient interviews and laboratory test results. Other data sources include calls to 911 lines, emergency room admissions and absences from work or school.
The problem with these methods is that they can be time-consuming and costly. By the time the numbers are crunched, an outbreak may be in full swing.
When it comes to health, people have found correlations between interest in certain health topics on Wikipedia and sales of medications. Others have linked searches for flu-related topics by American Wikipedia users to actual flu spread in the U.S.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Myth Of AI
A Conversation with
Jaron Lanier [11.14.14]
http://edge.org/conversation/the-myth-of-ai
Tomi Engdahl says:
14 Views of Samsung’s Dev Con
Targeting health, VR, wearables, homes
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1324620&
Julien Penders was just one of hundreds of attendees at the Samsung Developer Conference. But few here had worked more closely or bet so heavily on the Korean company as the young entrepreneur who launched his digital health company, Bloom Technologies, at the event.
Digital health was one of four growth areas in which Samsung rolled out new software developer kits at the conference, seeking to build ecosystems around its smartphones and tablets. Increasingly, its mobile Linux variant, Tizen, is a key ingredient in offerings targeting the smart home, virtual reality, and wearables.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fujitsu boss sets CDOs against CIOs at annual do
EMEAI chief tells traditionalists: ‘Don’t be a bottleneck’
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/18/fujitsu_boss_sets_cdos_against_cios/
Traditional IT and CIOs are often seen as a corporate bottleneck, Duncan Tait, the European boss of Fujitsu warned Tuesday, as chief digital officers increasingly take the reins.
Such upstarts had little truck with traditional ways of doing IT, said Tait, which may in part explain why the Japanese IT giant has pledged to pour $354m into upgrading its own delivery business after years of balkanization and successive reorganisations left it fragmented.
Who exactly will be making the final calls on IT strategy was also up for debate, Tait suggested, with “traditional IT” and IT bosses in danger of forming a decision-making bottleneck.
CDOs – who, where they actually exist, may have more strategic sway than traditional IT ops types – often see CIOs as “not doing stuff properly”, Tait said.
However, Tait argued that firms still needed people with traditional IT skills to guide them as they digitalised their businesses, namely building digital technology right through their value chain, even if the products remain analogue.
However, those IT skills might come from an external partner – someone such as … Fujitsu.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ask Slashdot: Professionally Packaged Tools For Teaching Kids To Program?
http://ask.slashdot.org/story/14/11/18/1958230/ask-slashdot-professionally-packaged-tools-for-teaching-kids-to-program
I recently found an online course for modding Minecraft that my 9-year-old daughter is really enjoying (she built a custom sword that shoots lightning).
http://www.youthdigital.com/mod-design-1-special.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
U.K. Government Funds Free Online Courses Teaching Startup Skills
http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/18/digital-business-academy/
A tech industry-backed, U.K. government-funded initiative offering free online courses to those wanting to learn commercial digital business skills goes live today, aiming to upskill Brits to work for tech companies or even start their own startup.
The wider narrative here is of course the need to reconfigure the skills of the working population to ensure they’re fit for a more digitally focused national economy. (And create a skills bolster as automation spins up to consume certain types of jobs over the coming decades.)
The newly launched Digital Business Academy is being overseen by Tech City, working in partnership with a range of educational institutions and tech mentorship organizations — including Cambridge University Judge Business School, University College London (UCL), and Founder Centric
Tomi Engdahl says:
The two projects probably need to be understood in the context of the company’s innovation forum, an event at which the Hitachi group talked up its ambition to assist “social innovation” with its many products.
a vision for using all of the company’s assets to develop analytics-driven products and services that enable governments to meet the demands of swelling populations and the stresses they place on resources.
Enthusiasm for this concept is high in Asia. Mobile device penetration is soaring across even the region’s less prosperous nations and citizens are keen for better service delivery from their governments and businesses.
Whatever the political implications of smart cities, Hitachi wants in and HDS’ expertise in building kit and doing system integration are apparently seen as key assets for the group’s push into social innovation.
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/19/hds_working_on_hyperscale_converged_iot_and_smart_cities_rig/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fujitsu CTO: We’ll be 3D-printing tech execs in 15 years
Fleshy techie disses network neutrality, helmet-less motorcyclists
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/19/fujitsu_cto_predicts_3d_printed_executives/
Fujitsu’s CTO slapped down the net neutrality dogmatists yesterday, saying the flood of data due to the emergence of the internet of things meant society would force a new pricing model.
Joseph Reger told a crowd of journalists at Fujitsu Forum that entertainment devices were swallowing ever more bandwidth, while machine-to-machine communications were generating more data, and connected vehicles were on the horizon.
Reger said: “We have to redefine what net neutrality means.
“If net neutrality means that very service and every connection needs to have the same priority all the time, then I think we are running into a problem.”
“Certain services might need to have a priority,” he continued. “But that you go out and just make a profit according to your own will, that is something that needs to be discussed.”
“Society has to decide if certain developments are acceptable or not,” he concluded
Society, ethics and legislation also came into play when it came to the rise of autonomous cars and other autonomous systems, Reger said. Developers of autonomous systems could not be expected to cover every eventuality with rules-based approaches common in software development: “The system has to guess.”
Reger also pondered the impact of 3D printing, which is part of the Industry 4.0 zeitgeist being explored in Germany. He said 3D printing genuinely offered the prospect of moving manufacturing of some products closer to their markets.
“The product is now a bunch of data…which can be downloaded to a place. You can print things that you cannot mill, you cannot shape you cannot press, you cannot cut around because of the geometrical nature of it.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
XLHEALTH
http://xlhealth.de/en/
XLHEALTH is an investor in startups of the IT healthcare industry.
XLHEALTH offers all you need to become successful with your health IT startup!
Join our network of entrepreneurs and create the future of “Digital Health – Made in Germany”!
XLHEALTH stands for Open Space Innovation: grow by inspiring exchange in our shared co-working space. Every participating Digital Health Startup strengthens its network, increases productivity and its level of innovation.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mouser aims to inspire with Mythbuster
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/serious-fun/4437325/Mouser-aims-to-inspire-with-Mythbuster?elq=8d79b896806445e4a47affd6fbe35e87&elqCampaignId=20257
Global distributor Mouser Electronics hosted Grant Imahara, a celebrity engineer, best known for his role on Mythbusters, at its Electronica booth this week to kick off its “Empowering Innovation Together” campaign.
Mouser will create a series of webisode videos with Imahara (photo, right) as the host, featuring creative engineers worldwide, as well as features on the newest products and technical expertise to help speed new designs.
In addition to his roles on Mythbusters and Battlebots, Imahara is the inventor behind many famous robotic characters – including the Star Wars prequel-era R2-D2; the Late Late Show’s Craig Ferguson sidekick, Geoff Peterson, the talking robot; and the rhythmic arms on the modern day Energizer Bunny.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to Help STEM the Tide of Unfilled Tech Jobs
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1324683&
How do we inspire the next generation to be creators, not just consumers, of technology?
The Internet of Things (IoT) is in that burgeoning stage when anything can happen. The first bugs haven’t shown up, companies aren’t too worried about the investment, and consumers aren’t yet panicked about privacy and security. And even after these hurdles begin to appear, many expect IoT to take off like the proverbial hockey stick. We’re entering an era of exponential growth where change is accelerating and standing still is not an option.
To effectively compete, businesses and organizations will need employees with science, technology, engineering, and applied mathematics (STEM) degrees. STEM builds critical thinking abilities and changes the way we view and experience the world around us. And yet, by the time this fall’s incoming freshman class, graduates from college, some 230,000 high-paying jobs in the STEM professions will go unfilled due to a shortage of qualified advanced-degree workers, according to the Department of Education.
It’s not because the jobs are unattractive.
As these jobs become more essential, the pay for qualified STEM workers will also rise faster than the average, according to numerous studies.
Here is what we know about the root of the problem in the USA: In elementary school, two-thirds of students say they like science and math, but by the time they get to middle school — a time when self-image is developing, and decisions are often based on what their peers think — the two-thirds has shrunk to one-third. Girls in particular begin to drift away from science and math, which is seen as geeky or nerdy.
What next?
So how do we inspire them? How do we inspire our children to be creators of technology, not just consumers of it?
One proven method is to expose them to real-life role models and mentors.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nokia Sensing XChallenge Has a Winner
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1324687&
The team that developed a handheld device that can provide hundreds of diagnostic values from a single drop of blood has won the Nokia Sensing XChallenge.
DNA Medical Institute (DMI) calls its device rHealth, short for Reusable Handheld Electrolyte and Lab Technology for Humans. rHealth can tell the user within minutes whether he or she has a cold, the flu, pneumonia, or even Ebola, according to a statement from the contest organization. The Cambridge, Mass.-based company won the $525,000 prize.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Not like this:
Barbie book implies girls can’t be coders; Mattel apologizes
http://www.cnet.com/news/barbie-book-implies-girls-cant-be-coders-mattel-apologizes/#ftag=CADf328eec
Mattel says a Barbie book that suggests girls can’t handle computer code doesn’t reflect its brand vision. That won’t stop the uproar surrounding the title, which is still available to buy.
Can girls be coders? A picture book titled “Barbie: I Can Be a Computer Engineer,” published in 2010, has set off a current firestorm of negative Amazon reviews because of its clueless handling of the subject of women and girls in technology. According to the book, aimed at girls aged 3 through 7, computer engineering is too hard for Barbie. Mattel, the company behind Barbie, is distancing itself from it.
The book starts off promisingly enough
It turns out Barbie is actually incapable of doing anything truly technical. “I’m only creating the design ideas,” she says. “I’ll need Steven’s and Brian’s help to turn it into a real game!”
From there, the book spirals downward.
flash drive turns out to be the source of the virus, which she promptly infects her sister’s computer with.
At this point, we’ve descended into a strange Lynchian world
It seems like some good intentions went awry here. On one hand, Barbie absolutely should be a computer engineer. There’s even an I Can Be a Computer Engineer Barbie doll
Criticism of the book, which was originally published in 2010, recently surfaced
Amazon user T adds this: “This is possibly the most irresponsible children’s book ever published. The title should really be a question: ‘Can I be a computer engineer?’ And the answer, according to this book, is ‘No! Silly Barbie, take all that hard programming stuff to the boys! It will be faster if they just do it for you.’ Aarrrrgghhhh.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Are MPs smarter than 5-year-olds? We’ll soon find out at coding school – Berners-Lee
Web daddy in near-impossible politician-upgrade challenge
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/17/send_mps_back_to_school_to_learn_coding_says_berners_lee/
The inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, has urged British MPs to learn how to code – in what could arguably be seen as his most ambitious call to action yet.
Speaking at The Guardian’s Every Second Counts Forum he said coding skills would equip MPs with the ability to legislate more effectively on technology.
“Being able to code means that you understand what people can do with a computer. You need to be able to understand what people can do with a computer to make laws about it,” he said.
“We need more people in Parliament who can code; not because we need them to spend their time coding but because they have got to understand how powerful a weapon it is, so that they can make laws that require people to code to make machines behave in different ways.”
In September, coding came into force as part of the national curriculum, with youngsters from the age of five now learning programming skills.
Such skills could also be useful for MPs also looking for work after the next election.
Tomi Engdahl says:
“Many times people are joining CERN with the knowledge of the tools from university,” says Bell. “So it means that the training time is considerably less – you can buy a book that will tell you about Puppet whereas in the past you would have had to sit down with the guru to understand how the old system worked.”
“As part of CERN’s mission, it’s not only the physics. There is a clear goal for CERN to act also as a goal for people to arrive spend a short period of time at CERN – up to five years on short term contract – and then return to their home countries with those additional skills. That could be engineering, [equally] it could be physics and computing.”
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/20/cern_it_chief_on_clouds/
Tomi Engdahl says:
TechShop | TechCrunch Makers
http://techcrunch.com/video/techshop-techcrunch-makers/518429924/
This episode of Makers features the San Francisco outpost of the Makerspace TechShop.
Tomi Engdahl says:
With Assembly, anyone can contribute to open-source software and actually get paid
A new startup wants to evolve open-source methods, adding a wide range of skills and profit sharing
http://www.theverge.com/2014/11/21/7258667/assembly-collaborative-work-open-source
The open-source movement has produced some of the most widely utilized software in the world, a huge economic value driven by a widely dispersed community who believe contributing good work is often its own reward. Outside of the world of computer science, however, these strategies are still relatively niche. A San Francisco startup called Assembly is trying to change all that, by evolving the open-source model to easily incorporate disciplines outside coding and to include a shared profit motive as well. Today the company is announcing a $2.9 million round of funding it will use to help expand its platform.
With Assembly, a part-time entrepreneur like Kaneda can open source any number of tasks he might need for his business: designing a new logo, creating an email marketing campaign, and researching the best cloud-hosting solution, for example. Since the business doesn’t have outside funding or stock options, Assembly lets him set the reward as a percentage of future earnings and handles the work of dividing and distributing that revenue stream.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Culture Is King in Job Search
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1324714&
Programmers, web developers, and software engineers often assume that technical skills land jobs and lead to career success, but in today’s startup landscape, company culture is king.
I would never suggest that technical skills are overrated.
However, too many applicants make the mistake of thinking that technical skills are all that matter. “If my skills are strong enough,” the thinking goes, “I’ll get the job and climb the ladder to the top.” But there are two fundamental problems with this mindset, especially as it pertains to today’s thriving tech startup environment.
The first problem is underestimating the importance of company culture to employers.
More and more, tech startups tend to be younger, smaller, and flatter, leading these employers to care even more about a cultural fit with their workers. Your boss is less likely to be a 50-year-old in a distant corner office who only has to interact with you two or three hours a day; instead, he might sit directly across from you for 10 hours a day. Younger companies also value lifestyle more: The team goes out for drinks, employees invite each other to birthday parties, and colleagues play in weekend soccer leagues. In a more intimate and inclusive environment, employers want to hire people who share the same values and interests.
“We put a lot more emphasis on the hiring process now than we did at first,” says Agrawal. “We’re a quirky group. We like to have fun. And we’ve built this company up through not micromanaging people. We believe that people create beauty through their work when they’re free to innovate and experiment. But that means that we want people who are entrepreneurial at heart — people who thrive without us looking over their shoulders.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to Help STEM the Tide of Unfilled Tech Jobs
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1324683&
How do we inspire the next generation to be creators, not just consumers, of technology?
The Internet of Things (IoT) is in that burgeoning stage when anything can happen. The first bugs haven’t shown up, companies aren’t too worried about the investment, and consumers aren’t yet panicked about privacy and security. And even after these hurdles begin to appear, many expect IoT to take off like the proverbial hockey stick. We’re entering an era of exponential growth where change is accelerating and standing still is not an option.
IoT will have a significant impact in just about every industry and will ultimately transform each and every business into a data-driven tech business. In an increasingly competitive global marketplace, technology will deliver a competitive advantage.
To effectively compete, businesses and organizations will need employees with science, technology, engineering, and applied mathematics (STEM) degrees. STEM builds critical thinking abilities and changes the way we view and experience the world around us. And yet, by the time this fall’s incoming freshman class graduates from college, some 230,000 high-paying jobs in the STEM professions will go unfilled due to a shortage of qualified advanced-degree workers, according to the Department of Education.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Lavish Perks Spawn New Job Category
At Tech Companies, Aim-to-Please Specialists Provide Yoga Classes, Jell-O Shots; ‘We’re Like Little Elves’
http://online.wsj.com/articles/lavish-perks-spawn-new-job-category-1416529198
In the 1980s, technology companies helped pioneer creation of the chief information officer to straddle the worlds of general management and tech. Now, competition among technology companies to outdo each other’s extraordinary perks has grown so fierce that it is spawning another new job category.
At companies hoping to be the next big thing and older ones trying to keep up, the role of office manager has transformed into a so-called workplace coordinator, who often leads a staff of aim-to-please specialists. Such employees function as concierges, responsible for everything from planning outings to memorizing favorite granola-bar flavors.
Tech companies say it is hard to avoid creating at least one full-time position devoted to the pursuit of worker happiness once a company hires about 100 employees.
“If you had asked me five years ago, I never would have known this existed in a job description,”
Kenny Van Zant, Asana’s chief operating officer, says free yoga classes, in-house chefs and other goodies enable workers to focus fully on work. They are more productive when they don’t have to dash out for lunch or to the gym.
“We don’t want them stressing out about regular life,” he says. Asana spends tens of thousands of dollars a year per employee on perks, which Mr. Van Zant says is “easily” equivalent to between 10% and 15% of salaries.
Tech companies expect the benefits to keep workers in the office later at night—and longer before they are tempted to quit for another job. “It is an interesting and moderately dirty tactic,” says Jeff Winter, chief executive of San Francisco recruiting firm GravityPeople.
Tomi Engdahl says:
LinkedIn Study: US Attracting Fewer Educated, Highly Skilled Migrants
http://it.slashdot.org/story/14/11/24/1754204/linkedin-study-us-attracting-fewer-educated-highly-skilled-migrants
The U.S. economy has long been powered in part by the nation’s ability to attract the world’s most educated and skilled people to its shores. But a new study of the worldwide migration of professionals to the U.S. shows a sharp drop-off in its proportional share of those workers – raising the question of whether the nation will remain competitive in attracting top talent in an increasingly globalized economy.
Study: US attracting fewer educated, highly skilled migrants
http://www.washington.edu/news/2014/11/24/study-us-attracting-fewer-educated-highly-skilled-migrants/
The study, which was presented at the recent SocInfo conference in Barcelona, Spain, found that:
While 27 percent of migrating professionals among the sample group chose the U.S. as a destination in 2000, in 2012 just 13 percent did.
The decline was seen across professionals with bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees.
The biggest drop was among those in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields, from 37 to 15 percent.
Asian countries saw the highest increase in professional migrants worldwide, attracting a cumulative 26 percent in 2012, compared with just 10 percent in 2000.
Australia, Oceania, Africa and Latin America also saw an uptick in their share of the world’s professional migration flows.
The U.S. attracted 24 percent of graduates from the top 500 universities worldwide in 2000, but just 12 percent in 2012.
“These other countries are attracting not only a higher share of migrants, but also migrants from the top universities in the world,” Zagheni said. “That was surprising.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
And the award for the world’s most tech-savvy country goes to …
… Denmark, ahead of South Korea, with Blighty climbing the charts and the USA in 12th spot
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/25/and_the_award_for_the_worlds_most_techsavvy_country_goes_to/
The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has issued its annual Measuring the Information Society report and found that Denmark is the world’s most technologically-developed nation.
South Korea scored the win in the last version of the report, but is now in second. Results for other big Reg-reading nations include:
The UK climbing from seventh to fifth;
The USA remaining steady in twelfth spot;
Australia retaining its fourteenth rank;
Canada climbing two spots to rank twenty-third;
India staying in 129th place;
Germany climbing one spot to seventeenth;
China jumping two spots to 89th, while Hong Kong sits in fourth and Macao sits in twenty-fifth place.
http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Documents/publications/mis2014/MIS2014_without_Annex_4.pdf
Tomi Engdahl says:
Researchers Say the Tech Worker Shortage Doesn’t Really Exist
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/14/11/25/0623241/researchers-say-the-tech-worker-shortage-doesnt-really-exist
“There’s no evidence of any way, shape, or form that there’s a shortage in the conventional sense,”
The Tech Worker Shortage Doesn’t Really Exist
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-11-24/the-tech-worker-shortage-doesnt-really-exist
“There’s no evidence of any way, shape, or form that there’s a shortage in the conventional sense,” says Hal Salzman, a professor of planning and public policy at Rutgers University. “They may not be able to find them at the price they want. But I’m not sure that qualifies as a shortage, any more than my not being able to find a half-priced TV.”
For a real-life example of an actual worker shortage, Salzman points to the case of petroleum engineers, where the supply of workers has failed to keep up with the growth in oil exploration. The result, says Salzman, was just what economists would have predicted: Employers started offering more money, more people started becoming petroleum engineers, and the shortage was solved. In contrast, Salzman concluded in a paper released last year by the liberal Economic Policy Institute, real IT wages are about the same as they were in 1999. Further, he and his co-authors found, only half of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) college graduates each year get hired into STEM jobs. “We don’t dispute the fact at all that Facebook (FB) and Microsoft (MSFT) would like to have more, cheaper workers,” says Salzman’s co-author Daniel Kuehn, now a research associate at the Urban Institute. “But that doesn’t constitute a shortage.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
A decade of cost reductions and job cuts has soured Sony’s culture of innovation
“The innovation program is very important, but it will take time and require some risk-taking,” said Sadao Nagaoka, a professor at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo who studies innovation and serves as an economic adviser to Japan’s Patent Office. “It’s not that Sony ran out of new ideas, but rather, it’s taking too long to restructure, and gigantic losses have starved new businesses of funds.”
Hirai’s new division is aiming to come up with products and services that don’t fit the mold of Sony’s existing businesses.
Besides the e-paper watch, the group is developing technology building blocks designed to help professionals and amateurs rapidly create prototypes of new products. The MESH project — for make, experience and share — is a collection of sensors, light-emitting diodes and buttons encased in colorful blocks smaller than a pack of chewing gum. The devices are linked wirelessly and can be operated via a tablet interface, friendly to people without programming or engineering skills.
The division also includes Sony’s Seed Acceleration Program, which was set up so any employee with a good idea can pitch for venture financing. Would-be entrepreneurs make their proposals either to other employees or to a panel of outside experts, in which case their pitch remains anonymous, said one of the people. The startup process includes an audition, incubation and implementation stages that emphasize speed and profitability.
Hirai has struggled to turn the company around as he faces rising competition in mobile phones and games, and soft demand for televisions and cameras. Sony is set to pile up more than 1 trillion yen ($8.5 billion) of losses since 2010.
“Sony’s trouble is not just with targeting the right technologies — they also have problems in terms of management, corporate governance and so on,” said Keun Lee, a professor of economics at Seoul National University who writes about disruptive innovation. “Tapping diverse sources for knowledge and communicating across the company’s silos can be one source of recovery.”
Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-26/sony-said-to-plan-e-paper-watch-in-test-of-innovation.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
All the coding ladies
By Christine Ley – November 21, 2014
http://www.igloosoftware.com/blogs/inside-igloo/all_the_coding_ladies
After Barbie’s latest shenanigans, Igloo decided it was time to put the spotlight on all the amazing ladies who are helping to build our platform. Here are their stories.
Tomi Engdahl says:
“Dot-Org” Boards—A Symptom of Advancement and a Source of New Designs
http://rtcmagazine.com/articles/view/103845
Recently I had the opportunity to have a prolonged discussion about open source software and whether it made sense to download and use an open source operating system as the foundation for commercial products. My opinion was emphatically that it did not. To create a commercial product with a unique added value, it does is not practical to download an OS, configure it with needed components from other sources, test all this, document it and then be prepared to support it for customers. That is especially so when the customers are buying your product for its perceived value added, which is not the value of the underlying operating system.
Somewhat less well known is the world of open source hardware. This is a world of very low-cost processor boards with a complement of interfaces, peripherals, schematics and tools and which are mostly supported by groups of enthusiasts and serious developers. They have names like Anduino, Gizmo, BeagleBoard, Minnowboard and Raspberry Pi. They include modern, powerful CPUs and MCUs and in some versions come complete with development kits. Many of them are openly available from their own organizations as well as well-known distributors and even from Amazon.com—usually for $100 or less.
Now it has long been possible for hobbyists to purchase PC motherboards and tinker away at building their own PC. Now they have low-cost access to modules that can be used for embedded systems as well. And in many cases, they also have access to a community of tinkerers and developers through web-based associations where they can share ideas, designs, software and even finished projects. They can find and acquire such things as compatible displays. That is why I, at least, have given these things the nickname “dot-org boards.”
There is also a cultural aspect to all this and that is that with their ease of use and especially with their price, kits like these are getting into the hands of kids, who are already more computer savvy than any of us dare imagine. Schools are starting to take advantage of them and science fairs are showing the results. What was once considered the realm of advanced engineers and scientists is now becoming commonplace for bright kids, hobbyists and tinkerers much like the ham radio technology of the past (or maybe not so past).
Tomi Engdahl says:
As-a-service upstarts will KILL OFF THE CORPORATES?
Um, NOT BLOODY LIKELY!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/26/staffasaservice_sites_will_kill_off_the_corporates/
Amazingly, economists have figured out a few things…even things that can help in this brave new digital world. One of these is the “marketplaces vs firm” debate.
So I was surprised to find a fascinating little piece in TechCrunch singing the praises of all those “online freelance work marketplace” sites. You know the sort of things: ODesk, ELance, Mechanical Turk.
Marketplaces Are Eating Firms
http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/22/marketplaces-are-eating-firms/?ncid=rss
If software is eating the world, then marketplaces are one of the agents of destruction. Marketplaces are eating every type of firm on the planet. Let’s look at where the feasting is happening.
With the majority of the work going to individual freelancers rather than small agencies around the world, oDesk is killing the traditional outsourcing firm. UpCounsel is trying to consume the law firm, especially for small businesses that find the cost of lawyers to be offensive. RecruitLoop, which is innovating on the delivery model and providing hourly-based recruiters, is trying to displace the recruiting firm. Rev is gobbling translation and transcription firms with fast, affordable, and high-quality service that is beating traditional providers. Contently, which is providing high-quality original content, is biting off pieces of PR and marketing firms. And yes, AngelList syndicates are trying to kill VC firms.
Many startups are trying to disrupt the traditional “firm” structure. The biggest driver of adoption is the massive cost savings that these marketplaces provide. For example, a marketplace with low fees is a very efficient delivery mechanism. Typical markups in law firms or consulting firms might be 4x, e.g. a worker making $50 per hour would get billed out at $200. The same person on a marketplace might raise their rate to $75 to compensate for utilization, but the end price to the customer might end up at $85 – $95 per hour.
The simple reason for this cost savings is the reduction in overhead. Freelance labor marketplaces don’t have middle layers of managers and other support staff, they have independent contractors rather than employees, and they don’t have the cost of office space. The cost savings are dramatic.
Turnaround time and quality are also key service attributes that marketplaces are providing.
Quality is always difficult to define and measure, but customers know it when they see it. Many firms have had decades to refine their internal tools and processes to produce consistently high-quality results, whereas, marketplaces are much earlier in their evolution and are in a building phase.
Shared Reputation. The reputation of McKinsey is excellent. There’s a saying, “Nobody has been fired for hiring McKinsey.” That saying is a result of a very good reputation of the firm built up over many decades. It is brand building.
Until recently, individual reputation was hard to know.
Guaranteed Quality. The guaranteed quality is a big benefit of turning to well-established firms. Buyers know that firms will stand by their work.
In completely open marketplaces, quality is at the control of the buyer who makes the hiring decision. However, in many new marketplaces, there is a much higher degree of vetting and curating of the suppliers. Therefore, the marketplace is guaranteeing the quality, much in the same manner that a firm would.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The gender imbalance in IT is real, ongoing and ridiculous
The Z80 and 6502 generation wore the sexist stereotype, now it’s up to them to fix it
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/27/the_gender_imbalance_in_it_is_real_ongoing_and_ridiculous/
Something happened between the early and late 1980s that turned IT into a male-dominated profession. And not just male-dominated, but something just on this side of misogynistic.
There were always a few brave women with enough sheer pluck to stick it out in these frat house working environments, but by and large men climbed into their IT clubhouse, stuck a NO GIRLS sign on the door, and held that line for a generation.
The closing of IT to women began when marketers identified young, nerdy males as the key to sales of those first-generation machines. The mostly-male subculture of hobby microcomputing grew into advertising and media messaging that completely cut women out of the computing revolution. In 1983’s War Games, Matthew Broderick hacks into WOPR while Ally Sheedy looks on in wonder. That’s Hollywood telling women they don’t have a meaningful role in IT.
The War Games generation have grown up. Now principal engineers and senior managers, their perceptions of gender and competence in IT have translated into an industry whose conferences and culture, frequently described as ‘sausagefests’, consist of men talking to men.
Yes, there are exceptions. There are always exceptions. But the existence of these exceptions proves the point: the gender imbalance in IT is real, it’s ongoing, and it’s ridiculous.
No one has to say this explicitly. A young woman simply needs to cast her eye on the way the culture around IT has developed over the last 30 years to see this for herself.
In 1970, women had a two professional career paths open to them. Today, every professional path will take them in – except IT.
It’s up to us to fix this.
Tomi Engdahl says:
UK Announces Hybrid Work/Study Undergraduate Program To Fill Digital Gap
http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/11/27/0032202/uk-announces-hybrid-workstudy-undergraduate-program-to-fill-digital-gap
The UK’s Digital Economy Minister Ed Vaizey today revealed a new scheme where undergraduates will be able to avoid student fees and student loans by working for companies for three years whilst simultaneously undertaking academic studies with participating universities, resulting in a degree at the end of their successful involvement in the scheme.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Closing the Skills Gap With a Talent Supply Chain
http://www.uschamberfoundation.org/closing-skills-gap-talent-supply-chain
Few readers will be surprised to learn that a skills gap is affecting the U.S. economy. U.S. employers are not able to find employees with the skills needed for open positions, and most unemployed job seekers agree they need additional education and training to get the jobs they seek. While this gap isn’t new, it is growing and will affect standards of living if we don’t start addressing it now.
We have seen time and again that when you build partnerships and apply different perspectives and experiences to solving problems, you achieve a greater outcome than any single participant could have achieved on their own. We believe this approach is needed to meet the challenges faced by the 21st century workforce
But this problem is complex—impacting millions of people—and growing. According to Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, 5 million U.S. jobs will be unfilled in 2020 due to the skills gap
In our recent report, U.S. States: For Richer, For Poorer? Winning the battle for talent and securing our standard of Living, we determined that if America does not “respond with urgency and decisiveness to address the fundamental challenges in [our] labor markets, [we] will see declines in productivity growth and a shrinking workforce,” and ultimately, a 9% decline in the standard of living by 2030.
A key element of the “talent supply chain” concept is that it is driven by demand. Any effort to close the skills gap must be grounded in an understanding of the skills and competencies demanded by employers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Announcing the 2014 Corporate Citizenship Awards Finalists
http://www.uschamberfoundation.org/blog/post/announcing-2014-corporate-citizenship-awards-finalists/41834
Every day, businesses serve as a powerful force for good around the world. Whether through disaster relief and recovery, STEM education initiatives, or women’s economy empowerment, businesses help solve today’s greatest challenges through innovation, expertise, efficiency, capital, and collaboration.
This year’s finalists show the significant, positive impact business makes around the world.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Issie Lapowsky / Wired:
Startup studios gain popularity as tech elite look for ways to pursue multiple projects simultaneously, reduce risk when any one product fails
The Next Big Thing You Missed: Tech Superstars Build ‘Startup Factories’
http://www.wired.com/2014/11/startup-factories/
The startup world is driven by a familiar formula: you get an idea, you build a product based on your idea, you start a business to sell your product, your business succeeds—or, more likely, it fails—and you start all over again, looking for a new idea.
Lately, however, a new formula has begun to take hold, one that challenges the very idea of how a business should be built. It plays out quite differently: you start a business, your business experiments with lots of ideas, many ideas fail but some succeed, you turn these ideas into new businesses, and the formula repeats on its own. Or at least, you hope it will.
There are lots of names for companies that follow this formula. Some call them “startup studios” or “startup factories,” while others refer to this style of business building as “parallel entrepreneurship.” But whatever you call it, it’s a model that’s catching on with some of the top names in tech.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Your Part in the Recovery
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1324774&
Engineers and innovators are central to the slow but ongoing economic recovery, a top economist told a recent gathering of semiconductor executives.
As bad as things seem sometimes, there’s always some reason to be grateful.
Many leading economists these days subscribe to a hypothesis called secular stagnation
“Basically, this theory says, ‘Get used to disappointment,’” Goolsbee said. However, “the evidence is that’s totally wrong.”
The economist, who proved to be a pretty funny keynote speaker, gave a few reasons for his optimism. For example, the US is aging, but that is manageable, since the population is expected to grow to 400 million, and healthcare inflation is slowing. In addition, US productivity remains high without much wage inflation at a time when the rest of the world is watching costs increase.
Perhaps most significantly, “the US remains one of the most innovative and entrepreneurial countries,” he told his San Jose high tech audience. “That is the thing that will save us.”
But the economist didn’t advise opening any champagne, either. The next 12-18 months will look pretty much like the last 3-4 years, with modest growth, he predicted.
With tensions in Europe, China’s slowdown, and the threat of war in the Middle East, “don’t count on the rest of the world saving us. Everyone else [is] in a currency devaluation process,” he said. “Half of the world doesn’t care about your problems, and the other 20% is glad about them.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
UK will miss the Internet of Things boat without a major boost in development
Digital Catapult CEO says UK needs IoT test beds so investors don’t go overseas
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2383666/uk-will-miss-the-internet-of-things-boat-without-a-major-boost-in-development
THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE of the London Digital Catapult centre has warned that the UK needs to ramp up development for the “huge revolution” that is the Internet of Things (IoT) or risk “losing out in the global race”.
“There is a huge amount of innovation coming [and] the IoT is a revolution that the UK should be a leader in. We have all the assets and all the strengths to do it,” he said.
Test beds are particularly important for the UK because it is only when people “get out and test ideas in what will be a legacy environment” that interoperability problems come to light.
“If we don’t take this opportunity we will once again create the ideas that everyone else commercialises.”
The idea is to advance the UK’s best digital ideas by bringing data to the forefront of the digital industry with a focus on four major challenges: trust and personal data; the IoT; building diverse datasets; and reducing licensing friction.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google Execs Have Ideas on How to Run Your Business
The ex-CEO and another longtime Google executive say the “new style of managing” they developed should be widely copied.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/531056/google-execs-have-ideas-on-how-to-run-your-business/
Google is daring, creative, and by multiple accounts an enviable place to work—but is the way it’s run a model for other companies to follow? After all, quintessentially Googley practices like giving people free time to pursue projects are easier to follow if you enjoy very large profits from a product that has remained unbeatable for a decade.
Schmidt: I believe, I guess immodestly, that Google did invent some new ways of managing, and we have tried to document them. It’s up to you to take advantage of this and apply it in your situation. I think both of us believe that the stuff we talk about in the book can be applied to new tech companies but also established companies.
Most companies think that the set of stuff that needs to be done is much more onerous than it really is today, and that’s because they’re not thinking in terms of information, reach, and computing power. They’re thinking in terms of the inputs that go into the old 20th-century manufacturing world. If you look at software today, much software is built on open standards. We have much more powerful APIs. It’s very easy to do things, like the guys at Waze did or the guys at Uber did, to put information together and accomplish something very significant with a very small number of people.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Saying Hello to Ello, an Ad-Free Facebook Alternative
A social network avoids ads and elevates design.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/531231/saying-hello-to-ello-an-ad-free-facebook-alternative/
The contrast is intentional. Created by designer and entrepreneur Paul Budnitz, Ello contends that on social networks like Facebook, we, the users, are the product, as our data is sold to advertisers who hope to entice us with ads in our feeds. Ello, on the other hand, positions itself as an antidote to that: it doesn’t include any ads, and one of several manifestos posted on the site says that those behind Ello “dislike ads more than almost anyone else out there.” It doesn’t sell user data to third parties, either, and you can decide whether or not you want to let it gather information about your own Ello activity to improve the site. To make money, it plans to take up a “freemium” model where it sells features to users.
This anti-ad (and in many ways, anti-Facebook) ethos, coupled with a stark, simple design that looks as if the German industrial designer Dieter Rams had created a more social version of Tumblr, is probably not causing many people to ditch Facebook, but it is making plenty of them curious about the new social network.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Art and Tech Share the Stage at New SF Startup Storefront
http://recode.net/2014/11/25/art-and-tech-share-the-stage-at-new-sf-startup-storefront/
A coalition of artists are taking over a derelict old theater in the heart of the San Francisco’s Mission neighborhood, turning it into a tech-artists’ incubator, and opening the city’s first startup exhibition space and shop.
A startup shop?
“Yes. What if you tried to pack every startup into a gallery store? If a startup tried to build Best Buy, what would it look like?” said Robert Stephens, the former Best Buy CTO who invented the “Geek Squad” and is now leading the storefront project. “What if you invited startups to have some physical space where they can demonstrate their stuff?”
He went on: “We’ll have like August Smart Lock, Skylabs, Electric Objects, Square. The lighting, I’ll maybe go with GE Wink. Every outlet, every sensor, every surface, even the glass,” Stephen said. “I’m sure there are companies that do LCD display glass and a chandelier made of projectors so companies can project their work on the wall if they don’t have a physical product.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
One of technology’s time-honored traditions is getting intellectual property by buying companies rich in ideas but poor in cash or connections. Burroughs Corp., for example, got the Nixie tube in 1955 by buying Haydu Brothers Laboratories. And Apple famously acquired a smart new operating system (and “reacquired” Steve Jobs) in 1996, when it bought NeXT Computer. Twitter got a search engine when it bought Summize in 2008.
Google has embraced this trend with a vengeance, buying more than 170 companies over the past 13 years. Voice over Internet Protocol, video hosting, Web analytics, mobile devices, GPS navigation, and visual search are just a few of the examples of technologies that were absorbed into the Google empire
Source: http://spectrum.ieee.org/robotics/artificial-intelligence/the-unknown-startup-that-built-googles-first-selfdriving-car
Tomi Engdahl says:
Disney princesses show Barbie how to get kids to code
Frozen’s Anna and Elsa lead the charge for women in IT
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/opinion/2383975/disney-princesses-show-barbie-how-to-get-kids-to-code
THE CODING MOVEMENT has really gathered momentum this year, with educators and governments in the UK and across the pond trying to encourage people to discover their inner geek, especially youngsters.
In the UK, much of this effort has centred around the curriculum and coding clubs. Schools are being pressured to teach programming skills as part of the general school day, while organsiations like Code Club are running after-school activities led by teachers and volunteers from the tech industry.
Over in the US, the push is being driven by Codecademy, which got some high-profile support a couple of years ago when then-NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced he was going to be learning how to code using the online programme, and calling on others to do the same. In its latest effort to promote IT skills, Codecademy has launched a workforce development initiative called ReskillUSA, which aims to help those who learn coding skills to actually get a relevant job afterwards.
With all this focus on coding and tech skills, the ongoing issue of the lack of women in IT has also been highlighted. The proportion of females as part of the technology workforce is still depressingly low – around 20 percent is the general estimate
For those among you who don’t have young kids or an inner princess to keep happy, Anna and Elsa are the two sisters from the film, who have become a worldwide phenomenom and the adored heroines for girls everywhere
Anna and Elsa are there on the site, giving easy to follow instructions on steps needed to complete each task, for example “Hi! I’m Elsa of Arendelle. Help me create a single line” or “Hi, I’m Anna of Arendelle! Let’s make a square with the ‘Repeat’ block, which uses fewer blocks. How many times (???) should the ‘Repeat’ block loop the blocks inside it to make a square?”.
So top marks to Code.org and Disney for their efforts.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Moore’s Law Competitor Wins $150K Elevator Pitch Prize
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1324742&
$150,000 seems a princely sum in exchange for an elevator pitch but not when you consider the research that went into it.
The Elevator Pitch Session, a contest recently sponsored by MIG (MEMS Industry Group, based in Pittsburgh, Pa.), brought out dozens of submissions competing for a $150,000 purse. Narrowed down to six entrants, finalists were allowed to give a five-minute pitch with five slides and five minutes for questions in front of a live audience at the MEMS Executive Congress 2014, held in Scottsdale, Ariz. Nov. 5-7.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Potential Pot of Gold in Mobile Marketing
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1324796&
Fasten your seat belts. Marketing via mobile devices will be $15 billion industry in 2019.
The billions of smartphones and tablets out there represent a captive audience for marketeers. However, mobile marketing is relatively new and has been slow to take off.
Reasons for the slow ramp up include inertia that comes with any new media, as companies rely on tried and tested methods until the results demand change, through to inexperience and a lack of understanding on how to implement new marketing strategies within a new medium. Further, in such a scenario companies have little experience to draw from and end up throwing a lot of proverbial mud against a wall to see what sticks.
It appears that for mobile marketing we are entering a phase of steady growth and today have a fairly good base of experience to draw from. In its latest report, market research firm MarketsandMarkets is currently forecasting that the global mobile marketing market will grow from $4,314.5 million in 2014 to $15,287.4 million by 2019, at a CAGR of 28.8%. North America is expected to be the largest market, while Europe and Asia-Pacific (APAC) are predicted to experience increased market traction, during the forecast period.
One caveat to all this is really based in the end-user experience, which today in many areas is not good when it comes to data services. Even 4G, in many areas is not delivering the speeds it is supposed to. Consequently, the success of mobile marketing, will to some extent depend on mobile networks delivering more robust 4G services.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Australia dumbs down: Chief Scientist says research performance lags the world
Chief Scientist Benchmarking ALL the stupid
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/30/dumbing_down_australia_research_performance_is_lagging/
Australia likes to flatter itself that it’s good at sciences: the nation’s scientists did, after all, invent WiFi and lots of other useful stuff. But when the nation looks in the mirror it should be honest and and admit it’s wasting away, says a new report from the nation’s Chief Scientist.
Rather than patting ourselves on the back and distracting ourselves from improving the country’s STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) performance, the report says Australia is an under-performer on many counts when compared to other advanced nations.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Brits to teach Norks hacks about ‘multimedia websites’. 5% of DPRK is in for a TREAT
Kim Jong-un, elites, academics only ones with ‘net access
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/12/01/knowledgeable_norks_brits_tutoring_north_koreans_in_the_ways_of_multimedia_websites/
A group of North Korean journalists will visit the UK next year to “observe how multimedia websites work at British media companies”.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office-funded project Inside Out: Working in North Korea to connect its journalists to the internet world aims to give North Korean journalists a greater understanding of freedom of expression and information via the internet.
According to a report, over the last decade the regime has undergone a “digital revolution”, with around one million users now signed up to its mobile phone network, Koryolink.
Internet access is still restricted to a limited few
Tomi Engdahl says:
A Third of Americans Think Technology Is Going to Ruin Their Lives
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/a-third-of-americans-think-technology-is-going-to-ruin-their-lives?utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=gravity&utm_campaign=motherboardgeneral
One third of all Americans think that technology will lead to changes that are detrimental to society and to their lives, according to the results of a new PEW Research Center poll.
The poll is one of the best looks at what Americans really think of most of the things we write about here at Motherboard, from commercial drones and lab-grown meats to genetic engineering, servant robots, and body hacking. To be honest, it’s a bit of a sobering reminder that not everyone is excited about a lot of this stuff as we are (and that people are scared of the same things we are). In general, people think that technology is going to make our lives better, but when you drill down into specifics, you get a different picture.
Americans are more likely to say that they would not ride in a driverless car than gladly hop in one, nearly 8 in 10 said they would not eat meat grown in a lab, and three quarters say they would not have a brain implant that improves their memory or mental capacity (where’s your sense of adventure, people?).
Meanwhile, people are fairly optimistic about our technological capabilities, even if they aren’t sure if rapidly-advancing tech is such a good idea. Looking 50 years out, one in five Americans believes we’ll be able to completely control the weather, a third of Americans believe we’ll have long-term space colonies, and 39 percent believe we’ll be able to teleport objects. Half of Americans think computers will make art just as well as humans do, and 80 percent think we’ll grow custom-made organs in a laboratory for transplantation