Cult of Innovation

I cannot stand Lady Gaga.  Yes, I’ve seen the video of her playing at NYU’s talent show (she came in second) and yes, she can actually sing and play the piano rather well, but her music, at least what I hear on the radio, is not very interesting — pop melodies with a little vintage rock throw in. Seriously, I hear it at the gym everyday and it sounds exactly the same as any other cheesy club music that they play at any gym in Brooklyn.

Yet part of the reason she’s become so successful is because people think she is “innovative.”  Have we redefined what innovative means or are the media using the word wrong?  Her music sounds like rehashed electro-pop and her clothes just look like more expensive versions of what club kids in NYC wore throughout the 80s and early 90s.  So then, does innovative mean, rather than something new and forward-thinking, something just recycled, calculated, and marketed to what the public seems to be craving (maybe as a response to the toned down vibe of our recession)?

I don’t know.  I’m just not that impressed.  All I can really wonder is, who is this girl and who paid for all of those clothes and why? Were they her idea, which I might then give her some credit for, or was it her record label, to cover up the fact that she’s not particularly attractive?

In his Newsweek piece In iPad We Trust, Daniel Lyons likens our excitement about new tech products to religious fervor and suggests that such high levels of expectation can often lead to disappointment.

From the article:

“Technology has become a kind of religion. We may not believe in God, but we still need mystery and wonder.”

Snowboarding has only been scored by Olympic judges since 1998 and unlike other competitions, such as figure skating or freestyle skiing, in this sport, performers don’t announce their routines to the judges in advance.  With a sport that thrives on innovative moves, this makes it hard to score, as judges must often weigh in on tricks they have never seen before, often in a manner of seconds, which can really limit their appreciation of the difficulty of the maneuver.

In his insightful post from Endless Innovation, Dominic Basulto explains how snowboarders like Shaun White now offer previews of some of their tricks at the expense of the “wow” factor, and suggests that workplace innovators may want to use this same principle in order to be fully understood by their superiors.

Good news for those of you who hate going to the dentist. A new technique called the Icon infiltration system lets dentists treat tooth decay by simply sliding an applicator between teeth to strip the enamel, filling the caries with resin, and then flashing it with a high-energy blue light to strengthen the toth.  It only takes about fifteen minutes and is virtually pain-free.

For more info, see the website amusingly called Drilling? No Thanks! or read a short article in this month’s Popular Science magazine.

Now if only they could do something about that Muzak…

The building of the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner has been marked by several delays and setbacks that pushed its first flight more than two years behind schedule. But as of December, Boeing said they are track to deliver the first 787 to Japan’s All Nippon Airways within the next nine months.

This new plane, which Boeing claims is twenty percent more fuel-efficient, cleaner, and quieter than similarly-sized jets, makes use of composite materials, advanced aerodynamics, Rolls Royce engines, and all-electric systems.  It also boasts an new approach to interior design, with an airier, lounge-like feel, changeable LED lighting that can mimic the sky, and larger windows that passengers can control with their own electrochromic dimming systems.

To read more about what caused some of the delays in the development of the plane that Boeing hopes will usher in a cleaner, greener future for the industry and what sets the 787 apart from other newer models, check out these two articles from Wired: The Innovative 787 Carries Boeing, And Aviation, Ahead and Boeing’s 787 Is as Innovative Inside as Outside

In December, BusinessWeek writer Helen Walters got herself into a bit of trouble for a irritable blog post about designers who were considered, by an article in The Times of London, to be a waste of taxpayers’ money over unhappiness with a new logo for the British National Health Service.  In the post, “Come on Designers. Step Up“  she stated that the value of design is clearly still not understood in the marketplace at large. She argued that the responsibility for this disconnect — and fixing it — lies with designers themselves. “Designers need to step up and fight back and prove their craft is not a 20th century anachronism.”

In a new special report, Walters attempts to address some of the controversy she created and invites others to explore the value of design from within and outside the profession.  Opinions include those of IDEO partner Diego Rodriguez, RKS Design’s Ravi Sawhney and Deepa Prahalad, and Silicon Valley investor Dave McClure.

The report also features the 27 most influential designers and design thinkers making an impact on business today.

What do you do when unforeseen or unpredictable forces threaten to sweep away your hopes for a new product or business?

In his forthcoming book, Seizing the White Space: Business Model Innovation for Growth and Renewal, Mike W. Johnson discusses how businesses can innovate their existing business models in response to radically changing conditions or develop new units with different business models entirely. According to Johnson:

“The key to innovating your business model in the face of discontinuity is to look for the opportunities in the threat itself. You have to try to understand how the new circumstances will change the jobs customers need to get done or give rise to entirely new jobs they need to do. Understanding powerful external forces in this way can make the suddenly overwhelming far more manageable. Instead of hunkering down and waiting out the storm or freezing your current business model like a deer in headlights, you can transform and renew your company by building better models that take advantage of the shifting environment.”

For an example of  a car company executive turned green-tech entrepreneur who was able to creatively turn a industry-upsetting challenge into an opportunity and to learn more about Johnson’s upcoming book, read The Way To Innovate To Beat Radical Discontinuity, from Forbes Magazine.

Just as many of our advances in Web technology were brought about to better serve the porn industry, much of the innovation in modern surveillance techniques has been created for Las Vegas casinos. An article in January’s Popular Mechanics explores how casinos are proving grounds for the world’s most advanced surveillance technologies.

Also check out 6 Ways Las Vegas Security Tech Has Entered Daily Life.

Okay, so they are hardly innovative, considering that the word has been around since at least 1866, but if not for these places, I would totally miss browsing around and discovering new or improved magazines, such as the updated version of Popular Mechanics, American Heritage: Invention and Technology, Technology Review, and my newest fixation, Monocle.

Not your father’s Monocle, this gorgeous, glossy (and expensive) magazine was founded by Wallpaper*’s Tyler Brûlé in 2007. The magazine markets itself as a globalist perspective on international affairs, culture and design meant for worldly, cosmopolitan readers. It only appears in print ten times a year but is updated constantly at Monocle.com. What is interesting is that the website contains an interactive archive available only to paid subscribers, which might just be a helpful model for other print media to follow.

Developed with an international audience in mind, Monocle seeks information across a variety of sectors, and by commissioning stories out of London, New York and Tokyo, it offers immeditate coverage from different time zones and events. By functioning more like a wire service than a periodical, Monocle’s reporters are able to take the time to unearth stories untouched by other sources, and with its additional use of the online platform, Monocle leverages other media, offering a wide array of films, slide shows, and audio reports to provide greater depth to its stories.

While it certainly embraces many aspects of old-school journalism — utilizing strong writing from journalists who’ve written for the the New York Times, the Independent, the BBC, etc., and lots of beautiful images — the magazine’s use of subscription and multimedia online archives is a forward-thinking one. According to editor Andrew Tuck in an interview with the Jakarta Globe, “the traditional way that magazines make money is through newsstands and subscriptions. This is a new take on the media model. No one else has done it.”  And apparently the model is working, because while many print publications have folded during these tough economic times, Monocle has been able to thrive by providing information on this multi-platform level.

Speaking of print publications folding, for those of you with your E-Readers, I get it–you want the convenience and immediacy that those devices provide–but I really think you lose something by giving up the thrill of the hunt, or the excitement you feel when you discover something new that you can hand over to someone else to enjoy as much as I’ve enjoyed finding this magazine.

No matter what you think of Microsoft, you gotta give it Mr. Gates–he’s really trying to make a difference in the world and he believes it will take innovation to do so.  You can read his views on how to address climate change, as well as what he thinks it will take to address global hunger, epidemics, and poverty.

When a man can afford to donate $10 billion for vaccines to the poorest nations, I’m willing to listen.  Who cares if Vista totally sucked?