Archive for the 'Interests' Category
Tuesday, June 24th, 2008
McKinsey: “The next step in open innovation”
There’s a great article over at McKinsey Quarterly’s website on the next step in innovation. It offers a peak into where companies are headed now that they’ve (well some at least) established basic means for tapping into open innovation through communities. To access the full article you need a login.
For most companies, innovation is a proprietary activity conducted largely inside the organization in a series of closely managed steps. Over the last decade, however, a few consumer product, fashion, and technology businesses have been opening up the product-development process to new ideas hatched outside their walls—from suppliers, independent inventors, and university labs.
Executives in a number of companies are now considering the next step in this trend toward more open innovation.1 For one thing, they are looking at ways to delegate more of the management of innovation to networks of suppliers and independent specialists that interact with each other to cocreate products and services. They also hope to get their customers into the act.
I was particularly interested in the hurdles to evolving towards a more participative value chain model. These are the four hurdles McKinsey identified:
- Attracting and motivating cocreators
- Structuring problems for participation
- Governance mechanisms to facilitate cocreation
- Maintaining quality
I would add a fifth challenge which is maintaining visionary leadership. The challenge is that when a company open up to such participation, it’s too easy to justify investment in innovation to solve what customers, suppliers, etc are asking for today. What’s difficult in an environment with tons of user input is to also step back and recognize where you *should be* beyond what’s being asked for today. Think of Apple. If Apple had asked and listened to its customers about what to do next with the iPod next, customers would have posted a million points about X, Y, … N feature enhancements they’d like to see. What Apple did instead is look beyond what was right in front of everyone and set a strategy to take over the mobile device people carry with them. Apple looked further ahead and built an SDK platform for enterprise applications. They set a brilliant strategy that has now resulted in the iPhone becoming the next generation of what was just a music playing device. How many people will carry and iPhone and an iPod? Now look at the boost to Mac sales and you can see Apple has executed this strategy very well.
This challenge is also present in open source communities. Often the community will set many resources to what gap is in front of someone willing to speak up and complain or advise. The challenge is for that community to look a step ahead and identify what are the needs your users will want 3 years from now, not today.
I’ve diverted from my starting post, but while I thought the article was great, I felt compelled to add my personal addendum. The bottom line is that I think companies need to build into their open innovation model a means to capture this longer term vision either from the community if possible (without community NDAs) or through internal means.
Sunday, June 22nd, 2008
The next generation
Interesting comic… how will learning evolve - and what do we define as learning in an age where limitless information is available clicks away? I think the education system needs to refocus on teaching “how to think” and “how to analyze” versus memorization.
Friday, June 13th, 2008
The world loses a great man
I was stunned today when my wife sent a text message that Tim Russert had died. Unfortunately, it was true. Ironically I share two alma maters with Tim - JCU and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. I met Tim only once and only to shake hands at a John Carroll University event. I don’t know of another public figure with Tim’s absolute integrity, respect and passion.
Monday, May 26th, 2008
A massive energy innovation bubble on the horizon?
I can sense it - energy innovation will be the biggest bubble for investment - and the greatest economic challenge over the next 5-10 yrs. We all know “things are happening” even today, but a couple datapoints this weekend confirmed for me this really is going to be huge. One thing I’ve noticed continually happens is that a major issue like energy will likely see over-investment which drives exuberated expectations and which will lead to the pendulum swinging too far with a market correction to follow. But the pendulum is swinging and that’s a good thing for the world economy. I only hope the changes are not too late.
If I get time this week, I’ll explain more, but I even just noticed James Governor is expanding the Greenmonk analyst team. Follow the money is always a good model for investing in growth :-)
Friday, May 16th, 2008
More proof the US Congress (and downstream courts) have not kept up with a changing world
A smirk of “when will this nonsense end” crossed my face as I read another Ars article this time covering issues with copyright and the impact on average American citizens. I too had once been turned away for trying to have an old family portrait professionally retouched. The issue? We did not have written permission from the copyright holder so they wouldn’t do the work for me. I went home and did it myself with a scanner and Photoshop. Sue me.
The photographer was long gone, I knew it was taken before the CTEA and the 28 yr renewal requirement had been in effect. Let’s be realistic - who would know which of his decedents (if you could find them) had been bequeathed his rights in an old family portrait from many years ago? If no one had inherited the rights, then what? Take the entire family (if you can find them) to court to figure it out?
Personally, I think it’s ridiculous that non-commercial photographs are not excluded or carved out from the copyright law today. Yes, it may disrupt how some photographers charge today, but they can change their billing methods. Let’s be honest: how hard would it be for you to just scan in your picture and reprint a billion of them vs finding a photographer from 30 yrs ago? Think of Snapfish - do you have authorization to print pictures your friend (the copyright holder) posted on their account and shared with you? Snapfish will print and deliver them to you - has Snapfish violated their copyright? I haven’t read Snapfish’s terms or agreements, but you can see how ridiculous this can get.
If you can’t tell, these issues where we have refused to modernize our legislation and/our court precedent fire me up. While I understand that oil, energy, and Iraq are very important issues in the US, these arcane principles that we have not adjusted for the modern world really do prohibit our society from advancing and innovating. Instead of taking new technologies and riding their full potential, the innovators are constantly caught up in a complex web of vague/loose rights that make it impossible to move forward. This ties right into the software patent post from earlier today.
Let’s wake up - our founding fathers never imagined a system whereby people could instantly share photos over an internet at will. Heck, at the time of signing the Constitution, photography “as a usable process” hadn’t been invented yet - it’s time to update our systems!
Many lawyers and scholars will argue that we can accomodate new technologies with the existing system. Sure, they love the existing system. It’s vague, complex, and crazy enough that they can bill hours for a lifetime.
I disagree - the issue is not whether a particular ruling can be expanding to cover a new technology or advancement. Sure, we can keep expanding/contracting the scope of rulings for another thousand years. The real issue is what do we in today’s society truly consider to be intellectual property and who do we consider to be the owner of those rights? Finally, are the current laws around this intellectual property still granting the right (as in proper) permissions? For instance, have you considered that your family photograph is under copyright by the photographer for 70 years after his/her death! Yes, unless you signed an agreement otherwise, your wedding, family, and other photographer-taken pictures are owned by your photographer and his/her decedents.
The US used to require a renewal of copyright after 28 years in order to continue holding your exclusive rights. (ahem, then Disney came along and took over the copyright system) I think it’s time to update the entire system bringing all walks of copyright holders to the tables and systematically update our system to align with a modern world one piece of IP at a time. In my humble opinion ;-)
Tuesday, May 6th, 2008
Yankees vs Indians Tomorrow @ Yankee Stadium
I’ll be in attendance - first game of the year and I’ll get to see Cliff Lee pitch for the first time live.
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
How did US Presidential Candidate Vote in Congress on IT
Very interesting article over at eWeek. There’s all kinds of “quirks” in the details for any of these comparisons, but it’s an interesting overview nonetheless.
Saturday, April 12th, 2008
Hello Winamp - we meet again
I remember using Winamp back in college. It was 1997 and downloading music from websites (yes, actual HTML links to download XYZ by Whoever) started to become popular. I don’t recall when Napster really hit my radar (not that I would admit to ever using it), but Winamp and MP3 were 1:1 in my world. When Winamp 2.0 came out, I remember playing around with all the skins… I even created a JCU skin at one point… memories.
It’s been a while since I’ve used Winamp though. Having moved most of my systems to Linux, I have rarely seen much of Windows and admittedly lost touch with Winamp. Today am happy to say that we’ve reconnected.
Our reconnection starts with an absolute hatred of iTunes and a horrible relationship that involves completely erasing, syncing, and re-creating libraries, playlists, etc b/c Apple decided to build in all kinds of DRM into iTunes. It’s nonsense and the challenge has always been in my mind, a lack of alternatives. The latest issue I’ve had is that my MP3 library is on a RAID array and for some reason, iTunes keeps on blowing up the RAID array… not good. I can’t even imagine how that’s possible, but it’s highly repeatable. I start Windows, RAID array is fine. I do anything, leave Windows on for 2 days, it’s fine. On the second day, if I open iTunes and do anything that involves accessing a file… my RAID drive splits into 2 separate drives in Windows Explorer and if I reboot - I get a degraded RAID array.
I have a system at home that has Windows Vista 64-bit. I needed Windows b/c I needed a couple things: 1) Photoshop, 2) Video editors for my home movies recorded on the awesome Sony HDR-SR7 HD video camera, and 3) web conferencing (although I don’t need Windows anymore now that I have the latest Ubuntu).
So back to my plight. I bought an iPod Nano 3rd Generation a while back simply because it’s thinner and lighter than my last MP3 player. It’s perfect for skiing is really what it comes down to.
I tried Songbird, but it’s way too early (couldn’t add any songs to my iPod). I tried a demo version of some terrible app that supposedly integrates into Windows Media Player. I searched for any way to get gtkPod on Windows, and even considered a Busybox/gtkPod route. And then… a Google search finally led to a blog, a blog to another blog’s list of alternatives and there it was: “Winamp.com”. The solution quickly unfolded before my eyes. Winamp - it’s been years, but boy am I glad to see you again.
So I fired up Winamp and right there, it found my iPod without me doing anything. I can click drag files onto the iPod and it’s seamless. And here’s the best part - you can play songs OFF the iPod and you can go in and delete files from the iPod (no check a box in the library / sync nonsense).
Winamp is the best iTunes there ever was. It’s like seeing a good friend from college that you had so many great times with but lost touch through the years. Now, let’s go have a beer.
Escape iTunes: Download Winamp
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008
Airwolf is on Netflix Instant Watch!
I just noticed that Netflix added Airwolf TV episodes on its instant watch library - sweet! It’s been so many years since I’ve seen Airwolf - I was a big fan as a kid - if you can’t tell.
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
Is it just me… or is the US Congress … well, you make the call
I couldn’t help but read this article and (assuming the journalism is accurate) concluding that Congress has absolutely no idea how to fix the problem. Some of these ideas are just ridiculous. And then the reaction seems to be “well, we need to pass something” - just “get it out the door” never seems to work and later just destroys any false confidence they may instill in the unknowing… bad, bad, bad.
Tuesday’s developments don’t guarantee a successful result, but both parties are under great pressure to produce a bill that can pass this year. There’s enough common ground for a bill, even though difficult negotiations remain on several fronts.
“Inaction is never an option when you have a crisis of confidence in the housing market and the financial market,” Shelby said. “The American people are looking to the Senate right now to see how we’re going to react to it.”
Friday, March 28th, 2008
South Park Episodes Are Now Online, DRM Free
Who knew a media studio could actually find a way to do things “right”? Comedy Central and Viacom appear to have “seen the light”. I love the ultimate reason that spurred this effort:
http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/03/south-park-to-o.html
South Park fans will soon be able to watch any episode of the seminal animated show free online, thanks to a deal between show creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone and Comedy Central’s parent company, Viacom.
In an appropriately glib statement, Parker and Stone said they were inspired to start the site when they got “really sick of having to download our own show illegally all the time. So we gave ourselves a legal alternative.”
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008
Casio Exilim EX-S10 “Card” Review - the ultimate “slim” camera?
I’m a digital photography junkie although I may not post here so often. I’ve always kept a well rounded portfolio of gadgets around including my Canon Rebel XT, a Sony HDR-SR7 HD video camcorder, and until now, I always used my Canon ELPH SD100 as my goto “pocket” camera that also did lightweight video recording just as many other consumer cameras do today. The SD100 had served quite a useful life and was an outstanding performer in all areas. However, a couple things were starting to create a need for an upgrade. First, the ELPH SD100 was the smallest, viable camera on the market when it came out but today, there were increasingly more “slim” and lightweight options being introduced on the market. Second, the 3 megapixels were ok, but when cropping, I could use a couple extra megapixels to play with. I was also hoping to find a new camera that boosted the “shutter speed” slightly so that I could get more instant shots. Finally, I was hoping to find a camera that had more water/freeze resistant features for added protection in skiing environments. I also did not want to spend more than $275 (arbitrary limit primarily set by what I could thought could “go under the radar” with my wife…).
Size (more specifically depth) was my greatest concern as I reviewed features. I could accept less than top tier performance in other categories, but I like to use this type of camera for skiing (drop it into a coat pocket), going out to bars (drop it in a pant/shirt pocket), and other places where I want its size to be no more than carrying a cell phone.
And so I began my research.
There were a few cameras that were easy candidates - the Canon SD1100 being the first. The SD1100 continued the ELPH SD100 tradition with portable size, a no-nonsense frame, and as expected a high quality Canon product. The SD1100 shutter speed only seemed slightly faster than my older SD100, boosted the megapixels to 8MP, widescreen pictures, and added Optical Image Stabilization (very nice). The SD1100 boasted a relatively small depth at 22mm. The price was definitely reasonable at ~$230.
I also looked at the Olympus Stylus SW line of cameras. The 850 was within my price limit, and boasted unique features such as shockproof, waterproof, and freezeproof (great for skiers). The 850 was relatively slim at 21.3mm, however, almost every Olympus SW camera had received poor image quality results in reviews, and while slim, the camera was slightly wider/taller than other options. One other negative was that Olympus still uses its proprietary xD flash media which I just have a hard time buying into. The price was within reason at ~$260.
I was really hoping Nokia would offer me the perfect package. Nokia had two types of cameras that may have worked. First there was the 21mm slim S51, but I couldn’t get over the “cheap” feel of the camera. Then I noticed the super-slim 18mm depth, Nokia S210 which was also one of the cheapest options at a mere $175. This camera was the perfect size and on paper, had great features. I nearly hit the buy button to order it when I noticed the bad reviews on the internet. I was seriously bummed this one didn’t work out.
I checked a few others and then remembered Casio had its super-slim camera line. Casio was never known for high quality pictures, but was known for super-sexy looking cameras. And that’s when I found the Casio Exilim EX-S10 (commonly just referred to as the S10). This camera was launched in 2008 as the “world’s slimmest 10MP camera”. It just hit the store shelves a couple weeks ago at $250 but unfortunately NO ONE had done even a modestly decent review of the camera making a purchase decision difficult (and hence I’m sharing my experience now). I bought one anyway at a local Target planning to return it if I was disappointed. Since I bought it, I’ve noticed CNet UK has done a review here.
“World’s slimmest” turned out to mean 16mm slim, which … is very slim. Check out the pictures below with a Casio S10 next to my iPod Nano (3rd Generation).
The S10 is just “3 Nanos deep”. On size/portability, you can’t possibly beat the S10. The Exilim very easily fits into a shirt or jacket pocket. It has a great size LCD screen that works well in direct sunlight.
The EX-S10 picture quality was pretty decent (not a Canon, but nothing Photoshop can’t fix). Images can be taken at up to 10 Megapixels. It has 3x optical zoom, a standard flash and other features. There’s a one button movie record button which is nice. I did find it was having trouble in lower lighting conditions or very cloudy areas. Taking pictures is fairly simple and I actually found it “so easy” that it was somewhat difficult as a more advanced SLR user to get the shot to take the way I wanted. The integrated “Best Shots” feature proved to be very useful as is the face detection engine that follows the subject you’re shooting.
Here’s an example shot taken from near the mid point of Copper Mountain in Colorado recently (unedited, raw JPG, click for full 10MP version):
The Exilim is a great looking camera and packs only the features I really considered “necessary”. I personally don’t care about “in camera image editing” or other nonsensical things vendors seem to be packing into these small digicams today. There is a “YouTube upload” software package that is supposed to make uploading YouTube videos easy… whatever…
As for videos, I was surprised to see the Casio takes good videos and even does “Ultra HQ Widescreen” at 848×480 pixels.
The Casio uses an SD flash card slot which is great. It also has a proprietary battery which is not so great, but easily obtainable at $30 for a retail Casio battery (I found Casio to be the cheapest place online). Given this is a new battery, it may take some time for the super cheap options to show up on eBay. I did notice that the flash card “speed” can create a big difference in shoot time. I originally was using a slower TransFlash memory card in an SD converter, but when I switched to a SanDisk Extereme III SD card, the performance was noticeably faster.
The bottom line: if you’re looking for a slim camera that you can take anywhere and that takes relatively decent photos and videos, then this Casio is a great buy. I’ve never seriously considered a Casio and have always recommended Canon P&Ss to my friends and family, but that may change with the S10. Other Casios CANNOT be assumed to “be just as good” so be careful which one you buy.
If you want absolutely top performance in shooting and image quality, and are willing to sacrifice some size features, then the Canon SD950 or other models with OIS may be a better option although bulkier. If you need to shoot underwater, Olympus seems to be your only option without buying expensive waterproof housings. Unfortunately, Nikon’s consumer P&S line needs to catch up to its SLRs. I also looked at other vendors, but didn’t find any of them relevant to my particular needs.
UPDATE: Steve’s Digicams has posted a long review that I’d recommend looking at. There are sample pictures and videos too. http://www.steves-digicams.com/2008_reviews/casio_ex-s10_pg5.html
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008
When you’re heading to Vail…
A severe winter storm warning is about as good as it gets ;-)
Check out this weather forecast
Wednesday, March 5th, 2008
Whistler: what an amazing place
Each year we seem to add a few more “should we really do that?” adventures to our days in Whistler (or Utah, or Colorado) and this year proved just as adventurous as the rest. We had a “narrow” experience hiking up to the glacier at Blackcomb where there is a 18″-24″ wide supposedly semi-official path next to a chute that drops for a few football fields of vertical. I don’t recall it being so narrow in past years I did the hike. For our group this is not entirely out of the ordinary… but this year Josh brought his girlfriend and she was with us at the time… and did I mention she’s a beginner? She survived and in retrospect I think it’s these experiences that help take people to the next level. She did quite well although I did stay with her at every turn preferring to give up an awesome run to ensure I didn’t feel guilty of leading her into a serious injury. Chris A fared less well accomplishing a near collision and a concussion (even with a helmet on). Other than that, there were no injuries to report which is a good sign on any ski trip.
This year we had 4 days of skiing. The first day was terrible (raining) until we finally found a good spot on Whistler that had new snow. After that it was 3 days of non-stop powder (Whistler was “Dump of the Week” on Ski Net this week). You simply can’t beat having 5-8 inches of fresh new snow each morning on Whistler’s peak. We did learn that Whistler’s snow tracking was a bit off (it’s odd to rationalize a snow report that says there’s just 3cm of new snow when it’s up past your ski boots…)
Once again, Cockalorum and Mondays were awesome (and relatively unknown to others - or too scary) offering the best snow and challenging terrain. A tip is to drop in off the shallow part of the cornice way to the left by aiming for the left-most orange/black “Cliff” warning sign and drop in about 5-10ft to the left of that sign. Piccolo’s face in hindsight had a much better drop in point than the rocks or cornice… try dropping in at the rightmost point. Everyone should check out the powder on Flute Bowl but be prepared to walk if you stay to the right. The Glacier was awesome except for the harrowing hike that could lead to a death this year if it stays in the same condition… hopefully not, but I was surprised it was not closed.
My Volkl Unlimited AC4 skis proved their worth again and again this year giving me outstanding control in the powder, edges on some of the sharper faces, and a strong base for some of the narrow hop turns. I would again recommend these skis to anyone looking for an expert level set of powder/resort “all mountain” skis. If you’re going backcountry, you may prefer the super fats, but the AC4s are perfect for any condition.
BTW, don’t go to Blackcomb this year - what a waste of time… at least while we were there - no snow over the 4 days and Whistler had daily snowfall…
All in all, a good time was had by all and we made it home safely. Next year we’re going to try heli-skiing - if you have any recommendations for a good outfit in the B.C./Whistler area that is reasonably priced, please please let me know.
Photo: Courtesy of Lisa C taken on 7th Heaven at Blackcomb (ok, there was a little snow!)
Thursday, February 28th, 2008
Heading off to Whistler - back next Wed
I’m heading off for a little vacation / skiing time in Whistler. If you recall last year I said I needed to go back and now I’m making good on fulfilling that need. My blog will probably be silent during my trip, but you can imagine me skiing down the side of something that would scare any health insurer. I tend to always play it safe and land well, so no need to
worry about me - I’ll be sporting a permanent smile for the next 4 days.
Tuesday, February 5th, 2008
What type of job do you need in order to …
Take off a day of work to participate in Super Bowl Parade festivities… I must be in the wrong line of work.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23001892/
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008
Buying an HD video player? Looks like Sony is the best bet…
I recently acquired a Samsung 50″ Plasma which has full 1080p resolution and I must admit… I’ll never go back to SD television. Even for what little I watch, the picture is just unbelievable. Now, keep in mind my prior TV was a 25″ Sharp CRT from back when I was in college… Yeah, I was long overdue for an upgrade. However, I chose to go with the 1080p, top spec sheet model for a number of reasons, but the top being it’s ‘near futureproof’ (famous last words, right?). Well, as far as resolutions go, 1080p should be around for a while and honestly, I can imagine a TV with a higher resolution as it looks amazing right now. I have a 1080i HDTV camcorder that I acquired last year and an Xbox 360 which does native 1080p and DVD upscaling. You could say within the last 12 months, I’ve gone from home media antique museum to MoMa.
However, I have two pieces of my setup that are still a generation behind. First, there’s the home theater. I have a cheaper setup that my wife bought me years ago and it serves its purpose and until the HDMI systems come down in price, there’s not much to gain from an upgrade. The other piece is the whole High Def video player. The HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray battle has been raging on and it now appears that Blu-Ray will win out (I *think* this is the better of the two, but it’s hard to tell - Microsoft vs Sony is like a computer virus vs a rootkit - which is less evil?).
Putting the standards battle aside, I’ve been waiting on the sidelines waiting for the future proof answer for high def video. The first Blu-Ray player I noticed on the market at sub-$1,000 was the PS3. It still is a competitively priced Blu-Ray player today (some newer models are ~$300). And guess what happens to all those who ran out and bought a Blu-Ray player for $1,000+, or when they dropped to $800 or when they hit $500 and then ~$300… they’re already antiquated: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080118-new-nlu-ray-2-0-spec-makes-ps3-the-most-future-proof-player.html
Who loses out in these standards wars? The consumer who’s willing to pay too much. But, I guess if you have $1,000 for a high end DVD player what does it matter anyway… just buy another.
So I guess I’m waiting again this time for a Blu-Ray v2.0 system (or PS3). It’s quite a shame that HDTV has come along so poorly for consumers. First it was 720i, then 1080i and then 1080p was the end game. Then you need to upgrade your cable, upgrade your DVR, upgrade your camcorder, upgrade your video player, upgrade your home theater system… if you bought any of those components at 720/1080i, upgrade again to 1080p. I have to wonder if HDTV will ever get to being “simple” and easy for consumers? I’m fairly knowledgeable, I can’t imagine some of my less than technically inclined friends of family buying all the right components in a future proof progression - it’s been hard for me I’ll admit… good luck to anyone looking to make a future-proof HDTV decision.
Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
Seattle Windows glitch ruins fireworks show at Space Needle
Doh! The first thing I thought of was South Park the movie where the general has a Windows 98 computer crash and furiously yells “Get Bill Gates in here!”… nothing like rebooting Windows when the music is going off and a crowd watching … might I suggest another option next year - begins with an ‘L’?
http://www.king5.com/topstories/stories/NW_010108WAB_fireworks_glitch_SW.72e7457c.html#
Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
New Open Season Episode 8
I think Open Season is probably the only podcast session I listen to regularly. What can I say, I’m a sucker for Ashlee Vance’s humor/critique… although I haven’t purchased his book yet…
This episode includes some (dare I say unsupported) speculation on Ubuntu and IBM from Mr. Asay. I guess there’s some evil plot to take over the world in there, but given my job at IBM… I’d probably know :-) I also found it odd that the 1.5 minute speculation bit also became the title (what do you expect from El Reg?). Anyway, listen if for no other reason than Open Season offers Ogg downloads (thanks!).
Anyway, you can listen for yourself here: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/12/28/open_season_8/
Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
New TSA rules for Lithium-ion batteries
Heads up if you fly with extra laptop, camera, or other Li-ion battery packs… I often check my extra battery packs for my DSLR and camcorder in other luggage so this would have caught me by surprise…
————-
Effective January 1, 2008, the Department of Transportation (DOT) through the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) will no longer allow loose lithium batteries in checked baggage. These batteries may continue to be packed in carry-on baggage.
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