NYC BigApps Ideas

The Paradox of Innovation August 01, 2010The Paradox of Innovation My big insight about innovation these days would make Nobel Prize winner, Niels Bohr, proud. "Now that we have met with paradox," explained Dr. Bohr, "we have some hope of making progress." Innovation is full of it -- paradox, that is. On one hand, organizations want structures, maps, models, guidelines, and systems. The noble search for a so-called "innovation process" can easily become a seduction, addiction, or distraction whereby innovation is marginalized, deferred, over-engineered, and worn like a badge. True innovation is about allowing room enough for paradox to be a teacher and guide -- and to accept, at least for a little longer than usual, ambiguity, dissonance, and discomfort -- the age-old precursors to breakthrough. Remember, there's a big difference between Six Sigma and Innovation. Six Sigma is about reducing variability. Yes, process, structures, systems are necessary, but they don't have to become overly pre-emptive. Of course we can.

Apps for the Environment | US Environmental Protection Agency Note: EPA no longer updates this information, but it may be useful as a reference or resource. Welcome to My Green Apps, your destination for 290 apps to help you understand and protect the environment. In addition to finding apps, you can see what app ideas people like best. You also can learn about EPA's Apps for the Environment Challenge, which was conducted in the summer of 2011. Find a green app! See the popular ideas! The people have told us what ideas they want. Featured Apps Joulebug JouleBug is a social, mobile game that rewards players for reducing energy waste. Avego Driver Avego Driver will offer your empty seats to other people along your route in real time and share the cost of the journey between you and each rider, saving everyone time and money. GasHog GasHog allows you to enter the odometer reading and the amount of fuel added every time you add fuel, and it automatically calculates the fuel economy of your last tank. Meter Readings Light Bulb Finder The Green Gumshoe What's Fresh

Amazon’s Future Is So Much Bigger Than A Tablet | Epicenter  A few years ago, people laughed at Amazon’s Kindle, especially its clunky hardware design and CEO Jeff Bezos’ breathless rhetoric about how it would change how customers bought and experienced media. Now that we’re getting closer to the unveiling of Amazon’s long-rumored, slickly designed multimedia tablet, nobody’s laughing any more. Amazon has swiftly become the most disruptive company in the media and technology industries. Its potential in this space is simply off the charts: bigger than Apple’s, bigger than Google’s or Microsoft’s. Amazon’s competitors are mostly software companies focused on a small number of tent-pole products that they then market to consumers or enterprise. The Kindle isn’t a book. It’s a mistake to underestimate where Amazon could take this, or to try to put the company in a box. A year ago, writing for Gadget Lab, I was curious but skeptical about early rumors of an Amazon tablet: Three things changed my mind: Wired: What other opportunities are out there?

Apps for Energy Innovators Don't Only Dream, They Remember Their Dreams September 06, 2011Innovators Don't Only Dream, They Remember Their Dreams Many great breakthroughs have come in dreams. Rene Descartes got the concept for the Scientific Method in a dream. In the dream state, the subconscious mind arrives at solutions that the conscious mind is unlikely to discover during the daily grind -- no matter much it obsesses, gathers data, or blames the "organization." That's why Thomas Edison and Salvadore Dali used to take naps during the day. 1. 2. 3. 4. PS: I once asked a group of chemical engineers to remember their dreams after the first day of a two-day creative thinking training I was leading. Before the session started on the second day, one of the engineers -- with a huge grin on his face -- asked if he could address the full group and proceeded to explain that, the night before, he dreamed the solution to an engineering problem he'd been wrestling with for two years. Technique excerpted from Awake at the Wheel. I absolutely agree with this. Post a comment

Wattzon WattzOn is a free web-based online tool created by Saul Griffith and Raffi Krikorian. It allows users to calculate their total energy footprint by estimating their direct and indirect power consumption with the stated goal of educating users about energy efficiency and conservation. It's notable, because unlike most carbon calculators it measures energy consumption, and not the by-products (CO2, or CO2 equivalent emissions) and because it aggregates information into a holistic view of energy consumption allowing users to see the energy used in their driving compared to their eating, for example. WattzOn has garnered media coverage from a number of blogs and media outlets such as Business Week,[4] Wired magazine,[5] and Lifehacker.com.[6] In 2011 the site departed markedly from its original intent of helping users calculate a comprehensive power footprint of their lives. References[edit] External links[edit] WattzOn

Phil McKinney – Do we lack patience when it comes to innovation? philmckinney | September 6, 2011 In the 7 Immutable Laws of Innovation, the Law of Patience states: Innovation takes time. More time than is expected. The organization must take the long view on innovation and avoid the temptation and resist the pressure for short-term adjustments. Annual resets of budgets force innovation to take on a short-term planning horizon. Patience is not a skill that comes naturally. One example of getting it right is the story of David Packard and HP’s decision to jump into the computer market. At the same time, some innovations do need to be killed. Be careful not to be too quick to pull the trigger and kill an idea. How should you instill patience into your innovation programs? Be realistic about how long this is going to take and set an appropriate time horizon. The point is, when you start down the path of creating breakthrough innovations, realize that you are making one of the most significant commitments for the organization. The Law of Resources

One Watt, One Year, One Dollar" WattzOn is a website that allows users to calculate their energy consumption, tracking just what kind of an impact you're making. Rather than having a carbon footprint, though, you see your impact in terms of energy consumption, or watts. From your electricity use, to your transportation methods, to the products you buy, WattzOn helps tally your energy footprint and tells you how much energy your lifestyle requires. Simply create a profile, add in your activities and select what products you own, and it calculates how much energy you're really consuming. But wait...how do we calculate the energy of the products we buy? That's where one of WattzOn's biggest features - and perhaps most ambitious - gets started. With the EED, WattzOn hopes to calculate and track the embodied energy in our consumer products, from foods to clothing to electronics and everything in between. Know Your Energy Use? Crowd sourcing means getting the users to generate the content. What's Embodied Energy?

Chinese Innovation – Lessons from the East The Chinese are innovating in a uniquely Chinese manner and consequently rising as formidable challengers to traditional multinational companies. Professor Winter Nie has found four interesting features regarding the manner in which the Chinese innovate: innovation on-site, innovation to reduce costs, tailored innovation and rapid product innovation. More often than not, Westerners dismiss the idea of Chinese innovation as a contradiction in terms. Indeed, the Chinese practice of “copying and improving” can blur the lines between innovation and piracy. In response to these accusations from the West, the Chinese assert – albeit tongue-in-cheek – that students must first learn to copy the master’s work before they are able to develop their own style. The rapid increase in China’s competitiveness in the high-speed rail, ship-building and even aviation and automotive industries caught some Western observers by surprise. Innovation on-site, not in the lab Innovation with a focus on costs

DEP: Reuse Main Page Do It Yourself Home Improvement and RepairEstablished in 1995 with a goal to provide consumers with unbiased home improvement and repair information in a community environment. Do It Yourself NetworkDIY Network’s programs and experts answer the most sought-after questions and offer creative projects for do-it-yourself enthusiasts. The site features broadband video channels including home improvement, crafts, automotive, gardening, and woodworking along with step-by-step instructions totaling more than 20,000 projects online. Fixers Collective NYC; FixItClinic, and FreeGeekAlthough not in CT, these are great models for implementing just about anywhere. They are dedicated groups of folks who meet regularly for "fixing sessions" where people can bring something broken to be fixed. wiki-HowwikiHow is a collaboration to build and share the world's largest, highest quality how-to manual. Make Stuff For crafter's, hobbyists, entrepreneurs and people who just like to make stuff. Rent or Lease It

The Future of Light Is the LED | Magazine Photo: Yasu + Junko Brett Sharenow is presiding over the Pepsi Challenge of lightbulbs. The CFO of Switch, a Silicon Valley startup, Sharenow has set himself up in a 20-by-20 booth at the back of the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, and he’s asking passersby to check out two identical white shades. Behind one hides a standard incandescent bulb, the familiar lighting technology that has gone largely unchanged since Thomas Edison invented it 132 years ago. Behind the other is a stunning, almost art- deco-style prototype that holds 10 LEDs and a secret fluid. It’s a liquid-cooled bulb, as radically different from Edison’s invention as anything that’s ever been screwed into a standard socket and, Sharenow hopes, the next big thing in the $30 billion lighting industry. It’s day one of Lightfair, the annual international trade show for everything that glows, glares, flickers, or shines—500 exhibitors and 24,000 visitors prowling row after row of light after light.

Designing with Energy The energy that goes into manufacturing our material world is the largest component of our energy consumption and something designers have a direct impact on. Yet few people understand this embodied energy or actively design with it in mind. This struck us as a little scary, so we started researching our own embodied energy footprints, visualising the data and creating tools that could integrate this data into our design process. The result was an energy driven design process and our Energy Trumps design tool. "The real issue is not our direct consumption of energy but the greenhouse gases embodied in the goods we buy" Monbiot (2010) Understanding embodied energy. Our own understanding of embodied energy started with a very personal exploration. These calculations were very rough, but gave us an approximate figure for everything, allowing us to compare different elements of his lifestyle. Exploring the data New design approaches A 1 Megajoule Lamp A 10 Megajoule Lamp A 20 Megajoule Lamp