Ged Carroll

Category: innovation | 革新 | 독창성 | 改変

Innovation, alongside disruption are two of the most overused words in business at the moment. Like obscenity, many people have their own idea of what innovation is.

Judy Estrin wrote one of the best books about the subject and describes it in terms of hard and soft innovation.

  • Hard innovation is companies like Intel or Qualcomm at the cutting edge of computer science, materials science and physics
  • Soft innovation would be companies like Facebook or Yahoo!. Companies that might create new software but didn’t really add to the corpus of innovation

Silicon Valley has moved from hard to soft innovation as it moved away from actually making things. Santa Clara country no longer deserves its Silicon Valley appellation any more than it deserved the previous ‘garden of delights’ as the apricot orchards turned into factories, office campus buildings and suburbs. It’s probably no coincidence that that expertise has moved east to Taiwan due to globalisation.

It can also be more process orientated shaking up an industry. Years ago I worked at an agency at the time of writing is now called WE Worldwide. At the time the client base was predominantly in business technology, consumer technology and pharmaceutical clients.

The company was looking to build a dedicated presence in consumer marketing. One of the business executives brings along a new business opportunity. The company made fancy crisps (chips in the American parlance). They did so using a virtual model. Having private label manufacturers make to the snacks to their recipe and specification. This went down badly with one of the agency’s founders saying ‘I don’t see what’s innovative about that’. She’d worked exclusively in the IT space and thought any software widget was an innovation. She couldn’t appreciate how this start-ups approach challenged the likes of P&G or Kraft Foods.

  • Dopplr death & more news

    Dopplr

    The slow death of Dopplr | guardian.co.uk – on its own the death of Dopplr is not really news, the interesting timing  of this article by The Guardian put out this evisceration of Nokia’s web service ambitions. I’m not saying that Jemima Kiss got it wrong, but the timing was interesting: published last Friday – right on the eve of Nokia World. Dopplr is similar to other startups that have gotten lost after having been acquired. Dopplr allowed users to create itineraries of their travel plans and spot correlations with their contacts’ travel plans in order to arrange meetings at any point on their journey. It was known for the quality of its user experience design in comparison to other apps.

    China

    String of Holidays in China Bring Time Off, With Complications – NYTimes.com – complex yes, but I can’t help feeling for the bureaucrats who came up with this who thought that they were doing the best they could for the people and now must be as popular as tax collectors

    Economics

    Inflation in China Is Rising at a Fast Pace – NYTimes.com – the downside of continual double digit growth

    Environment

    MIT: We’ve Got Plenty of Uranium | Fast Company – nuclear power not the washout environment naysayers think

    FMCG

    Deal Profile: Unilever to Buy Alberto-Culver for $3.7 Billion – WSJ – interesting move that strengthens Unilever by taking out a competitor. It does make me wonder about all the brands that Unilever sold a few years ago though

    Japan

    Japan Surrenders – The Atlantic – interesting though very American focused article on changes in Japanese society over the past three decades

    Marketing

    Some of Sharecare.com’s Health Advice Will Be From Advertisers – NYTimes.com – this was where I thought Hunch and Yahoo! Answers could have done more. Ideal opportunity for branded content as trusted brands are experts in some areas and expertise could help imbue trust in a new brand

    Media

    Jason Calacanis: Revenge is a new editorial project to rival TechCrunch | guardian.co.uk – interesting that he is going down an email newsletter route. It potentially cuts social sharing a la Twitter and Facebook as well as social bookmarking off at the knees

    The real cost of free | guardian.co.uk – Cory Doctorow in praise of free and dealing with ill-informed critics

    Online

    Yahoo: Is Carol Bartz in the process of being replaced? – Quora – insightful answer. Possibly yes as part of a process to take Yahoo! private. The critique of Bartz is telling:

    • She has not articulated a coherent product or vision for the company
    • She wasted over $120M on an ad campaign (no material impact on any user engagement metric)
    • She promoted executives like Hillary Schneider after failing miserably with APT (Yahoo ad exchange system).
    • Yahoo left between $500M to $1B of value on the table as part of the search agreement with Microsoft (Carol made Hillary the POC for the Yahoo deal team – lets just say that Microsoft had their way with the Yahoo deal team)
    • She used odd (my gentle way of saying they didn’t work) PR tactics to recast Yahoo in the tech and business community

    Alibaba and Yahoo quagmire: a battle of the wills | FT.com – the FT is very slow to this story. I suspect that this isn’t only about corporate wills, but also about Ma pleasing the Chinese government as well and if he manages to get even richer by doing so: win-win

    Combing Your Friends’ Tastes, Not the Whole Web’s – NYTimes.com – social search market analysis

    Software

    N900 plug-in for OSX iSync – makes Nokia N900 into a a viable option

    Technology

    China Catching India As Asia’s Service Provider? – WSJ – China’s technology service industry catching up with India

    Web of no web

    DOCOMO and University of Tokyo to Conduct Joint Research for Urban Planning Based on Mobile Spatial Statistics | Press Center | NTT DOCOMO Global – really interesting work here, kind of reminds me of The Dark Knight were Batman maps out the building in Hong Kong using mobile phone signals and captures mafia money man Lau

    Wireless

    Nokia’s problem – QuirksBlog – interesting thoughts on Nokia from a software developer

  • Closing the innovation gap – Judy Estrin

    Closing The Innovation Gap is a rare breed of book. It looks with a clear eye at the subject of innovation and Silicon Valley.

    Innovation is an overused word, companies like to have it associated with their brand, products and services as it affects both the share price: covering management sins and providing investors with a veneer of hope for future growth. In a previous life, I worked at a firm where we used to talk about doing ‘innovation communications’. Where the theory went, we helped innovative companies communicate the fact that they were innovative.

    All this pre-supposed that we had a clear definition of what innovation was. From my time there, there seemed to be an assumption that all IT and biomedical related businesses were essentially innovative (unless they competed against our existing client base).

    Whereas a food business that borrowed the ‘virtual fab’ model from chipmakers in the semiconductor industry to take on big guns like Proctor & Gamble or PepsiCo wasn’t. I guess the bottom line I am trying to get across is that innovation is critically important, yet tragically misunderstood by many people.

    Judy Estrin has a genuine pedigree in innovation coming from a family of innovators. Her father worked with John von Neumann (the father of modern digital computing) at the Institute of Advanced Studies in Princeton and her mother was a professor at the computer science department of UCLA.  Judy has a Silicon Valley pedigree having had senior roles or been a board member at: Sun Microsystem (who build servers on which banks, telecoms providers and many dot.coms depended – now part of Oracle), Cisco (who pretty much are the internet infrastructure) and FedEx.

    The book addresses the challenge of innovation that we currently have.

    I have had a gut feeling about the decline in pace of innovation over the past decade or so. In a lot of respects improvements in computing have lost their sparkle, they longer feel like a leap forward, but more of the same.

    When I think about the dot com period there were meaningful improvements in telecoms hardware, web technology, software and business processes – not all of them where financially successful but things felt as if they moved forward.

    If I think about web 2.0 – the biggest single improvement was more of a software engineering improvement with a deliberate focus by the likes of 37signals and the original flickr team on avoiding feature bloat at the expense of usability.

    Facebook is an evolution from the likes of The WELL, Friendster, Friends Reunited and MySpace – rather than a true innovation.

    The iPhone whilst beautifully crafted in terms of software and hardware, increasingly reminds me of my long departed Palm Vx PDA – but with a shitty battery life.

    In Closing the innovation gap, I found the book to fall into three distinct sections:

    • Charting the origins and progress of what I will call ‘innovation entropy’ in the west. This talks about how the cold war was entwined with the rise and stall of innovative research that helped in creation of technology that we take for granted today: keyhole surgery, the internet, modern computers, cellular phones and CCDs (coupled-charged device which go into digital cameras.)
    • The economic and cultural effects of ‘innovation entropy’. In this respect Estrin echoes the work of Will Hutton’s The state we’re in published in 1996 which I read in college. Like Hutton, Estrin is a critic of short-termism in business, the financial markets, academia and government spending. Some of this short-termism was unintentional as the law of unintended consequences kicked in due to changes in regulations that were designed to encourage innovation. A secondary factor that Estrin points out is a corresponding lack of appetite for risk – or the rise of risk management which has helped cripple long-term research which begat big innovation
    • How to address ‘innovation entropy’. In Closing The Innovation Gap Estrin maps out the areas where educators, government, financiers and businesses need to change and collaborate on. This collaboration requires root-and-branch change

    Estrin’s book is powerful as she pulls together a coherent story which makes it easy to read. As a prominent person within Silicon Valley she gains access to many people who are at the head of organisations driving innovation at the present time. More related content here.

  • Influence singularity

    This post on what I am calling influence singularity (and some other trends) came from discussions whilst travelling. I have been on the road a fair bit and have speaking to a number of people coming from all aspects of communications and marketing. Speaking to these different people has covered a lot of areas but three trends stood out:

    • Influence singularity
    • Welcome to your new press spokesperson, your customer care rep
    • Inhouse vs. agency

    I have explored these trends in a bit more depth below.

    Influence singularity

    Increasingly we are seeing agencies of all ilks: PR, advertising, marketing, digital and everything in between are descending on the area of influence – creating an influence singularity. This influence manifests itself primarily through social media and digital; though it can manifest itself in experiential events like un-conferences and meet-ups. One of the best campaigns I have come across was the RNLI’s efforts to engage with young people.

    RNLI

    A social media campaign thought through and brought to life by a direct marketing agency: they saw the interaction in a similar way to the relationship between an organisation and the recipient of a direct mail piece. Instead of a purchase call to action, they provided a task to be completed. It is not only at agencies where this conflict is happening, I hear anecdotally that marketers are having PR discussions both online and offline actvities and carving it up with no PR people involved.

    The communications heads that were left out instead retreated to focus purely on corporate communications: outflanked, outgunned and out of their depth in a digital world. PR agencies where they have been involved, are often working with marketing managers as the inhouse PR people are not clued in.

    A secondary aspect of this, is that where the role is reversed and the PR department has led on social media, they are now having their efforts hijacked by marketers playing catch-up – because the marketers feel that they should be the owner, have better budgets and often have the ear of the board.

    This then begs the question: does PR the profession, its practitioners and the business need to have a rapid rebrand as a profession before it becomes roadkill?

    Welcome to the new press spokesperson: your customer care rep

    Back in 2004, I wrote a blog post about some comments that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had made about iPod owners having devices full of stolen music. I dashed off a missive to Microsoft.com’s customer service form and got a response.

    At the time John Lettice, when writing about the affair in The Register said:

    We’re sure iPod owners will regard being called law-abiding by an exec from a company with Microsoft’s legal experience as a high point to end the week on. But, you ask, how the blazes did we get to this one? We have Ged Carrol’s blog to thank. Mightily offended by Ballmer’s original comments, Ged used the feedback system at microsoft.com to demand an apology, and he got one. The possibility of feedback systems of this ilk actually working had never occurred to The Register, so we’ve never bothered trying, but if you want your very own grovel, insert your outraged howls here.

    At that time, journalists didn’t think of customer care representatives as a source of comment. Six years later and with social media on tear, the customer care representative is increasingly on the frontline of reputation management.

    Some of the discussions I have been involved with has been about the interface between PR and customer services. Where is the overlap? How do you ensure efficient and effective task management between the two? The last question is being addressed with solutions from the likes of Brandwatch and Salesforce.com.

    Inhouse vs. agency

    I was discussing in-house versus agency with some people recently and one of the key points they made was that whilst agencies provide flexibility in terms of manpower and access to tools that an in-house team couldn’t justify because of cost, social media’s need for immediate and decisive responsiveness required organisations to re-address their in-house requirements and expand their current capability.  This is a great opportunity for measurement companies, other organisations that provide ‘horizontal’ services and e-lance digital communications people to interject as these considerations are being made. It may also cause some agencies to start thinking about what an agency means and how they can change the structure of their offering to ensure that they remain relevant.

  • Nozoe Kuniaki & more news

    Nozoe Kuniaki

    Former CEO of Fujitsu Nozoe Kuniaki (野副州旦) – blackmail forced his resignation | Japan: Stippy – interesting story of boardroom intrigue. Nozoe Kuniaki was originally said to have resigned due to ill health. The FT reported that Nozoe Kuniaki was really forced to resign by Fujitsu. Apparently Nozoe Kuniaki was forced to resign over links to a company of “unfavourable reputation”. The FT hints the roots of this palace putsch: apparently Nozoe Kuniaki was opposed by colleagues due to his drive to refocus the group on IT services at the expense of unprofitable electronics divisions, including its hard disk drive business.

    China

    FT.com / China – China faces shortages of migrant workers – this is more about structural change than an economic problem, the demographic bomb hasn’t kicked in yet. Shenzhen and similar areas will go to higher value products and industry permeate deeper into the country FT.com / Asia-Pacific – Labour shortage hits China export recovery

    Consumer behaviour

    When Trying to Preserve the Planet Strains the Relationship – NYTimes.com – environmentalism causing maritial strife

    Culture

    Axe Cop – genius: a 5 year-old script writer and a 29 year-old illustrator create an awesome comic

    From Quantic Dream, a Child Killer and a Tormented Dad – NYTimes.com – interesting new direction in gaming. In some ways it reminds me of Myst and the vision that Philips had for the CD-i platform

    Economics

    Economists Urge Government to Stop War on Piracy | TorrentFreak – Digital Economy Bill-type measures don’t make economic sense according to Spanish economists

    Innovation

    Op-Ed Contributor – Microsoft’s Creative Destruction – NYTimes.com – “Microsoft has become a clumsy, uncompetitive innovator. Its products are lampooned, often unfairly but sometimes with good reason. Its image has never recovered from the antitrust prosecution of the 1990s. Its marketing has been inept for years; remember the 2008 ad in which Bill Gates was somehow persuaded to literally wiggle his behind at the camera?” and “Microsoft’s huge profits — $6.7 billion for the past quarter — come almost entirely from Windows and Office programs first developed decades ago. Like G.M. with its trucks and S.U.V.’s, Microsoft can’t count on these venerable products to sustain it forever.”

    Chinese Premier Talks Up Internet of Things – NYTimes.com – interesting stuff here, however we need to move to IPv6 addresses fast in order to take advantage of it

    Ireland

    RTÉ News: ‘Guerrilla street’ hurling in US capital

    Japan

    Grads return to watches as job-hunter prop | The Japan Times Online – watches used to give the impression of being well-organised

    Tech Lawyers Say ‘Uh Oh’ as Microsoft Outsources Legal Work to India

    Google and antitrust: Searching questions | The Economist

    Slapdash Bill will damage Britain’s digital economy – The Irish Times – Fri, Nov 27, 2009 – external perspective on the forthcoming Digital Economy Bill

    Media

    Leaked UK record industry memo sets out plans for breaking UK copyright – Boing Boing – WTF. The BPI-authored changes the effect of which was that “the security services concerns were not being met” and then goes on to talk about the irony that the Open Rights Group and the Security Services being on the same side as if it validates his standpoint

    ivi.ru — смотрите фильмы и сериалы с комфортом! – Russian answer to Hulu and iPlayer. Really nicely designed.

    When using open source makes you an enemy of the state | Technology | guardian.co.uk – interesting evidence against MPAA and RIAA of trying to incite unilateral US government actions against Indonesia because it uses open source software

    Online

    U.K. Kids Start Social Networking Way Under the Age Limit | Fast Company

    Philippines

    Sinatra Song Often Strikes Deadly Chord – NYTimes.com – My Way correlates with karaoke-related killings in the Philippines. Fascinating bit of newspaper anthropology

    Retailing

    FT.com / Comment / Analysis – China: The jailed salesman – background on the Gome business

    Security

    China PLA officer urges new Internet control agency | Reuters – People’s Liberation Army Major General Huang Yongyin ‘For national security, the Internet has already become a new battlefield without gunpowder’

    Google Case Highlights Gaps in Computer Security – NYTimes.com – interesting take on security

    Software

    The best health apps for your iPhone | The Guardian

    Wireless

    FT.com / Telecoms – Students power BlackBerry growth – I can completely understand this, I miss a proper keyboard a la the Nokia Communicator

    Motorola’s First-Quarter Forecast Hurts Shares – NYTimes.com – Android failing to save Motorola’s bacon

  • Who is your city? by Richard Florida

    Richard Florida is famous for his works on the rise of the creative classes. Who is your city? is an exploration into how clusters develop wrapped up under the guise of a self-help book. The book was recommended by a friend to mine who has been studying architecture and urban design. Florida looks at the characteristics of different cities (predominantly in North America) and explores factors that attract people at different life stages. You can see similar patterns in China around the rise of Shenzhen as a new city in the space of a few decades, or the way London draws talent from across the rest of the UK across various creative services.

    Flordia provides some of the starting points to the age-old regional planning question ‘How do we make another Silicon Valley in <insert region name here>?’ by listing some of the factors involved. There is an interplay between planning and organic effects. Korea is currently facing these challenges as it tried to have Sejong City meet its full potential

    Unlike many books he hasn’t fallen into the classic bad science trap that correlation and causality are the same thing. For instance: whilst no two neighbouring countries with a McDonald’s restaurant may have gone to war, that doesn’t make Ronald McDonald a prime candidate for the next United Nations secretary general.

    The book is interesting in the way that a Malcolm Gladwell book is interesting; I would prefer for Richard Florida to surface more of the modelling and research that went into Who is your city. The book is a serious academic piece of work that is devalued by reducing it to dinner party talking points. The section of questions at the back seem logical enough for someone thinking about relocating, there is no rocket science in them. At the end of it, I was left wondering how much utility did Who is your city? have for the average European or Asian reader? More book reviews here.