Here’s Where We Screwed Up With Gas
A few months ago I wrote about The Long Tail. The main idea behind this principle is that there is a class of commodities that eventually become so cheap they can be ‘wasted’ in order to exploit bigger, more valuable opportunities. Yahoo gives offers unlimited storage to its email customers to entice them to spend on other things - because storage has become cheap enough to give away. Netflix offers unlimited movie downloads for a flat monthly fee, implying an incredibly cheap per-movie viewing cost for heavy users.
Sphere: Related ContentHow To Transform A Culture With Innovation
Have you ever witnessed an innovation that transforms everything in a culture?
It doesn’t happen often. Most of the time innovation improves rather than transforms. Well over 90 percent of the time, in fact.
There’s a good reason for that. Change is hard. In Myers-Briggs terms, most people in our culture (75 percent) prefer ’sensing,’ and one of the aspects of sensing is resistance to change. Incremental change, if useful, might be OK. Transformational change is painful.
Sphere: Related ContentWill Verizon’s Open Source Innovation Succeed?
Up until late last year, Verizon was a closed network. And then, this:
In late November, Verizon Wireless said it would allow any device or software to run on its wireless network. It’s a reversal for the No. 2 U.S. wireless carrier, which had been known as the most protective in the industry.
Why the turnaround? And what does this say about the organizational character of Verizon?
Sphere: Related ContentHow The US Patent System Crushes Innovation
Forbes Magazine recently interviewed Michael Meurer and James Besson, authors of Patent Failure: How Judges, Bureaucrats and Lawyers Put Innovators at Risk, a massive study on the costs and benefits of holding patents. Their chilling conclusion:
Sphere: Related ContentMeurer and Bessen concluded that in every industry, except pharmaceuticals and biotech, publicly traded companies spend more money litigating to protect existing patents and paying fees to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office than they earn from the same patents. (Bessen and Meurer evaluated patents issued by all publicly traded companies between 1984 and 1999.)
7 Things Innovators Do That You Don’t
What prevents you from being a great innovator? Not much. Innovators by and large aren’t creative geniuses gifted with da Vinci-like talent. It’s not what they ARE - it’s what they DO. They do these seven things you most likely do not.
Sphere: Related ContentThree Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part II
Table of contents for State of Innovation
- Three Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part I
- Three Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part II
In our first installment, the Boston Consultancy Group identified innovation trends via a survey of over 2400 senior level executives. In this installment, Booz-Allen-Hamilton studies the world’s largest R&D investors to determine what innovation strategies succeed.
Sphere: Related ContentThree Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part I
Table of contents for State of Innovation
- Three Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part I
- Three Amazing Reports On The State Of Innovation - Part II
In December, three international consultants published the results of their research on the current state of innovation. This four-part series will cover each in turn, then I’ll add a conclusion that ties them together. First on the block - Innovation 2007 from the Boston Consultancy Group.
Sphere: Related ContentUnlimited Free Broadband Downloads!!
That sounds a lot better than “Up to 17 hours of broadband downloads per month!” And when you can do it for the same price, you’ve entered The Long Tail. That’s what Netflix has discovered.
Sphere: Related ContentThe End Of Tesla Motors??
Tesla Motors. Everyone has been writing and posting nothing but glowing, positive articles about the present, and future, of this maverick automotive company. So naturally I’m a little shocked to relay this information:
Sphere: Related ContentThe Next Big Disruptive Innovation Platform
This article in PC World describes Samsung’s two latest television prototypes that use an astounding new technology called organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs). But the article is remarkable not for the new product but for the new disruptive platform it represents.
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