Dick Brass, ex-vice president at Microsoft comments on the past and the future of our favourite “unrepentant intentional monopolist” (notice the “”, they’re from the article in the NYT, I would never use such words, would I?).

Unbelievable stories included, like this one:

For example, early in my tenure, our group of very clever graphics experts invented a way to display text on screen called ClearType. It worked by using the color dots of liquid crystal displays to make type much more readable on the screen. Although we built it to help sell e-books, it gave Microsoft a huge potential advantage for every device with a screen. But it also annoyed other Microsoft groups that felt threatened by our success.

Engineers in the Windows group falsely claimed it made the display go haywire when certain colors were used. The head of Office products said it was fuzzy and gave him headaches. The vice president for pocket devices was blunter: he’d support ClearType and use it, but only if I transferred the program and the programmers to his control. As a result, even though it received much public praise, internal promotion and patents, a decade passed before a fully operational version of ClearType finally made it into Windows.

Oh well, the miracles of organizational culture – it can work wonders or it can be outright dysfunctional, stifling innovation. On a more systematic level:

Unlike other companies, Microsoft never developed a true system for innovation. Some of my former colleagues argue that it actually developed a system to thwart innovation. Despite having one of the largest and best corporate laboratories in the world, and the luxury of not one but three chief technology officers, the company routinely manages to frustrate the efforts of its visionary thinkers.

Well, ideas are aplenty and not the problem – it’s about the follow-up and the implementation … always harder for the large organizations and for those with established and nicely profitable business models to listen to their research departments.

Monster pic by gapingvoid obviously – oh the irony

nett, an einem Sonntag via Mika73 gefunden – sehr passend auch zu den 5 innovation killers

Via Boing Boing, Neatorama, Buzzfeed, I am Jeriko and Polkarobot (internet memes they travel fast and far …) the Heavy Metal Band Names Flowchart:

Plain black and white takes us so far, huh? Now, let’s see, reduced graphic vocabulary in a colourful subject, found via MaisonBisson and you may click on through):

Some colours are nice, see e.g. the Milky Way as subway map:

Or this neat visualization of the industrial-economic complex, really nice:

Notice the green money studs? Same green in the little gem I found in the eduFutureBlog (alas, can’t really explain this, but I like the colours so much):

Ah, science and the internets – a complimentary relation. So, and again in the edufuture-Blog, I found this neat visualization of the global Net – an Internet Map for 2009 and for you. Granted, this is a complicated mesh of networks …:

At last, found via Martin Ebner, an Interactive Social Media Map (pdf) (don’t use this for your internet ventures, some pifalls and weird classifications are in there and I wouldn’t recommend to use ma.gnolia for your social bookmarking needs, at least for some time):

[...] minimal impact KM touts the benefits of doing a great deal without in any way affecting the work lives of your colleagues or the results of your enterprise [...]

Dr. Vaine identifies several proven methods of achieving minimal impact KM:

- depreciative inquiry
- social network paralysis
- corporate flogging
- six stigma

Great stuff, but if you’re really interested in catching up on KM World 2008 better check out Michael Sampsons conference notes. Interesting in many regards, especially for an (enterprise) social software consultant who sees Knowledge Management as one of the most interesting usage arenas.

Barry Jaruzelski, a partner at Booz & Co., discusses the findings in the fourth annual Global Innovation 1000 survey of the world’s top spenders in corporate R&D, and why it’s important to invest in new products during a recession.

Yes, right, products but let’s not forget improved processes. I wonder thus why the cuts and lower spend expectations in IT hit there as well – check the most current CIO survey (page ):

Dann das schöne Procrastination Flowchart von projectsidewalk.com, noch mal gefunden via Lobo und Co. (hmm, was soll mir das sagen)

In meinen Augen sind beide gleich undurchdringlich … und ja, ich brauch dringend zwei Widmungen für mein Exemplar …

„It is hardly possible to overrate the value … of placing human beings in contact with others dissimilar to themselves, and with modes of thought and action unlike those with which they are familiar… Such communication has always been, and particularly in the present age, one of the primary sources of progress.“

I wonder what this tells us about tonights rush of like-minded people to sign up for the upcoming BarCamp Berlin 3:

After ’roundabout 4 hours of open registration all places are taken – yes, I’m in there too, thanks for asking.

Doch je mehr Musiker diese Quelle anzapfen, desto weniger Geld dürften sie einnehmen.

Auch Kevin Kelly hat dazu eine Meinung: The Reality of Depending on True Fans

I have been researching new business models for artists working in the low end of the long tail. How can one make a living in a micro-niche? Is it even possible, particularly in this realm of no-cost copies?

Gerd Leonhard wurde von der Zeit interviewt

Malte schreibt in der Netzeitung über das Urheberrrecht.

Und Spreeblick testet dieses neue Dingsda namens TV.

- Executive Leadership
- Skill Development
- Innovation Infrastructure
- Network for Innovation Mentoring & Facilitation
- Internal Promotion
- Recognition & Reward for innovation

Nice list but let me add another perspective on corporate innovation management: An apt innovation infrastructure – organizational structures (like processes), competencies and strategies too – needs to be designed. So when frog design strategy director Ravi Chatpar outlines the benefits of an iterative design process, in which design and business strategy impact one another directly, we should listen too. Innovation management can profit from including “designers” early on in the strategic planning process, i.e. have them iterate through various prototypes as a way of refining strategic thinking:

[...] designers should be brought into the innovation process at the very earliest stages. Too many companies still make the mistake of keeping business strategy and design activities separate. From concept through development, designers should function in parallel with corporate decision makers.

See his short article in Harvard Business Review in September 2007 (“Innovate Faster by Melding Design and Strategy”).

In this theme I also liked Irving Wladawsky-Berger’s take on the possible contributions design can bring to innovation (“Creativity, Innovation and Design”), explained via the example of a newly formed design-business-think-tank:

[...] bring together the disciplines of design, engineering, technology and business to address jointly the challenges of innovation in an increasingly global, competitive economy. Design-London aims to “create an innovation triangle between design (represented by the Royal College of Art), engineering and technology (represented by the Imperial College Faculty of Engineering), and business and management (represented by Imperial’s Tanaka Business School).”Two sides of this triangle are familiar territory. [...] The third leg of this triangle is very intriguing – namely the inclusion of Design and the Royal College of Arts as a full partner in Design-London. What are creative disciplines – and a college of arts, for heaven’s sake – doing side-by-side with the hard, analytical disciplines that are charged with pushing the economy into the future – engineering and management, technology and business? You are mixing the people who run companies and build things with the creative types?

But the more I thought about it, the more I started appreciating the sheer brilliance of this move. After all, we are talking about innovation.

[...] Clearly, design and the creative arts in general have long played a big role in initiatives aimed at fostering innovation