4iP launches: the innovation’s already started
Channel 4 is pinning its hopes on digital mavericks (that means you), the headline on today’s Sunday Herald feature on 4iP. It’s not a bad piece for setting out some of the context of ‘4 Innovation for the Public’, the new element of Channel 4 for which I am its first (and currently only) Commissioner. It also sets out the importance we place on getting some great ideas turned into tangible mobile, web or game-space as soon as possible.
Ross picks up on the potential for what’s to come in his blogged summary of Wednesday’s briefing and stakeholder event in Glasgow, stressing the potential that starts in 38minutes for companies and individuals to club together with their skills and aptitudes, creating projects that with the traditional boundaries and disaggregation of the creative industries would not be possible: “There’s more insulation on Scottish agencies than on most hot water tanks”…
Turning connections into collaborations
38minutes is an interesting example of what small amounts of money - or no amounts of money - can do while creating significant impact. A few people have sneered (via email or even to my face) about the perceived ‘cheapness’ of using Ning as a platform for connecting and collaborating, but the impact of this network, like all others, is not to be found in its code but in the people who choose to devote some time and effort to collaborating on it. And for that, 38minutes has been a roaring success.
In Scotland and Northern Ireland we see a fairly disaggregated creative economy, the elements of which have rarely connected with each other beyond cliquey friendships and haphazard arrangements.
In Dundee we have some of the world’s greatest game-makers (most of the titles you play on the Wii, DS, XBox and PS3 come from here) and, like in Edinburgh, a spattering of incredibly talented graphic artists and new media workshops. In Edinburgh, alongside these you can find some of Britain’s top creative talent from the PR, ad and marketing scenes, as well as world class Artificial Intelligence research and business coming from the universities. Meanwhile, Glasgow has tended to support a strong independent TV scene, spawning a multitude of new media companies covering every size of screen you can imagine.
38minutes.co.uk has not been marketed, sold or advertised. Initially, its Channel 4 members told seven people about it. One month on we’re approaching 400 members, all of them top class new media producers from one of these sub-sectors, ready to collaborate on the next generation of public service… well, not broadcasting.
What we’re after is anything that is not telly, but which helps change the lives of people in Britain, and which may have the potential to change the lives of people wherever else they may be. By not being about broadcasting, limited by the geography of transmission towers, 4iP could create projects that have a global impact on the way we use, adapt, share, manipulate data, create change and improve the world around us.
So, having already turned around a few ideas submitted through the online proposals system since our launch in Scotland this week, never has there been a better time to get to know your colleagues in the new media business, suggest your ideas and land a 4iP commission in the coming weeks and months. *
I have a Motorola Razr. It’s a lousy, generic cell phone that I hate.
I call it my “phone”. Like, if I’m looking for the recharger, I say “Darn it, where did I put the charger for my phone?”. I do not say “Darn it, where did I put the charger for my Razr?”. In fact it would sound really weird if I said “where did I put the charger for… Continue reading
IIM-A’S annual business summit Confluence 2009 concluded on Sunday with speakers stressing on innovation and entrepreneurship in relation to emerging economies and businesses and a new world order in terms of the economy.
At the valedictory function to mark the conclusion of the three-day summit, former President A P J Abdul Kalam urged the students to become “employment generators” rather than “employment seekers”.
At a panel discussion on ‘New World… Continue reading
Isaac Asimov once said “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not Eureka! (I found it!) but rather, “hmm…. that’s funny….”. Based on a 30 year study across 300 product categories and 225 countries, the phrase might actually be “Hmmm…. that’s what I thought.”
A new whitepaper from Phillip Roos from GFK sums up 30 years of findings started by product guru… Continue reading
Michael Gilbert writes:
Coolness is not innovation. That which is innovative is not always cool. More importantly, that which is cool is not always innovative. Indeed, cool can be seen as inherently conservative. If an invention is not already well on its way to adoption in certain (possibly small, probably themselves cool) circles, then it is too obscure to be cool. Even if we’d never use the actual word “cool”… Continue reading
Registration opens today for the 25th annual Emerging Issues Forum, which brings North Carolina business, academic and political notables together to talk about policy issues.
Registration for last year’s forum sold out.
The topic of the Feb. 8-9 forum at the Raleigh Convention Center is “Creativity Inc.” and participants will talk about creativity, art, culture, design, and how public policy can encourage breakthrough ideas.
Attending costs $350 per individual, or $225 for
Digital advertising is evolving beyond the desktop computer, leaving companies relying solely on Web sites and display advertising woefully behind the eight ball. More and more, brands are relying on software development to create engaging consumer experiences that span multiple open platforms. Branded mobile applications
- The Observer, Sunday 15 November 2009
- Article history
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by Jeff Richardson, LSI CORPORATION
Generic multicore processors have been promoted as the solution to networking communication processing. In reality, they can’t address the scalability, determinism, and ease of programming required for next-generation networking infrastructure. An asymmetric multicore approach that blends multicore processors with networking-optimized accelerator engines and C-programmable libraries meets the challenges of next-generation networks.
Achieving deterministic performance is a key requirement for network operators to ensure reliability across wide variations… Continue reading
Disaster movie 2012 inspired panic in the States with Nasa having to reassure Americans that the world wasn’t about to end. Is movie viral marketing getting too clever for its own good?
One of the interesting fields of innovation today is business model innovation. Although technological innovations raise most interest and have the highest impact, business model innovation is the lever to business success in most cases. Examples like Google, Easyjet and IKEA prove that innovative business models can generate sustainable business success. In the module on Innovation & Entrepreneurship that I conduct for TSM Business School I… Continue reading
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