Tech & Innovation
News, opinions and advice on technology development and the state of innovation.
Five similarities between forming habits and deep customer development
I spend a lot of time thinking about new companies finding, nurturing and winning over their first lot of customers and I’ve realised that there are a lot of similarities with forming habits. Here are five...
Get rid of “Best Practice” Bingo once and for all
Yesterday I was in a meeting and the term “best practice” came up. It wafted across the table and went straight up my nose. The meeting was nearly over and I’d made a big enough menace of myself that day to launch into my tirade on “best practice”, so I’ll let you hear it now. It might change the way you think...
Creativity vs Innovation – A fool’s dilemma
To succeed, innovation needs to be more than a nebulous desire to foster creativity in an organisation. It needs to be a concrete business process driven from the top. Roger La Salle explains.
Flame Wars 101: A Guide to Profiting from your Disagreeable Nature
Are you a misanthrope? Do you enjoy causing arguments for the sake of it?
Do you insist on playing devil's advocate in every single situation, no matter how inappropriate?
Then you might just have a career ahead of you as a blogger.
In 2009, were you a proactive, experimental future leader or a reactive, butt-covering also-ran?
If there is one good thing that came from this year's commercial carnage, it's the liberating affect the economic downturn had on our collective ability, as entrepreneurs, to speak openly.
Check out Stanford's avant-garde iPhone Orchestra
What do tech-head muso students do in their spare time? Well the ones at Stanford University in California started an orchestra in which every member has the same instrument with the capacity to produce a near limitless variety of sound. As you can see in this excellent New York Times video profile (read the accompanying article here), the end result is avant-guarde to say the least (think Yo Yo Ma on LSD).
Check out Stanford’s avant-garde iPhone Orchestra
What do tech-head muso students do in their spare time? Well the ones at Stanford University in California started an orchestra in which every member has the same instrument with the capacity to produce a near limitless variety of sound. As you can see in this excellent New York Times video profile (read the accompanying article here), the end result is avant-guarde to say the least (think Yo Yo Ma on LSD).
2009 Cool Company Awards video highlights in two-and-a-half minutes
With a Pop Art theme, this year's Anthill Cool Company Awards ceremony was always going to be groovy.
Here are the highlights, distilled down into a manic two-and-a-half-minute clip by our very own multi-talented multimedia maestro, Peter Arena (who also designed the winners' "trophies"). Awe-some!
DUMB REPORT 2009: iSnack 2.Doh! (1 of 10)
As the first instalment in our annual DUMB REPORT, it's hard to look beyond the most discussed media and marketing experiment for 2009, Kraft's controversial crowdsourcing campaign and the naming of iSnack 2.0.
What makes women click?
The web and email content that women find interesting is radically different to the content that interests men. So it stands to reason that engaging men and women online requires fundamentally different strategies.
Are Australian businesses subsidising dirt cheap copies of Windows 7 in China?
How do you justify the price of $120 per copy of Windows 7 Home Premium in China against the price of around $300 in Australia without saying rich countries are subsidising the cost of Windows in poor countries?
How to harness bloggers to spread your message (the right way)
Earlier this year, Australian wallet maker Dosh Wallets released its second line of wallets (which are über cool, by the way). Consumer awareness was low, so Dosh Wallets hired digital strategist Julian Cole and his team at Sydney-based agency The Population to create a buzz online for the product line release.
Unsocial Media – What the hell am I doing here?
Communication is a fundamental human need. However, as Will Egan explains, Twitter and Facebook can become costly distractions from the main game if companies don't understand where their communities are coming from.
Ford's inflatable seatbelt innovation helps save lives
Ford is currently bringing to market an inflatable seatbelt design for rear-seat passengers. The concept incorporates the added safety of airbag technology to reduce head, neck and chest injuries caused by seatbelt restraint in a crash.
Ford’s inflatable seatbelt innovation helps save lives
Ford is currently bringing to market an inflatable seatbelt design for rear-seat passengers. The concept incorporates the added safety of airbag technology to reduce head, neck and chest injuries caused by seatbelt restraint in a crash.
15 new year business resolutions you should start NOW.
The new year is a perfect time to clean out your desk, head and bad habits. Rowena Murray offers 15 tips for streamlining your business, renewing focus and retuning for a bumper 2010.
Fear and hope at Copenhagen – a Gen Y perspective
On Monday we published Dave Sag’s first post from Copenhagen. Today we received this diary entry from 26-year-old Australian Wendy Miller, who is attending the Copenhagen COP15 climate change summit as a member of the Australian Youth Climate Coalition.
Could this be the future of magazines? Time Inc says, Yes.
Just last week, we posted the Sun Newspaper's parody of the iPhone ads and mobile alternatives to print magazines. It was clever, entertaining and pure ammo for print lovers (who have come under heavy bombardment this year, as digital continues its march over print circulations and into classified advertising revenues). However, it's hard to see how a print magazine might match this collaboration between The Wonderfactory and Time, Inc.
Awesome Japanese shop window installation
Those Japanese know how to do shop windows with class. Check out this breath of fresh air -- a Maison Hermès installation by Tokujin Yoshioka.
Can you keep a secret? Protecting your intellectual property from pirates
Brands such as Coca Cola are worth hundreds of millions of dollars and rely on secrecy to protect their secret formulae. Rumour has it that only four people know the formula for Coca Cola. It is also alleged that only four people know the secret to the finger licking good taste of Kentucky Fried Chicken.
If companies like Coca Cola and Kentucky Fried Chicken can rely on secrecy, is that enough?
