Strategy. Innovation. Brand.

disruptive innovation

Platforms, Solutions, and Aggies

Typical land-grant graduate.

Typical land-grant graduate.

My father, who was the first in our family to go to college, went to a land-grant university (Texas A&M). My sister went to a land-grant university (Clemson). I went to a land-grant university (Delaware). My wife went to a land-grant university (Purdue). My wife’s parents went to a land-grant university. (Wisconsin)

Abraham Lincoln set up the land-grant system through the Morrill Act of 1862. The federal government granted land to each state. The state used the land to set up a college to teach the practical arts, including agriculture, engineering, and military science.

The system worked. Land-grant colleges became social elevators that allowed lower-and middle-class kids to pursue higher education affordably. They also became engines of innovation, fueling an innovation boom that catapulted the United Sates to leadership positions in multiple industries in the late 19th century. We’re still riding the echo of that boom. I’ve often wondered about the return on the land-grant investment. The economic value created by the system must be orders of magnitude higher than the original cost.

The genius of the system is that it’s a platform, not a solution. For instance, Lincoln didn’t identify the inefficient harvesting of cotton as a national problem and jump to the conclusion that the government should invest in the cotton gin. Instead, he created a platform that allowed many people to pursue an education, investigate problems, and develop solutions on their own.

I bring this up because we seem confused about what role the government should play in stimulating innovation. I hear it in my IT/innovation classes all the time. Some students argue that government should get out of the way and let private industry solve every problem “efficiently”. Others argue that government should have a role but they have a difficult time describing it.

Ultimately, I think it’s fairly simple. The government should invest in platforms, not solutions. The land-grant system allowed millions of people — including me — to take something from America and then turn around and make something for America. (It’s not true that we’re either makers or takers. We’re usually both.)

In the recent past, the best example of platforms that stimulate innovation are probably the Internet and the human genome project. The massive brain mapping project — the Human Connectome — that President Obama recently announced could become the next great platform. On the other hand, the government investment in the solar panel manufacturer, Solyndra, was solution picking rather than platform building. It didn’t work so well.

So, I’m all for government investment in platforms that can stimulate innovation. By the way, I don’t claim that this is an original idea of mine. Steven Johnson makes much the same point in his book, Where Good Ideas Come From. But I do think it’s an idea that needs to be popularized. That’s why I’m writing about it. I hope you will, too. In the meantime, I’ll give credit where it’s due by saying, “Thank you Mr. Lincoln for helping my family get an education.”

 

 

Virtual Prisons

Nice prison you've got there.

Nice prison you’ve got there.

The USA locks up more citizens proportionally than any other country in the world. For every 100,000 people, we have 716 in jail. We’re followed closely by countries like Rwanda (527), Georgia (514), Cuba (510), and Russia (502). Nice company. At the other end of the spectrum we see those pesky Nordic countries again: Denmark (74), Norway (73), Sweden (70), Finland (59), and Iceland (47). (For a list of incarceration rates in 220 countries, click here).

We might think of this as an economic and technical problem. Prisons aren’t very efficient at converting criminals into model citizens. It costs a lot to keep so many people in jail and the recidivism rate is high. This can’t be helping us to balance the budget. So, the question becomes: are there more efficient, less costly ways to keep so many people off the streets?

As Evgeny Morozov points out in a recent article, this is exactly the way the consulting firm, Deloitte, framed the question in its recent report on virtual incarceration. The idea is simple: use technology to increase efficiency. By combining mobile phones with GPS and video cameras, we can lock up low-risk perps in their own homes. It’s less costly and certainly more efficient than current jails. If it can break the role of jails as the higher education centers of crime, it may also be more effective.

But Morozov asks a different question: is that really the problem we want to solve? Wouldn’t it be better to find solutions that would lower the incarceration rate? I’ve written a lot about disruptive innovations (and been the victim of a few), but Morozov writes that, “Smart technologies are not just disruptive; they can also preserve the status quo. Revolutionary in theory, they are often reactionary in practice.” Efficient incarceration is a good example. We’re not changing the fundamentals — we’re just making it easier, cheaper, more efficient to do the same old stuff.

I’ve always been a technical enthusiast. I remember reading Malthus in college. He wrote (in 1798) that, sooner or later, we would run out of resources to support a growing population. Society is improvable only up to a point; it’s certainly not perfectible. I essentially rejected the idea, assuming that technology would always stay a step ahead. If Malthus’ prediction hadn’t come true in 200 years, I thought we could safely ignore it.

Morozov is making a subtler point, however. It’s not just about resources. It’s also about our attitude and our ability to frame questions effectively. As he writes, “That we now have the means to make the most miserable experiences more tolerable should not be an excuse not to reduce the misery of those experiences.”

I think an increasing number of Americans is growing increasingly concerned about the number of people we lock up. We may be building a consensus for change. If we make incarceration less costly and more efficient, we may just undercut that consensus. Is that really what we want?

If Morozov is right, we may have to re-phrase Karl Marx’s classic aphorism. Reigion isn’t the opium of the people. Technology is.

(By the way, Morozov has also written a terrific book, To Save Everything Click Here: The Folly of Technological Solutionism, which I’ll write about soon).

 

Sunday Shorts – 10

Of course I can talk.

Of course I can talk.

Interesting things I’ve found this week — even if they happened long, long ago.

Want to improve medicine and reduce costs at the same time? Just add robots.

If there’s a gorilla hiding in your chest x-ray, shouldn’t a radiologist find it? Maybe not. After all, they’re intent on finding other things, like abnormalities. But isn’t a gorilla an abnormality? Why would 83% miss it?

Can dogs talk? You bethca. In fact, Bella just finished telling about her trip to the nail salon. She liked the service but wasn’t happy with the color.

Is Iran Botching the Bomb? According to Jacques Hymans in Foreign Affairs, it’s hard to build a bomb without good management systems and that’s “why so few authoritarian regimes have succeeded: they don’t have the right culture or institutions. When it comes to Iran’s program, then, the United States and its allies should get out of the way and let Iran’s worst enemies — its own leaders — gum up the process on their own”.

Need more caffeine? I certainly do. How about buying soap with caffeine in it and absorbing it through your skin? Why not?

What are the 50 companies that are most likely to disrupt the market place in 2013? Yikes! And the accompanying editorial.

Will solar energy cost less than fossil fuels in the next decade? It’s possible if this new technology proves out.

Have a malformed ear? Print a new one using a 3-D printer. Vincent Van Gogh should be so lucky.

You’ve heard about 3-D printers. How about a 3-D pen — write in the air!

Sustaining versus Disruptive Innovations

Every company wants to be more innovative.  But some innovations will help your business while others will disrupt it.  You need to enable sustaining innovations and defend against disruptive innovations.  But sometimes, disruptive business innovations are inevitable.  The only way to defend against them is to adopt them and disrupt your own business.  Hey, better to disrupt your own business rather than have someone else do it for you.  Right, Kodak?

Learn more in the video.

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