innovation playground Idris Mootee

Powerful And Affordable Real Time Data Mining, Visualization And Interactions Are Powering Up A New Culture Act - And Enabling "Infovation".

Just landed in Rhode Island and spendin the next 2 days in Providence, long working sessions ahead, expect to some productive knowledge exchange. The topic will be around where arts meets science, design meets technology.

We talk about how information changes our life and how it affect the way we make decisions both as individual and as a team or society, I think we are still unaware of the true power of change information visualization can have and the impact when applied in an interactive and social mobile settings.

Imagine a scenario everytime a politician suggests an idea and you can see realtime information in simple graphics visual data to confirm his/her coment or when a company makes a statment you can see how other respond with an instant trust index? That's a very likely future, an idea which I am working on. Can't say more.

And I don’t mean just data visualization such as bar chart and 3D chart etc, primarily it is the study and application of the visual representation of quantitative data, meaning "information which has been abstracted in some schematic form, including attributes or variables for the units of information."

Infodesign of infographics is actually different (it is like when I was trying to explain the differencne between customer experience and user experience/usabiity 10 years ago) from data visulaization. Information graphics (or so called infographics) instead of visualizing data, it is the strategic use of data by incorporating interactions, icons, charts, diagrams, graphs, tables and maps to present information that could bring new knowledge and sense making. Not only it helps to explain oterhwise difficult to understand data, but also illuminate and explain system complexities or system relationships in an easy to digest manner.

This is not new, in our human history our ancestors created cave murals and giant paintings to show us what was happening including what their understand of the the world, an event or even the universe. The power of infodesign lies in its effectiveness in simplifying complex data into understandable visual representations that can be universally interpreted.

The power of real time interactions with live data brings the potential to a whole new level. The human minds are real time computing machines that works to constantly changing and creating value and meaning of objects; the interactions between human brain and semiotics is conducted every time we see a visual representation of a scenario and makes possible of expanding our human cognition to absorb large amounts of data at just one single glance or click.

Here comes the most interesting part, infodesign is powering up an “infoculture” where massive real-time socailly digitally distributed (useful and useless) information is enabling a new form of cultural act. It is where science meets arts, and will continue to power up new possibilities as we learn how to use them. I will be the first one here to call it “Infovation.” Remember you hear it here first. Will write more about it next few days.

One more thing, how many schools out there actually teaches information design? Not many. We are still training people yesterday's skills for yesterday's job. No wonder it is hard for designers to find work. I think design schools should be paying for the continuous education of their graduates, becasue they never trained them enough or properly in the first place.

What Designers And Design Thinkers Can Learn From Complex Adaptive Systems?

Early 1995, I was obsessed with the new science of complexity and have spent a lot of time on cellula automata and was looking for new clues to illuminate strategy making when emerging technologies were causing uncertainties in the world of business. I questioned the relevance as well as applicability of many social science theories and economic theories in understanding the nature of change bought by complex systems.

Complexity science seems to shed some lights on the behaviors of network effects of people/computers, immune systems and termite colonies. I was intrigued by what I was seeing and ended up writing a book on its complexity theories and business strategy. It helps to explain the role of network influences and behavior, connections and interactions. Fascinating to the business applications of concepts of emerging orders, self-organizing, nonlinearit, I realize the value of pattern recognition, difference between the whole and the mere sum of the parts, the value of outliers and diversity, and the way some very small inputs can lead to big changes.

15 years later, now when I revisit the ideas, these concepts seem to make more sense as we see with what’s doing on around us. It is important to understand that this science is not a single theory or a theory of everything. It is a lose combination of different ideas, theories and concepts from a variety of disciplines--biology, anthropology, economy, sociology, management that together helps explain complex adaptive system.

What does it mean for designers and design thinkers? The new science (or art) helps us to understand how complex adaptive systems work the patterns of relationships within them, how they are sustained, how they self-organize and how outcomes emerge. It is highly relevant when we are dealing with introducing a highly innovative products/technologies to the market where different elements interact to create a new behavior. Until they use the products, it is hard to see how it will be actually used rather than what was envisioned. It invites us to examine the unpredictable, disorderly and unstable aspects of organizations and human behavior.

Think social media and think sustainability. Think how activities at a local level can shape individual change and activate organizational capacities of communities and ultimate affect structural change. If Blockbuster understands these ideas, they might have a good chance of not letting Netflex eats their lunch. If GM understands these ideas, the might have come up with a new business model. If Visa understands these ideas, their market cap could be doubled from the current market valuation. If LG understands this, they can create the next tablet that beats iPad.

From Recycling To Fair Trade And Conflict Free Material. Companies Such As HP Are Doing A Great Job.

Despite there are a lot of effort on recycling, very few of our stuff are recyclable and being recycled. I don’t think we are doing enough, designers and consumers have a dilemma, and we love nicely designed packaging but hate to see the kind of waste we’re producing. Food containers are one good example.

Now a new sugar-based polymer could be used to make food containers compostable at home together with your potato peels. A team of scientists at the Imperial College London led by Charlotte Williams in partnership with BioCeramic Therapeutics have created a degradable material from sugars derived from the breakdown of lignocellulosic biomass. This is definitely not the first "biorenewable plastic," previously biodegradable plastic made from sugar beet or corn-based biomass. There is a Denmark-based company, Agroplast, that is working on developing plastic products from animal urine, that’s good idea but not for my milk please.

The polymer developed at the Imperial College London is instead derived from the sugars that are produced when you breakdown lignocellulosic biomass: biomass made from cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin that is found in wood byproducts, grasses, and some types of agricultural waste. I think there are still technical and economic issues before this become market ready. I like to see fair trade biodegradable material to be used for all our everyday consumerables.

If you think recycling is the only problem for computer and electronics, think again. Think about blood diamonds, blood oil and blood minerals, and now blood PCs.  HP is the first trying to trace 'conflict minerals' in electronics as part of their socially responsibility initiatives and they are taking it to an unexpected place including the war-ravaged Democratic Republic of Congo.

Concerned that purchases of metals could be financing armed conflict in the West African country, HP and other companies are turning their attention to its suppliers of metals, including tin, gold, tantalum, and tungsten, which are used in everyday computing products. Most of the world’s raw material came from places where there have been conflicts for a long period of time.

It is not easy at all for HP to trace all their components and to make sure that they are fair trade and conflict free zone. The push toward "traceability" in the metals extraction is an outgrowth of HP's practices of auditing its supply chain partners to make sure they do not contribute to human rights and environmental violations. Kudos to HP. Next time you buy a HP notebook you will find a Fair Trade and Conflict Free stickers on top of the Recycle stickers there. In the meantime if you're interested in recycled PC, you can buy the fashionable keybag designed by Joao Sabino, is a made from recycled computer keyboards available in red, white, black and pink! If you have a few old keyboards, you can actually create your own.

Another Product Innovation: Introducing The New Digitpon.

Digitpon, or digital tampon - is an innovative tampon design made of absorbent material capable of being compressed to self-sustaining form. A portion of the material is compressed to a rod-like shape to provide a rigid central support for the remaining relatively uncompressed portion.

Digi doesn’t digital; it simply means the product is inserted into the body by using a "digit" or finger---hence the name "digital tampon". There is a US patent on the design. It is interesting to note that over 97% of European female prefer digital tampons, and in the US only 3% of use them. Like many digital products, it has adoption issues.

I am no expert in this product category although I am very familiar with other personal care products, any innovation in the personal care space often have long adoption cycles. A digipon comprises an elongate absorbent body of unitary construction, with the remaining upper portion of the absorbent body being relatively uncompressed with upper portion overhanging the top end of said insertion. The bottom end of the insertion provides a small downward facing finger-receiving pocket based at the bottom end of said insertion means, and a withdrawal cord, one end of which is secured to at least the bottom end of said insertion means. Lots of human factor insights are incorporated into the design.

Without the need for any ethnographic studies, we know how some women the menstrual cramps can lead to nausea and makes it hard to concentrate on work. There are real unmet needs here that provide lots of opportunity for innovation. New research to be presented at the 2009 American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) annual meeting in Now reveals that a new device to treat this pain is safe and effective--, since the device is essentially a glorified tampon. The research participants received an oral dose of 10 mg of Ketorolac (a nonsteroidal antiinflammatory medication), and nine of whom received a tampon coated with the same amount of the same drug. Then, during the next menstrual cycle, the patients switched treatments, so that each woman had access to each type of drug delivery system.

The results? The drug administered vaginally accumulated more efficiently in the uterine tissue than the drug administered orally. Existing oral medications cause significant gastrointestinal side effects for women, creating additional discomfort.

I think there are plenty of opportunities for drug delivery platform innovation, I am really bad in swallowing pills or capsules and I hated the after taste in many cases. I don’t see why drugs can not be delivered by many everyday surfaces. Here are two killer ideas:

Imagine you can use the computer mouse as delivery platform for vitamins or prescriptive medications. Knowing what deficiencies you have, now you can customize how those can be delivered. Don’t use your colleague’s computer without asking as you might end up getting an unnecessary dosage of Viagra.

Imagine you can use your iPhone skin as deliver platform for your cold medicine? And you can pick different colors and patterns. Polymers can be used as a drug delivery agent. The chemical conjugation or the physical embodiment of therapeutic agents in polymers offers great potential to improve the efficacy and safety of therapies and create novel therapeutic opportunities. Polymer is a large molecule (macromolecule) composed of repeating structural units typically connected by covalent chemical bonds. While polymer often suggests plastic, it actually refers to a large class of natural and synthetic materials with different properties.