Weekly Assignments
- Daily Drift
- Weekly Wandering
- Reflection
- To Review
- Notes
- Classmate Feedback
Elon Musk on Innovating by First Principles vs. Analogous Thinking
Review this Week’s Reading
- “The Rules of Innovation” by Clayton Christensen in The Innovator’s Cookbook
- take root in disruption – do something smaller, more convenient or cheaper, addressing a marginal market the leaders will ignore
- necessary scope to succeed – better product than the existing? Or simpler, faster, more convenient
- leverage the right capabilities – use the right tools (tools you know best and that will get the job done)
- disrupt competitors, not customers – try to help customers do things they already do, but do them better, faster or more easily
- 37Signals & Basecamp
- “The Adjacent Possible” from Where Good Ideas Come From
Review this Week’s One Time Assignments
- Personal Manifestos
- Portfolio Maps
Assignments for Week 3
Reading
- “Liquid Networks” from Where Good Ideas Come From
Weekly Assignments
- Daily Drift – Google Drive doc, 300 words daily, stream of consciousness to kick start your creativity (share link with me only)
- Weekly Wandering – take a walk, go running, whatever, capture your thoughts in words, pictures, sketches, music, video – whatever helps you express your thoughts, Google Drive doc (share link on Google Community).
- Reflection – at the end of the week, reflect on everything you’ve gathered & pondered. Write 300 or more words in a Google doc trying to organize it into a cohesive whole (share link on Google Community).
- To Review – a list of links in a Google Drive spreadsheet; videos, books, films, etc, you’d like to review later (share link on Google Community)
- Notes – notes in a Google Drive doc on your ‘To Review’ materials for the week (share link on Google Community)
- Classmate Feedback – comment on 2 or more classmates’ posts to our class Google Community
One-Time Assignments
History of the Field – 3 points for presentation; 3 for write-up
Research the history of the area in which you’d like to develop a project. How did we get to where we are today, to the state-of-the-art? What previous technologies and what advances in other fields fed into the development of your field? What sort of predictions were made about your field, from people within or without? Did those predictions pan out? (Vannevar Bush described something very similar to the World Wide Web in 1948, for example. And Star Trek TNG had touchscreen tablets that look and function almost identically to an iPad.) Who were some of the pioneers in your field? Illustrate this history in the form of a spatial “concept map” along the lines of your portfolio map from last week. Use the map to show—at a glance—the relationships between ideas/tools/people. It may make sense to use more than one version of the map to demonstrate the evolution of ideas in the field over time.
Members of Team Blinky will present their research—including their concept map—to the class on September 22. Use web sites, videos, images or any other media that will help describe your discoveries. Refer to these additional guidelines for an effective presentation.
Everyone in the class—regardless of team—must write up his or her research as a single Google Doc, posted to the “History of the Field” category in the Google Community before class on September 29. If you presented your research and ideas to the class, be sure to incorporate and/or respond to any feedback you received from your classmates during your presentation. Attach your concept map image to the written blog post. You’ll later refer to this text as you develop your formal project proposal, and revise it based on your proofs-of-concept and feedback from your classmates and me. You’ll be graded not only on the thoroughness of your research, but on how effectively you present your ideas in writing. Use headings or other formatting to lend clarity and organization to your Google Doc, and keep these guidelines in mind. Your Google Doc should be at least 700 words.