Week Four

4. January 30
The Group Solves the Problem

Question: How could technological innovation come from group “chemistry”?  

Quotes for Class Seven

"Essentially, Schumpeter believed that an increase in knowledge, plus the profit motive, will induce an entrepreneur to undertake something new and unfamiliar, usually borrowing money to build his innovative product.  When the products of entrepreneurs are commercialized and sold in the marketplace, the total output and wealth of the economy are increased by far more than the old products or capital that were replaced or destroyed.  What’s more, Schumpeter not only believed that bursts of technological innovation are the single most important forces that create and drive a dynamic growth economy, he also asserted that technological innovation leads to more output, with better quality, at lower prices.  According to the US Labor Department, personal computer prices have fallen nearly 100% since the early 1980s.  High-tech capital equipment prices are dropping about 30% a year . . .”
-- Lawrence Kudlow, American Abundance

                The Xanadu ideal is to model and enact exactly a new world that users would want and need if they realized it was possible.  The most general statement of the Xanadu paradigm is this: the purpose of computers is tracking connections.  A new computer world must be created built around explicit connection.  Great efforts must be made toward this end.
                The present computer world is built on crude traditional models: hierarchy (believed by some to be synonymous with "structure"); paper analogies, machine analogies, spatial analogies; a crude model of time and backtracking.   Older computer methods have great unseen drawbacks, pushing huge problems out into users' laps.
                Users' needs are ill-addressed by the paradigm of hierarchical files and their inability to deal with non-overlap.
                We need instead a rational representation of structure-- from computer mechanisms to electronic literature-- around the representation of all connection, rather than on false approximations (eg copying).  This includes a different approach to files (making their contents more streamlike).  Most important, it means system-maintained connections in vast quantities.
                The objectives are: the escape from paper, finding the best ways to support human thought and creativity-- building on a sophisticated knowledge of complex documents, not building up from the simplest implementation of the simplest documents.  The search is for an orderly, fast-evolving, fast-accumulating universe of electronic documents, not modelled to paper, and showing detailed relations among documents and versions, including overlap and commonality. 
- Ted Nelson, The Xanadu Project

Assignments:
Tim BERNERS-LEE, Weaving the Web: The Original Design and Ultimate Destiny of the World Wide Web, pp 1-122

February 1
New Human Relations Theory

Question: What role does “individualism” play in innovation?

Quotes for Class Eight

People with a high level of personal mastery share several basic characteristics.  They have a special sense of purpose that lies behind their visions and goals.  For such a person, a vision is a calling rather than simply a good idea.  They see ‘current reality’ as an ally, not an enemy.  They have learned how to perceive and work with forces of change rather than resist these forces.  They are deeply inquisitive, committed to continually seeing reality more and more accurately.  They feel connected to others and to life itself.  Yet they sacrifice none of their uniqueness.  They feel as if they are part of a larger creative process, which they can influence but cannot unilaterally control. . . .
                 Helplessness, the belief that we cannot influence the circumstances under which we live, undermines the incentive to learn, as does the belief that someone somewhere else dictates our actions. . . . This is why learning organizations will, increasingly, be ‘localized’ organizations, extending the maximum degree of authority and power as far from the ‘top’ or corporate center as possible.  Localness means moving decisions down the organizational hierarchy; designing business units where, to the greatest degree possible, local decision makers confront the full range of issues and dilemmas intrinsic in growing and sustaining any business enterprise.  Localness means unleashing people’s commitment by giving them the freedom to act, to try out their own ideas and be responsible for producing results
-- Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline

Mental toughness is humility, simplicity, Spartanism.  And one other, love.  I don’t necessarily have to like my associates, but as a person I must love them.  Love is loyalty.  Love is teamwork.  Love respects the dignity of the individual.  Heartpower is the strength of your corporation.
-- Vince Lombardi

Assignments:
Tim Berners-Lee, Weaving the Web, pp 123-209.