Last night we gathered at the Pervasive Media Studio for the second in the Dorkbot Show’n'Tell series. Sam Downie gave us an introduction to life casting and some of the technologies he’s been using in his internet radio and video casting shows. There was also a large swag bag from the last MacWorld that Sam was trying to get rid of generously giving away.
John Honniball then stepped up and showed some of his near inexhaustible range of old junk that too many of us recognised from our early brushes with technology. Whereas we used and abused these artefacts, John has accumulated, restored and demonstrates them. But not the Amstrad in the picture; thanks to Sir Alan Sugar’s engineering/business acumen, the plastic has degraded to the point that it has to be handled with latex gloves to prevent getting decomposed Amstrad all over your hands. Nasty.
We also had an introduction to SWiM from Tom Holder. Since a large portion of the audience were involved in web development, there was a ton of interest. Some great questions about authentication and the quality assurance for the apps store that they’re planning rounded out a great evening. Thanks to Sam & his Eye-Fi card for the photo and to Rachel for organising. More Dorkbot photos on Flickr soon I’m sure.
Bit slow off the mark on this post but it’s been a busy couple of days.
We had a really good morning on Tuesday with new faces and new coffee to try. Jack had popped up from the Temple Meads branch of Starbucks to mix some fresh brew for us using their Organic Ethiopian blend together with some cinnamon pastries to bring out the spicy aroma and flavours. We hope to have Jack back with his coffee tasting table.
Over the fresh coffee a couple of new faces joined the familiar ones. A twitter link brought Rick Hurst along for the first time. We also welcomed Jamie Dyer all the way from Plymouth and only just back from Canada, kudos! Just as I was leaving I saw Jamie and Mark Paney deep in discussion and it sounds like there could be another partnership arising from OpenCoffee, great stuff!
Joel Huges was also along having developed his platform but missed the Seedcamp deadline. Have to see if there is a business development / funding opportunity there, hopefully there’ll be something to demo shortly.
Chris Garrett & Craig Hellen from BexMedia were along as was Rachel Carney; apologies to anyone I missed.
The next OpenCoffee will be on 26 August, from 8.30am at Starbucks on Park St as usual. See you there.
I was just thinking I needed some inspiration to write a post and Rob Sheffield emailed to point me at WhyNot? an ideas exchange from Profs Ayres & Nalebuff of Yale. Rob and I had been chatting recently about creativity, entrepreneurship and intersections between ideas. I’ve not seen this site, though it seems similar to global:ideas:bank and a couple others.
The concept is simple enough that you apply the wisdom of the crowds to identify the best ideas. People are free to post their idea, everyone votes on them and the best float to the surface. WhyNot? seems to be suffering from lack of participants, the top rated ideas are all from 2003 vintage and have just over 100 votes each (except for the top idea that has 337 votes). With over 3,500 ideas and 5 years you’d expect a bit more activity. WhyNot? uses a very simple vote count to determine the best ideas (Support, Neutral, Oppose).
The global:ideas:bank has a few more ideas (just over 6,000) and a different rating system based on % for Feasibility, Originality & Humour. The drawback here is that a small number of high rating gets you to the top. There doesn’t appear to be any weighting for a balanced opinion.
Of course Digg has been surfing the wisdom of the crowds for some time. Google also uses a variation on this to track site traffic and links and back-links to work out which are the best sites (or solutions) to your problem (or search query). There’s a whole industry in getting your product announcement to the top of Digg and your site to the top of Google (I just did a search for Angel Networks and Oprah has the top two spots on Google).
Digg and Google are successful (in small part at least) because there is an instant path to action. You find something at the top of the list that addresses your need and you click the link to go to the site. Alternatively, if you have a problem looking for a solution (or a site looking for ad traffic) then Digg and Google also work quite well for you. The challenge with many of the other idea exchange formats is that there’s no champion or pathway to change. So you vote an idea as being great, so what, does anything happen?
That’s the great benefit of purposeful network events like BEN, OpenCoffee (disclosure: I run OpenCoffee Bristol) and SeedCamp. They’re great melting pots for ideas because they go out of their way to bring diverse groups together. They also do this with a clear objective in mind; learn something new that will make you and your business more enterprising, find people in your city/region to help grow your business, hook up with investors and springboard your start-up.
They also give people the time and space to figure out who they can work with before disclosing the golden nugget idea. They also have the wider network to help bring the idea to some degree of realisation.
So how do you get your ideas to become reality? If it’s your idea, how do you find your partners and collaborators? If you’re into making things happen, how do you find cool ideas to work on?
Really good turn out at this morning’s Open Coffee with plenty of new faces and old friends. Sam Machin and Tom O’Neil both back after recent breaks, Sam even took time out from his Honeymoon to find an incubation centre in Dublin next to the Guinness factory so he could report back to us, that’s dedication (or at least that’s what he told us, mind you he also showed up with a brand new Acer sub-notebook).
Craig and I had a chance to catch up and agree some ideas to push Carrotmob Bristol forward a bit more and he also took the opportunity to show their latest mobile video project with Anglia Ruskin university providing a video map of the campus.
Peter, Tom, Matt Anderson and I had a good catch up on business confidence from our various perspectives. While a couple of industries have seen a down turn (or at least a hesitation) there are still plenty of growing technology businesses and great opportunities out there.
All of which bodes well for those starting and growing their businesses, and for those of us supporting them.
Apologies to those that I didn’t get to talk to but I’m greatly heartened that more people are turning up than I can network with in 90min (which is saying something). Thanks to everyone for supporting Open Coffee and look forward to seeing you all (and your colleagues, business partners, etc) at the next Open Coffee on 12 August.
Well a lot has been happening and there are a couple of conversation threads so I thought I’d put up a quick ’story so far…’
Craig Hellen (Pod Chains) brought up Carrotmob at the OpenCoffee meeting on 1 July. We were talking about Seedcamp and various ideas for supporting innovative new businesses across the South West. Craig kind of lobbed Carrotmob in as a thought grenade and since none of us had heard of it it kind of fizzled out until later that evening when I’d had a chance to see the video and twittered it.
Craig and I swapped a couple of DM’s but everything pretty much went quiet until he shared an email he’d just received from Brent at Carrotmob saying what a great thing it’d be to see a Carrotmob campaign in Bristol. That got us going again and I dropped Kevin O’Malley a note at Connecting Bristol to drum up some more interest from the wider readership that he gets. I also got in touch with Bristol City Council as they organise the Harbour Festival and we’d (Craig and I) thought that’d be a great event to put Carrotmob alongside.
Following Kevin’s post and another twitter post lots of folks responded (@Z303, @mikedunn, @emargee, @PeteJ, @wrestlevania, & @bluerocket) so we set up a room in Friendfeed to discuss and share. Then Jacob Park from Carrotmob got in touch and Zoe and I swapped a couple emails with him and that lead to the suggestion that we (Bristol) might work with Carrotmob testing an application to help folks put together their own Carrotmob’s.
Which is all really cool!
The drawback is their application probably won’t be public until October, and it’s now only 10 days to the Harbour Festival (9 by the time I post this).
All of which means we’re still really keen to see Carrotmob come to Bristol, and we’re going to be helping Brent & Jacob specify and test their application, and we’re going to keep building the momentum here ready for a (probable) Halloween launch!
Right now the best way to register support is probably to join the Friendfeed group and/or subscribe to this blog. That way we’ll know you’re specifically interested in Carrotmob rather than my general ramblings, and you’ll find out more information as it becomes available. You can also leave suggestions in the comments for other groups to partner up with to make Carrotmob Bristol really take off.
Also, if anyone wants to take the lead in organising the Bristol Campaign, let us know and head over to the Carrotmob sign up page.
This morning’s Open Coffee had some visitors from the research community asking about user generated innovations in the field of intelligent transport systems. Prof Glynn Lyonns and Dr’s Juliet Jain and Tilly Line are leading the activity to better understand this bottom up innovation driver in an industry that is dominated by top-down incrementalism.
The discussions quickly wheeled around forms of innovation, the challenges facing government in supporting innovations, and the competing interests after the funding that the Technology Strategy Board is making available. Nick Sturge (SetSquared) was on hand to provide a wider city and business perspective and the entrepreneur / innovators started coming up with both ideas and examples that I’m sure will keep Glynn, Juliet at Tilly busy for several weeks to come.
It was great to also welcome Sam Tipper from Gloucestershire who was pointed at OpenCoffee by Chris and got the details via chatting with Sam Harding via the GTalk widget on this website; and Robin from Bath who’s providing media businesses with growth and development consultancy support (and launching a business start up; website pending).
OpenCoffee will be running through the summer, every other Tues from about 8.30 in Starbucks on Park St (the next few are on 29 July, 12 & 26 Aug). Contact me at jwgbradford@gmail.com to be added to the email reminder list and/or follow OpenCoffeeBR1 on Twitter for reminders and nudges.
Yesterday was spent in Manchester at the NESTA launch of their latest report (pdf not live yet) into innovation in the Creative Industries.
From a broad reading of the report, it seems to largely reflect last year’s report that much innovation in industry isn’t recorded in official statistics rather than not taking place. The Creative Industries face a further double whammy since very small and micro companies (under 10 employees) are excluded from the official returns, as are many of the SIC codes that cover the sector. Prof’s Ian Miles and Lawrence Green recognise that the existing surveys are a potential burden that the micro companies could probably do without, except that without the evidence base there won’t be policy and incentives from central Government.
This could be a valuable role for places like the Pervasive Media Studio and Universities? Aggregating and presenting an industry perspective on behalf of the micro business communities?
Most of the findings from the case study interviews could apply across pretty much any sector. Customers are more sophisticated, networked, discriminating and active. Not sure there are many industries where that isn’t the case. One point of note was a comment from the video games industry (one of the 4 sub-sector foci) for novel titles, sophistication and interfaces - wonder how that translates to the explosion in casual & mobile gaming, Kongregate, Gameloft, the Wii etc?
One aspect that might be unique was the reported lack of innovation management. Some of this is undoubtedly down to the speed of change and comparative size of companies, but may also be down to a culture of perpetual beta. Many of the associated issues that have been reported could be related to company size. How many firms under 10 employees have a dedicated R&D budget, or a formal knowledge management system whatever industry they’re in?
How about providing/managing a framework for Open Innovation as a role for HE in the creative sector?
There was a distinct whiff of entrepreneurial planning (if such a thing isn’t an oxymoron) at yesterday’s Open Coffee. The trigger was the launch of this year’s Seedcamp and the ensuing conversation about how we could encourage local start-ups to apply.
Things quickly moved on to running something in Bristol to encourage regional entrepreneurialism. Drawing on Seedcamp, Mashed, etc the idea was to give people an outcome orientated brief (i.e. build something that lets me communicate to a group) and then let folks come up with their own solutions. Critically, each idea would be judged not just on it’s technical/interestingness merits, but also on the marketing/presentation of the idea and on the business case. It sounded like more than a weekend event since we wanted to provide people with lots of plenary events and workshops to help round out ideas. Having said that we quickly came up with a whole bunch of people in the area that would have the relevant expertise to cover pretty much everything.
Sam Machin was fresh back from Mashed08 where the range and variety was outstanding (and the geekiness unsurpassed), but he thought there was a need for a longer event where the wider aspects of building a viable application could be rapidly prototyped. Clare was also along from the Pervasive Media Studio and we bounced a few ideas around on how this could be done and who would be instrumental. There was also a recognition that we needed to include Falmouth, Plymouth, Bournemouth and benefit from the many hotspots across the region.
Lots more to follow I’m sure!
Apologies to the folks on the other side of the room, there was plenty of intense discussion going on but I didn’t get over to join in. Hopefully we’ll hear what that led to shortly.
I hot-footed it from Cheltenham to the Pervasive Media Studio a couple nights back for a Gurteen Knowledge Cafe. The topic was ‘unlearning’ which is a sufficiently interesting topic for a Knowledge Transfer/Exchange professional to drag me out and through the wind and rain that Bristol chose to throw at us!
I wasn’t entirely sure what ‘unlearning’ was; I’d constructed a meaning that was roughly a bit more purposeful than forgetting. The brief presentation from Daniel Doherty (University of Bristol, Management School) ranged from the quite possibly certifiable Institute of Unlearning through to more constructivist (and believable) approaches.
There was quite a bit that bordered on (or was overtly about) brainwashing and ‘re-programming’ people Leaving aside the ethics and morals of those particular applications of unlearning, the discussions were mainly around trying to decide if there was more to it than situational flexibility. We touched briefly on meta-physics in trying to figure out how far back into perceptions of reality you had to go before it became ‘unlearning’.
Quite a few of the examples described were really just putting one set of learnt behaviours or patterns of thought aside to more effectively address a particular situation. We didn’t feel (and I’m speaking in the royal ‘we’) that this represented unlearning. Quite a few of the proposed unlearning situations (miltary training, regime change, etc) are externally imposed. Even if there is a degree of consent there is an external mechanism, framework and big shouty Sergeant Majors moulding you to become the best of the best of the best. Sah!
I was curious to see if anyone could propose an instance where that level of ‘unlearning’ could be initiated and carried through in a purely individual framework. Apart from physical impact injuries to the skull, or psychotic drugs, there didn’t appear to be. Which got me to wondering if in fact unlearning is something that you can consciously undertake.
Even more benign approaches to unlearning, such as the coporate merger or unlearning intolerace require external intervention. The incoming organisation (or new CEO) will impose ‘their’ view on the organisation being absorbed. The UN has a conference series on unlearning to help people identify strategies to tackle intolerance in their societies through education, inclusion and example.
There’s no doubt that you can learn new patterns and behaviours that are more effective to the changing circumstances and social ‘norms’. Can you unlearn without the rather scary brainwashing aspects, I’m less sure. The brain is remarkably good at retaining data, sometimes we are less good at retriving it and most of us can’t recall every detail of every second of our lives, but I think it’s all in there.
[Disclosure: I attended in my role as Flagship Initiative Adviser for Knowledge West, we have the Knowledge West Enterprise Awards, which brings together competitors from the 6 University Business Plan competitions in the area. However, I'm not on that judging panel, nor this one, and my views here are not those of Knowledge West.]
After the introductions and thank yous, the keynote was Adam Goodyer (co-founder of Concert Live, UWE graduate & HSBC 2007 Start-Up Stars winner). Adam gave a barn storming keynote, with a mix of humour, humility and insight into how they’d grown and overcome early adversity. Concert Live basically record gigs live, mix them to CD, burn them and then sell to the crowd just as they’re leaving the gig. Following early success (they secured an early contract to cover The Levellers gig tour) they hit a dry patch where the industry wouldn’t touch them because their business model was perceived as potentially competitive to the core business of shifting CD singles.
Adam used Porter’s 5 Forces to identity the dominant force in the market (major label’s fear of losing sales & chart positions) that was overcoming a strong customer force (people love buying CD’s of the actual gig they attended) and figured out how to flip the forces in their favour. By setting up a secure chart transaction system to sell singles at the gig, they could bundle a couple of singles mixes in with the live CD. That was a bonus to the customers (they basically got 2 albums for the price of one) and a huge bonus to the Labels (each single mix counts as a separate chart sale). They could then go to the major labels and say that by giving Concert Live a license, their artist would shoot up the chart with every concert, genius!
Adam then admitted that they hadn’t actually sat down with Porter’s diagram and worked it out, but the process did accurately describe what they’d down and how they’d identified the dominant players and the blockage that needed to be cleared.
Next up was Patrick Dasoberi (Student Community Portal System & 2007 BizIdea winner). Patrick’s idea, as submitted to the 2007competition, had evolved significantly into the business he’s now running, though the core vision is the same: helping temporary international residents find their way in a new country. Patrick’s initial focus was on the student population but he’s now working with a wide range of organisations that send people around the globe to work in communities.
What was really interesting was that the software developed to do this (Whahala), is to be provided as a white label solution for other organisations that want to establish their own international support network. Very cool!
Claire Foster (Superjuice) - discovered smoothies and juice bars when on her travels in Australia. When she came back to the UK it proved really difficult to get the same idea of the ground here. So she went to London and talked to everyone in the juice/smoothie business (being from Somerset she wasn’t perceived as a threat). She went down into the far South West and worked a couple days for free to learn the business. She then landed some Business Link support, Princes Trust support (links to page with video) and things began to take off. She’s now purveying to the rich and famous (well Prince Charles at least) and building her brand. The immediate expansion plans are into the new Bristol Broadmead development.
Last up on the Keynotes was Sally Lincon (co-founder Nomensa). Sally described their journey of building a digital design and usability company, along with some highs & lows.The common thread with all the presentations was that every day was different and they all thoroughly enjoyed the experience of running their own businesses.
Competition Winners
The winner of the Best Business Idea was Carolyn (Chief Whale of Whale Bags), eco-shopping bags made of 100% cotton/calico that fold neatly into a small pocket that’s part of the bag. We didn’t get to see the business plan but the idea is a really good one, and very topical with the Zeitgeist of recycling and reusing shopping bags.
The runner up was Magee Private Investigator, a criminal law student that setting up her own PI business. The gap in the market being that soon PI’s will have to be licensed (they aren’t at the moment), with her law background Magee thinks she’s got a differentiator.
The winner of the Best Social Enterprise Idea was the Bristol Festival Community Groupa collection of volunteers, with a wide range of backgrounds, interests and ages, who have come together to plan a community-based festival for September 2008 following the sad demise of the Bristol Community Festival at Ashton Court. The runner up was Vscheme a volunteering management scheme for individuals and organisations.
In the Best Creative Design Idea, the winner was Five on One (can’t find a website) with a DVD magazine showcase five aspects of Bristol social and cultural scene, given away alongside Venue magazine and funded through advertising. The runner-up was Basic Baroques, providing everyone with the elements to make their own baroque styled interior.
[I'll try and get more links and logos as people launch their websites]
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