Nuggets from student projects and book reviews:

CINE - June 2012

i learn

we learn

Title Cover Image:

Gua Tewet Tree of Life

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GuaTewet_tree_of_life-LHFage.jpg

Back Cover Image:

Bansky

good-wallpapers.com/misc/2679

No copyright violations are intended.

However, if there have been some, we crave for forgivance (forgiveness).

This compilation is used only for educational purposes and no credit and authorship is sought .

Anil Gupta

Marianne Esders

Foreword

Dear CINE Participants How do we learn the limits of what we can do? Obviously by finding out what we can not live without. But if our tolerance of inertia is already very high, we will probably be quite happy with the things as they are. In such a case, this course would be a wrong choice for you. But if you do feel that there is a scope of shedding some inertia, taking a few initiatives, experimenting with ideas, using null hypothesis as an approach to life, then “kill your darlings”, that is, try to prove the positions you like most as wrong, invalid, undesirable. Love the devil, and forgive the god. Sounds difficult? We all have a narcissistic streak in us, we all love our own voice, ideas, images and, of course, positions. Why else would there be so much resistance for any new idea coming form the ground, shop floor, grassroots? This compilation of ideas, excerpts, thoughts, mostly from the projects reports, book reviews and submissions of the students in previous CINE batches, is meant to provoke, persuade and if possible pester you to nudge the edge a bit more.

If you don’t find these colours provocative

enough, then you already know the

expectation from you this year. If you find

ideas worth reflecting, then please try to

explore ideas that help you not just to

broaden the range of our imagination, but

also to convert these into enterprises

(social, economic or even political).

Most creative ideas don’t always become innovations. They don’t have to. But some of them having potential to become an enterprise may

need the help of an empathetic knowledge network. I hope that this time you will create new benchmarks of triggering entrepreneurial

ventures. The course may end in August, but you can continue your effort till March. There will be a second offering of CINE in the third term.

I am grateful to Marianne Esders, a visiting doctoral fellow, for

helping in putting this selection from CINE archives together.

It still needs a lot more work but till then,

enjoy!

I could not have learned so much from you, if you did not try

hard. We can not learn, if I don’t learn, is not it?, help me learn

Anil ( breeze, wind………………………)

June, 2012

Content

imagining

triggering, incentivising, motivating, inhibiting

pooling, sharing, collaborating

living & building

i learn – we learn

speaking, writing, reading

dancing, playing, painting, moving

caring, loving, giving

synergising

embracing

introspecting

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Why do we feel so possessive about our ideas and feel shy in sharing them with others?

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A

Gandhian Young Technological Innovation Award 2012 Winners 1. Vardaan: Stair climbing wheelchair

Shanu Sharma, IIT Kanpur

Project Guides: Dr. J Ramkumar, Dr. Satyaki Roy

Vardaan facilitates climbing up and down the stairs by using an innovative ‘Y’

shaped wheel that provides better grip and optimum braking along with a

ratchet and a braking system.

2. Image, Speech Recognition and Speech Synthesis for physically disabled

Saurabh Saket and Rahul Ranjan, Bhutta College of Engineering & Technology, Ludhiana

Project Guide: Er Inderdeep Singh Grewal

Project Hope is an Image, Speech Recognition and Speech Synthesis system. It aims to aid people suffering from hearing and orating /vocal

impairments.

A

A Multi-Fuel Stove that Makes Water Potable 2011 CINE Project Report by Devadittya Banerjee, Hemant Chhabra, Lovesh Vashist Neeraj, VC Shekhar Suman, Someshwar Roy

Comes with a portable biogas generator, and

uses house waste to generate biogas

- Runs on multiple fuels - biogas or wood –

no issue of dependency on a single fuel

- High efficiency design, and extremely low

emission

- Water filtration - uses waste heat for filtering

water to make it potable

A Needle Safety Device

Dr. Kalpesh Gajiwala’s invention: A needle safety device - A very simple, economically viable syringe needle cover that safeguards health care workers from routinely accidental hypodermic needle injuries and protects against AIDS and Hepatitis B. The accidents occur while handing over the needle to the nurse in the operation theatre. The problem was to keep the needle at a distance from the body so that even by accident the nurse while receiving the needle doesn’t touch it.

Satnam Singh 2010 CINE Innovator Interview with Dr. Kalpesh Gajiwala

A

Equity Financing: Fostering Education and Innovation

“Most people in India finance their college education through a combination of the following sources: Family savings, government subsidy;

medium-term bank loans; part-time jobs. All the sources listed above have limitations that prevent universal coverage"

“Financing is thus a critical bottleneck that hampers access to education to all. The core problem that hampers value creation in the manner

described in the previous section is that the returns to education take time. An individual invests resources and time for two decades and then

the returns are reaped over the lifetime. It has been proclaimed that, on average, the returns to education are some of the highest among

alternative investment options available to individuals and societies. However, the long investment horizon creates uncertainty and

impatience. Financial institutions, such as private and public section banks, are hesitant to provide loans. When they do, the term duration of

the loan is short (a 5 year term is typical) and collateral demands are stringent"

“The traditional financial support provided by the government to individuals is in the form of fixed-term loans that are to be repaid back once

the tenure of education is complete. This is analogous to the debt corporate houses raise. However, corporate houses also harness another

attractive source of capital in the form of equity investments from willing shareholders. My proposal for education financing is inspired by this

equity model of financing"

Tarun Agarwal 2010 CINE Project Report

“The government can finance an individual’s education in return for a financing stake in his future income. In financial

parlance, the government becomes an equity-holding shareholder in the individual. The government gets a small share of

any financial returns generated by the individual in the form of salary or entrepreneurial profits. In practice an x% stake by

the government can be implemented by an x% additional marginal rate of taxation paid by the individual on his annual

earnings. This can be implemented through the regular Income Tax enforcement mechanisms"

A Private Equity Solution to Human Capital Development

“We propose a business model based on the operation of “Private

Equity” funds. We would spot “under-performing” capital assets (i.e.

poor children who are out of school or those who cannot afford a

quality education) and take long term financial commitment and

actively manage these capital assets (i.e. offer information, counseling

and mentoring services) so that they develop into productive assets.

We would fund our operations through equity subscription and employ

innovative financial contracts to recover our investments" (Suhruta

2008, CINE Report)

“Our conception of active management of our assets is through

relationship managers (RM). RMs will mentor and counsel a select

group of children. Each RM will closely follow the children’s progress

individually and assist them in many ways. It is critical that we recruit

and retain people with the right fir for RM roles. Continuity is essential

for mentoring and developing children who have no access to proper

parenting" (Suhruta 2008, CINE Report)

“Private equity provides capital to enterprises not quoted on a stock market. Private equity can be used to develop new products and

technologies, to expand working capital, to make acquisitions, or to strengthen a company’s balance sheet. It can also resolve ownership and

management issues. A succession in family-owned companies, or the buyout and buy-in of a business by experienced managers, may be

achieved using private equity funding" (Calpers 2012)

Can education be treated as commodity?

www.mobile-settlements.com/img/img_1.jpg

Suhruta 2008 CINE Project Report A

Innovations in a Middle-Sized German Bakery

1. ”Loo paper roller for product label roll Stupid

to handle the product

label roll. I had the idea

with a wire. Someone

took it further and this is

the solution now:”

Stephanie Nestel 2006 CINE Project Report

2. “Fan to dry rolls: Dough was sometimes

too wet (in summer) to

be processed through

the machine and we had

a lot of stops and fall

outs. This fan dries the

roll on the surface and

there are no problems

anymore. (The machine

producer took this idea

into their new machines

after they saw this) “

3. “Adhesive label for delivery vans: My father

had the idea to place it

upside down and it was

in our area the topic for

almost a month"

4. “New/Old bread “Lichtenberger”: Made

like the bread was

made in former times,

with potatoes to keep

fresh longer. “

5. ”Pretzels with grains: Customer asked us to

strew the salt pretzel

with grains instead of

salt"

GRATIS

“The objective of the venture is to distribute notebooks required for the academic year to students in post graduate and under graduate

colleges in India. The notebooks shall be distributed free of cost and the requisite funding will be through advertisements.

The product shall be 5 subject notebooks of high quality and would be distributed free of cost. While ads would be placed in the books, they

shall be located without any hindrance to writing. The educated youth represent a huge target segment for many products. Gratis provides a

medium for targeting the segment directly. In addition to ruled pages for writing and advertisements, the notebooks shall also have insightful

thoughts and sayings on each page. While this might escalate the cost structure, we believe the value added and the expected response

would be magnified by incorporating sayings on each page.

We also plan to collaborate with social organizations like CRY, Blind People's Association etc. in order to bring in paintings and publicity for

these organizations. This shall be part of our CSR initiative in order to generate popular support for them.

BILT, the largest manufacturer of writing and printing paper in India has been contacted to source the notebooks that will be distributed to

campus students. Various prospective advertising partners, ranging from retail outlets to restaurants and malls have been approached in

Ahmedabad. Several have expressed strong interest in partnering with Gratis. Several local restaurants, for whom IIMA students are key

customers, have agreed to insert vouchers and tear-away offers into Gratis notebooks. Of the large brands, Raymond’s and McDonalds have

verbally expressed support that could materialize into accounts worth Rs. 25000 each.

We have spoken with the authorities at IIMA regarding the launch of Gratis at IIMA and have obtained their permission to issue free

notebooks to the students along with their case issue during the academic term beginning June 2009. Association with IIMA in future

launches, dependent on success of the test launch, has also been discussed.

Gratis is highly scalable and the volume of notebooks issued can be increased by incorporating more colleges. While the initial plan is to

launch at the pan-IIM level, including the undergraduate colleges will lead to a significant increase in volumes handled and a corresponding

increase in profitability – due to lower costs for greater volumes"

Vignesh Sridharan & Karthik V. 2009 CINE Project Report A

FreeNote

The mission of the company is to make education a more financially viable option for India’s underprivileged children. Free education is

already being provided by a number of organizations across the country. However, to truly enable free education, there has to exist an

ecosystem of free stationeries that would support free-education ventures. The Free Note project addresses one such concern – attempting to

distribute notebooks for free among underprivileged children. The Free Note implementation consists of two broad strategies:

(1) Financing: A viable financial model has been arrived at, where the cost of the notebook can be offset by means such as advertising.

(2) Distribution: The Free Note project attempts to collaborate with schools to distribute the notebook to students.

Free Note has been envisaged as a non-profit initiative that is beneficial to society.

2011 CINE Project Report by Devadittya Banerjee, Hemant Chhabra, Lovesh Vashist, Neeraj VC, Shekhar Suman, Someshwar Roy

Free Notebooks

Students

Targeted brand building High loyalty user base of students at IIM Ahmedabad

Association with IIM Ahmedabad Official notebooks at IIMA

Long exposure of adverts Continued exposure through 3 months of notebook life

Social Cause Future plans of a nationwide movement – free notebooks for underprivileged children

Free Notebooks Extremely low priced notebooks mean sure-shot adoption by students

Official notebooks at IIM Ahmedabad

Contribution to a social cause All profits donated to PRAYAAS – an IIMA initiative for under-privileged kids

Attractive deals Exclusive offers/discount coupons

Sponsors

All profits donated to PRAYAAS An IIM Ahmedabad initiative for

under-privileged kids

A

www.viziomag.com/index.php?p=wall&sb=wa5&fd=107

Conventional plug:

Convenience

There is difficulty of using all the available electrical outlets

because of the positioning of the furniture

Security

Large uncovered area left with classic 2 pin plugs

=> contact with earth connection

Aestheticism

Not discrete, nor in accordance with the global decoration

of the room

Butterfly Plug

Butterfly plug:

Unfolded wings

make up a handle in order to insert or

to extract the electric plu.

Folded wings

the wings are lying against the body of

the female plug

Security

Spare of space

Better looking

Damya Bouferrache 2010 CINE Project Report A

Reuters

“Out of quantity comes quality" (Thomas Edison)

“The more I practice, the luckier I get" (Gary Player, golfer)

“Do quantities always generate design, or do they make existing patterns manifest?”

(Anil Gupta)

“When I see the grooves on the parapet of the well, made by the repeated use of rope sliding against the

stone wall for lifting water from the well, I ask myself, why will repeated effort not make me succeed, if a

soft rope can make grooves on a hard stone wall?”

(Kalidasa)

A

homeenergypartners.com/pages/training/hers-rater-training/what-is-hers.php

“On one side there are 20.000 installers of renewable energies

in France, many of these companies have only one or two

employees and no marketing service. They often encounter

problems for getting new clients and are willing to pay for leads

of new clients.

On the other hand there is a need of the general public for an

independent and customized advice on renewable energies.

People are aware of environmental issues and know that there

are financial incentives for house renovation. But they are not

yet completely convinced of the reliability of energy systems

such as solar panels or geothermic and are lazy, Thus making

them unlikely to change their current energy-using habits.

Considering the scale of the required investment to change an

energy system, they do not want to try risky alternative sources

of energy which could be less effective than what they have

now. The majority of people being highly risk-averse, they are

not interested in these alternative energy systems as long as

their reliability has not been established. This is a dilemma,

since the mainstream is not interested, green energy does not

have the chance to prove its reliability to the majority.

QuelleEnergie proposes a solution to this dilemma in informing and thereby reassuring the householders. Without obliging the householders

to take the slightest risk, QuelleEnergie forwards them to a new energy system, to which they are consequently more open and receptive.

QuelleEnergie was founded in 2008 with € 40000 capital. The € 40000 capital came from relatives and friends who were interested in

investing in the project and who wanted to take profit of an advantageous French tax policy for start ups. Antoine Chatelain had the idea to

launch QuelleEnergie. But he wanted to develop a start up with an other person having skills in computer science. Julien Lestavel, a friend for

a long time, was highly motivated in the project. So both decided to become partners and to create the company. They worked on the creation

of the comparison engine for 5 months"

Website of QuelleEnergie www.quelleenergie.fr (French for “Which Energy”)

All the visitors have to do is to answer a series of

questions concerning their energy behavior, their type

of house or building and their geographical area. A

rating of the inhabitant’s profile, from A (economical

consumer) to G (“energy-vore” consumer) is then

calculated. It is also proposed to the visitor alternative

improvements of the current situation, accompanied by

an estimation of the realizable annual savings. A wide

range of solutions might be proposed: solar panels,

insulation, heat pump among other things. It is also

proposed to the visitor to meet an installer"

Heloise Clement 2010 CINE Project Report; Innovator: Antoine Chatelain & Julien Lestavel

Quelle Energie

“Once the comparison engine finished, they launched

the homepage in September 2008. QuelleEnergie has

a steadily increasing number of people asking for

advice for buildings’ savings potentials and thus an

increased number of leads that can be sold to the

partners and growing revenues. Company growth has

been reinforced by a raise of funds (€ 500.000 have been invested by Alven Capital in January 2010).

“QuelleEnergie could rely on strong governmental support. Furthermore, the economic environment also contributed to the innovation’s

success as the government had recently introduced an encouraging tax policy as well as a credit scheme (credit of up to 30.000€ with 0%

interest to be paid back over 10 years)"

Further info to be found here: http://www.iea.org/Textbase/pm/?mode=re&action=view&country=France

“The company functions as an intermediary between general public for which it provides a free, independent and customized advice on

buildings’ energy-saving potential via a website and more than 100 installers and partners across France. In 2010 the site had more than

30000 visitors per month"

A

Understanding Trends in Energy Sector Innovations (using Techpedia as source) Pritika Padhi & V.M. Avinass Kumar 2010 CINE Project Report

“(…) we did identify the following topics as recurring themes:

• Automatic Generation Control – This refers to the regulation of generation output with changes in load, system frequency and other factors

so as to improve the economies of generation.

• Distributed Generation – Distributed generation is an attempt to spread generation across the nation so as to minimize T&D effort and to

match loads with supply. For this to happen, it is important to develop commercial sources other than the traditional thermal and hydro plants,

which are site-specific.

• T&D planning – Apart from study of designs to reduce T&D losses, we also found projects focusing on algorithmic efficiency for planning

transmission lines and distribution centre establishment.

• Carbon Tax – The government has recently (in Budget 2010) introduced the carbon tax, which is a recess of Rs.50 per tonne of coal

produced or imported. Also, the government has provided for some tax-breaks for import of equipment relating to renewable energy. Thus,

there is a slow shift away from traditional fossil fuels. A number of planning projects were involved in the study of changed energy scenarios

under these new laws.

• Focus on clean technologies – 15 projects explicitly stressed on cleanliness of technology used and were involved in estimating and

improving cleanliness.

• Focus on rural applications – 9 projects focused on rural applications or extended their research to suitability in remote and rural conditions,

thus, showing that there is awareness of the need to make research and innovations more inclusive"

“The main trends we found were that the bulk of the projects were confined to the generation aspect (76%). (…) Looking into the technology

underlying the Generation projects, we found a clear majority in terms of the number of projects focussing on wind energy. Also high was the

number of solar and thermal based projects"

Dye Based Solar Cell

“The high cost of silicon in solar panels has led

researchers to look for alternate methods of generating

electricity without using highly expensive Silicon. (…)

This has led people like Atul Kumar Singh and Rahul

Kashyap (both doctorate students of IIT Delhi) to

innovate solar cells in such a way that reduces its overall

cost drastically. It was their desire to come out with a

product which doesn’t use silicon and is very simple to

manufacture that led them to work day and night and they

have finally succeeded in it"

“The invention is about a unique solar cell fabrication

procedure using natural materials. These dyes include

salt water, pomegranate juice etc. It basically works on

the principle of photosynthesis"

“The product made by these IITD students need to be

publicized by media so that it can get suitable VCs/

investors who can provide these people with funds to

carry forward their design and research. It is really sad to

see many good inventions die a premature death in India

for want of adequate fund or investors. Government

needs to form a society consisting of top scientists and

academicians who should regularly look into new

inventions like these and give guidance to these young

bright minds. If India has to become a knowledge

superpower we need to give constant support to creative

people and strengthen microfinance institutions to provide

loans at appropriate rates"

Rahul A. Kumar 2008 CINE Project Report, Inventor: Atul Kumar Singh & Rahul Kashyap

A

Automated Gas Stove and Pressure Cooker

Possible Solutions

“Three students from Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT),

Ahmedabad - Saurabh, Ann and Shubham - have developed a vessel detector which turns

on the gas automatically when the vessel is put on the burner and turns it off automatically

when the vessel is removed from the burner. The innovation involves a sensor which is

based on IR radiation and can detect an object based on transmitting and receiving of

radiation. If an object is detected, it uses an electric lighter to light the gas automatically. As

soon as the object is removed, the sensor detects the same and switches off the gas

automatically"

“Davalsab from Karnataka has developed an auto stopper which senses the pressure cooker

whistles, generates an alarm and turns off the knob of the gas stove. It also has a digital display

system which counts and displays the number of whistles of the pressure cooker. The innovation

also includes a timer controller which can turn off the gas stove after preset time. The innovation

works on one stored battery and storage cells and is electronic. It consists of an electrically operated

stopper with a digital display system for a rice cooker that counts according to the number of

whistles. It also consists of two DC motors powered by a 12 volt battery with analogue clock. The

preset cooking time for different verities of rice or different dishes can be preset with the clock and

this system will automatically switch off the gas once the cooking is over. The adjustment control is

easily accessible on the face plate of the machine. A manually operated switch is also available on

the face plate of the machine to disable the automatic control and enable a gas machine to be used

as a standard manual on/off electrical switch. A unique feature of the innovation is the extremely

sensitive and reliable gas flow sensing circuit, which can detect leakages and turn off the knob"

Take a look at http://nif.org.in/awards/pdf_file/auto_stopper.pdf

“Cooking gas is one of the necessary evils of everyday life and very few innovations have been made in this space"

Sachdeva 2010 CINE Project Report

While reading about accidents caused due to LPG leakages,

Sheikh Mohammed Ishfaq decided to develop a device which

can prevent these. After studying the problem and causes of the

same, he concluded to find a way of not allowing gas in the pipe

when not in use. He discussed the problem and solutions with

Prof Anil Gupta and Brig Ganesham. Brig Ganesham gave him

financial support for doing the trials. After a number of trials he

developed the present gas safety system (2008).

• The system comprises a cable having a semi circular clip and

the necessary framework.

• This is a system for allowing gas flow from a cylinder when

the burner is on (i. e. gas is being used).

• When the switch located on the burner is turned off, gas

supply from the cylinder is also turned off.

• Later the innovator added a one way valve just after the

regulator which is operated by the clutch wire from the knob

on the burner.

• He developed this system in 2008 and is using it since then.

• NIF has filed a patent in the name of the innovator

(2812/CHE/2009)

Gas Safety System Innovator: Sheikh Mohammed Ishfaq

Prototype 1

Prototype 2

A

workisnotajob.com

Software Interface for Selecting Paint for Houses

“The software interface will have the following modules:

-Uploading of a real time image of a house

- Building a 3 D Model of a house

- Identifying and creating layers in a 3 D model

- Color applets of various brands

- A pick and drop color scheme

- Taking account of sunlight and other sources of light “

“Business Model

Once we have developed the software, the business model can follow two

different routes

Option 1: Complete Service Provider

In this model, we act as company which provides a complete solution to

clients who want to paint their house. They will contact us and we will do the

3 D modeling of their house and help them to choose the best color and also

provide them color and painter. For providing all these services we will

charge them premium.

Option 2: Licensing of Software to Retailer

In this model, we develop the software and provide it to a retailer for a year

subscription whose license can be renewed by paying some amount. In this

model, retailers also benefit because the customer will prefer them over other

retailers, which increases their market share. Also they can charge a fixed

amount of money to their customer"

Avinash Karn 2010 CINE Project Report A

Eblink – Interview with Christian Bittner – Managing Director & Founder

‘“The world cellular network is like a surface enlightened by many spotlights” (Christian Bittar’s metaphor). Each spotlight has its own range of radiance.

To make sure no area remains in the shadow, parts of their radiance have

to be stacked. Cells of the cellular network are just like these spotlights.

However, if cells are too close to each other, it can cause interferences. This

leads to the first and primordial constraint operators are submitted to, to

install their cells or relay stations: the precise location of the antenna to

ensure the quality of the network.‘

Elodie Brochot 2010 CINE Project Report

Cells

BTS

Base stations

Coaxials

Base Station

Wireless RRH

Remote Radio Heads

Radio antenna

Radio Link

“(…) this new pattern eliminates the

problem of the cable tray, which is

the origin of most issues the

operators are facing. It gives them

more flexibility to negotiate the

acquisition of new sites, which

means that they will be able to focus

on their first constraint: the precise

location of the antenna.

The EB1 device answers to:

- The leasing issues,

- The environmental issues,

- The efficiency issues,

- The negotiation and timing issues,

- The costs issues"

Exploring Innovation of Industrial Workers

“When the workers are entangled with problems they try to find out the solutions on their own depending upon their creative skills. If we see

closely then we may observe that the shop floor is one of the major sources of innovation for organizations. An organization can achieve

long-term sustained competitive advantage if it can tap these innovations and integrate them with the organization’s long term strategy.

Exploring, sharing and upgrading these innovative ideas did several miracles in the history of industrialization and it will continue to serve this

purpose if we are able to handle such innovations in our times also"

www.emeraldinsight.com/Insight/ViewContentServlet?contentType=Article&Filename =Published/EmeraldFullTextArticle/Articles/0680070104.html

There are several structural and social barriers which prevent

shop floor workers to come up with their innovative ideas:

- lack of sharing (generation gap, rigid hierarchy, language

barrier)

- lack of corporate culture

- dependency on latest technology

- dependency on external consultants

- lack of investment

Recommendations to promote innovation:

- proper utilization of suggestion scheme system

-- close interaction between executives and workers

-- recognition

-- more exposure to latest technologies and systems

-- investment in human capital particularly shop floor workers is

need of the hour

-- meeting presided by a shop floor worker at shop floor itself

- presentations by shop floor workers at the workshops to the

management executives

Abhijit Roy 2009 CINE Project Report A

Water ATM

“In essence, Sarvajal is a water ATM. The business model works

on a franchisee system wherein franchisees buy the device and

technology from Sarvajal, and establish water dispensing outlets in

locations where clean water is scarce. Once established, it is

inexpensive to operate (so the cheap cost of operation is typically

passed on to the consumer, and it is very affordable) –given the

surging demand, profits are expected to be high.

As shown on the right, a franchisee owner who caters to 250

households per day, delivers the bottles to his consumers, and

pays his operator a respectable sum of Rs 2000 per month, will

make an annual profit of almost Rs 3 lakh"

Dicky Roeffen & Kartikeya Shah 2011 CINE Project Report

Innovative Water Faucet

“Water being a precious commodity, needs to be conserved in all ways

possible, especially water for domestic usage. Saving water wasted

inadvertently in everyday use can be a significant help in prolonging the

supply of water.

C.V. Venugopalan invented an innovative faucet design which saves up to

60% water used daily for washing hands etc. It’s a simple design which

can be installed easily, is hygienic and can be the answer to saving from

leaky and inefficient taps"

Operation

“(…) when the knob is pressed, water rushes in and fills the container until

air pressure seals it from within. When the knob is released, water flows

out through the outlet until it is completely drained and the tap comes back

to its original position"

What is unique about this tap is the fact that you can pre-decide how much

water you want to use by filling the container (400 ml capacity) initially. Say

if you just want to rinse your hand, then you need maybe 1/4th of the

container filled or if you want to wash your hand thoroughly, then you may

need the whole container or two runs of the same"

Developed by C.V.Venugopalan

M.S. Karthik 2010 CINE Project Report, Innovator: C.V. Venugopalan

A

Dominic Wilcox

Ski Equipment Carrier Elodie Brochot 2010 CINE Project Report

“How to carry ski equipment and luggage?”

“I made a survey on a population of 50 students, who have their own equipment

(…). Among these, 34% would be interested in a product, which would allow

carrying the whole equipment, the most comfortable way. We can see that these

34% mostly affect women"

A

Fuel Dispensing Nozzle with Drip Less Spout for Complete Fuel Delivery

“The device is useful to ensure that no drop falls on

the ground or remains in the spout pipe of the fuel

dispensing nozzle after re-fueling a fuel tank of a

vehicle"

Fazle-Imdad Shirpurwala came up with the idea

“when he was getting his bike filled and some petrol

fell on the seat. He had a discussion with his brother

about it. However the design was entirely his idea"

“Patent filing in India is a painful process and is

tricky. About 5000 patents were filed in the West

office in 2007 and only 2 examiners are employed to

do the filing. Thus there is a huge resource crunch

and this causes delays. The patent agent is

supposed to act as the mentor to the filer however

the agents themselves do not know the entire

process and are of little help. The entire process of

getting a patent in India itself is about 4 years and

the idea itself might have changed over the course.

Therefore, he went for a renowned patent lawyer,

who charged 10000/hr and it proved fruitful because,

he was well prepared when he met the lawyer and

the lawyer was professional and knew his job well"

B. Saranya, S. Aditya, Jagatjit Turuk 2011 CINE Project Report

How it works

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbUaCo1OUU4

The nozzle pushes the trapped and stuck fuel from the spout into the

customer’s fuel tank by means of air blow. Approximately 8 to 10ml of fuel can

be recovered from the nozzle each time it fuels a tank. On average, every such

nozzle shall save at least 0.5 litre of fuel each day.

SIRHANA

“SIRHANA - Society for Innovations at Remand Homes to Arrive at Non-conventional Answers, is the brainchild of 6 students from IIM

Ahmedabad who are dedicated to social change and entrepreneurship.(…) SIRHANA aims to capture the latent creativity in the minds of the

young inhabitants of Remand Homes (…)"

2011 CINE Project Report by Angad Bhatia, Manu Bajaj, Moti Baba, Rahul Aggarwal, Rajani Verma, Sagar Megharaj

Remand Homes: Possible breeding ground for innovation?

After visiting the remand home and after personal interaction with

students and administration at this remand home, we identified

the following opportunities and weaknesses.

Upsides

•Lots of leisure time

•Some children identified selectively brilliant in solving everyday

problems

•Art & craft has been identified as a strength

•Bare minimum resources forces them to innovate

Downsides

•Poor technical know-how

•Poor self confidence due to social rejection

•Confusion on long term thinking

•Inadequate support for creativity and innovation

•Inner energy & frustration to be channelized

Conditioning & Enabling

Problem Identification

Idea Validation

& Publishing

Rewards & Incentives

Of the various solutions provided by children,

we hope that a certain percentage would have

commercial value. The above ideas would be

patented with the help of organizations like NIF.

The requester would have the incentive of

sharing royalties of possible patents and being

the first choice for commercialization apart from

a gamut of ideas. The incentive structure would

be based on sharing of royalty from

commercialized patents. An account will be

created in the child’s name which would hold

the rewards till he is 18 years old.

Stakeholders %age stake (hypothetical)

Innovator (Child) 50%

Requester 25%

SIRHANA 10%

Remand Home 10%

NIF 5%

A

PhokatCopy

Shagun Gupta, who was student of IIM Ahmedabad and Alumnus of IIT Delhi, came up with idea of PhokatCopy.

“The Idea is to create an alternate channel for advertising so that the advertiser and the customer both benefit. There are three stakeholders

in the business viz Advertiser, Students and Photocopier. In general students at engineering colleges take 1000-3000 photocopied pages of

books and notes and pay for it. But, in this model one side of the photocopies has an advertisement from an advertiser and the amount which

students pay for a 1 side photocopy gets redeemed by Phokatcopy online in terms of some other benefits. The photocopier gets more margin.

The advertiser directly reaches the target audience"

Avinash Karn, Kumar Rahul and Sumedh Chaudhry 2010 CINE Project Report

Online Pharmacy and Health Management

“We plan to create a web, mobile and tele based platform that connects healthcare providers (e.g. hospitals), doctors, pharmaceutical

manufacturers and insurers with the patient. Through the platform, the patient shall be able to procure all health, wellness and fitness

products (including medicines) and have them delivered at the doorstep. The platform shall also provide access to health and wellness

services and these services will be made available pan India and 24x7. “

“Key Features

Pharmacy: It will provide both OTC as well as prescription products as well as health aids.

Electronic Medical Records: Each consumer will receive a unique and universal ID as well as access to a medical calendar which will be used

for supplying long term medication.

Wellness: Lifestyle, cosmetic and beauty products will also be distributed through the platform. “

“Value Proposition

Our advantage is our ability to ensure the genuineness of our products and services. Consumers can be assured that they will not be sold

spurious or counterfeit drugs that are rampant in the Indian market today. Our platform will also offer a convenient solution to the health and

beauty requirements of consumers. Transactions, especially those involving medium to high ticket size, will become easier due to the

availability of online purchase.

Our competitive advantage also arises from the fact that we will be able to sell our products at discounted rates because we will not have to

incur the rentals that a bricks and mortar pharmacy does. We will be the single point of contact for the consumer and ensure ease of access

by growing our presence via multiple mediums. “

“One of our foremost targets is to reduce the number of medical errors in the country. According to a study conducted by the Institute of

Medicine the number of deaths caused by medical errors in the US was around 44000-98000 in the year 1999 which was more than the

number of deaths due to motor accidents, breast cancer and AIDS combined each year.

Clearly we understand the importance of reducing medical errors, and we firmly believe that our system in place will help in doing so"

2011 CINE Project Report by Anuj Jhaveri, Muralidhar Jetti, Rajesh S., Saurav Ghosh, Siddharth Shah, Vivek Iyer

A

“See Up is a French start up that has

been created in 2011 in Paris by 3 young

entrepreneurs and they invented the first

at-hand presbyopia glasses. Their

starting point was the fact that 100% of

the population in the world is affected by

presbyopia (sooner or later…). They

thought that every public and private

place should provide presbyopia glasses

for people who don’t have theirs with

them, just like someone who needs to

use a pen and who does not have one

with him" www.seeup.fr

Le petit ballon has been created by a 26 years old young

graduate of EM Lyon business school in Lyon and by the

former sommelier of the Ritz hotel in Paris. Through their

website, people can subscribe for about 20€ per month to

receive two bottles of wine at home by month. Bottles of

wine have been selected by the sommelier and are

coming with many tips for tasting from this very famous

French sommelier. If people like the bottle that they just

tasted, they can buy some others online (online wine

shopping is very successful in France).

Capital Koala has been created in

September 2011 by two graduates

of ESCP Europe in Paris and it

offers a bank saving account that

can be opened for each child.

While shopping in Capital Koala

partners (big brands of

supermarkets, electronic retailers

but also groupon, amazon….) a

small percentage of the purchase

will be put on the account that has

an interesting rate of return and

will be financing the child’s

education.

Underpromise and Overdeliver

“(…) Guy Kawasaki gives a short definition of Enchantment : “It causes voluntary change of hearts and minds and therefore actions. It is more than manipulating people to help you get your way. It transforms situations and relationships. It converts hostility into civility. It reshapes civility into affinity. It changes skeptics and cynics into believers" So enchantment is not magic, it is a journey with steps that gives you the key

to success"

Lauren Bragard 2011 CINE Book Review of Guy Kawasaki‘s Enchantment

“Once you have achieved likeability, by showing your passion and aspirations to the whole world, you need people to trust you and for this

you need to make the first step: start trusting people before they trust you. Always say « yes » first and then change your mind if necessary

but show people that your interests are sincere"

“Then, enchant your boss, always end a conversation with a good note and never try to hide them anything. Always “underpromise” but

“overdeliver” by prototyping your work"

A

Preventing Counterfeiting

”A lot of people are affected by the counterfeiting of drugs. Life saving drugs, costing thousands of rupees and most importantly someone’s

life, may not be of the original quality. There is no sure way of identifying whether a medicine purchased is of original quality or not. With the

lack of this resource, lots of unethical people have made this counterfeiting their business.

With this innovation, we can device a mechanism by which we can identify the authenticity of the medicine bought. A sixteen digit unique

number will be printed on the packaging and by means of the supply chain a track of that lot will be kept in record. Any consumer buying any

medicine from anywhere in India, will just send that sixteen digit sms to a predefined number. The return sms will tell the place of purchase,

the cost, expiry date and also whether he is the first one to buy or not. With this information he can be rest assured that the medicine he has

bought is original or not.

As things advance, we can apply this concept to stop counterfeiting of other products like cosmetics, spare parts, clothing, etc"

Vatan Vindal 2010 CINE Project Report

Google images: Pills

www.diseaseproof.com/uploads/image/PILLS(2).jpg

Biodegradable Emergency Beds

“Leaf stands for Local Emergency Aid Furniture. Leaf Supply provides relief

organizations with a simple, economical and environmentally friendly bedding

solution to help them accommodate massively displaced communities in the

aftermath of a natural disaster"

“(…) Leaf Supply will contribute in

humanizing living conditions in emergency

situations. The maximum weight that a

LeafBed can bear is 200kg. It is usable for an

estimated time of 3 weeks. It is foldable, but

is not meant for that. Basically, it's meant for

single use for a period of 3 weeks max. (…)

NGOs abandon the equipment after use. It is

given to local governments or thrown into

dustbins, in which case they must pay for

grabs. To reduce their cots they must wash

them for reuse (which is an expensive and

complex process), whereas in 6 months,

when left outside, the LeafBed is

disintegrated"

Alexandre Bedier, 2010 CINE Project Report A

Medicine Expiry Indication

“While cleaning out the medicine box at her house one day, Shweta saw that a lot of medicines had already expired. She got worried that she

may have, at some point, taken an expired tablet and it may have caused some damage to her. She thought that being a literate person if she

could make this mistake of not checking the expiry date, an illiterate person would face even more problems. This is how she came up with the

idea of putting a layer of liquid that degenerates the covering membrane and spoils the tablet after the expiry date"

“Jaskiran got the idea for putting a layer of liquid that disintegrates the covering membrane and soils the tablet once it has expired while she

was watching a TV serial. She saw an illiterate person give expired medicines to a patient which worsened his condition. Jaskiran felt that she

needed to find a technique to help an illiterate person find out if the medicine has expired or not. So her idea was to make the medicine

box/packaging such that it changed colour once expired" They got Ignite award at the hands of Dr A P J Abdul Kalam, former President of

India.

www.nif.org.in

Medicine Box with Reminder Facility, Taps with Different Timer Settings www.nif.org.in

Waste not, want not’, that is the principle that inspired Mohit to innovate taps with different timer

settings. Every day he used to watch his sister use the washing machines and other household

gadgets. He saw the water wastage and thought he needed to do something to reduce it. His

conscience told him that if there was so much water wastage in his house, then the community would

also be wasting as much. Mohit’s second innovation came about because he often used to forget

taking medicines when ill. So he thought of putting a timer and an alarm on the medicine box, which

would alert him of the time to take his medicines.

A

What distinguishes those who have hundreds of ideas but never do any thing to implement them

vis-à-vis those who test the validity of their ideas by experimenting them, no matter how tiresome?

triggering incentivising motivating

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B

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"Gathering raw material in a real way is not as simple as it sounds. It is such a terrible

chore that we are constantly trying to dodge it. The time that ought to be spent in material

gathering is spent in wool gathering. Instead of working systematically at the job of

gathering raw material we sit around hoping for inspiration to strike us. When we do that

we are trying to get the mind to take the fourth step in the idea-producing process while

we dodge the preceding steps"

- James Webb Young

B

Fostering Creativity

“I believe creativity does not come in one form only. Rather, in my opinion as many forms of creativity exist as there are thinking beings on our

planet. Each of us not only practices but also thinks creativity in a different way. Each of us has a different view of creativity in terms of

practical activity, but also in terms of goals, meaningfulness, reasons. In my opinion, creativity does not exist: what exists, instead, is people

who apply their intellect in order to do something new, or to do something better. These people may be anyone, at any time and anywhere.

They could make their creative efforts just for fun, as a pastime or hobby, as a job, out of sense of duty, just to achieve money or fame, or for

thousands of different reasons.

Creativity as such does not exist: actions and thoughts of individuals exist. Each of these individuals will have a background and a

personality, which will obviously affect what he creates, how, when, where and why.

Innovation as such does not exist, either: only new things, objects, processes or actions exist, and they can only be there if conceived by

some living creatures (animals or humans: I am not considering the spontaneous mutations of nature).

Understanding the real essence of creativity and innovation helps us answer our question: there is no specific trait that the creators or the

creating processes must have for the creators themselves to be successful innovators. This may sound trivial, but it is the major learning that,

after a long reflection to dig deeper than the obvious logic, I got from the book"

Pierfrancesco Rocca 2009 CINE Book Review of Ashis Nandy‘s Alternative Science – Creativity and Authenticity in Two Indian Scientists

“Creativity is a very personal thing, a very personal process, no matter whether it is pursued individually or in a group. Each of us has his or

her abilities and weaknesses, passion, interests and preferences, biases and ideas, opinions and wrong preconceptions. Each of us has

different goals in life, in the short- medium- and long-run. Each of us has a different character, personality, way of viewing and living life. Each

of us, thus, has a specific, personal way of going through the experience of a creative effort. This is something so deep into the human mind

and so involving that I believe it cannot be evaluated in any way. The creative effort, thus, cannot be judged, but it should only be praised"

A mind on the margin

is not a marginal mind.

www.sristi.org/cultural

B

Bhabi Mahato, Puruliya

Does the definition of innovation require a language of action?

Innovation as Social Action

“How does it all start? What makes a person initially act outside the norms of the system, if only so as to enter into an innovating subsystem?“

(Hellström 2004, 639)

“I believe that at the heart of innovation lies a social act, i.e. ideating a concept or a mental object, a desired goal, and then physically acting to

create and disseminate a product of some kind into a unit of adoption" (Hellström 2004, 632)

“Innovation from the point of view of Hegel’s dialectics implies that progress comes about not in a smooth and orderly manner (not

incrementally as is assumed in, for instance, Kaizen and linear stagegate models of innovation), but rather through various competing and

disrupted forms where conflict and power struggle play a central role. An idea may develop into what it has the potential to become only by

being positioned in opposition to existing notions and orders. In this process, the already existing orders may be destroyed (or radically

reinterpreted); history evolves by destroying what it was (cf. Hegel’s metaphor of the plant consuming the seed from which it stemmed).

Hence Hegel holds that history and historical action (and, in our sense of the term, also innovation) proceed through contradiction. Conflict

engenders new and better ideas and pushes towards a more comprehensive understanding (Hegel, [1830] 1993)" (Hellström 2004, 640)

“From a critical perspective then, entrepreneurial brain-workers who both own and are owned by themselves have willingly and without conflict

entered the iron cage of hegemonic constriction. They are both objects of exploitation and subjects performing the exploitative act, at the

same time" (Hellström 2004, 642)

“In this view, innovation is a commodity, as is the innovator, and the relation between the two, i.e. the process of innovation, is a thing outside

of both. If innovation is viewed as a thing and gets its value from some internal quality or through its relation to other things, then its social

history of becoming is not about human transcendence, vision or meaningful action" (Hellström 2004, 644)

“This implies taking intention seriously in the study of innovation, including such things as the interplay of identity, affective moods and goal

conceptualization, as well as the related duality of norm fulfilment and social deviance involved in innovating" (Hellström 2004, 646-647).

Innovation in Companies

To fully harvest a company’s internal inventive potential, an approach is needed that “promotes invention within the whole company” (…)

and “offers solutions of how to deal with ideas that are not in line with the current product portfolio, market segments or applications of

choice" Such an initiative aims to “foster an innovation culture that motivates each employee to think about new products and businesses.

Furthermore it helps to cooperate with all subgroups to follow up promising ideas and finally it aims at bringing people together, giving

inspiration and supporting the submitters of ideas"

“(…) the main challenge was how to make ideas of "personal

relevance" and assign them to persons in charge. Because he

himself experienced how ideas can be "lost" within the

organization when no one is in charge of taking care, he

proposed the implementation of centralized Innovation

Managers who function as a contact person and a suitable

incentive system. (…) he explains that many ideas, that didn’t fit

the existing business set-up were ignored instead of taken as a

sign that there might be a greater potential in other areas.

Having this issue in mind he fought for the set-up of an

independent subgroup, the Innovation Corporation that

exclusively evaluates the business potential of new ideas that

come in (…) As it is an independent company, the Corporation

might be more enabled to think "out of the box" of existing

structures (…)

According to him the lack of inventions was not about the fact that

there were no creative people within the company. It was more

about the missing connection amongst them and the lacking

incentive to be innovative. Additional to that, he emphasized

diversity in terms of different people with specific backgrounds to

be elected as Innovation Managers. He believed that the so far

widespread belief, that innovators have to come only form the

Research & Development department is wrong and that mixed

groups of people are more likely to come up with revolutionary

ideas. (…) The intranet platform created a forum, where people of

all backgrounds and functions could post their ideas, share

assessments or challenges with each other as well as discuss

different aspects"

Anna-Leona Breidbach 2010 CINE Project Report

B

“We understand … that what constitutes the dignity of a craft is that it

creates a fellowship, that it binds men together and fashions for them

a common language"

— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 1967

Inventive Ideation

“Creative individuals are thought to embody a tension of knowledge breadth and depth, viz lateral and vertical thinking and have been

described as ‘the embodiment of contradictions’. As such, they should not only be given opportunities to deepen their knowledge and acquire

requisite expertise in the field, but also to be stimulated by exposure to a diversity of information, thoughts, people and situations"(Ross 2006,

11)

“People will be most creative when they feel

motivated primarily by the interest, satisfaction

and challenge presented by the work itself, more

so than for instance via extrinsic rewards such as

money. Key elements of this intrinsic motivation

are recognition, and encouragement via

organisational, supervisory or work group

supports, as well as autonomy, freedom, allowing

self-initiated activity, personal initiative, and

provisioning of effective incentives. The

importance of providing creative people with

challenging work that provides ‘stretch’, whilst

minimising workload pressures and tolerating

failure, is emphasised by several sources. This is

critical to the incubation of ideas that eventually

leads to new insights and discoveries" (Ross

2006, 11-12)

The four sources of inventive ideation (Ross 2006, 13)

B

A Manifesto of a New Innovation Model Driven by the Arts

“This book promotes innovations and new ideas which involve both art and science. It explains how a new kind of lab, based on the principles

of typical science labs, but more focused on art and design, can become an incubator for innovative products that would certainly not have

been realized without such a structure. The artscience lab was the incubator for breathable food called the Whif – a small object which

enables you to breathe chocolate and get the taste in your mouth, for zero calories – and for Andrea – a plant-based filter that can remove

toxic gases from the air of a room – and many others…”

2011 CINE Book Review of David Edward‘s The Lab, ( the student reviewer will like to remain anonymous: Ed)

‘As David Edwards puts it: “A

manifesto of a new innovation

model driven by the arts, this is

the first detailed description of an

emerging cultural phenomenon in

the United States and Europe

where artists and scientists

collaborate to produce intriguing

cultural content and surprising

innovations"’

“The positive aspect of passion is

that the person it drives will never

give up and attempt the craziest

thing so that the idea becomes

successful. The drawbacks of

passion can be lack of realism,

narrow vision and stubbornness" www.davidideas.com/

“Edwards is convinced that people learn more

quickly when they have personal interests at

stake. On the other hand, he promotes the

concept of idea translation, where “students

learn to learn in real-world settings”. Those two

concepts are I think quite opposite. Students

within the Cloud Foundation have nothing really

personal at stake, and that is certainly the reason

for which they participate. They can only be

winners, and students developing projects that

do not become concrete do not lose anything…

And I think it is a good motivation for regular

students to simply be experimenting in order to

learn. They do not need to have anything at

stake, incentives –like prizes, recognition… - are

enough for them. This is allowing students to

develop crazy ideas which might be at first sight

believed to be impossible to realize"

“Edwards says: “Logic tells us that the pursuit of ideas that exclusively serve narrowly defined interests is a bad bet […]. Experimental altruistic

ideas defy the kinds of perceived conflicts of interest that sometimes stop idea translation in non-lab environments with more narrowly defined

interests”. I have to say that I completely disagree with this statement. People with narrow sets of interests can get their ideas through very far,

if they have a good communication strategy, good lobbyists, strong power or good allies and certainly a lot of money"

The Weight of Complexity

“Concerning the environment, Harford offers great insights

revealing how very "ungreen" are the actions of those who

presume to be environmentally aware. Grocery shoppers have

been skipping the plastic bags in favour of reusable ones

brought from home, but Harford notes that those plastic bags

provided by grocery stores account for 1/100th of the carbon

emissions of the food environmentalists put in them. Those who

are embracing the theory of global warming are seemingly

always turning off lights and other appliances, but the

cappuccinos they drink (think milk) while congratulating

themselves for their forward-thinking ways are responsible for

far more carbon emissions than result from plugging in a mobile

phone, or turning on a kettle"

M.D. Nafis Ahsan 2011 CINE Book Review of Tim Harford‘s Adapt: Why Success Always Starts With Failure

“To summarize, in Adapt, Tim Harford argues that the process of

innovation has been pulled down by the sheer weight of

complexity of the modern world. Good ideas are being ignored

and rejected by bureaucracy while bad practices and dangerous

errors flourish in most dysfunctional markets. To find solutions to

some of the big problems – climate change, financial instability,

global poverty – we must go back to basics, examining the

circumstances in which ingenuity has broken through in the

past, and then we must find ways to replicate them and sustain

them" www.modepilot.de/2009/02/14/leinentaschen-mit-botschaft/

B

www.thersa.org/

The surprising truth about what motivates us.

RSA Talk by Daniel H Pink

Determinants of Innovative Behaviour of a Firm

“What triggers change and innovation in firms?” (Montalvo 2006)

“It is clear that a wide variety of factors depending on the type of innovation in question

and the internal and external contexts of the firm can trigger innovation"(Montalvo 2006)

“We can have a firm that is highly motivated to innovate by normative aspects of behaviour (i.e. either by

market, community or regulatory pressures). In addition the firm could be facing good economic opportunities in

combination with laudable social outcomes. Taking into account only these aspects concerning attitudes and

social norms might lead to wrong conclusions if we do not take into account past experience and the current

control over the innovation process (i.e. economic resources, timing and capabilities). Similarly, a firm could be

highly motivated to innovate by attitudinal aspects of behaviour (i.e. economic opportunities and good

appropriability conditions) coupled with high capabilities to innovate. Being both aspects optimal, still normative

aspects (e.g. community and regulatory pressures) could stop the innovative process. The case of genetically

modified crops provides an example of this case" (Montalvo 2006)

“…rather than focusing on individual determinants the proposed model takes a holistic approach. It includes cognitive,

motivational and instrumental aspects that may affect the behaviour of the firm" (Montalvo 2006)

“(…) concerning the explanation of dissonance between cognition, motivations, plans and behaviour, contrary to

mainstream models, the proposed model does not assumes that behaviour should be consistent with the optimisation

principle. (…) the model is a definitional system that prompts for the inclusion of variables such as beliefs, expectancies,

values, plans, past experience and control as moderators between cognition, motivation and behaviour. It takes into account

that the relationship between cognition, motivation and action is not straightforward. This provides the opportunity to look at

managers (firms, groups and organisations) as dynamic social actors searching for change but perhaps encountering many

obstacles that hamper the achievement of an ideal goal" (Montalvo 2006)

B

travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/countries/sumo-photos/

Freakonomics

“What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common?

How is the Ku Klux Klan like a group of real estate agents?

Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?

Where have all the criminals gone?

What makes a perfect parent?

Would a Roshanda by any other name smell as sweet?”

Freakonomics is based on certain principles:

1) Modern life has a strong dependence on incentives.

Understanding incentives or what makes certain things work the way they do is the key.

2) “Conventional wisdom” may not always be right.

It is often the most quoted answer but that does not necessarily mean it is correct.

3) Distant, subtle causes can lead to spectacular effects in the future.

Roe v. Wade (i.e. legalization of abortion in U.S.) has had more effect on lowering crime than better policing and

gun control, although no one had connected the dots between the two.

4) Experts use their informational advantage to server their own agenda.

However, with the wider reach of the Internet, this advantage is reducing, especially for items like insurance

policies and coffins.

5) An understanding of what to measure and how to measure it makes it much easier to understand the otherwise

complicated world.

An economist has to be able to look at the data the right way to recognize the signs, make connections and solve

problems.

Moti Baba 2011 CINE Book Review of Levitt and Dubner’s Freakonomics

B

Three Cups of Tea

“Of course the inhabitants of Korphe didn’t have all the resources it takes

to build up a school from scratch in the first place. But the question is:

Did that hinder them to think about building one or did they just never

question the system that was in place since forever: that there was no

chance for children to get a non-extreme kind of education. Mortenson

mobilized people and motivated them to contribute to his idea so that in

the end the heads of other villages asked him for advice because they

wanted to participate in his idea.

(…) he sustainably contributes to an increase of international

understanding. I don’t want to compare this to other entrepreneurs, but

in my mind this is the main contribution, people in nowadays society can

do"

Anna-Leona Breidenbach 2010 CINE Book Review of Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin’s Three Cups Of Tea: One Man’s Mission to

Fight Terrorism and Build Nations … One School at a Time

Creativity in Product Innovation

“(…) Are consumers a rich source of creative alternatives when a company is looking for alternatives to a new product or service. And the

answer is NO. Ideas can be generated in two ways: based on creative thinking or based on market information (or the consumers).

Consumers may provide information concerning the improvement of existing products but they cannot help in creating truly original products,

since consumers may be a reliable source of information for present needs, but they are not able to predict future needs.

In the book you will find the Creativity Templates approach, in which they trace the common characteristics behind known creative ideas or

products and based on them create new products or ideas. According to this approach: "Over time, market needs and desires are 'mapped' or

'encoded' into a product, the configuration of which becomes a physical representation of past selection of the market or an 'echo' of past

customers' preferences. Therefore, the Templates approach places the product itself as a tool to predict the market trends and the

characteristics a new product should have to answer future needs of customers. While the approach applies familiar characteristics to new

products, it also has a surprise element, since the characteristics are new concerning the specific product; this produces an effect of

"unrecognized familiarity".

The main section of the book describes and demonstrates 4 Templates, with a Forecasting Matrix added to assist use of one of the Templates.

If one decodes these Templates, one finds that they are simple Su-field action/function statements.

1. The Attribute Dependency Template: It is a suggestion to use a component of the system to perform a new function, or a new variation of

that function.

2. The Replacement Template: It suggests you use a component to replace the function of another component and thus remove that

component

3. The Displacement Template: It suggests removing a component and all its functions, which is standard TRIZ where the functions are no

longer required, but we do like their additional suggestion that you then find a market for this new product, which lacks these functions, and

they give good examples.

4. The Component Control Template: It suggests using a component to reduce a harmful effect from an outside component”

Vatan Vindal 2010 CINE Book Review of Jacob Goldenberg & David Mazursky’s Creativity in Product Innovation

B

Innovation and Warfare

“There are differences in the way the army works and civilian

organizations work. In an army the line of command is clear. There

are no politics, organizational cultural differences and personal

agenda. The fact that the personal imperative is taken away from

the agenda during wartime helps to bring the best out of people.

Everyone involved in war has a very high level of identification

towards the cause. There is pride, patriotism and other emotional

values attached in war effort, as opposed to the monetary gains in

an organization. The nation’s vision and mission, that is to win the

war and keep the country free is something which is everyone’s

aim, and everyone identifies with this cause. In a commercial

organization, the vision and mission of the company might not be

something which every employee identifies with. People might

have personal agendas, commercial and numerical targets to

achieve etc.

Survival is yet another issue. In the face of an invading enemy,

there is no option but to fight back. In an organization, the fall of an

organization does not necessarily mean the fall of every individual.

There are exit options, and other companies to go to. But in war, a

person has just one army to stick to till the end of his life and one

country to fight for – that is his own"

Abid E.H. & Arun Balakrishnan 2009 CINE Project Report

www.christies.com/lotfinderimages/d51009/d5100960l.jpg

Innovation in Jail

“The inventor of the toothbrush was William Addis, an inmate. He invented

this item in the year 1770. He made it from a bone saved from a meal. Holes

were drilled and tufts of bristles glued to finalize the realization of the first

toothbrush. This invention was completely unexpected to come this way: Jail

is not the cleanest environment we could imagine! But when you live 7/7

24/24 in the same cell, you pay more attention to your personal hygiene"

Invented by Angelo

“As integrated coffee machines are forbidden in jail, Angelo had to develop a

proper filter. This filter is based on the metal tabs of a notebook, topped in

both sides by two toothbrush heads melted together in the middle – which

are the core part of the filter, and wrapped by a rubber band"

Anne Delvincourt & Louis-Marie Schmitlin 2009 CINE Project Report

B

Guns, Germs, and Steel

“The first printed (stamped, not handwritten) document is the Cretan Minoan Phaistos disk of 1700 BC, but it did not lead to a proliferation of

printing apparently because it was ahead of its time, lacked receptive circumstances and supporting technology, etc . Though necessity is

sometimes the mother to invention (e.g., cotton gin, nuclear weapons, steam engine), invention often precedes the creation of necessity (e.g.,

airplane, light bulb) and arises cumulatively from creative geniuses building by trial and error on the discoveries of their capable

predecessors.

Early models of inventions often perform poorly and appear unconvincing. The flourishing of inventions requires acceptance within a society,

which is influenced by the invention's: (1) economic advantage, (2) social value and prestige, (3) compatibility with vested interests, and (4)

ease with which its advantages can be observed. Receptivity to technological innovation varies from society to society and is increased by (1)

longer human life expectancy, (2) lack of availability of cheap or slave labor or a high cost of labor, (3) patents or other legal protections, (4)

ready availability of technical training, (5) rewards for investment via capitalism, etc., (6) individualism, (7) encouragement of risk-taking, (8)

scientific outlook, (9) tolerance of diverse views, (10) religious tolerance and religious encouragement of innovation, (11) ±war, (12) ±strong

central government, (13) ±rigorous climate, and (14) ±abundant resources. Receptivity to innovation varies widely on each continent. Most

new developments arrive by diffusion, which for places with geographic or ecologic barriers is limited.

Food production and large population and land mass favor more rapid technological development -- e.g., in Eurasia. In New Guinea and other

areas of the world, conservative (resistant) and more receptive societies lived side by side. The Navajo more than other Indian tribes adapted

European use of dyes for weaving and took up ranching. The receptivity to innovation in Islam and China has varied over time. Thus no

continent has been unusually innovative or noninnovative over history.

Important inventions such as guns can allow a culture to overrun another. Yet in Japan, the samurai restricted the adoption of guns until

Commodore Perry arrived 1853. Other examples of cultures rejecting new innovations include the Tasmanians (fishing), China (ocean going

ships), and Polynesians (pottery in some areas).

Technology is autocatalytic, begetting more technology, and the rate of development can accelerate dramatically.

The main factors leading to the difference in technological development between the conquering Europeans and the New World inhabitants

were: level of food production, barriers to diffusion, and differences in human population"

Michael McGoodwin 2011 CINE Book Review of Jared Diamond‘s Guns, Germs, and Steel

Survival of the Sickest

Imagine if a virus causing a fatal disease needs a particular chemical which is found in abundance in the nasal

fluid of healthy people, what will happen, the sick people will survive. That is what happened once in Europe.

“Haemochromatosis is a medical condition which is related to high iron levels in the human body. These iron levels

can build up over a period of time and can be fatal in extreme cases. The irony is that iron in small amounts is

necessary for the proper functioning of the body. This particular disease is more common in European people. The

author has tried to probe deeper into this problem. In fact iron is required by the microorganisms attacking our body

to survive and flourish.

The author goes back in time to 13th century when Europe was devastated by the epidemic bubonic plague also

infamously remembered as “black death”. Then he goes on to state that the healthier people were more

susceptible and vulnerable to bubonic plague as their bodies contained the adequate amount of iron which

unfortunately provided the perfect platform for the microorganisms to grow and multiply. This argument explains

why the people with less amount of iron in their bodies were less vulnerable to this disease.

Rohan Anand 2011 CINE Book Review of Sharon Moalem‘s Survival of the Sickest

However there is another mechanism in the bodies of people with less

iron which plays the trick. In people who have less oxygen in their body,

there are some internal mechanisms which are active to trap whatever

small amount of iron they can find. So continuing from the 13th century

bubonic plague, it can be argued that most of the people who survived

were deficient in iron and thus possessed the iron-locking internal

mechanism.

So today when most of the people are having balanced diets, it is highly

unlikely that there would be iron deficiency. But since the European

people have descended from the survivors of the 13th century bubonic

plague, the iron locking mechanism in their bodies is still carried to the

next generation through genes. Due to this mechanism, the amount of

iron keeps on increasing to dangerous levels and can be fatal at extreme

levels. So in a very cryptic argument, one can say that this process which

would have led to a certain death 25-30 years down the line was carried

forward by just one logical explanation- that it prevented the death now" anarchistcoloringbook.wordpress.com/

bentspoke.tumblr.com

B

Fooled by Randomness

"This is a book about luck. More specifically, it is a book

about how we perceive luck, twist it around and regard it

as intention or purpose. What better setting than the

world of trading to investigate the subject? How often has

the brilliant trader, who seems to the outside world to

have been granted the gift of second sight in the

implementation of his strategies, been suddenly wiped

out by an unexpected shift in the markets? The book may

have its roots firmly in the financial arena, but it also

incorporates and explains the effects and repercussions

of randomness in many varied fields - ranging from

philosophy to literature and science - to create an insight

into how randomness cannot be conquered, but can be

embraced"

"Humans try to bring pattern into everything to arrive at

some result or predict the future but it’s not correct

because result is completely random which cannot be

captured in patterns. "

"A chance of fittest survival doesn’t state that there can’t

be any incident which can alter it"

Ashok Nehra 2011 Book Review of Nassim Nicholas Taleb‘s Fooled by Randomness

www.jvlendnote.com/post/17754105333

Life-Cycle Thinking and Design

“The concept of Life Cycle Thinking integrates existing consumption and production strategies, preventing a piece-meal approach. Life cycle

approaches avoid problem shifting from one life cycle stage to another, from one geographic area to another and from one environmental

medium or protection target to another. Human needs should be met by providing functions of products and services, such as food, shelter,

and mobility, through optimised consumption and production systems that are contained within the carrying capacity of the ecosystem of this

planet" (European Commission 2010)

“Considering environmental issues during product development widens the scope of the product developer and reveals new aspects which

support innovation in two ways. Firstly, the product developer gets to know the product better, since he/she gains more insight from a different

view point. This leads to a better known strengths-and-weaknesses profile of the product, which makes it easier to find solutions to the problem while keeping the whole product and its system in mind. Secondly, foreseeing the whole life cycle and considering other aspects

often inspires new innovative solutions on various levels. Examples of this are the fuel cell and hybrid technology in the automotive industry"

(Ernzer & Bey 2003, 563)

Related topics include:

IPPD – Integrated Product Process Development

Rebound effects

Cradle to Grave

Cradle-to-Cradle

Functional innovation

Product-Service-Systems

Systems Thinking

B

Where Do Good Ideas Come From?

“It involves creating an environment where a hunch

can gestate. Often, you have half of an idea and it

doesn't make any sense, but it's interesting. If that

idea can sit around for a few years, it changes, or

you meet someone who can help complete it, the

technology around it changes or your own

technological maturity advances. Suddenly, that idea

makes a lot of sense.

Hunches also need to collide with other people's

hunches. It's through the collision between those

different ideas, those different world views and those

different perspectives that people become more

original thinkers. (…)

It's much easier to stumble across something on the web than it is in a library. The percentage of the population that goes to the library and

walks along the stacks and takes a book down because they like the binding is incredibly small, whereas the number of people who've gone to

Wikipedia and ended up reading about monarch butterflies when they had no idea that they were interested in monarch butterflies is a very

large part of the population. And probably growing. (…)

We often have successes that are disproportionate to what makes them good, particularly things based on network effects. Once you hit the

tipping point, you will end up a thousand times bigger than the competition. But your original idea may only be five times better. It's hard for

humans to look at the thousand-times bigger innovation and not to assume that the person who came up with it was a thousand times smarter"

(Steven Johnson 2010)

ffffound.com/home/traskblueribbon/post/

“To never stop breaking the rules is

the essence of evolution. (…) Like in

generating new models, no restraint

must stop one from designing

experiments that test the boundaries

of the model. One important fact

forgotten by people who fear failure is

that every failed experiment which

was well-designed is also a source of

vital information"

(Sardana, D. & Vasudevan, S., 2011

CINE Project Report)

Ben Shahn - www.illuminationstudio.org/images/Ben_Shahn_Wheatfield.jpg

B

Innovation and Ego Walls

“First, he analyzes how large companies &

experienced management display a very risk-

averse attitude while adopting innovations.

The reason, according to him, is the

resistance to change from a philosophy that

has worked for a person or a company as a

whole, and the potential risks brought by

adopting a new strategy. Other negative

reactions to innovation are based out of envy,

pride, priority, sloth, greed & consistency. The

learning here is that the notion that the

manager or the large corporation knows best

is flawed …” (Rohan Choudhary 2010 CINE

Book Review of Sott’s The Myth of Innovation)

itsbanksyprick.tumblr.com/

“People have a nasty habit of clustering in coalitions, professing certain

beliefs as badges of their commitment to the coalition and treating rival

coalitions as intellectually unfit and morally depraved. Debates between

members of the coalitions can make things even worse, because when the

other side fails to capitulate to one's devastating arguments, it only proves

they are immune to reason”

(Steven Pinker, CINE 2010 book review by Jagatjit Turuk on Brockman’s

What s your dangerous idea: Today’s leading thinkers on the unthinkable)

ffffound.com/home/traskblueribbon/post/

B

“Criticism is not the worst thing that can happen to anyone.

The worst that can happen to anyone is if no one notices

one’s initiative" (A Yashwanth 2010 CINE Book Review of

Seth Godin’s Tribes)

“(…) most of the time people don’t give honest feedback in

business life because it is easier not to do so. However

according to Jack Welch the most important advantage of

candor is that it enriches conversations and thus enables

people to generate rich ideas, bring about progress faster and

operate more efficient. (…) the necessity to provide people

the possibility to speak their minds and the necessity to deal

with people in a respectful way. He describes that in an

environment where open speech is not promoted by higher

level managers employees would tend to withhold their own

opinion a pattern leading to corporate inertia" (Christian

Schlapka 2011 Book Review of Jack Welch’s Winning)

ffffound.com/image/0fd881decafb3c793a337ff0bd804e088d6f4290

Feedback and Criticism

“Many times, however, it is the competence in a particular field that leads an innovator to explore the problem at hand and arrive at a solution

which can be much harder. This is because innovations require people to get involved in the “doing” process and many people who have

relevant knowledge are reluctant to do so. One of the reasons discussed in many papers and reports on creativity is that people who have

knowledge feel that the problem solving process is easy and anyone can solve the problem. Therefore, they do not get involved in the “doing”

process. Another reason discussed by many writers on this topic is that people may find the problem too difficult or uninspiring due to which

they do not get involved in the creative process"

“Another problem faced by innovators is the asymmetric information problem. Innovators possess plenty of technical knowledge while the

scientists who test the product understand the theoretical models behind the product. Many times this asymmetric information results in ego

clashes or heated discussions between innovators and scientists"

Discrepancies Vivek Sharma 2009 CINE Project Report

adpeople.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/solutions_challenging_traditional_model_featured1.jpg

B

“Final commercialisation of your product is the toughest job. We can

always make a prototype and show the concept to everyone, but to make it

marketable we need to have a Chinese finish, which most of the products

lack in India. Taking a product from 0 to 99 percent is still do-able, but that

1 percent of commercialisation is the toughest job" (Akshat Khare in 2010

CINE Interview by Vatan Vindal)

“As is evident from Galileo’s story also, financial help for innovators is a huge blockade in

nurturing the innovative human mind. A lot of innovators stop pursuing their passions and ideas

for lack of financial funding. Galileo’s situation is more than relevant in today’s world. Despite all

the lack of funds, he continued to run after his passion for science and that is how the best

innovators in today’s world have turned out to be successful.

The world today is full of popular stories like investors who completely refused initial funding for

Google - which now practically rules our lives and the world in some sense" (Hemant Chhabra

2011 Book Review of Bertolt Brecht’s The Life of Galileo)

www.star-astronomy.com/wp-content/uploads/ galileo-telescope.jpg

marshacottrell.com/pages/current/current11L.html

Marsha Cottrell Untitled 2011

iron oxide on mulberry paper

Nicolas Hayek – Beyond SWATCH Saga

“I am convinced our watches are not measuring instruments to know

what time it is. You can do that, but watches are more—they are art.

We put in all our watches, Switzerland"

(Statements by Nicolas Hayek in WSJ Article

by Michael Clerizo, June 2010)

“How are you?”

“Why ask this question without expecting an answer"

“Every structure in operational units is necessary but should not

become a purpose in itself"

“The businessman is also an “artist”.

He has to imagine, create and accomplish new ideas"

(Statements by Nicolas Hayek in 2010 CINE Book Review

by Alexandre Bedier)

swatch4u.blogspot.in/2010/10/swatch-new-gent-collection-2010-fall.html

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/finance-obituaries/7861751/Nicolas-Hayek.html

Alexandre Bedier 2010 Book Review of Hayek & Bartu’s Nicolas G. Hayek, Au-delà de la Saga Swatch

B

The Innovator’s Dilemma Rahul A. Kumar 2008 CINE Book Review of Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail

“Now, let’s try to answer how come some large companies have vanished into oblivion. Generally,

large companies have large goals and they look for opportunities whose payout is large. If the

payout is not very profitable they generally chuck the plan. And here small and growing companies

come into the picture. They invest in new products and technologies compared to established

ones. The new firms also understand the value network, customer needs and thus they try to

position themselves to the usage of this new technology and make it hard for established players

to enter. It’s not that large companies couldn’t tackle disruptive technologies. Yes, they can but it

comes at the price of diverting away resources from existing revenue technologies to the

disruptive ones. This shifts attention from the core work and sometime is detrimental to overall

health. Also, organizations sometimes acquire smaller companies who have succeeded in

disruptive technologies, but it often results in failures because of egos attached to parent

companies. The mantra for large companies is that they should continue to improve upon

conventional technologies and at the same time be followers in adopting new ones"

“Now, let’s ponder what this book means to budding entrepreneurs like me. To me, it gives the

motivation that, if I have the will power to take on the well established players only sky is the limit for

me. I just need an innovative bent of mind which can come up with new inventions and technologies

catering to the anticipated needs of people. To make it successful I must be able to recognize the

value of disruptive technologies through conservative initial marketing practices, targeting relevant

markets and consumers, and frequent changes to the initial layout and design of the product"

The Ten Faces of Innovation Nupur Gupta 2011 CINE Book Review of Tom Kelley‘s The Ten Faces of Innovation

The Learning Personas

The Anthropologist: The wisdom to observe with an open mind is the most critical characteristic of an anthropologist in an organization. The

fact that they don’t judge, but only observe ensures that they look beyond the obvious and seek inspiration in unusual places.

The Experimenter: These are the people who have a curious mind and are very passionate about hard work. They love to try different ideas

and approach problems with different angles.

The Cross Pollinator: The author gave a beautiful definition of the cross pollinators. They are the ones who can create something new and

better through the unexpected juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated ideas or concepts.

The Organising Personas

The Hurdler: Hurdlers are the risk-taking, often street-smart individuals who are always ready to take challenges head-on and smoothly

overcome any obstacles in their path. The most admirable characteristic in them is their positive and deterministic attitude towards life. They

love to excel through all sorts of challenges, tight deadlines, finding way out of disastrous situations etc.

The Collaborator: As the name suggests, collaborators are the ones who like to bring diverse people together and get the work done. They

like to work in multi-disciplinary fields and value the team over the individuals.

The Director: Directors are the leaders who gladly step up and take charge when the need arises. They put together the best team they can

find and are even willing to restructure projects if the need arises. They take tough challenges and in spite of that, are content to let others

take the spotlight.

The Building Personas

The Experience Architect: A good experience architect sets the stage for positive encounters within the organization and for the customers.

The Set Designer: Every organization (and every employee) performs a bit better or worse because of the planning, design and management

of its physical workspace. The set designer can create that intangible element that helps turn around an organization.

The Caregiver: The personal touch of care in the organizations or to the customers can work wonders. Anticipating customer needs and go

beyond mere service to satisfy that need can spur the profits of any company.

The Storyteller: In the end, the author gives strong reasons why a storyteller is important to an organization. The most important among them

is that a storyteller builds credibility.

B

Failed Innovations

“Exploring out the reasons as to why innovations fail would be an interesting question to unfold"

“It is believed that fifty to ninety percent of innovation projects make little or no contribution to the organizational goals. According to a

product innovation survey, out of three thousand ideas for new products; only one becomes a success in the marketplace. As a matter of

fact, failure is an inevitable part of the innovation process; and most successful organizations factor in an appropriate level of risk. The

impact of failure can’t be limited to the simple loss of investment. It can also lead to the loss of morale among staff, an increase in cynicism

and even higher resistance to change in the future"

Anumeha Singh 2009 CINE Project Report

“The main realm of projects basically deals with those

innovations or creative ideas which because of some

reasons couldn’t deliver its promising effect and eventually

failed disastrously. The fact that almost around 90% of

innovations fail to materialize was the main motivation to

drive me to research upon this particular topic. It’s quite a

known fact that the failure reasons for each innovation is

case specific which cannot be generalized. In due course of

the project research, I came up with the examples of few

such innovations; attached with which were lots of

expectations and capital investments. In other words, there

were huge market hypes prior to the product launch which

ultimately resulted in a terrible failure. These were the

innovations which ceased right at their third stage of the

Hype Cycle"

Gartner Research's Hype Cycle Diagram

www.admittingfailure.com

B

Blink

“Gladwell builds upon the immediate judgments through the presentation of the “thin slice” theory, wherein he relates that the thin slice is the

ability of the human mind to accurately zero in on a certain situation and reach a decision in a matter of seconds"

Khitij Gupta 2009 CINE Book Review of Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink

“Innovations often suffer for want of these kinds of snap judgments. People sit and brood too much, researching whether similar innovations

were successful in the past. The element of scepticism becomes so inherent in our decision making process that for us to even consider the

blink effect as credible becomes blasphemous. The entrepreneurial spirit relies on the ability to be able to follow your instincts and be able to

act on the spot with whatever limited information is available. Only through the actualisation of the blink effect will we be able to kindle the

entrepreneur in each one of us, the way we desire it to unfold"

“Innovations are not the only question being posed by the blink effect. What arises out of this entire discussion is also the psychological

aspects of human intellect and managerial function. We often let our prejudice and predicaments rule supreme and in the end deny the same

through carefully crafting out an excuse. This has resulted in us denying the concept of “intuition” as a made up concept. We have been quick

to dismiss snap judgments as mere flukes or lucky guesses. We fail to acknowledge the existence of the sub-conscious as a higher and

stronger governing force for us when it comes to taking a stand. It is obvious that the human psyche would fear accepting such a proposition

as it shifts control from out of our hands and gives it over to the sub-conscious – an aspect we consider alien to our conscious minds"

“More often than not it is better to be ignorant of certain aspects than to be too worked up over detail. The lesson comes from the simple fact

that we experience more in life by being adventurous than by being cautious – one can always learn by trying and falling, but the possibility to

learn does not exist for someone who just does not try due to too much of analysis and ultimately restricts oneself with the uncertainty of the

outcome. Action is personified by the snap judgment, and reaction is the embodiment of deep cognition. It does not imply that one outscores

the other, just that contextually both hold their relevance, and should be looked upon with due credibility"

by Robyn Graubard http://lalanguedesoiseaux.tumblr.com/post/22461842844

B

Intuitive Decision Making

“The idea that executives should make decisions according to what their intuition or “gut” tells them is generally out of favour. In a scientific

age, one’s feelings are supposed to be mastered, while painstakingly collected megabytes of data reveal the correct path. And yet people

continue to feel — intuitively, if you will — that this is an oversimplification. For many complex decisions, all the data in the world can’t trump

the lifetime’s worth of experience that informs one’s gut feeling, instinct or intuition" (Matzler et al. 2007, 13)

“(…) what we call intuitive decision making is really one’s ability

to recognize patterns at lightning speed — a process that often

happens unconsciously. This is an especially important trait for

complex decisions" (Matzler et al. 2007, 14)

“Complex decisions, however, bring into play a process in which

knowledge, experience and emotions are linked, and this

process is what people commonly think of when they hear the

word “intuition" Research has found that people who have

acquired deep wells of knowledge and experience — through

their curiosity, openness and propensity to seize opportunities

— are able to reach good “intuitive” decisions much more

frequently than people who possess a relatively limited sphere

of experience" (Matzler et al. 2007, 14)

“(…) intuition is a highly complex and highly developed form of reasoning that is based on years of experience and learning, and on facts,

patterns, concepts, procedures and abstractions stored in one’s head” (Matzler et al. 2007, 14)

managementhelp.org/blogs/strategic-planning/2011/05/20/strategic-intuition/

"What makes the desert beautiful," says the little prince, "is that somewhere it hides a well"

– Antoine de Saint-Exupery, 1943

B

Open innovation models are being used widely even by large companies but start-ups feel

inhibited in exploring such a platform in which reciprocities are well defined and sourcing of

ideas from strangers is encouraged. What is the fear in learning from strangers?

pooling sharing collaborating

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Creative Commons – IPR

www.flickr.com/photos/ell-r-brown/5585735946/

How do I know whether my ideas are valuable, unless some others try to steal them?

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Open Source Abishek Barua 2009 CINE Project Report

C

“(…) defining and enforcing a tradable asset in new technological knowledge is also important because it encourages the evolution of a

market in technology, and because it extends and increases incentives for investment in inventive activity to segments of the population that

would otherwise find it difficult to directly extract returns from their technological creativity" (Khan & Sokoloff 2004, 395)

Patenting

(…) the great inventors who had only primary or secondary education received as many (and often more) patents over their careers as did

their peers with more extensive formal schooling. The technologically creative seem to have been able to accumulate the skills and

knowledge necessary to operate at the frontier largely on their own, or through their work experience as apprentices or younger employees

(…) The ability to obtain patents provided a means for individuals whose chief asset was technological creativity, or accumulated human

capital that was conducive to inventive activity, to extract a return from their talents by focusing on invention" (Khan & Sokoloff 2004, 397-

398)

“We have demonstrated that those 19th-century skeptics who contended that only an elite segment was capable of truly important invention,

and therefore that an extension of property rights in technology to the general population would have no beneficial effect on the pace of

technical progress, were wrong. Although few of the celebrated inventors in Britain were of humble origins, by design such individuals were

well represented among the great inventors of the United States. In the United States, this group was more likely to invest in inventive

activity, not only because of the relatively lower cost of obtaining a patent, but also because the examination system facilitated the use of a

patent as a general asset that could be sold licensed, or offered as collateral for finance. This latter feature was of profound importance for

technologically creative individuals who lacked the financial resources to exploit inventions directly. In short, the patent system was a key

institution in the progress of technology, but it also stands out as a conduit for creativity and achievement among otherwise disadvantaged

groups" (Khan & Sokoloff 2004, 400-401)

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C

USHAHIDI (Pascal Unger 2011 CINE Book Review of Tapscott & Wiliam’s Macrowikinomics)

“On Sunday, January 17, a full five days after a devastating earthquake struck Haiti, a text message sent from a cell phone in Port-au-Prince was translated from Creole into English and posted on an interactive crisis mapping site that was being closely monitored by emergency respondents" “(…) While at first glance, it seems remarkable that someone could survive for full five days after such a devastating earthquake, at second

glance it is very interesting to look at how the emergency respondents got to the text message and were able to save the person sending the

message"

“Within an hour of learning of the earthquake in Haiti, the people running Ushahidi, the crisis-mapping website, sprang into action. Ushahidi is

a crisis-mapping website that allows users to submit eyewitness accounts or other relevant information in a disaster situation via e-mail, text

or twitter. The website then visualizes the frequency and distribution of these events on the map. It was born in Kenya in 2008 when violence

erupted in the aftermath of Kenya’s disputed election in order to provide prove to these acts of violence, For the first time in history, interested

parties could see at a glance which areas of the country were experiencing trouble by information that was not controlled by organization or

government and could thus provide unbiased information. In the case of Haiti, Ushahidi allowed the respondents to specify their geographic

area of interest as well as the type of alert such as collapsed building, medical emergencies and food shortages. Before Ushahidi, in crisis

situations, big institutions and aid workers would parachute into a crisis, assess the situation and dispense aid with the very limited

information they had. This would usually lead to money and more importantly wasted time and thus wasted opportunities. Ushahidi now

provides the rescue teams with accurate and specific information from areas which are usually very hard to reach and this allows the rescue

teams to deploy their resources according to the needs and allows them to proceed and move much faster.

Another remarkable thing about the Haiti incident and the Ushahidi involvement evolved around the fact that a majority of the incoming text

messages were in Creole while the rescue teams spoke English and thus needed translation. The people behind Ushahidi thus reached out

to dozens of Haitian communities around the world and soon hundreds of volunteers across the globe were using the website to translate,

categorize and geo-locate urgent life-and-death text messages in real-time. These volunteers also used Skype to relay critical information

about the location of potential survivors to search-and rescue teams on the ground despite being thousands of kilometers away. As a result,

Ushahidi’s crisis-mappers found themselves center stage in an urgent effort to save lives during one of the largest relief operations in history.

After Haiti, Ushahidi has been used and been a great help in many other crisis showing how the web 2.0 can even safe people’s life in

seemingly hopeless and catastrophic situations"

“According to the authors, there is nothing that cannot be fixed if enough people that are like-minded connect and share their thoughts and

ideas over the World Wide Web. This applies to any industry such as the ones with specific examples given in the book which are, amongst

others, healthcare, finance, education, green energy, media, transportation and governments"

USER

USER USER

USER USER

USER

USER

USER USER

USER USER

USER

MFR

MFR

The way it was:

Producer-Innovators and

Robinson Crusoe

User-Innovators

The way it increasingly is:

User innovation

Collaboratives

“The Internet is enabling individual user innovators to join into user innovation collaboratives –

an increasingly powerful competitor to manufacturer-based design"

Needs: Good networking/collaboration infrastructure, adequate protection/sharing system for rich intellectual/creative commons.

Democratizing Innovation (Eric von Hippel 2005)

C

Online Incubation Platform Rohan Choudary & Shashank Jagarlamudi 2010 CINE Project Report 2010

“Present incubation cells work on a “come to” model, where stakeholders need to come to it rather than the incubation cell reaching out to

them"

“The online incubation centre leverages upon the strength of internet and other tools that can be build over it to bridge the geographic gap

between innovators, researchers and investors and try to bring them on to a single platform at least virtually"

Choudary & Jagarlamudi, CINE Presentation 2010

Choudary & Jagarlamudi 2010 CINE Presentation

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“Grassroots innovations and the innovators require many special protection

mechanisms as well as trusted assistance in order to ensure that their

innovation goes to market under their own name. We need to increase

awareness regarding the immense potential of these innovations. India’s

creativity and traditional knowledge lies tied up in these creations and there

is an urgent need of a platform to uncover this potential by bringing various

stakeholders together"

“An online cell leverages the benefits of technology to enable real-time

collaboration between innovators, researchers, VCs, experts etc. This real-

time collaboration helps in bringing speedy solutions to problems faced in

adding value to the innovation. It also helps in building trust between say, an

innovator in India and a designer in Europe. This kind of intermingling of

different cultures, ideas and backgrounds can result in unique and delightful

value addition to the innovations that make them even more useful. Also, it

helps to bring the grassroots innovator, staying in remote areas, into the fold

of society outside his place of residence and also helps people in the formal

sector understand their creativity and problems. Thus, both parties

immensely benefit by entering a world and interacting with people whom they

had always considered outsiders. The online platform also provides a safety

net for both parties in such interactions by having experts who play the part

of mediator or negotiator"

Online Incubation Platform Gaurav Singhal & Kitty Argawal 2011 CINE Project Report

Online Incubation Platform Ravi Subramanian 2010 CINE Presentation

“Since it is possible that many of the innovators might not have time to carry the innovation to

commercialization or the inclination either, it becomes necessary to find a set of new champions

who can take the innovation forward. This leads us to the concept of separating the innovation

from the innovator wherein an online incubator is set up with all the stakeholders of societal

innovation. This ecosystem enables separation of the innovation from the innovator to enable the

innovation to go through the complete innovation value chain without the innovator sitting in the

driver’s seat"

C

“Some of the most useful innovations of our culture are lost in common knowledge"

“An outsider’s perspective may be essential in bringing an innovation to the fore"

Chaitanya Shravanthh & Ravleen Kaur 2011 CINE Presentation

“Being a part of another entrepreneur’s venture could help in one’s own venture"

Ali Gulec – society6.com/artist/aligulec

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The aim is “to become a single platform connecting all the events & SME consulting with a diverse set of people and enabling participation"

YouSolve Timeline

Start

Staged information dissemination of events at

Major schools & corporate houses

Pitching Schools & corporate to allow more cross-institute &

geographic collaboration. Selling points-Reach, results, mktg. PR, Assigning Mods &

Building Platform Launch of fan-

page

Launch of web-site, forums,

QnA

1month

3 month

4 month

Promotion of platform, “How to” &

Technical assistance at forums

6 month

12 month

12 month

Partnering with Cognizant for exclusive SME consulting (e.g include FII of IIMA, IIMB)

18 month

Collaborating with existing events and corporate to partner in the

events

Adding competencies, peer rating,

participation summary in profile

YouSolve

“Crowdsourcing is an act similar to traditional outsourcing with the feature of outsourcing the work to the crowd.

At present most competitions (case-studies, B-plans, development & testing applications, cover design) are institute-bound. These

competitions restrict the user to form a team from a specific institute and/or geographic domain. But as we know that we live in a world where

all the problems have multiple views of looking at it, these competitions do bring out good solutions but possibly not the best ones.

We would gain grounds from the youth’s current familiarity with the internet and the culture of sharing. For enabling individuals from

complementary backgrounds to form teams, it is now possible to leverage new technology of sharing and collaborating online. Google docs,

Skype, Google Cloud connect, sketch are only few of the examples, some of which were not even available in early 2010 (Google cloud

connect).

The key innovation comes from the idea of using diversified teams (team members coming from disparate geographies/domain/institutes) to

participate in competitions and to bring out the best solution possible. Our team suggests that using rewards/competitions and facilitating

diversified teams can leverage the crowd’s potential in a better manner. For example an event related to a technology’s market potential will

attract a group of technology grads, executives, market research practitioners and business graduates.

We will create a website which will regularly update the existing competitions, prizes and will have built in support accessories like profile

page of users, discussion forum and calendar. We also intend to build an online platform (which would also be available as thin client on

desktop) for facilitating collaborative work"

A Short Video about YouSolve www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfmwG4nQrZ8

Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/pages/YouSolve/120368564756767

2011 CINE Project Report by Avinash Reddy, Kushal Gupta, P Subhash Chandra, Rahul Yelisetti, Sharath Devasani, Sudeep Bagchi

C

Reinventing the wheel is a waste

of time and resources.

Why not build upon each other?

www.techpedia.in

"Research is for the society, and at the end of the day what matters is not the

amount of papers lying on the desk, but the impact they have on the society,

towards development"

Shantam, A. 2011 CINE Project Report

“All men dream, but not equally. Those men who dream by night

in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the morning to find it

was but vanity, but those men who dream by day – these are the

dangerous men, for they dream with open eyes to make their

dreams come true"

- T.E. Lawrence thes

ilver

bir

d.t

um

blr

.co

m

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Equity Based Model for the Growth of Artists

“It is often not realised that even the most famous artists find it extremely hard to make a profit even from their most popular albums. The

record deals signed with “record labels” are often structured in such a way that the unsuspecting artists are robbed of most of the sales

revenue"

Ameya Upadhyay 2009 CINE Project Report

“(…) there is a great need for artists – especially budding artists to form an independent platform where they can sell their music DIRECTLY

to the fans without intermediation from labels.

This is exactly what I have chosen to suggest – such a model already exists in the United States called “www.sellaband.com” and I have

looked at the ground level implementation in an Indian scenario of the same thought"

• ”Once a predecided critical investment is reached the artists have a commitment

with the believers and the hosting corporation to record their music for commercial

marketing

• Once the money is invested the believers and musicians become business

partners and can accelerate promotions in tandem (face book, word of mouth etc.).

The corporation hosting the platform also augments the promotion by offering

incentives to believers contributing a certain minimum investment.

• Once the music is released the revenue is split in three parts between the artists,

believers and host.

• Musicians have COMPLETE ownership and right for their music right form the start

of recording the music. The corporation provides the support needed" www.cherrybam.com/music-graphics3.php

“Music lovers or believers are encouraged to sample the music and “invest” or contribute to the artist they believe will make it big in return for a claim to their revenues if and when their music is sold commercially"

Networks

“While I did an internship with Deutsche Bank AG, I had a

hard time to gain all the knowledge by my own because

everyone was busy and had no time to explain it to me.

Therefore I started to write an Intern-Manual to provide next

interns with all the necessary basic information in one

handbook. This will save a lot of time for the future interns as

well as for the employees. In our bakery we have a book

where the salesladies can write down the name and

appearance of customers, so that they can greet them with

by name and all the other colleagues are able to learn the

names, too. It is not necessary to have a computer-based

platform it is also possible to have a paper-based knowledge

network. Of course the best would be when people can meet

personally and share their experience for example during

shared lunch brakes etc. This will also help to increase the

learning among them. It should be compulsory for higher

management to attend these meetings at least occasionally.

Most managers never visit the lowest level of organization

and have no idea what the problems of those people are and

therefore what the problems of the customers are. “

Stephanie Nestel 2006 CINE Book Review of Dvora Yanow‘s

Translating Local Knowledge at Organizational Peripheries

www.graphicart-news.com/wonderful-double-exposure-portraits/

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The Medici Effect

“The author suggests some practical strategies for creating our own

personal Medici Effect. These ideas focus on helping the reader lower

her/his associative barrier. An important step is to expose oneself to

diversity of cultures and environment. A person exposed to diverse

contexts begins to realize that many of the presumed associations are

artificial and dictated by local traditions. This realization weakens the

natural hold of associative barriers in thinking. The second strategy is to

actively attempt combining seemingly unrelated ideas. Randomly

combining diverse ideas is an effective step to chance upon new

innovations"

“Another strategy is inspired by a key insight presented in the book. Though it may seem counter-intuitive, the strongest correlation for quality of ideas is quantity of ideas. It is commonly believed that quantity leads to lowering of quality, but it may just be the opposite. Creating lots of

ideas is likely the key to creating a few great ones. This concept mirrors Nassim Taleb’s ideas presented in his book The Black Swan. Taleb argues that transformational discoveries are unpredictable and improbable – so the best strategy is to expose oneself to lots of randomness

so as to capture that chance of great innovation. For example, Johansson cites the musician Prince. While Prince has produced many

legendary songs, he has produced a vault of thousands of other songs that have never been released"

“(…) When an innovator attempts to combine disparate fields of study, the outcome is much less certain than incremental directional attempts.

This uncertainty and greater risk of failure is the cost that must be borne if intersectional innovations are to be harnessed. In this context, the

author propounds that “Successful execution of intersectional ideas does not come from planning for success, but planning for failure”. The key

is to execute past one’s failures"

“While associative thinking is efficient by helping us to analyze situations

quickly, it inhibits broad based thinking. The benefits of associative

thinking outweigh the opportunity costs as we carry out daily activities.

But, for those focused on innovation, it is important to overcome their

associative barriers"

Tarun Argawal 2010 Book Reivew on Frans Johansson’s The Medici Effect

themedicieffect.typepad.com/stories/

Open Innovation

“The external world has a lot to offer to firms …”

“Today, with the power of the internet, information sharing has become so easy

and hard to resist that it’s become virtually impossible for firms to carry research

and development on their own without information being leaked or without the

external world knowing about it"

For instance, “Intel believes that small groups of likeminded people can work

together only by common interest of research, not by physical proximity and that is

possible by networking them through virtual workplaces"

Abhay Kumar 2009 CINE Project Report

C

“The Web is the World’s Sandbox” (Lovesh Vashist, CINE Class 2011)

issuu.com/david.dencker/docs/the_long_tail_innovation_model

Shared Movie Experience

Business Idea

An application/website which will allow users to watch movie with their friends who are geographically apart. Our aim is to simulate a virtual

cinema hall online. Application will be absolutely free for users. Advertising will be the only source of revenue for us.

Product Design

Image below explains the product idea and the way the application is going to look.

2011 CINE Project Report by Dushyantha Kumar C, Sumit Saurav, Nafis Ahsan, Amit Bhasin, Nupur Gupta, Alix Fanneau

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The Politics of Networked Innovation

“… innovations are not amenable to either top-down or

bottom-up forms of management. Rather, this analysis

suggests that understanding the politics of networked

innovation depends on understanding the generative (and

sometimes degenerative) relationship between power,

knowledge integration, network formation and the role of

technology. This relationship is schematically outlined in

Figure 1, illustrating the contrast between the generative

interplay of power, networks and knowledge integration

found in the Healthco and Liftco cases, with the progressive

unravelling of these same phenomena in Bankco. This

comparison effectively underscores the important role of key

actors in co-ordinating networks. Through effective network

co-ordination, new sources of power – notably at the level of

process and meaning – are created, which further reinforce

the kinds of networking and knowledge integration which

contribute to successful innovation outcomes" (Swan &

Scarbrough 2005, 939)

(Swan & Scarbrough 2005, 939)

The Tipping Point

“Gladwell defines the tipping point as “the moment of critical

mass, the threshold, the boiling point” – tipping points are

essentially “the levels at which the momentum of change is

unstoppable”. The possibility of sudden change is at the centre

of the idea of this book"

“(…) These so called “super infectors” are only a few – hence

the Law of the Few – but they have an immense ability to

spread the idea. These special individuals can be categorized

either as Connectors, Maven or Salesmen.

The Connectors are the ones that help connect diverse

individuals and their ideas. The Mavens are individuals who

have a strong desire to help others and Salesmen have a

powerful charisma and can be extremely persuasive to achieve

a defined goal"

“Stickiness is a unique quality that compels the phenomenon or idea to

“stick” in the minds of the people and influence their future behaviour"

“The Power of Context is another powerful rule (…). If the environment

or historical moment in which a trend is introduced is not right, it is not

as likely that a tipping point will be achieved"

“Once Gladwell establishes the existence of such a radical

world – the world in which the unexpected become expected –

he goes further to dig the science behind this craziness. He

attempts to unravel how such social epidemics manifest

themselves; what causes them in the first place and what

sustains them. Gladwell has come up with a scientific theory to

explain this spread of this “social virus”. According to the book,

there are three rules that help shape any idea into an epidemic

scale – The Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor, and the

Power of Context. “

The cycle time for ideas to “tip” has greatly reduced. Such is the power

of an epidemic triggered over social media like facebook, YouTube, etc.

Of course, with great power comes greater responsibility; one needs to

have the power of context well ingrained in the delivery of such

messages especially on such open networks. Else, the ubiquity of this

powerful media can make the recipients of such messages “immune” to

the effects – and may lead to the death of the idea much before it

reaches its “Tipping Point”!”

Prithvish Chatterjee 2010 Book Review of Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point – How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

brooksreview.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/kony-20121.jpg

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Breakthrough Innovations

Are breakthrough innovations the result of collaborative innovation efforts or created by lone inventors?

Lone inventors:

“Because they are less constrained by convention and skeptical groupthink, lone inventors are more likely to invent (and not immediately

dismiss) the radical breakthrough. Thus, lone inventors are less creative on average and yet are also more likely to come up with a

breakthrough. In other words, lone inventors make fewer shots on goal, have lower scores on average and tend to score both very low and

extremely high. They are on average both less successful – and more likely the source of breakthroughs" (Lee Fleming 2007, 71)

Collaborative inventors:

“… collaborative inventors are exposed to more recombinant opportunities and hence are able to contrive a greater number of new

combinations. A reason that collaborators have a higher average score than loners might be because collaborators help one another identify

the most promising new combinations for further development: They make the selection stage of invention more rigorous, thus improving the

average quality. Inventions by collaborators are also more likely to be adopted by others because there are a greater number of diffusion

paths for that knowledge to travel. (For noncollaborative innovations, the lone inventor is usually the sole source of the necessary expertise.)“

(Lee Fleming 2007, pp. 70)

Many loners may not always win, but they at least don’t blame others when they fail.

Collaboration and Diversity

“Brokerage occurs when a single individual is the hub through which all

collaborators interact. The opposite structure of cohesion occurs when

collaborators develop separate and independent relationships with one

another that do not include a central individual" (Lee Fleming 2007, 71)

“Neither brokered nor cohesive collaboration is inherently superior to the

other; much depends on the organizational culture and the specific

environment of the inventors. For example, although brokerage is better for

the generation of new combinations, cohesion confers strong marginal

benefits in collaborations that lack trust or involve fresh information" (Lee

Fleming, 2007, 72)

“Many companies have noticed that diversity and breakthroughs seem to co-

occur. Yet that goes against the advantages of specialization and focus. This

apparent contradiction can be resolved by considering the histogram of

inventive creativity. Diversity helps generate more shots on goal although, on

average, those shots are less successful. But diversity also gives rise to new

and unexplored combinations that increase the probability of a highly skewed

breakthrough" (Lee Fleming 2007, 72)

(Lee Fleming 2007, 72)

C

thesilverbird.tumblr.com

Social Capital & Biodiversity Conservation

“Agricultural and rural conservation programs address biodiversity at three levels: agrobiodiversity on farms, nearby nature in landscapes,

and protected areas. Recent initiatives that have sought to build social capital have shown that rural people can improve their understanding

of biodiversity and agroecological relationships at the same time as they develop new social rules, norms, and institutions. This process of

social learning helps new ideas to spread and can lead to positive biodiversity outcomes over large areas. New ideas spread more rapidly

where there is high social capital. There remain many practical and policy difficulties, however, not least regarding the need to invest in social

capital formation and the many unresolved questions of how the state views communities empowered to make their own decisions.

Nonetheless, attention to the value of social relations, in the form of trust, reciprocal arrangements, locally developed rules, norms and

sanctions, and emergent institutions, has clearly been shown to deliver a biodiversity dividend in many contexts. This suggests a need to

blend both the biological and social elements of conservation" (Pretty & Smith 2004, 631)

“The tribal dominated Mewar region of Rajasthan (...) harbours a vast diversity of vegetation. It includes subtropical evergreen forest of

Boswellia serrata, Diospyros melanoxylon, Dendrocalamus strictus, Bombax cieba, Madhuca indica, Tectona grandis, Anogeissus latifolia and Balanites aegyptiaca. These forests are inhabited by the major tribes of the state, viz. Bhil, Garasia, Damor and Kathodia. The

surrounding plants form an integral part of culture of these people and the information about plants is passed on from generation to

generation only through oral folk lore, although it is often kept secret" (Katewa et al. 2004, 41)

C

“Social Insects work without supervision. In fact their team work is largely self-organized, and coordination arises from the

different interactions among individuals in the colony. Although these interactions might be primitive, taken together they result

in efficient solutions to difficult problems.

The collective behaviour that emerges from a group of social insects has been dubbed “Swarm Intelligence”.

(Harvard Business Review, May 2001)

“In swarm intelligence, simple rules for individuals result in surprisingly complex group behaviour"

(Paroksh Gupta & Roushni Agrawal 2011 CINE Presenation)

Swarm Intelligence thephotobook.wordpress.com/2012/04/11/lukas-felzmann-swarm/

And what about dissent?

society6.com

C

Is the issue how much of social connectivity or what kind of social connectivity,

which makes a difference to the quality of a knowledge network?

Are we not part of several knowledge networks?

living & building

pouretrebelle.com

D

masdarabudhadistudy.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/26masdar-graphic-custom12.jpg

Sustainable Disneyland?

Ithewondrous.com/masdar-city-photos-worlds-first-sustainable-zero-carbon-zero-waste-city

D

www.elliedavies.co.uk dansim.tumblr.com/post/9676449571

suffering-in-the-labyrinth.tumblr.com

D

Are not people with high social connectivity

often poor in ideation and innovation?

How much isolation is necessary to nurture fresh ideas?

grofjardanhazy.tumblr.com/post/4062787566/warsaw-1946-michael-nash-ap

Urban Innovation Engines

“An ‘Urban Innovation Engine’ is a system which can trigger,

generate, foster and catalyze innovation in the city" (Dvir & Pasher 2004, 21)

“We suggest that what Innovation Engines really do is to create Conversations

– which are the foundation of most innovations" (Dvir & Pasher 2004, 16)

“THE UNIFYING PRINCIPLE - CONVERSATIONS:

According to Nonaka’s spiral model of knowledge creation (1998), the

process is based on the conversion of knowledge:

- Combination: From explicit knowledge to explicit

- Internalization: from explicit to tacit

- Externalization: from tacit to explicit

- Socialization: from tacit to tacit.

Conversation (including contemplation, which is an inner conversation) is

instrumental to these four knowledge conversion phases. Ideas are created

at conversations (and contemplation) , and are enhanced and developed

through conversations. Alan Webber argues that “Conversations inside and

outside the company are the chief mechanism for making change and

renewal an ongoing part of the company’s culture” (quoted from Stewart,

2001). Therefore, they are a core element of an Innovation Ecology" (Dvir &

Pasher 2004, 20-21)

solidgoldcreativity.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/conversations.jpg

D

ecosalon.com/25-photos-of-urban-green-spaces/

Together, we can do it, alone we can wait for it to be done by some else.

Dominic Wilcox

D

How many innovations do we know which grew into

products and services without creation of knowledge networks?

i learn

we learn www.thedirtfloor.com/2011/01/23/hand-painted-street-art-from-downtown-los-angeles/

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The Impact of Curriculum on Intelligence & Creativity

“Intelligence and creativity are often equated with

each other but are not really the same thing. Studies

have shown that intelligence and creativity have little

correlation, i.e. a highly intelligent person may not be

very creative. Intelligence refers to the capacity to

acquire and apply knowledge while creativity refers to

the richness of ideas and originality of thinking.

(…) India has lesser number of subjects which impact

creativity than China and Finland and there are no

compulsory subjects which impact bodily, inter

personal, musical and spatial intelligence. Hence on

average Indian students can be expected to be less

intelligent than their Finnish and Chinese

counterparts. Similarly an Indian student would be

expected to be less creative. However when Finland

and China are compared, even though they have the

same subjects in the curriculum, Finnish students are

found to be more intelligent. This could be primarily

because the subjects which impact creativity are

optional in China, the method of education is still

focused on rote and memory and there is inordinate

pressure to perform than learn. India as a country can

take lessons from these countries and design a

curriculum which would allow for learning that would

create a more intelligent and creative youth. Dance,

music and sports etc need to be introduced in the

curriculum and should be encouraged and taught like

any other subject like mathematics and science"

(Jagajit Turuk 2010 CINE Project Report)

“Unfortunately, in the academic world—where much of today’s scientific innovation takes place—researchers are encouraged to maintain the

status quo and not “rock the boat" This mentality is pervasive, affecting all aspects of scientific research from idea generation to funding to the

training of the next generation of scientists" (Southwick 2012 The Scientist)

“The results of this suppression of creativity are not limited

to the world of grant-funded research. The same leadership

that fosters the status quo in research also affects the

classroom. A university education is supposed to teach

students how to think critically. However, that goal has been

set aside in many of our classrooms, being traded for the

less ambitious goal of memorizing facts. Curiously, when

the rote memorization is emphasized, creative students are

often penalized. Multiple-choice exams are the standard for

testing a student’s ability to memorize facts, and creative

students are usually not adept at guessing what a test writer

is thinking. They are much better at solving problems,

generating hypotheses, designing protocols, and

developing a deep understanding of their discipline—all key

aspects of good critical thinkers and professionals in

science. By rewarding those students who accept the

current facts as gospel, rather than skills that are likely to

lead to the creation of knew knowledge, universities are

stifling the next generation of scientists" (Southwick 2012

The Scientist)

Academia & Creativity

scienceblogs.com/retrospectacle/2007/11/confocal_image_of_cochlea_wins.php

E

We are told to operate by Scientific method The painstaking collection of facts The repeated performance of experiment Until generalizations emerge. But is this really how scientists operate? Does it do justice to the search for pattern, the

imagination, the construction of language to describe?

Does it allow for the way we are intimately bound up with what we describe, the unity-in-estrangement of man and nature?

Science is a response to Nature, leaping in imagination form the mind of the scientist.

Science is a search, not for certainty which is never reached, but for unity and pattern in the universe,

Science is the attempt to become one with Nature in knowledge and understanding.

Science is not a model, but a living language of Nature!

K. Roby

The Scientific Outlook

“The author points out that the purpose of science as a means of acquiring knowledge is getting blurred in modern times and it is being used

more and more as a tool for manipulating nature"

“One necessary condition pointed out by the author for a scientific civilization to be responsible is to have proportionate increase in wisdom as

the scientific knowledge increases. Hence progress in science alone cannot make the civilization progressive although it is one of the

necessary ingredients for overall progress of the civilization. The book argues that to some extent the scientific attitude is unnatural for

mankind as most of the thought process is generally dedicated to wish fulfilment. There is a clear distinction between a scientific and an

unscientific opinion. In case of scientific opinion we have a reason to believe that it is true while the unscientific opinion is held for a belief

separate from the reason for it being a probable truth"

“It has been pointed out that in certain schools of sociology the intelligence of an individual is highly neglected and never recognized for all

the scientific developments which the society is enjoying today and all credit is attributed in general to impersonal causes. The author

believes that this is a sorry situation and most of today's technological advances can be attributed to great men who existed in the

seventeenth century and he thinks of Galileo as chief or the head of this group of men"

“(…) the details of geography and history are generally presupposed by science. Certain things are considered as brute facts are never

questioned. But observed carefully we find that these brute facts contain the inference making process on part of us and it may or may not be

correct. This is justified with a nice example of a student refusing the existence of Napoleon in a history class and getting punished. As a

pragmatist he or she will accept on face value that Napoleon existed but as a student of science he or she will believe that had there been a

strong support in favour of Napoleon's existence it would surely have got discussed in the class. The point is not that such support does not

exist but that people are ignorant of that support and accept certain things on face value"

“Finally the author talks about the scenario where the common man has started believing more and more in science while the scientist

working in the laboratory is slowly loosing faith in science"

Ankur Gur 2011 CINE Book Review of Bertrand Russell‘s The Scientific Outlook

"In the existing, state of science, no facts and no hypotheses are isolated ; they exist within the

general body of scientific knowledge. The significance, of a fact is relative to such knowledge. To say

that a fact is significant in science, is to say that it helps to establish or refute some general law: for

science though it starts from observation of the particular, is not concerned essentially with the

particular, but with the general" (Bertrand Russell)

E

“If there are multiple ways of knowing the truth, could truth itself sometimes dance on its axis, i.e., there could be different ways of describing

truth. Some of these ways become conjecture when one cannot make others see those ways. Local knowledge may have more abundant

supply of such ways. But even the modern science has multiple interpretations co-existing without casting doubt on the ethics or efficiency of

such contradictory positions to survive within the category of science.

(…) Those who believe that traditional knowledge must necessarily be collective and passed on from generation to generation through

cultural means may have as much to blame as those who believe that it emerges essentially through interaction with nature or through

experimentation. None of these conditions need be true. Traditional knowledge of a blacksmith used while giving a temper to the sickle or the

knife may have evolved through careful observation, experimentation, intuition, understanding of materials and development of some rules.

This way may not be different from a scientific method except that the blacksmith may not be able to parameterize various steps in

sharpening the knife or sickle.

The scientific knowledge is not opposite of traditional or local knowledge in all respects. It could never be. The distinction has been drawn or

demolished by academics whose interest lies in academic boundaries and institutional structures. When one interacts with people and learns

from them and shares with them one’s own learning, the only issue is the ability to decipher each other’s metaphor to understand the same

thing from similar observations.

When farmers develop a method of dusting road side dust or ash on the cumin plants likely to develop disease because of the dew, some

characterize this practice as local knowledge (and thus less scientific) and others figure out that dust absorbs the moisture and prevents it to

remain for longer period on the leaf, creating conditions for the disease to occur. The farmer may not have described the process because he

did not know, how little, we scientists really know about the logic of their functional practices.

The local knowledge could be as reductionist as any institutional scientific approach and the holism could similarly be attempted in both the

systems though with different degrees of accuracy or tenability of assumptions. A holistic worldview in a community context might include

assumptions about the way animals think or behave which may be totally divorced from the way local scientists or technologists may think.

And yet, outcome may be much better in some of the traditional knowledge systems than in the modern ones from the point of view of

conservation" (Anil Gupta 2006)

Overcoming Boundaries and Structures

images.travelpod.com/tripwow/photos2/ta-0382-7cca-ba8d/blacksmith-shillong-india+13222391720-tpfil02aw-14104.jpg

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Have we ever made Best the enemy of Better?

www.makeitinmusic.com/music-good-enough/

Creativity and Innovation in Riot-Affected Children of Ahmedabad

“Gujarat riots (2002) changed the lives of thousands of children. Many of them lost their parents and relatives, and the worst aspect was that

they saw them being murdered, maimed, raped and burnt before their eyes. Even a full grown adult male would be disturbed and traumatized

after seeing such scenes. The effect on a tender psyche of a child is unimaginable"

“According to a study on PTSD in children and adolescents affected by the

riots, conducted in February 2006 by mental health professionals belonging

to the Psychiatry Department of B J Medical College and Civil Hospital,

Ahmedabad, close to five percent of the 255 interviewed showed signs of the

disorder even four years after the riots, whereas 9.4 percent of them suffered

from depression. Around 50 out of 255 showed symptoms of some disorder,

which was not PTSD, but they needed medical help"

“Arzoo Centre is an initiative by Ms. Sulekha Ali and friends which was

started in 2002, closely after the riots. Sulekha was herself hit by riots and

had to take shelter in Shah-e-Alam camp, a temporary shelter for riot victims.

Sulekha could see many children in that camp who were either orphaned or

were rendered homeless due to riots. The days spent at Shah-e-Alam

brought Sulekha and these children together. They used to play and talk to

alleviate their misfortune and tried to put together pieces of their lives"

“The best thing about the centre is that Hindu and Muslim kids study together,

which doesn’t make it a ghetto where a person might grow up with imagined

prejudices and threats from other communities"

Kumar Rahul Roushan 2007 CINE Project Report

“Apart from education, Arzoo centre imparts skill training to these children, which makes them explore the creative and innovative part of

themselves. Children make beautiful handicrafts and paperwork which the centre puts on exhibition and they also help in generating some

funds for meeting a small part of their expenses"

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Unlocking Children‘s Creativity

“(…) adults should monitor their evaluations in order to avoid prejudging

the ideas which are given by children. Research suggests that judgments

given by adults are often inaccurate, and these may contribute to the

slumps found in the creative thinking of certain age groups. With this in

mind, valuation – the effort toward appreciation – may be more important

than critical evaluations, both for the gifted child and for his or her parents

and teachers" (Runco 2004, 49)

Judging children is locking in a lot of creative potential to come up with

outstanding ideas. However, when there are slumps, some children climb

on top of hills to find the best place for wifi-internet. During the Honey Bee

Network’s 27th Shodh Yatra at Singhari, the shodhyatris stayed in a

highschool on the top of a small hill. The experience here was remarkable

in many respects. There was a student, Rahul Kumar Mahato, who had

figured out which hill top had the best internet availability. After passing a

competition, he was given a password for a website from where he could

download questions in different subjects every day. He submits the answer

through a mobile phone and gets the response. Such a desire to learn and

get feedback is rarely found even in cities. Here is a tribal boy who has

created rigorous benchmarks for his learning every day. His sister was

equally keen to explore opportunities for learning. When various

innovations were shown to the children and others in the village through a

cell phone based projector, there were many innovations that students

wanted to implement or fabricate in their village.

www.infobarrel.com/Teaching_Children_Science

Problem Based Learning

“(…) This school puts its philosophy on three pillars: Rigour, Relevance and Reflection. All of these apply to a problem based learning system

in the school.

‘Rigour’ says that students should try to explore the problem, its reach and effects and ways to solve the problem. Students are asked to

define the problem, discuss it in their groups and analyze the information associated with it. They are supposed to search for new information

themselves. Teachers act as facilitators rather than instructors; students themselves carry out the entire discussion and ask the concerned

people whenever needed. When they analyze a problem, they also include other problems linked to it. Thus the topic or problem is covered

comprehensively in a logical flow pattern.

‘Relevance’ brings attention toward relevance of concepts, being taught, in practical life. This is ensured in two ways. First, the original

problem is often derived from some real life scenario or problem. Students are encouraged to look around whether they are at home or school

or market and question the processes, which are taking place there. “No question is useless”, is the main key of their philosophy. Second

point of relevance comes when students are about to apply concepts to solve the problem. They are supposed to consider only those

solutions, which are relevant for all and can be valid in practical life.

‘Reflection’ emphasizes the importance of reflection in the learning process. Listen, Understand, Use and Reflect; these are four steps of

learning. Any knowledge is internalized best when we reflect on it. We can refine our internal knowledge by reflecting on it"

Have a look at Learning Without Frontiers:

blip.tv/learning-without-frontiers

www.mobl21.com/blog/category/weekly-cartoon/page/2

Ajay Goyal 2009 CINE Project Report

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“There are these two young fish swimming along and they

happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who

nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?"

And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually

one of them looks over at the other and goes "What the hell

is water?”

― David Foster Wallace

E

What do

you see

when you

look into the

hole in the wall ?

blog.vandalog.com/2010/03/page/5/

www.arcticoak.net/categories/art/page/9/ /

www.educationinnovating.org

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in the kabbalah

chaos

– tohu bohu –

is simply a

state in which

order is latent

the egg is the

’chaos‘ of the

bird

- Colin Wilson

www.ceskinner.com

E

"We have to continually be jumping off cliffs

and developing our wings on the way down"

- Kurt Vonnegut

Not all the social capital embedded in knowledge networks

is harnessed by an entrepreneur, but without harnessing

such capital, can any enterprise ever survive?

speaking writing reading

suffering-in-the-labyrinth.tumblr.com/post/21055821325/nevercertain-f-o-n-d-e-r

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“… everyone who can read should be able to type"

“Those who did not know English were automatically excluded from the benefits of the computing boom"

“Devanagari text input presents unique challenges to the field of human computer interaction"

“Initially some of my colleagues were not very keen on my decision to move away from QWERTY format. Their argument was since that

format is so universally accepted and familiar to people at large, it would make better sense to come out with a new design which is not so

distant from this design"

“Even after filing the patent, one has to be very careful while displaying it in job interviews and conferences. I learned that hard way when a

big MNC in the computer industry filed a patent and won a prestigious award for a very similar design right after I had displayed it in my job

interview with them"

Overcoming Language Barriers Amit Rathod, Innovator, Interviewed for CINE report by Aaditya Radoth, 2010

fuckyeahbookarts.tumblr.com

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Language Shapes the Habit of Thought

"It is not surprising therefore to find that the metropolitan elite all over the world

reads the same novels, speaks the same language and has similar habits of

thought in terms of their indifference to the goal of poverty elimination and

generation of an unethical and accountable system of governance"

(Anil Gupta 1995)

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dirtyprettything.tumblr.com

“For a long time, the idea that language might shape thought was considered at best

untestable and more often simply wrong. Research in my labs at Stanford University and at

MIT has helped reopen this question. We have collected data around the world: from

China, Greece, Chile, Indonesia, Russia, and Aboriginal Australia. What we have learned

is that people who speak different languages do indeed think differently and that even

flukes of grammar can profoundly affect how we see the world. Language is a uniquely

human gift, central to our experience of being human. Appreciating its role in constructing

our mental lives brings us one step closer to understanding the very nature of humanity"

‘Follow me to Pormpuraaw, a small Aboriginal community on the western edge of Cape York, in northern Australia. I came here because of

the way the locals, the Kuuk Thaayorre, talk about space. Instead of words like "right," "left," "forward," and "back," which, as commonly used

in English, define space relative to an observer, the Kuuk Thaayorre, like many other Aboriginal groups, use cardinal-direction terms — north,

south, east, and west — to define space. This is done at all scales, which means you have to say things like "There's an ant on your

southeast leg" or "Move the cup to the north northwest a little bit" One obvious consequence of speaking such a language is that you have to

stay oriented at all times, or else you cannot speak properly. The normal greeting in Kuuk Thaayorre is "Where are you going?" and the

answer should be something like " Southsoutheast, in the middle distance" If you don't know which way you're facing, you can't even get past

"Hello"’

“People rely on their spatial knowledge

to build other, more complex, more

abstract representations.

Representations of such things as

time, number, musical pitch, kinship

relations, morality, and emotions have

been shown to depend on how we

think about space"

“Look at some famous examples of personification in art — the ways in

which abstract entities such as death, sin, victory, or time are given human

form. How does an artist decide whether death, say, or time should be

painted as a man or a woman? It turns out that in 85 percent of such

personifications, whether a male or female figure is chosen is predicted by

the grammatical gender of the word in the artist's native language. So, for

example, German painters are more likely to paint death as a man,

whereas Russian painters are more likely to paint death as a woman"

“(…) linguistic processes are pervasive in most

fundamental domains of thought, unconsciously shaping

us from the nuts and bolts of cognition and perception to

our loftiest abstract notions and major life decisions.

Language is central to our experience of being human,

and the languages we speak profoundly shape the way

we think, the way we see the world, the way we live our

lives"

How Does Our Language Shape the Way We Think Lera Boroditsky (2009)

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fuckyeahbookarts.tumblr.com

Creativity in Bengali Literature

“Literature is a mirror of society. It reflects the socio-cultural and political ideas of contemporary mind sets. As the society passes through

several phases of continuous change over a period of time, so does literature. So, in a sense literature helps us to put the bygone era in a

proper perspective.

The creativity in the fertile landscape of Bengali literature is well recognized. Over the centuries it has witnessed several experimentations,

and it still continues its journey. The first ever literature in Bengali- Charyapada or Charyageeti, dates back to eighth century. Gradually the

literature had to go through several phases; some of them have had a great impact in shaping the style of the Bengali literature. In the Court’s

of Arakan dynasty the contribution of Muslim poets, during 17th century, in Bengali literature had brought a drastic change to the 15th century

Vaishnabi Sahitya.

The project would be focused to study the evolution of Bengali literature over the centuries- starting from the eighth century creation –

Charyapada, to current creations of the twenty-first century. The project would strive to find out the trend of changing experimentation with

literature and how successful it has been in attaining the objective of being a mirror of contemporary thoughts of general mass at large. It

would study how the literature shifted its focus from glorifying religious beliefs and lives to picturization of real Bengali life; and the modern

theme of human mind and its analysis.

Along with this, the project would also study the present situation of children literature that had once reached its pinnacle in terms of variety of

taste and experimentation in the hands of veteran writers like Sukumar Ray and Satyajait Ray. This will also encompass the role of current

teenage magazines and the penetration of internet on the changing trend of Bengali literature"

Ranjit Saha 2006 CINE Project Proposal

upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Charyapada.jpg

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Amanda Nelson collected 40,000 pieces of

junk mail, folded and bundled them together.

www.amandanelsen.com

www.amandanelsen.com

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http://lossofgrasp.com . . .

digital poetry ... directory.eliterature.org

www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/05/02/ounce-dice-trice

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www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/05/02/ounce-dice-trice

www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/05/02/ounce-dice-trice

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nesbeth.blogspot.in/2011/02/dorito-narrative.html

The Narrative Fallacy

‘Taleb questions our reliance on the "narrative

fallacy"; that is the way we use past information to

analyse the causes of events when actually so much

history does not exist or is silent. It is this gap - the

missing energy in the historical system, which

produces the black swan. He gives an example

with the problem of turkeys: "Every single feeding will

firm up the bird's belief that it is the general rule of life

to be fed every day by friendly members of the human

race 'looking out for its best interests', as a politician

will say. On the afternoon of the Wednesday before

Thanksgiving, something unexpected will happen to

the turkey. It will incur a revision of belief"’

Vibuti Rathore 2011 CINE Book Review of Nassim Nicholas Taleb‘s

The Black Swan – The Impact of the Highly Improbable

nesbeth.blogspot.in/2011/02/dorito-narrative.html

“If you hear a "prominent" economist using the word

'equilibrium,' or 'normal distribution,' do not argue with

him; just ignore him, or try to put a rat down his shirt"

(Nassim Nicholas Taleb)

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furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu

mizu no oto

ancient silent pond a frog leaps in

the sound of water

Matsuo Basho (1686)

Imrcooksfinal.blogspot.in/2010/05/matsuo-bashos-frog-haiku.html

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Do potential clients or customers always know best what is needed by them?

Under what conditions do we put faith in ‘supply creating demand’?

dancing playing painting moving

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Chandralekha – ‘Hybrid’ Indian Dance

www.thehindu.com/arts/magazine/article2820364.ece www.youtube.com/watch?v=lR2Um0sljkw

thehindu.com

Pina Bausch – ‘Hybrid’ Western Dance

www.pina-film.de/en/trailer.html

www.ithunter.org/2011/04/pina-bausch-wim-wenders/

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“Rotational inertia indicates how difficult it is to start

an object spinning (or to stop it, if it's already

spinning)

- It depends on the mass of the object

- The greater the mass, the greater the rotational

inertia

- It also depends on how far the mass of the object is

placed from the rotation axis

-If this distance is doubled, the rotational inertia gets

quadrupled!

-If no torque is applied, the angular momentum stays

the same

-So since angular momentum = rotational inertia times

angular velocity, the greater the rotational inertia, the

smaller the angular velocity!“

(Natalia Kuznetsova 2003 CINE Project Report)

A Dancer’s Body Evolution

“Ballet dancers have not always been held to this standard. In the 19th and early 20th century, bodies and feet were not always pushed to the

extremes that are now sought after. Not only did dancers from these days tend to be just a tad more voluptuous, in my opinion, but the

expected en pointe look was also quite different. [Beneath], we can see that Spessivtseva’s left (standing) foot is en pointe, but she is not

quite over the box of her shoe. (The box is the rectangular-ish part of the shoe that encloses the toes and forefoot.) These days, it is expected

of ballerinas that they will be able to get over the box of the shoe. A good arch makes this possible, and a high instep enhances the look. As

the 20th century progressed, dancers bodies became thinner, more streamlined, more elongated, more flexible, faster, and so on"

(http://apricot.wordpress.com/2009/03/31/high-insteps-high-arches-ballet-feet/)

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“Increased technical demands required new body looks" (Natalia Kuznetsova 2003 CINE Project Report)

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www.sristi.org/cultural

“There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into

action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if

you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost"

- Martha Graham

‘There is a need in the field of dance to encourage creativity and innovation in order to

keep the dance forms in a continuously evolving stage. Art is expression and freedom

and any form of stagnation in art would lead to the demise of the art form. Thus, there is

a need for forces encouraging innovation in dance in the country. India has produced

the greatest dancers of all times and the amount of talent and knowledge in the country

calls for an innovative and experimental approach. The future lies in co-existence of the

traditional and the modern. In the words of Ms. Mrinalini Sarabhai, “Many dancers are

experimenting with new ideas in dance. This is good as long as the tradition also is

kept alive and the choreographers know and respect those roots" She continues on the

issue of innovators in dance and fairness to classical arts as, “There is no fairness

about it. One either is an innovator or not. It is not something that can be learnt. There

is no danger to the classical arts. Our heritage is very strong"

Dance has been an ancient art and is embedded strongly into the Indian roots.

Classical dance has given a unique place to India in the global arts scenario. The field

will undoubtedly be enriched with more innovations and creations in the dance forms,

taking dance to a new presentation level and giving it a new purpose each day. Ms.

Mrinalini Sarabhai predicts the future of dance as, “The dance will continue growing into

new dimensions of beauty in form and truth in expression. And the dancer will continue

to give more and more expressions to the sentiments of love. And the heroines of the

classical dance will continue to be the nayikas of today"’

Dance in India: From Evolution to Innovation Twisha Anand 2009 CINE Project Report

G

www.sristi.org/cultural

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“We should consider every day lost on which we

have not danced at least once"

- Friedrich Nietzsche

Enablers of and Boundaries to Creativity in Sports – A Mirror to Understanding Creativity in Society?

“Sports do not only capture human interest, fascination, aspirations and

emotions they also provide the stage for people to change roles and

behaviour. It can be more than a means to spend time and exercise the body

but also enable individuals to express themselves in ways that differ from their

ordinary, day to day routines. In this context humans will often look for ways to

increase their efficiency and to enhance their competitiveness and in many

cases continue to find ever novel ways of approaching the challenges of their

specific discipline.

Within this context I will try to set the scene for understanding in which various

ways and on which levels creativity and innovation influence and/or change a

disciplines and how both creativity and innovations are fostered or prohibited

by the rules and standards of the different sports. In a second step I would like

to relate the different solutions back to the overall society and try to

understand if and how sport can be used as a metaphor for a society’s

approach to creativity and innovation"

Maximilian Brandt 2006 CINE Project Proposal

www.graphicart-news.com/12-amazing-women-designers/

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The Zitar

“With more and more globalization, many cultures are intermingling. Fusion music is an excellent medium to bring different cultures together.

It blends the pleasing elements of different genres of music from different parts of the world to create a new, much fuller and more engrossing

form of music.

Niladri Kumar, a well-known personality in Indian classical and fusion music, has been touring the last few years with his own creation - the

Zitar - an electric sitar. A modified sitar with lesser number of strings and pickups just like an electric guitar, plugged into a guitar effects

processor is indeed a marvelous innovation. Now, Niladri does popular fusion concerts besides the regular classical sitar recitals. Niladri's

Sitar-funk concerts with musicians representing both Indian and western music are truly enjoyable"

‘Niladri Kumar started playing fusion with the traditional sitar in his early days. As a youngster he listened to rock & pop music also and got

immense exposure to harmonies through film music. Thus a certain sound and tone got engraved in Niladri’s music and playing style.

Regarding the cause and need for his innovation Niladri says “...[you] need to have the mindset of wanting to do something ... So many things

have been done, you just need to resurface them back,” and “Creativity is usually there and one might just not know about it … If you have a

will, then you will innovate!”‘

“With a number of iterations and a lot of trial and error, Niladri ended up creating an electric sitar called the Zitar. The interesting aspect and also the key differentiating factor here is that it does not try to imitate the sound of a traditional sitar like many other electronic sitar simulators do. This is similar to the fact that an electric guitar has a sound very distinct from an acoustic guitar and both have their own place in music" “Niladri faced many technical difficulties while building the instrument. The journey started with an amateur guitarist friend named Aslam

Khan. They used to experiment with their sitars and guitars. Starting off with ripping the pickups out of an electric guitar and mounting them

on a sitar, they could see that this could probably work and something can be made out of it. Thereafter, began the numerous visits to various

guitar repair shops and the instrument got refined. Nine years ago, many parts were not even available in India and had to be sourced from

abroad"

“The present look of the Zitar is an evolution of 9 years. The instrument has only 5 strings and no sympathetic strings like a traditional sitar.

Electric pickups are used just like an electric guitar and Niladri uses the Zitar with a standard guitar effects processor that many guitarists

themselves use. It is amazing to see the kind of stuff Niladri can do with his Zitar. From pull-offs and hammer-ons to legatos – he can pretty

much use every guitar technique on the Zitar besides all the traditional sitar playing styles which he is already a master at"

Chinmay Bhagwat & Maruti Konduri 2011 CINE Project Report

Nilradi Kumar with his Zitar

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Jilatombi Singh (craftsman, singer, musician), Kennedy Singh (musician cum theatre artist) and Bhagat Singh (small contractor), three music

lovers from Imphal have improvised the traditional instrument “pena” into pennao by changing the number of bundle strings and modifying

the bridge arrangement. This arrangement allows the Pennao to play a wide range of musical notes, without losing the original and distinctive

sound of the traditional Pena.

Pennao

The three friends have a common vision, to establish a Pena Music

School at Imphal. Pena is one of the most popular musical instruments of

the Meitei community and is used in a variety of social and cultural

events. The uniqueness of the pena lies in its distinctive sound which is

quite different from any other fiddle and string instruments. The three

have worked together to improve the pena to enable it to play classic and

modern music. To increase the range they tried to introduce two to three

strings. Cow‘s hide/cow‘s skin was used to make the belly of the pena. To

keep the identity of the sound they kept the same skin as before. Pennao,

the modernised version of the pena has three strings and can produce

lower octave, middle octave and upper octave. It can be used as a folk

musical instrument, classic and modern musical instrument. Further it can

also be used in the orchestral music as violin and it can be easily tuned to

required scale by using new technologies. NIF has filed a patent in the

name of the innovators.

“Amongst musical phrases are some which do more than please our

musical faculty. They stir other elements in us; they reverberate

throughout a larger part of our being. Certain emotions and

expectations are aroused beside those that accompany our reactions

to pure music. And the sequences of such phrases, besides satisfying

our musical faculty’s criteria of coherence and fitness, also satisfy

these other expectations, give a natural development to these other

emotions, continue, by a process of organic growth, this wilder life that

has been awakened in us"

- J. W. N. Sullivan

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The Invention of Depth of Focus

“After Citizen Kane, cinema would never be the same again. The revolution initiated

by a 25 year old man [Orson Welles] disrupted all established codes of

cinematography. The innovation appears in the way the story is being told (with the

use of multiple flash backs) and also in the physical film techniques used.

The most innovative technical aspect of Citizen Kane is the extended use of deep

focus. This invention unsettled the viewing public but not the critics who recognized

the precursory genius of the new‐born director"

“The phrase depth of focus was historically used to mean depth of field. The depth of

field of a scene is influenced by the focal length and the diaphragm aperture. It defines

how much the background, midground and foreground will appear in the screen with an

acceptable sharp focus. A deep focus is generated with a very small iris aperture and the

camera focuses on a distant point.

The innovation could be achieved thanks to the genius of Orson Welles but also thanks

to his meeting with a young operator called Gregg Toland. At this period, using the focus

this intensely was a revolution.

Gregg Toland had to find some innovative techniques to obtain the depth of focus

Welles’ wanted. The diaphragm was largely closed and thus, there was a lot of light.

Then, they chose to put some shadow parts, which was new in a Hollywood movie.

They also cheated on the size of the objects on the foreground in order to accentuate a

little more the depth. The genius of Orson Welles consists of manipulating the viewer

with unrealistic images to convey emotions and to strengthen his messages"

Elena Zahariev 2010 CINE review of the movie Citizen Kane

www.urbanautica.com

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"Nothing belongs more fully to an artist than his

creation - even if you give him your youth, your money,

your love, your courage, nothing belongs to you"

— Consuelo de Saint Exupéry

www.urbanautica.com

“Films are made, the images are made when there’s no one looking. That’s

what the invisible is, that which we don’t see. That’s what the incredible is,

that which we don’t see. And cinema shows you that which we don’t see, the

incredible"

Jean-Luc Godard

“When film is not a document, it is dream. That is why Tarkovsky is the greatest

of them all. He moves with such naturalness in the room of dreams. He doesn’t

explain. What should he explain anyhow ? He is a spectator, capable of staging

his visions in the most unwieldy but, in a way, the most willing of media. All my

life I have hammered on the doors of the rooms in which he moves so naturally.

Only a few times have I managed to creep inside"

Ingmar Bergman

www.toutlecine.com

“In a sense all film is entering into

someone else’s dreams"

David Lynch

a-bittersweet-life.tumblr.com

a-bittersweet-life.tumblr.com

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“In 1996, Frenchman Herve Perdriolle began a collection of Indian

tribal art, leveraging it later as a curator, to pitch the contemporary

alongside the traditional, folksy or tribal — take your pick — not

without some degree of success. In the bargain, he did what

governments in India have failed to do despite their many awards

and recognitions for tribal arts and crafts: focus attention on art

forms that are dynamic as well as contemporary despite having a

tradition in their folk roots.

And yet, Indian “tribal” art has a long way to go before it can start

matching the likes of Australian Aboriginal artist Clifford Possum

whose auction record of Rs 11 crore has an extremely low parallel

in Warli artist Jivya Some Mashe, who at Rs 9.8 lakh is currently

India’s highest auction price holder. Madhubani “master-artist” Sita

Devi, who died in 2005, would have found it hard to imagine a

canvas, or even a commission, netting her or her kin even Rs 1

lakh despite being feted around the world. And Gond wonder-boy

Jangarh Singh Shyam, who committed suicide at the remote

Mithila Museum outside Tokyo in July 2001, sold works for a few

thousands despite countries and collectors expressing themselves

amazed at his talent"

(Kishore Singh, Business Standard, Aug 18th 2010)

“The Next Big Thing”

www.business-standard.com

Does Use of Contemporary Material Prevent Us from Accessing Traditional Meanings Underneath?

Indigenous knowledge needs not essentially be traditional in nature. Contemporary knowledge serving indigenous ends, or using indigenous

materials or processed through indigenous rules or heuristics can also be part of indigenous knowledge systems provided it is interpreted

through local cultural meanings. A string of plastic beads (modern material) coloured and shaped in traditional designs, put in synthetic

strings (modern material) can be used for traditional fashion, ceremonies or rituals. Knowledge of how many beads be there in a string may

have evolved over a long period of time.

Just because a certain kind of knowledge is indigenously produced does not make it necessarily virtuous or even a preferred mode of

expression. Not all aspects of indigenous knowledge are worth preserving or sustaining. The tragic and most dishonourable practices of

killing a female fetus or a newborn child through local/indigenous practices, pursued often by women, must be annihilated through modern

education as well as regulatory institutions (see www.itsagirl.com). There is, however, a greater probability of local knowledge being more in

tune with the local environment and cultural context. (Gupta 2006)

kostisvelonis.blogspot.in/2010/11/blog-post.html

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What is the Colour of Music?

www.artchive.com/glyphs/kandinsky/index.html

“Lines also have an affinity for certain colors. Bold, dynamic lines like

diagonals get a bold color like yellow. Less drastic diagonals get a less

drastic color, red. Dead lines that are nearly horizontal get a dead color like

black. Slightly active lines like verticals get a dull color like blue.

Kandinsky even has a theory about coloring lines according to their centrality

in the composition. Lines in the middle get yellow. Sad, unloved lines that

hug the edge of the frame should get dull colors" (Edouard Nuttin 2010 CINE

Project Report)

“Sad, Unloved Lines that Hug the Edge of the Frame”

Image: Edouard Nuttin 2010 CINE Report

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www.torgeirhusevaag.com/english/prosjektsider/kart/medalland_02.html

A duet made up of finn-whale song and sonar pulse.

histsociety.blogspot.in/2011/09/lascaux-staffordshire-and-serendipity.html

www.lascaux.culture.fr

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“There is nothing, perhaps, in our everyday life which appeals

more to the mind than colour, yet so accustomed are the

generality of mankind to its influence that but few stop to

inquire the “why and wherefore” of its existence, or its cause"

- Colour Measurement and Mixture by

Captain W. de W. Abney, published 1891

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amix.dk/blog/post/19480

“A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away"

– Antoine de Saint-Exupery G

Zahariev 2010 CINE Project Report

“The only companies or products that will succeed now are the ones offering the lowest possible level of

complexity for the maximum amount of value" (Aaron Levie 2012)

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intentionally blank with five words

Day and Night – Maurits Cornelis Escher

deskarati.com/2012/03/27/maurits-cornelis-escher

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Some of the most precious moments of our life are those in which we undertake non reciprocal acts (that is in

which no body can pay us back, for whatever good we may do for others) and yet a large part of our life is

spent in most calculative acts. Is it surprising that many of us always find true happiness so elusive?

How do start-ups embed larger social purpose in the DNA of the enterprise?

caring loving giving

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Are Humans Capable of Real Altruism?

“… numerous human behaviours seem anomalous from the evolutionary point of view"

“Where human behaviour is concerned, the distinction between biological altruism,

defined in terms of fitness consequences, and ‘real’ altruism, defined in terms of the

agent's conscious intentions to help others, does make sense. (Sometimes the label

‘psychological altruism’ is used instead of ‘real’ altruism.) What is the relationship

between these two concepts?”

“Ordinarily we think of altruistic actions as disinterested, done with the interests of the recipient, rather than

our own interests, in mind. But kin selection theory explains altruistic behaviour as a clever strategy devised

by selfish genes as a way of increasing their representation in the gene-pool, at the expense of other genes.

Surely this means that the behaviours in question are only ‘apparently’ altruistic, for they are ultimately the

result of generic self-interest? Reciprocal altruism theory also seems to ‘take the altruism out of altruism’.

Behaving nicely to someone in order to procure return benefits from them in the future seems in a way the

antithesis of ‘real’ altruism — it is just delayed self-interest"

“But when you give to someone in need, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing"

Matthew 6:3

(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 2008, Biological Altruism)

Doctor Hudson--if you had a small, inadequate brick house, and decided to give yourself more room, what would you need for

your building? . . . More brick. . . . If you had a small, inadequate steam-engine, you would want more steel to construct larger

cylinders--not a different kind of steel to house a different kind of steam, but merely more room for expansion. . . . Now--if you had

a small, inadequate personality, and wanted to give it a chance to be something more important, where would you find the building

materials?“

He seemed waiting for a reply, so I humoured him.

"Well--according to the drift of your argument, I presume I would have to build it out of other personalities. Is that what you're

driving at?“

"Pre--cisely!" he shouted. "But--not 'out of!' . . . Into! . . .Glad you said that, though; for it gives me a chance to show you the exact

difference between the right and wrong methods of making use of other people's personalities in improving one's own. . . .

Everybody is aware, instinctively, that his personality is modified by others. Most people go about imitating various scraps and

phases of the personalities that have attracted them--copying one man's walk, another's accent, another's laugh, another's trick of

gesture--making mere monkeys of themselves. . . . This theory I am talking about doesn't ask you to build your personality out of other personalities, but into them!“

"I'm afraid all that's too deep for me," I admitted befuddledly.

- Magnificent Obsession by Lloyd C. Douglas, 1929

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“Dawkins had a gene-centered view of evolution and coined the term "selfish

gene". The gene centered view gives rise to the hypothesis that the more two

people are genetically related, the more it is likely that they behave

altruistically with one another"

“When genes are described as being “selfish”, it is not implied that the genes

are driven by any motive or will. However, their effects seem to be driven by

them. The genes that get passed on serve the implicit interest of getting

replicated, not of the organism. This view explains altruism at the individual

level in nature, especially in kin relationships. When an individual sacrifices

its own life to protect the lives of kin, it is acting in the interest of its own

genes. It seems altruism at the individual level emerges only because of the

selfishness of the sets of genes along with millions of years of evolution.

Saving your ten brothers from a certain death at the expense of your own life

might mean a lot to your genes, because the probability that 50% of your

genes are to be found in every brother of yours means that your death will

save five more times copies of some of your genes than they would be saved

if you would have left your brothers to die"

The Selfish Gene Chittaranjan Samantaray 2011 CINE Book Review of Richard Dawkins‘ The Selfish Gene

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"The small wisdom is like water in a glass:

clear, transparent, pure.

The great wisdom is like the water in the sea:

dark, mysterious, impenetrable"

— Rabindranath Tagore

"I will sit in the pupil of your eyes and that will carry your sight into the heart of the things"

— Rabindranath Tagore

The Great Gatsby Gaurav Bhati 2011 CINE Book Review of F. Scott Fitzgerald‘s The Great Gatsby

“The lesson to learn is that the power of wealth and materialistic

interests may very often win over the superior values of morality,

honesty and stability. Surely, corruption of values did not first appear in

the 1920s and it certainly did not disappear in the following decades.

The reality is that humans are inclined to deliberately exchange maxims

of morality and spiritual principles for shallow, but very comfortable

benefits of wealth and status"

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childrenwitharsenic.tumblr.com

“Firstly, the idea of Pay It Forward is in itself a fascinating one. It is based

on the “guilty conscience” principle: we all expect kindness and favours

from those we know, but when someone we do not expect a favour from

does us one, there is guilt weighing on our conscience – guilt about not

deserving the favour – and we will not sit in peace till we can take this

feeling of guilt to some conclusion. Generally, we try to return the favour so

as to balance the scales. However, it is not always possible to find an

opportunity to return the favour to 1 person. But if we look around us, there

are opportunities everywhere, of doing a favour to so many around us.

Hence, Pay It Forward. If we pay it back, we are restricting the goodness

between 2 people. If we pay it forward, we are spreading this chain of

goodness to include more people"

“But not all feel the guilt of the conscience that strongly. Some people manage to suppress this

guilt and move on with live. Do them a favour and their cynicism will see no good intent in it.

They do not feel compelled to return the favour – either forward or backward. How does Pay It

Forward work in this case? Here lies the second most important lesson. Pay It Forward is not

just a do-good tool. It is a powerful personal development philosophy. It teaches one patience

and endurance. Results will not be forthcoming. We will not see the world change. We may not

even see our neighbourhood change. No one may take us seriously. Or, as shown in the movie,

the kid manages to affect a huge change but himself gets killed in a school fight – we might

better one part of the world, but the other parts may come and hit us right in the face. Alone, we

do not amount to much. Yet, we must believe in ourselves, have faith in our purpose"

“Many a times, age and experience weigh on our minds and rob us of qualities like curiosity, willingness to take risks, openness to new ideas

and experiences and courage to explore the unknown. It is important to retain the child in us, for it is the child that sees hope and possibilities

where the adult mind is constrained by norms and responsibilities"

“There’s a world out there and even if you decide you don’t need it, it’s still going to hit you right in the face. So, it’s best you start thinking, about the world and what it means to you. What does the world expect of you? You, Trevor, what does the world expect of you?” “Nothing"

“The realm of possibility exists where? – in each of you, here, in your minds. You can surprise us, each of you, or you can sit back and let it all be atrophy"

Pay It Forward Pritika Padhi 2010 CINE Review of the movie Pay It Forward

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Many start-up ventures don’t grow because the entrepreneur does not have a clear business

model in mind. The line between personal and firm’s accounts are not clearly drawn.

Team building is a very critical component of setting up an enterprise. How do we choose

partners and how much openness do we maintain in the team, how do we handle break-ups?

synergising

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“Learning is a complex function, and can't be reduced to a

single model. Owing to the number of its aspects, it even

presents multiple paradoxical components. For example,

the individual understands, learns through his conceptions.

They are the only tools he masters, it's through them that

he decodes reality and the information he receives. But

they are also his intellectual "prisons" which enclose him in

a way of understanding the world. Another paradox, the

individual has to learn on his own, and no-one can do it for

him, but the learner has little chance of discovering on his

own the set of elements which can modify his questions,

his concepts or his relation with the knowledge" (Giordan

2004)

“The need for an optimum knowledge of biology has

become fundamental for everyone. This knowledge has

become indispensable to making personal choices and

participating in social and democratic life. At the same

time, broad-sweeping debate on exploring the living world

would avoid numerous fears and confusions continuing to

spread through society; it would avoid political indecision

in the field and distrust with regard to biological research.

Without biological benchmarks, an individual is as illiterate

today as if, at the turn of the century, he didn't know how to

read" (Giordan 2004)

Knowledge of Biology

www.fastcodesign.com/1669657/how-do-you-create-a-culture-of-innovation

Symbiosis

“One of the most spectacular examples of a symbiosis is between the siboglinid tube worms and symbiotic bacteria that

live at hydrothermal vents and cold seeps. This is a mutualistic symbiosis where the worm completely loses its digestive

tract and is solely reliant on their internal symbionts for nutrition. The bacteria oxidize either hydrogen sulfide or methane

which the host supplies to them. These worms were discovered in the late 1970s at the hydrothermal vents near the

Galapagos Islands and have since been found at deep-sea hydrothermal vents and cold seeps in all of the world's oceans"

(Wikipedia, Symbiosis)

Nicolle Rager Fuller, National Science Foundation

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The Aesthetic Ideas of Birds – The Bowerbird, Nature’s Great Seducer

www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1zmfTr2d4c

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Inspired by Nature

Shyam Antokoor, inspired by the

lock-in Khajoor Tree, developed a

fall-protection device that was

patented in 1979. The device was

later acquired by the Department of

Atomic Energy and has been

installed on all their projects. Mr.

Antokoor, who launched a company

called India Innovations Inc.

designed further fall protection

devices for the safety of workmen

working at heights, which can be

used for instance for work that

involves pole climbing. He patented

his product along with 8-10 versions

of the design. Furthermore, he

invented a para-gliding simulator,

which might be installed in

amusement parks and he is working

on a device which does not require

any manual assistance to clean

windows of high rise buildings in

metros.

Gurpreet Sabharwal 2010 CINE Presentation, Innovator: Shvam Antokoor

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hint.fm/wind

a flock of white cranes against a black thundercloud

- Colin Wilson

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Designs that can self-correct itself:

autopoesis designs

Nature’s Architecture - 23rd Shodh Yatra - Dahod

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(…) When two swarms of crabs meet in motion, they tend to compromise by

merging and continuing on in a direction that is the sum of the two swarms’

velocities, and this is where the computing comes in. The researchers built a

system of channels in an environment that funnel the crabs along, like electrons

flowing through a computer (they are prodded along by a fake bird shadow that

is cast from overhead). Using a group of 40 real soldier crabs, the researchers

tried to cajole the group into acting like a logic gate.

They found they could build a very reliable OR logic gate--where one or two

swarms are merged into a single path. Creating the AND gate--one that requires

the crabs to all swarm down one of three paths--was more difficult, but the

researchers think they can improve its rate of success by altering the

environment to be more friendly to the crabs.

“A Computer Constructed From a Consortium of Live Crabs” “If biomimicry is the instance of technology emulating natural processes, then this must be something like the opposite: researchers at Kobe

University have built a computer out of crabs. Placed within a geometrically constrained environment, swarms of soldier crabs can be

effectively used to emulate logic gates. In other words, researchers have replicated the fundamental workings of a computer--with crabs.

All that means that, technically, you could build a classical computer using the presence or absence of a swarm of crabs to represent 1s and

0s. Which doesn’t impact you at all, since it would be kind of silly to actually build a working computer that works in such a way.

But isn’t it cool that you could?” (Clay Dillow, 2012, PopSci)

PopSci

The Buddy System: Two Fish Swimming Side-by-Side

Birgitt Boschitsch '13, Peter Dewey (GS), Alexander Smits (fac)

Dept. of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

In developing next-generation autonomous underwater vehicles we look for

inspiration from the intelligent designs observed in nature.For this image,

two artificial fish fins are placed side-by-side and flapped in-phase with each

another as water flows past the fins (flow direction is up). Small hydrogen

bubbles (the white part of the image) allow for the wake of the fins to be

visualized. The interaction of the fins creates two repeating patterns of

swirling vortices known as vortex streets.

www.princeton.edu/artofscience/gallery2011/

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Long term relationships require erecting non-negotiable fences which we can

cross only with mutual consent and sometimes not at all. How do we decide

which values are non-negotiable in an enterprise? Does it matter at all?

embracing

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www.gwiin.com

Most recent award: Asa Magnuon from Sweden was voted overall winner in the European Union Women Inventors &

Innovators Awards 2011 for her patented QSAVE PRO, an innovative life saving small, easy to swim with and bring under

the surface device. It is suitable for assisting heavy victims from drowning while it can be brought from under the surface

with relative ease than the other equipment that is used today, both on and under the surface.

Elena Zahariev 2010 CINE Presentation

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“Women are rather invisible in the world of innovation.

In the US, the country where most patents are filed:

Only around 2% of the patents in the 200 past years

have been granted to women.

Almost 95% of the patents filed each year are still

granted to men.

Why don’t we know famous women innovators?

Do women invent less?

Are they less creative?

Is there a difference between men and women vis-à-

vis innovation?

Does invention have a sex?

“Feminising” science?

To bring specific “feminine qualities” (intuition,

expression of emotions, etc.) into science.

BUT beware not to consider these qualities as genuine

women’s attributes. They are socially constructed.

It is not certain that more women in science will bring

more of these “feminine values”

–> female scientists often feel the necessity to

abandon these qualities to feel more legitimate.

Are women’s innovations invisible? Or women

effectively innovate less?

Autumn Stanley, author of Mothers and Daughters of

Invention, states that women innovate as much as

men.

BUT maybe, they are not able to innovate as much as

men because of the internalization of constraints and

of their social role “

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Women and Innovation

“(…) since women have a different managerial orientation than men, they should not try to integrate themselves into current institutions and

create completely new, truly egalitarian and democratic institutions for themselves (feminist standpoint perspective). It is also observed that

the approach of women to management is not suited with that of achieving pre-ordained instrumental goals and hence women can not be very

successful in the present institutions. This is considered to be a radical and somewhat unpractical position since it claims that 'existing

institutional arrangements are fundamentally flawed' and that 'women lack a real interest in adapting to them'. “ (Hoonar Janu, CINE Book

Review 2009 of Alevsson & Due Billing - Understanding Gender and Organizations)

“While there is a growing body of information about women business owners and their enterprises, an increasing amount of focus on

entrepreneurship and innovation, and excellent recent work in the area of how innovation has improved the lives of women in general, there

remains a dearth of factual information on the intersection of all three: gender, entrepreneurship and innovation" (Womenable 2010)

“Loscocco et al (1991) identified that the concentration of the firms owned by women in the services and retail sector may explain a relative

lack of success or performance of these firms as these sectors are highly competitive and with low growth" (Nageshwar V Neela, 2008 CINE

Report )

“Meluhan women were free and had all rights. The prime minister of Meluha is a woman, as is the doctor who tends to Shiva and his people

as they arrive in Srinagar from Tibet. Sati seems to embody the ideal Meluhan woman, bold, fearless and beautiful. Some women even make

it as Kshatriyas through the Maika system. Again, this is something which came as very surprising to me and shows the importance of liberty

of women in building a just and successful society in current times. And while we find it hard to still believe this, this followed as early as 1900

BC i.e. 4000 years ago. So, there is definitely a lesson we can draw from this. There is a lot of merit in this. From our past experiences, we

have witnessed that the society which doesn’t provide proper recognition for women’s role has been laggard. By proper recognition, I don’t

mean the highest position or something like that, but the respect that they deserve in whatsoever form. It is imperative for a society to respect

everyone irrespective of their caste, creed, sex or religion. (…) We have seen certain instances in the current society as well where a woman

with no child is treated unequally. Forget without child, in the current society, a woman with girl child only is also looked down upon which is

really shameful. A woman being deprived of social status once her husband dies without any fault of hers can still be seen in some parts of

Rajasthan. It has been depicted very well in the recent movie “Dor”" (Krishna Murari 2011 CINE Book Review of Amish Tripathi’s Immortals of

Meluha )

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The New Asian Hemisphere: The Irresistible Shift of Global Power to the East

“Mahbubani strongly believes that all the current geopolitical

tensions between the East and the West are derived from a big

misunderstanding that as being an “Indian” Singaporean raised in

the West, he should be able to solve. This misunderstanding is a

result of both cultural differences and cultural ignorance. The West

replicates its own beliefs and ways of doing things when it believes

that the rise of the East in economic and political terms are

meaning a domination of the West by the East, through a

retaliation process. In other words, what the West has not

understood according to the author is that the East is not willing to

dominate the West but just to replicate its model and values. After

making a cultural and sociological analysis of the Eastern minds,

Mahbubani comes to the conclusion that there is a radical

difference between the East and the West: where the West is

convinced that the economic rise of the East means domination,

the East only thinks about replication of a dreamt model i.e. the

consumption society. As a result, the West still believes that a

more balanced power system in the international organizations

would meant less power and therefore more fragility and

vulnerability"

Gregoire Schwebig 2008 CINE Book Review of Kishore Mahbubani’s The New Asian Hemisphere

“By a matter of fact, the West should prepare for a transfer of

power towards the East. Unfortunately, the author reckons that

neither the US nor Europe has shown the willingness and the

courage to do so. Consequently the risk that the world is facing is

that an imbalanced distribution of power in global institutions will

weaken them, resulting in a possible creation of a parallel

international system, established by the East with its own sets of

rules.

Making room for new players in international organizations require

courageous national politicians as well as a deep rooted sentiment

in the Western public opinions that the world has dramatically

changed and that it is no longer possible to run it on old principles.

Thus, Mahbubani urges Western intellectuals to explain to their

people the need for a new global governance with balanced

power. The world has new stakeholders and the West has to adapt

for the better i.e. a world of peace, prosperity and stability.

By arguing for a radical change of mindset in Western countries,

the author highlights the relevance of Keynes’ quote at the very

beginning of the book. Keynes’ message was: what is hard is not

to embrace new ideas or to understand new concepts but to forget

our former ways of thinking"

“Mahbubani estimates that the East is rising because it has been capable of absorbing the best of the West – political stability, focus on

education, science and innovation, an independent justice etc. (…) Now that the west is relatively declining, it should have the humility and

intelligence to do the same but in the reverse way. In other terms and to put it in an American corporate way, the West should make a

benchmark of the best practises across the globe in terms of public governance and public policy. Consequently, the author believes that the

West has several things to learn from the East: mainly pragmatism, patience and cooperation"

Jacob Hashimoto, Overgrown with Osiers (2009) artruby.tumblr.com

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"The butterfly counts not months but moments,

and has time enough"

— Rabindranath Tagore

Choice is ours, whether to be graveyard of ideas or a

garden of weeds (ideas that grow even without permission).

Is it necessary that we always work on ideas which most people vote for?

Under what conditions should we believe in unpopular ideas?

introspecting

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if you don’t know where you are going,

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Mind & Heart

“The main question for now is why I have chosen this book

which is so high on emotional content. As a management

student the normal choice would have been some

businessman biography, entrepreneurship or others. But I

still rate this book as the best book I have read so far, now

you can argue that I have not read many books. But truly

this book has changed the way or improved the way I see

people around me. Before reading this, I have never

contemplated much on the roles of mind and heart. Mind as

we all know is very logical and practical and heart as we

understand acts more on emotions and love. I believed that

mind wins over heart in most of the cases or the cases

which count. But this book challenges the believes I had.

While reading this book you feel mind is nothing, it is the

heart that drives the person. All major decisions in life if not

been consulted with heart will later on lead to unimaginable

consequences.

(…) Mind and heart are two separate entities we have to

keep both happy by maintaining balance in our decisions,

this is the most important lesson I learnt from this

remarkable book"

Aman Vig 2011 Book Review of Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina

streetanatomy.bigcartel.com/product/you-are-here-letter-press-poster

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

“Seagulls as a species do not concern themselves with pursuits beyond their daily existence. But Jonathan wants to fly - and fly not just

enough to catch the daily fish and muddle through a mundane life - but fly at a speed beyond the imagination of any seagull. He wishes to fly

at a sinful speed. And learn how to stall in mid-air, how to swerve like a fireball and glide effortlessly through the morning sky"

“Jonathan Livingston Seagull is one of the few books that touch the core philosophy of three very distinct religions. It talks about “karma” and

rebirth drawing parallels with Hindu ideas regarding the same. Its emphasis on love and forgiveness are reminiscent of Christian virtues. The

underlying theme of the book and the nature of its characters also draw attention to the importance of “focus” and “non judgemental

understanding” which form a cornerstone of the Zen philosophy"

“(…) when Jonathan is learning formation point rolls from Sullivan and keeps failing, we do not see any judgement being passed on Jon’s

ability. Instead Sullivan continues saying “Let’s try it again” like a chant until Jonathan is able to master the art. This ritual of intense focus on

the task at hand is almost like a prayer and it places a very high emphasis on action and on the ability of an individual to overcome all

barriers. This is a very likeable idea because our society today places an exaggerated amount of importance on IQ and natural abilities. (…)

Richard Bach places absolutely no limits on what an individual can achieve given the right directions and the right amount of hard work. This

contrasts very sharply with the attitude of authors like Ayn Rand (or Nietzsche) who consider the majority of human race as “social ballast”. It

is this departure from the existentialists that places Richard Bach on a more Christian path which, I personally feel, is a step up in the

development of an individual’s paradigm"

‘The genius of Bach goes one step further when he outlines a clear and simple response to this attitude. He advocates love and forgiveness.

Loving and forgiving those who damn your soul can only come from a highly developed sense of understanding and empathy. (…) The great

Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh says, “When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don't blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of them, they will grow well, like the lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and argument. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument, just understanding. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and the situation will change”. ‘

Gaurav Singhal 2011 CINE Book Review of Richard Bach‘s Jonathan Livingston Seagull

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“Logotherapy focuses on the meaning of human existence and man’s search for such meaning. This hunt to find the meaning in one’s life has

been one of the primary motivational forces in a man"

“According to the concept of Logotherapy, this meaning could be discovered in three ways:

· By creating a work or doing a deed.

· By experiencing something or encountering someone.

· By the attitude we take towards unavoidable sufferings"

“Dr. Frankl discovered that despite all the pain that people have to go through at the concentration camps, the ultimate salvation for humans is

through love. (…) Dr. Frankl believed that everything can be taken away from a person but for his/her attitude under any given circumstance

i.e. choosing one’s own way. The manner in which an individual could bear and handle the sufferings and pains is the actual inner

achievement which makes life of that person meaningful and purposeful. The person who loses faith in himself and future is often doomed,

plain and simple. This leads him to loss of his spiritual control over his life and further he becomes subject to physical and mental decay and

his life falls apart"

The Quest for Meaning in Life

“The widespread phenomenon of existential vacuum, as it is termed by the author, suggests that neither an inner instinct nor the traditions can

tell a present day man what he or she wants to do. In the world nowadays, often people do not now what they want to do. Instead they simply

follow what other people suggest them to be best for them or what others wish them to do"

Atul Nivrutti Kawale 2011 Book Review of Viktor E. Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning

“(…) if there is a meaning to life, there also must be a meaning in the

sufferings which a person faces in his life. The way a person accepts and

adapts with all the sufferings, gives them an opportunity to add more

meaning to their life"

asoftskeleton.tumblr.com

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"If you cry because the sun has gone out of your life,

your tears will prevent you from seeing the stars"

— Rabindranath Tagore

Fear & Innovation

“Being the strongest of human emotions, the importance of fear’s role in shaping imagination cannot be overstated"

“When people fail to understand a phenomenon with their existing knowledge or fail to resolve any kind of uncertainty, they try and use their

imagination to explain their observations or to predict the future. (…) An exception is that sometimes people, especially the more creative

ones, imagine things they have never seen, experienced or known"

“Imagination, Creativity and Innovation are the three stages of

what can be defined as an “Idea Chain”. The idea chain

begins with mysterious components of psychology which form

imagination and culminates in an innovation passing via the

stage of creativity"

“[Fear] pushes people out of their comfort zone and creates a

sense of urgency. They no longer have the luxury of waiting till

they can find a conventional solution and are forced to look for

novel ideas. (…) Fear can also act as an inhibitor of creativity.

However this is a different kind of fear than the one mentioned

above. ”

“The fear that inhibits innovation is the most common of all

fears and is widely experienced by all of us in our daily life. In

most cases it is not as intense as the ones mentioned above.

Most commonly, it is the fear of being different, fear of

challenging the norms, fear of appearing foolish or immoral,

fear of being rejected, abandoned or boycotted by others, fear

of being alone, fear of being unsuccessful, fear of a financial

loss, etc. Although not life threatening, these niggling fears or

worries are responsible for holding back the journey of most of

the creative ideas to the stage of innovation"

Hoonar Janu & Saurabh Singhal 2009 CINE Project Report

(Janu & Singhal 2009))

Fear & Success

“A very counter-intuitive but important fear which blocks innovation is the fear of success, a phenomenon first described by Martina Horner

and later by Janet Shibley Hyde in her book "Half the Human Experience -- the Psychology of Women". This phenomenon is described as

people not putting in their full potential or hesitating from doing new things because subconsciously they feel that they are not worth the

success they might get and they wouldn’t know how to handle it. This feeling is born out of the human tendency of feeling comfortable in

status-quo and avoiding any major changes in life’s routine and shying away form the limelight. Also, many people are afraid of the fact that as

a side-effect of their success, their friends and other people close to them will become dissatisfied with themselves and would become more

jealous and hostile. People also fear the fact that achieving success symbolizes the end of their endeavors in life and hence hesitate in

utilizing their full potential. (Lazaris, 2002)"

Dealing with stress

“Some people believe that the relationship between fear and creativity is very

symbiotic, especially in the field of arts. Fear is the first sign that you are being

creative and if harnessed correctly can result in exciting and unconventional works

(Daniel Saroka, 2006). “

“Psychological studies, through experiments under controlled situations, have found

that both Eustress and Distress have the same physiological effect on the body and

it is not possible for the body to differentiate between the two through only the

effects. The difference is purely a psychological one and depends on how a person

adapts to the situation causing the stress and how he looks upon the stress causing

agent. If he accepts it as a validation of his creativity and uses it to push his thinking

process, he will be able to enhance his performance. If he fears it and tries to avoid

it, considering it a negative feeling, it inhibits his performance"

“(…) kids quickly accept and try to adapt to their fears , but by the time they become adults, they loose the ability to recognize and accept their

fears due to social conditioning and hence their fear is usually manifested in emotions like anxiety, depression, chronic complaining etc. (Dr.

Maurer). Instead, realizing that fear is an indication that you are being imaginative and are doing or learning something new and using that

fear to energize you to go further will result in an expansion of the brain’s imagination domain"

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www.beililiu.com/06_07/encircle.html

“Fortitude is the capacity to say ‘no’ when the world wants to hear ’yes‘”

- Erich Fromm (1968)

K

The Pomegranate

Once when I was living in the heart of a pomegranate, I heard a seed

saying, “Someday I shall become a tree, and the wind will sing in my

branches, and the sun will dance on my leaves, and I shall be strong and

beautiful through all the seasons"

Then another seed spoke and said, “When I was as young as you, I too

held such views; but now that I can weigh and measure things, I see that

my hopes were vain"

And a third seed spoke also, “I see in us nothing that promises so great a

future"

And a fourth said, “But what a mockery our life would be, without a

greater future!”

Said a fifth, “Why dispute what we shall be, when we know not even what

we are"

But a sixth replied, “Whatever we are, that we shall continue to be"

And a seventh said, “I have such a clear idea how everything will be, but I

cannot put it into words"

Then an eight spoke—and a ninth—and a tenth—and then many—until

all were speaking, and I could distinguish nothing for the many our life

voices.

And so I moved that very day into the heart of a quince, where the seeds

are few and almost silent.

- Khalil Gibran

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Francesca Woodman

“Woodman’s oeuvre represents a remarkably rich and singular exploration

of the human body in space and of the genre of self-portraiture in

particular. Her interest in female subjectivity, seriality, conceptualist

practice, and photography’s relationship to both literature and performance

are also hallmarks of the heady moment in American photography during

which she came of age"

-Guggenheim

oahzyllib.tumblr.com/post/21690295647

Designing Suicide Proof Fans

“As I was watching the movie 3 Idiots, in which one of the student commits

suicide hanging from a ceiling fan in his room, this problem struck to me.

And as I kept thinking about it, it occurred to me that each one of us is just a

couple of feet away from a potential suicide. Even a little bit of suicidal

tendencies coming out of some frustration can lead to a death. I mean, it is

so easy so take away one's life. I thought that this should not be so. World

over so much effort goes into making man's life comfortable, happy,

lengthening his life span, so much R&D that takes place in medical world.

But, so little is talked about making it harder to commit suicides. That’s why I

want to design a ceiling fan, which is Suicide-Proof i.e. you can not commit

suicide using it"

“I never intended and don’t intend to trivialize suicides. In fact, what

happens is that after a suicide, the family and the society around is so

shocked that they cannot look at the situation objectively. The issue of

suicides is so sensitive that it looks like no one wants to think about it

rationally and actually find some workable solution"

“So my point is - the feeling of utmost anger, frustration, and helplessness can be caused by many things. We cannot eliminate all of these.

It’s a part and parcel of life. What we can do is, create an environment which doesn’t punish so severely momentary insanity. The efforts

should be towards creating suicide proof objects and atmosphere. So the efforts to reduce suicide rates should be more on means than on

causes"

“The concept of creating suicide proof objects (just like water proof or fool proof objects) should gain currency in the world. With 1 million

people dying every year because of suicides, I think its high time innovators around the world start focusing on finding a remedy for it. When

so much money gets spent in R&D for even disease which are not life threatening, the absence of any such investment on preventing

suicides is sadly surprising. Thus, the field of medicine and especially household equipment manufacturers should start focusing on

innovation in this respect"

Additya Rathod 2010 CINE Project Report

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Adrian Ten’s commencement speech at halfhalf.posterous.com/dont-work-be-hated-love-someone

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"In the end you are left with a damning silence, wondering what is reality"

"If we do not have Big Brother as such, there might be other, more

subtle things to worry about"

"In another parallel, I think that Orwell's idea of doublethink is not

restricted by any means to the fictional society of Oceania. An

example from the book deals with the Party's claim that the revolution

happened to liberate the Proles: "But simultaneously, true to the

principles of doublethink, the Party taught that Proles were natural

inferiors who must be kept in subjection, like animals, by the

application of a few simple rules". I see doublethink in the way that

European powers colonized the rest of the planet, and in the

continuing economic domination of poorer countries. I see

doublethink in certain attitudes towards women, where the double

standard is alive and well"

“Perhaps the strongest aspect of the last half of the novel is Orwell's

blunt answer to the question of why. Winston has read a book

describing how the Party stays in power, but he is plagued by the

question of why. When he asks O'Brien this question, the answer is

as blunt as could be imagined: power for the sake of power. And we

are confronted, not with some abstract homily about absolute power,

but the reality of complete and utter social power perpetuating itself,

confident of its own immortality"

Muralidhar Jetti 2011 CINE Book Review of George Orwell’s 1984

www.synapseproductions.org/whatson/images/1984web.jpg

Phantoms in the Brain

“Since the way we experience the world around us is almost

entirely wired in the brain, the chance of “reality” being actually

the (collectively) common aspects of personal brain maps of

humans becomes an option, even if probabilistically remote.

Then, those aspects of our brain maps which we do not share

with the masses give meaning to our individuality. In short, the

eerie concept of the world, in reality, not being the way we

experience it, becomes a possibility"

Someshwar Roy 2011 Book Review of Ramachandran & Blakeslee’s Phantoms in the Brain

rerylikes.tumblr.com K

“I'm alive, thought Veronika. Everything's going to start all over again. I'll have to stay in here for a while, until they realise that I’m perfectly normal.

Then they'll let me out, and I'll see the streets of Ljubljana again, its main square, the bridges, the people going to and from work.

Since people always tend to help others—just so that they can feel they are better than they really are—they'll give me my job back at the library. In

time, I'll start frequenting the same bars and nightclubs, I'll talk to my friends about the injustices and problems of the world, I'll go to the cinema, take

walks around the lake.

Since I only took sleeping pills, I'm not disfigured in any way: I'm still young, pretty, intelligent, I won‘t have any difficulty in getting boyfriends, I never

did. I'll make love with them in their houses, or in the woods, I'll feel a certain degree of pleasure, but the moment I reach orgasm, the feeling of

emptiness will return. We won't have much to talk about, and both he and I will know it. The time will come to make our excuses—‘It's late’, or ‘I have

to get up early tomorrow’—and we'll part as quickly as possible, avoiding looking each other in the eye.

I'll go back to my rented room in the convent. I'll try and read a book, turn on the TV to see the same old programs, set the alarm clock to wake up at

exactly the same time I woke up the day before and mechanically repeat my tasks at the library. I'll eat a sandwich in the park opposite the theatre,

sitting on the same bench, along with other people who also choose the same benches on which to sit and have their lunch, people who all have the

same vacant look, but pretend to be pondering extremely important matters. Then I'll go back to work, I'll listen to the gossip about who's going out

with whom, who's suffering from what, how such and such a person was in tears about her husband, and I'll be left with the feeling that I'm privileged:

I'm pretty, I have a job, I can have any boyfriend I choose. So I’ll go back to the bars at the end of the day, and the whole thing will start again.

My mother, who must be out of her mind with worry over my suicide attempt, will recover from the shock and will keep asking me what I'm going to do

with my life, why I'm not the same as everyone else, things really aren't as complicated as I think they are. ‘Look at me, for example, I've been

married to your father for years, and I've tried to give you the best possible upbringing and set you the best possible example.’

One day, I'll get tired of hearing her constantly repeating the same things, and to please her I'll marry a man whom I oblige myself to love. He and I

will end up finding a way of dreaming of a future together: a house in the country, children, our children's future. We'll make love often in the first year,

less in the second, and after the third year, people perhaps think about sex only once a fortnight and transform that thought into action only once a

month. Even worse, we'll barely talk. I'll force myself to accept the situation, and I'll wonder what's wrong with me, because he no longer takes any

interest in me, ignores me, and does nothing but talk about his friends, as if they were his real world.

When the marriage is just about to fall apart, I'll get pregnant. We'll have a child, feel closer to each other for a while, and then the situation will go

back to what it was before. I'll begin to put on weight like the aunt that nurse was talking about yesterday—or was it days ago, I don't really know.

And I'll start to go on diets, systematically defeated each day, each week, by the weight that keeps creeping up regardless of the controls I put on it.

At that point, I'll take those magic pills that stop you feeling depressed, then I'll have a few more children, conceived during nights of love that pass all

too quickly. I'll tell everyone that the children are my reason for living, when in reality my life is their reason for living.

People will always consider us a happy couple, and no one will know how much solitude, bitterness and resignation lies beneath the surface

happiness" (Paulo Coelho – Veronika Decides to Die)

What’s There To Live For?

“Hence what’s there to live for? Why to keep on living a mediocre life, just because you are supposed to do so? Who says it is wrong to

commit suicide? If I am an adult then it’s my life and it is my right to do whatever I want to do with my life. What right has anyone got to govern

and decide what I should do in my life? Why should I keep on living for making people happy when every day the discontent in my life will

increase even more and someday down the line I will be hurting the same people for whom I didn’t “go”? Why can’t I take a decision which

will make me happy? If I feel suffocated in this life then why don’t I have a right to end this suffering?”

“What do you think about all this? Rubbish? You are free to think this way. It seems like it says youthfulness is bad, looking beautiful,

intelligent is all bad. But not only this, it also denies the great institution called ‘Marriage’ and the most important institution, in our minds but not on our lips, called ‘Sex’. Well, I suppose this is truth for only some of us but disturbingly among these few, very few want to admit this. In

fact, most of us think that marriage, as well as all the other “society” institutions (except ‘Sex’) are really very true. Unfortunately this is so

because they are people afraid of change, people who cannot even look beyond these systems and this society, who cannot look within

themselves, and act the way they want. Loose themselves up and move on, move on to some other world if they want to is not allowed for

them. Why is there so much pressure? Why this pressure is constantly increasing? While developing as an economy, we are forgetting that

we are selling ourselves, even more every day, to the unknown and putting our souls into a big box to be thrown into the deep waters of our

hearts"

“Well finally, I don’t agree with the way Veronika behaved initially, the whole suicide thing. I think finally she found love, not only love as a

person, but love towards life and discovered that each and every person in this world is not alone. There are so many people whose lives are

affected by a single life. So many experiences are there to be had in this life, so many feelings are there inexperienced, so many changes can

be made, so many people can be made happy and their lives touched by only one person. I think, she would surely be an inspiration for many

others in her lifetime who will start having a meaningful life!”

Abhisek Kishor 2011 CINE Book Review of Paulo Coelho‘s Veronika Decides to Die

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Good Will Hunting

“(…) This part of the movie made me think about what I have been going through during my time as an engineer and now as an MBA. I know I

am good at what I am supposed to be good at as an engineer and MBA, but it really is not what I really want to do. Like Will in the film, having

certain abilities often leads to a conventional choice of career, while one's heart may be in another field altogether. I am now wondering if

what I am doing now with my career is right or not"

“Will Hunting is a janitor in MIT. He secretly works out the problems which the advanced mathematics professor puts up on the board outside

the classroom. He had a gift of solving problems. He could learn any academic text, whether economics or mathematics in almost no time, by

using library books without anyone's guidance and solve any related problem"

M.S. Karthik CINE 2010 Review of the movie “Good Will Hunting”

20poorandfabulous.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/good-will-hunting.jpg filmadventhrough.blogspot.in/2011/10/good-will-hunting-van-sant-1997.html

“One only understands the things that one tames”

The little prince said "I am looking for friends. What does that mean, 'tame'?"

"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. It means to establish ties"

"'To establish ties'?"

"Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy

who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of

you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more

than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we

shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I

shall be unique in all the world.."

"I am beginning to understand," said the little prince. "There is a flower... I

think that she has tamed me.."

-----

The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time. "Please, tame me!" he said.

"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I

have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand"

"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox.

(Antoine de Saint-Exupery – The Little Prince, from 2011 CINE Book Review

by Sharath Chandra Devasani)

tsbanksyprick.tumblr.com/ K

The Friction of YES and NO

“I went to a tattoo parlor and had YES written onto the

palm of my left hand, and NO onto my right palm, what

can I say, it hasn’t made my life wonderful, its made life

possible, when I rub my hands against each other in

the middle of winter I am warming myself with the

friction of YES and NO, when I clap my hands I am

showing my appreciation through the uniting and

parting of YES and NO, I signify “book” by peeling

open my hands, every book, for me, is the balance of

YES and NO, even this one, my last one, especially

this one. Does it break my heart, of course, every

moment of every day, into more pieces than my heart

was made of, I never thought of myself as quiet, much

less silent, I never thought about things at all,

everything changed, the distance that wedged itself

between me and my happiness wasn’t the world, it

wasn’t the bombs and burning buildings, it was me, my

thinking, the cancer of never letting go, is ignorance

bliss, I don’t know, but it’s so painful to think, and tell

me, what did thinking ever do for me, to what great

place did thinking ever bring me? I think and think and

think, I’ve thought myself out of happiness one million

times, but never once into it"

Jonathan Safran Foer (2005) Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

minuhemmati.blogspot.in/2010/12/leise-quietly.html

The Outsider

“What would happen if everyone became an outsider? Does this mean no one will understand the purpose of life? Would it not lead to end of

progress and innovation and ultimately the end of the world?”

Vimal S. Nair 2011 CINE Book Review of Colin Wilson’s The Outsider

Outsiders are born so, or do people tend to change from Insiders to Outsiders? In this regard, the author specifies that insiders chase the

world without a purpose. In my opinion, he means an unending paradox, when a person is trying to follow the text on a page as follows:

The text on the other side of the paper is true.

The text on the other side of the paper is false.

“Do Outsiders ever experience freedom? The hypothesis suggesting the alternative is that, freedom comes from a will to do something which

is an effect of a motive in life. Motive comes from belief in any aspect which is a consequence of trust in reality. An outsider who finds it

difficult to trust reality will not be able to enjoy freedom"

“(…) a romantic outsider divides himself into two persons: a civilized

man and a wolf man. The civilized man loves all things of the world

i.e. cleanliness, order, poetry and music. His other half is a savage

who loves the second world, the world of darkness. For him,

bourgeois civilization and all its inanities are a great joke. This

immediately brings to our mind Dr. Jekyll and Hyde who let the

savage Dr. Jekyll take over the normal Hyde. If having two

personalities is the criterion to become a romantic outsider, everyone

is a romantic outsider. But letting the normal person take over the

savage one is a character which not everyone would possess.

Finding the perfect co existence of both characters brings a man akin

to god"

“Another reason why we can find a romantic outsider more plausible

is as follows: The previous description of Outsider challenges truth

and tries to find the ultimate truth. The romantic outsider does not

contend the presence of truth but tries to find out where he can find

the ultimatum. This essentially should mean that a person, who is

consciously and continuously awake to questions, has in him all

qualities to be classified as a romantic outsider"

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“Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy"

In order to preserve and consolidate his power Napoleon practices

military force over the other animals. Through this daunting approach

Napoleon is able to control and manipulate the rest of the animals to

follow his tyrannical lead. Day by day Napoleon’s power grows

stronger and trough his manipulating and supervisory fashion he

makes sure that nobody comes in his way, and if anyone actually

does so he takes on all necessary means to remove them. When he

faces competition, as he does from Snowball, he influences the other

animals to believe that Snowball is the cause of their problems, and

consequently Snowball becomes ostracized from the group.

Furthermore, since the intention of the revolution was to create a free

and liberal animal farm where everyone is equal most of the animals

are almost blind to Napoleon’s rise to power. Naively most of the

animals do not understand what Napoleon is trying to do before it is

too late; they trust him to do what is best for all of the animals since

this was the intention of the revolution. Without opposition

Napoleon’s power is allowed to grow even stronger, and he does not

let anything come in his way in his constant power-struggle.

Kantesh D Patil 2011 CINE Book Review of George Orwell’s Animal Farm

It is well known that The Animal Farm is a allegory of Soviet Russia and that the concept of Animalism rises from the socialist tradition

originating from Karl Marx’s ideas. However, Stalin (who is portrayed by Napoleon in this novel) countered this communistic society by the

ways of capitalism, the very counterpart of socialist society (…). In the Battle of Cowshed the animals overthrow the rulers, just like the

Russian government ruled by czars was overthrown and the subsequent leaders established a corrupt government driven by greed and

corruption of power. Just like Stalin, Napoleon continues his hunt for power, and what ones was seen as an idyllic place for the animals to live

and prosper slowly turned in to a place filled with suppression and anguish. The mental and physical agony continues for the animals as

Napoleon deprives them of one of their most basic needs, the milk, and just like Stalin, Napoleon in this way transfer power from the group to

the rulers – and no longer does the power belong to the people (the animals) but to an authoritarian regime.

www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/wp-content/j/rules.jpg

www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/wp-content/j/inner.jpg K

Why do we feel so possessive about our ideas and feel shy in

sharing them with others?

How do I know whether my ideas are valuable, unless some others

try to steal them?

Do potential clients or customers always know best what is needed

by them? Under what conditions do we put faith in ‘supply creating

demand’?

What distinguishes those who have hundreds of ideas but never

do any thing to implement them vis-à-vis those who test the validity

of their ideas by experimenting them, no matter how tiresome?

Choice is ours, whether to be graveyard of ideas or a garden of

weeds (ideas that grow even without permission)?

Is it necessary that we always work on ideas which most people

vote for? Under what conditions should we believe in unpopular

ideas?

How many innovations do we know which grew into products and

services without creation of a knowledge network?

Are not people with high social connectivity often poor in ideation

and innovation? How much isolation is necessary to nurture fresh

ideas?

Is the issue how much of social connectivity or what kind of social

connectivity, which makes a difference to the quality of knowledge

network? Are we not part of several knowledge networks?

K

Not all the social capital embedded in knowledge networks is

harnessed by an entrepreneur, but without harnessing such capital,

can any enterprise ever survive?

Some of the most precious moments of our life are those in which we

undertake non reciprocal acts (that is in which no body can pay us

back, for whatever good we may do for others) and yet a large part of

our life is spent in most calculative acts. Is it surprising that many of us

always find true happiness so elusive? How do start-ups embed larger

social purpose in the DNA of the enterprise?

Open innovation models are being used widely even by large

companies but start-ups feel inhibited in exploring such a platform in

which reciprocities are well defined and sourcing of ideas from

strangers is encouraged. What is the fear in learning from strangers?

Many start-up ventures don’t grow because the entrepreneur does not

have a clear business model in mind. The line between personal and

firm’s accounts are not clearly drawn.

Team building is a very critical component of setting up an enterprise.

How do we choose partners and how much openness do we maintain

in the team, how do we handle break-ups?

Long term relationships require erecting non-negotiable fences which

we can cross only with mutual consent and sometimes not at all. How

do we decide which values are non-negotiable in an enterprise? Does

it matter at all?

Abney, W.W. (1891) Colour Measurement and Mixture. New York: The Ninth Step.

Alvesson, M. and Billing, Y.D. (2009) Understanding Gender and Organizations. USA: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Bach, R.D. (1970) Jonathan Livingston Seagull. United States: MacMillan Publishers.

Berkun, S. (2010) The Myth of Innovation. USA: O'Reilly Media.

Boroditsky, L. (2009) How does our language shape the way we think? Edge, accessed online 9th May 2012 at

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/boroditsky09/boroditsky09_index.html

Brockman, J. (2007) What’s your dangerous idea: Today’s leading thinkers on the unthinkable. USA: Harper Perennial, Simon & Schuster.

Christensen, C.M. (1997 ) The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail. Boston: Harvard Business School

Press.

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“Knowledge can be communicated, but not wisdom. One can find it, be fortified by it, do wonders through it, but one cannot communicate and teach it"

- ‘Siddhartha’ by Hesse