innovation course

What do Uber drivers and strippers have in common?

And Susan Fowler's blog on her year at Uber ... and the NYT story ... and then ... this guy

Here is a story from the NYT on opening up hardware design.

The internet of things in the home.  A story from the NYT.

And a search engine for the internet of things:

We talked about Kodak and its patents.  An article from the NYT on Kodak and a short NYT video.

Our speaker yesterday spoke of developments in data center efficiency.  Here is an article from Wired magazine on Google's data centers.  Although this is not the latest and greatest.  That is secret.

The next big thing:  Quantum Computing.  The Canadian company which makes these is D-Wave.  Google has bought one and so has Lockheed Martin.

In devices:  A material called Graphene. Can't wait to dump my iPhone!

Here are the slides for our last session.  The sources are in the slides ... Jocelyne Bourgon and Beth Simone Noveck.  Gordon Brown's argument is in his book (probably), but otherwise you could look at this Cisco white paper or the executive summary.  The New York Times coverage of Brazil (Mayara Vivian) is here and here or download here and here.  If you are interested in how to deal with the positive and negative effects of technology you should read this book by Kevin Kelly.

Ok, it sounds like an obvious question, but Apple didn't always do their manufacturing overseas. The NYT explains how the manufacturing game changed.

"In 2007, a little over a month before the iPhone was scheduled to appear in stores, Mr. Jobs beckoned a handful of lieutenants into an office. For weeks, he had been carrying a prototype of the device in his pocket.

Mr. Jobs angrily held up his iPhone, angling it so everyone could see the dozens of tiny scratches marring its plastic screen, according to someone who attended the meeting. He then pulled his keys from his jeans.

People will carry this phone in their pocket, he said. People also carry their keys in their pocket. “I won’t sell a product that gets scratched,” he said tensely. The only solution was using unscratchable glass instead. “I want a glass screen, and I want it perfect in six weeks.”

After one executive left that meeting, he booked a flight to Shenzhen, China. If Mr. Jobs wanted perfect, there was nowhere else to go."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?ref=general&src=me&pagewanted=all