What kind of thing is a think tank?

They are, of course, organizations of one kind or another whether formal, informal, small, large and so on. This post from "On Think Tanks" is highlights a very obvious but critical element, namely the people who originate, lead and live in the think tank. The organization is the people, particularly at the scale which most think tanks function - small, compact, mission-driven and expertise loaded. Being small, they need to be timely, selective, and capable of acting quickly and intelligently on opportunities. That nimbleness is underpinned by having invested in capacity, intellectual and otherwise, to carry out those timely forays. Being flexible and nimble isn't about being haphazard or careless - quite the opposite.

It would be worth exploring what role conscious organizational design plays in think tank establishment and growth. If think tanks were compared against a typology of organizations, where would they end up? It would seem that the small, entrepreneurial sector of the spectrum would be well represented with a power law distribution as size increases - the bigger a think tank is, the more rare it would be.

Has anyone come across a study of this type? What would such a study tell us about the role, purpose, and future of think tanks? Are they changing more or less than other institutions in their comparative space? Do the visible aspects of a think tank reveal what is going on under that visible layer? What would we see if the top layers were peeled back?

Co.Design put together a compilation of 22 of the best infographics of 2011 that is worth taking a look at for a number of reasons. First, what each of them represents is interesting. Second, as a whole, they represent the many ways that we can visualize and communicate information. Third, they are not merely graphic representations but reflect a wide range of cultural and historic dynamics that remain important as we move into 2012. Finally, making good use of the data streams around us is an important space where technology and human experience intersect.

What does dying look like for businesses?

This brief video from The End of Business is a sketch of what happens when organizations don't change quickly enough to survive. Businesses have always failed in some proportion but the stat from Forbes about 70% of Fortune 1000 companies failing by 2031 is pretty sobering. None of them think it can happen or are living like it will happen. But it will.

Amazon is a Super Nova Business

This infographic, sent to me compliments of Brian Dijkema, is just plain shocking. The monster size of their disruption has/is/will change the retail climate and a lot of other things as well.
Source: Frugaldad.com

Understanding how people might move through a given space is very important for designers, architects, planners, advertisers, retailers, and really any setting that involves people. Daniel Hambleton has a really interesting piece of software that allows 'people' to navigate through spaces by ray casting - a method that involves the 'people' seeing the room and then moving based on what they see.

Whether you're designing office space or putting together a new streetscape, this could be a very valuable modelling tool. As we know, modelling doesn't tell you what will actually happen but it does sharpen our capacity to think through how various combinations of elements will influence human interactions and the flow of crowds.


Dragonfly: AI Perception and Motion from ArchitectureInCombination on Vimeo.


Take a look at see what you think. It's interesting to watch just one of the figures and see what 'it' does. The group flows are also very intriguing. I'd like to try changing configurations, crowd size, etc. to see what happens.

Does anyone know how this compares with crowd-flow modelling software applications like this - eg. SMART Move (see below)?

SMART Move simulation software:

I recently attended Shreyas Sundaram's talk at the University of Waterloo. Shreyas is an assistant professor in electrical and computer engineering. Some aspects of the talk are more technical than a general audience will likely tolerate but it is worth sticking with Shreyas through those parts for the conclusions and insights that his work represents. 


A couple of points to note - the ability to discover malicious nodes mathematically in a network. This is useful in finding bad sensors but is equally useful in understanding where key gatekeepers are in a human network. The brokers who are critical to information flows have always been important but in vary large data sets they may be difficult to detect.


Another interesting point very much related to the malicious nodes work is the ability to determine which nodes bridge between network structures. What nodes, if you removed them, would split the network into two or more distinct parts? There are many possible applications of this as well.


The power of developing powerful mathematical tools for understanding networks is that the processes developed can be applied to very large data sets. Mathematics also makes it possible to see novel structures and qualities that would not be possible with human processing alone. From epidemics to information technology structures and power grids, gaining greater insight into the science of networks is critical. In addition, disseminating that information and teaching people across disciplines how the technical aspects of networks function will determine the level of sophistication we can sustain in our various domains of analysis. 


The Waterloo Institute for Complexity and Innovation was the host of the talk and they seek to deepen our understanding and application of complexity science as a means of approaching the most challenging issues and questions of our time.



Diffusing Information and Reaching Agreement in Networks: Convergence and Resilience from Waterloo Institute for Complexit on Vimeo.



(that's me ducking in at the front right at the beginning)

I've never been able to restrain my drawing/sketching/doodling tendencies. During my formal schooling, it came up from time-to-time as an issue of attentiveness. The assumption was that if I was doodling, I wasn't listening. For me it was in fact the opposite. I somehow think better when I sketch and draw. That has translated to writing words, ideas and concepts and then connecting them, filling things in, linking possibilities.

This TED talk suggests I don't need to feel bad about it.

I've been following InnoCentive from early on, ever since I first came across it in the burgeoning field of collaboration thinking and practice. For those of you who may not have heard about InnoCentive, this brief video is a great explanation of how it works.





I am interested in InnoCentive at two levels. The first is participation as a solver and potential seeker. The second is as a platform. I think the second is far more important and more profound. As a functional brokering of problems and problem solvers that is commercial, sizable, substantive, and growing, we must keep iterating this platform in ways that suit other settings. 


Here are some possible platform spaces for this to be expanded into (or grown as there are some entries in some categories already):

• Think tanks (there are 6500 globally and the number is growing)
• Universities (Yaffle.ca is a good example but there must be much more it these kinds of projects)
• Disenfranchised PhD grads (this pool must be tapped, coordinated and motivated to apply their knowledge to current challenges)
• Libraries and databases (where search rankings and other trending data are married to people who are working in those areas or who could work in those areas)
• Intellectual capital in the developing world (those who don't have institutional access but who have a great deal to offer)
• Other educational spaces (imagine a richly connected network of schools at all levels where real problems were being contemplated by all kinds of students around the globe)

The Magic of Flying

I grew up designing, building, flying and crashing various kinds of rockets, U-control, and radio control aircraft. There were very few things that gripped my imagination more as a boy. The first time I flew a 2-meter glider I had built, my hands were shaking I was so nervous and excited. It was fantastic (and the climb up the spruce tree to retrieve it later wasn't bad either).

Watching this amazing video of a more design that follows the motion of a bird re-awakened all the magic. It's a fantastic machine that really does change the way we might consider flying things (or ourselves) around. I'd love to see a next step where electronic or pneumatic muscles provide the motion rather than a rotating motor but it loses none of the wonder when you see it actually flying around the auditorium in a controlled way.

 

Data Visualization - Minimum Wage in Europe

This is a dataset available on Google via Public Data Explorer and represents how minimum wages have changed in Europe since 1999. There are other very interesting datasets and with various governments around the world opening up public data, this is an important research space to watch and explore for stories.