http://diesel.adidas.com/83ways.php - coool site by Adidas and Diesal.

NADD

Gargh! I've just self-diagnosed myself with NADD - Nerd Attention Deficiency Disorder.

Whilst reading this article I followed the instructions to count how many other things I had going on whilst reading it. Do you dare to know?

1. My email account was open.
2. I was uploading photos to my Facebook account.
3. I had 10 tabs open with different articles relating to Cuba, the Zimbabwe elections, telecommunications updates and non-profit grants
4. I had iTunes open and playing the Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind soundtrack
5. I was working on a couple word documents
6. I had another computer next to me with 8 tabs open...
7. I had a conversation going on MSN with a friend in Australia
8. I was checking and comparing flight prices to Wellington

Yeah.... g.e.e.k

global warming and CONFUSION

how many of my friends are terrified of global warming? lots.
how many of my friends are like 'meh...' lots.
how many of my friends believe it's a conspiracy? lots.

i recently watched Al Gore's wee doco An Inconvenient Truth. Hmmm.. inconvenient indeed! It was a well stated opinion and after watching it, that's all I felt - it was one man's opinion. Because even though he had the 'facts' there from 'scientists' - how do I know that it's accurate information? I'm no scientist! I can't argue or agree on any basis whatsoever! It's super frustrating and so I set about to say nothing to anyone but to read everything I could in my spare time (which is not much... but some)

I found this article today called 'Don't Fight, Adapt.' It says very clearly what has been mulling around in my mind over the past few weeks:

Attempts to prevent global climate change from occurring are ultimately futile, and constitute a tragic misallocation of resources that would be better spent on humanity's real and pressing problems.

Yeah. And so apparently this is actually in a letter written from 100 scientists to the UN. Or something.

A friend who recently returned from the UK told me that he felt NZers didn't care enough about Climate Change. Interesting - when you consider that NZ has the fourth highest rate of suicide
in the world - WHY would someone who hated their own life, give a toss about saving human existence?

I'm not gonna be close-minded to anything, but I'm starting to think that maybe we shouldn't be putting all our eggs in one basket so-to-speak. Yeah we care about our world, but seriously, our world isn't going anywhere - it's our existence that is at risk... lets think about the people.

Ask the public how to run your business

And so Starbucks has launched a website asking the public for advice.

If you have an idea about how Starbucks should operate, what they should be doing differently, innovative ideas etc - stop by their website.

It's an interesting approach to giving people what they want - i like how they show the people who will be reviewing ideas. And apparently they even implement the good ones...

Cool.

How to Think

Stumbled upon this on Ed Boyden's blog:

How to be creative, thoughtful, and powerful in a world where problems are extremely complex, targets are continuously moving, and our brains often seem like nodes of enormous networks that constantly reconfigure:

1. Synthesize new ideas constantly. Never read passively. Annotate, model, think, and synthesize while you read, even when you're reading what you conceive to be introductory stuff. That way, you will always aim towards understanding things at a resolution fine enough for you to be creative.

2. Learn how to learn (rapidly). One of the most important talents for the 21st century is the ability to learn almost anything instantly, so cultivate this talent. Be able to rapidly prototype ideas. Know how your brain works. (I often need a 20-minute power nap after loading a lot into my brain, followed by half a cup of coffee. Knowing how my brain operates enables me to use it well.)

3. Work backward from your goal. Or else you may never get there. If you work forward, you may invent something profound--or you might not. If you work backward, then you have at least directed your efforts at something important to you.

4. Always have a long-term plan. Even if you change it every day. The act of making the plan alone is worth it. And even if you revise it often, you're guaranteed to be learning something.

5. Make contingency maps. Draw all the things you need to do on a big piece of paper, and find out which things depend on other things. Then, find the things that are not dependent on anything but have the most dependents, and finish them first.

6. Collaborate.

7. Make your mistakes quickly. You may mess things up on the first try, but do it fast, and then move on. Document what led to the error so that you learn what to recognize, and then move on. Get the mistakes out of the way. As Shakespeare put it, "Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt."

8. As you develop skills, write up best-practices protocols. That way, when you return to something you've done, you can make it routine. Instinctualize conscious control.

9. Document everything obsessively. If you don't record it, it may never have an impact on the world. Much of creativity is learning how to see things properly. Most profound scientific discoveries are surprises. But if you don't document and digest every observation and learn to trust your eyes, then you will not know when you have seen a surprise.

10. Keep it simple. If it looks like something hard to engineer, it probably is. If you can spend two days thinking of ways to make it 10 times simpler, do it. It will work better, be more reliable, and have a bigger impact on the world. And learn, if only to know what has failed before. Remember the old saying, "Six months in the lab can save an afternoon in the library."

I have just returned from a week in Wellington.

My highlights:

• Chatting with Josh and Tai and learning about the Ship for World Youth.
• Sitting next to David Baldwin on the plane - finding out that Cherrie Kong is working for them - falling in love with synergy all over again.
• Talking with Paul Matthews from the Computer Society and regaining faith in the future of the ICT industry
• Getting some insight into what community groups are thinking about in terms of online solutions, after being invited to sit in on the CIMS workshop.
• Having a picnic 'meeting' with Megan Hosking and leaving it feeling stoked about the people in NZ who are just so on to it
  

The Issues with Innovation

Every truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. -Arthur Schopenhauer.

Today I had the pleasure of attending a presentation. This presentation was done by my mother (Ingrid) to ARTA (Auckland Regional Transport Authority) on behalf of my father(Paul)'s organisation 'Trip Convergence' and their 'innovative' idea of Flexible Carpooling.

Being the offspring of this power-couple, my opinions expressed here are likely to be somewhat biased.. but that's OK - just know where I'm coming from.

ARTA claim to be about "helping find solutions to the traffic challenges facing the rapidly growing Auckland region." Great!

I am relatively new to the whole 'traffic solutions' scene and so I started searching for clear evidence of what ARTA have done to help find such solutions. The most obvious attempt is of course - the Northern Busway.

I was in the northern hemisphere over summer and upon returning south in mid-February, I witnessed the result of this $200 million dollar investment.


Judging by this photograph, this has clearly solved the issue of traffic congestion! ..... not.

According to North Shore City, one bus will run every 3 minutes.

A bus every 3 minutes! Imagine if a car passed along a motorway lane every 3 minutes! It deserves to be better used...

Hold that thought - we'll come back to it.

This is where Paul's company comes into the equation.

The general idea of flexible carpooling, is that it's like carpooling... but it's flexible. What I've done here, is made reference to a schema - carpooling - to get us both on the same page quickly.

But just to recap - you know what carpooling is:

It's a way to share the cost of traveling. It's a way to ease your eco-guilt. It's better for the environment and your pocket. And it's more comfortable than the bus!

But you also know carpooling as that annoying system of organising to share a ride with friends/co-workers/neighbours. It's that system that requires you to be on time. People are relying on you. If you're sick one day, you have to get in touch with someone. If you drop out of the carpool, they might have go through the hassle of finding someone else. *sigh*

So now I'm going to alter that schema with the word 'flexible'. By adding this word to the beginning of 'carpooling', we have just eliminated ALL of those annoying and tiresome definitions of carpooling in a traditional sense.

So what are we left with?

Flexible Carpooling: Better for the environment and your pocket. More comfortable than a bus. Convenient, hassle-free, no commitment required.

Neat-o.

Now I'd like to point out that Paul has been rallying for this idea to happen since... about 2005. (I think).

Today, after Ingrid's presentation to ARTA, Rabin Rabindran, deputy chair, asked "is there any working evidence of this system? Any pilots or small-scale examples?"

Ingird stammered. "Uh.. Seattle is interested. But Seattle want to know why Auckland isn't doing anything."

Ahhhh. According to Geoff Mulgan in the MIT Press/innovations, "Social innovations may be helped by formal market research or desk analysis, but progress is often achieved more quickly through turning the idea into a prototype or pilot and then galvanizing enthusiasm for it."

In Paul's case, I think this may be what's needed. Innovation is risky business and often involves failure of some kind. So governmental organisations are cautious about innovation for good reason - 'appetite for failure is limited in accountable organisations or where peoples' lives depend on reliability'. (innovations/spring 2006).

So whilst Trip Convergence is asking for the support and investment of the government and city councils - in my opinion, a lot could be done to get the public involved/on board, sans-huge dollars, in the meantime.

The 'risk' in this case, is that they will put up money to invest in an idea that won't work (ie. won't get used). That's the only risk as far as I can see? But if the public 'get it', if they demonstrate they can change their behaviour (ride sharing requires a shift in behaviour for most) and are demanding infrastructure to make using the system easier and safer - then the risk that it won't be used, is reduced/contained/eliminated... right?

Now bringing us back to my earlier thoughts on the Northern Busway. Assuming Trip Convergence have a pilot or many small examples of flexible carpooling being carried out around Auckland (by the public, without the safety/membership technology and without parking facilities). Now we have a $200 million busway that lies largely empty. The risk is now minimal. The cost is now minimal. The users have choice (bus or flexible carpool!). And the result, if Auckland decides to implement this? They appear to be leaders in innovation. The traffic congestion is reduced. Tailpipe emissions are reduced. Cost of travel is reduced. And internationally we lead the way for solutions to traffic challenges that many rapidly growing cities worldwide are facing.

Neat-o.

So I'm feeling fabulous!!!!

Not really though. I finished my detox yesterday, and it went something like this:

9am: I awake to the smell of pancakes. Automatically, my mind conjures up images involving hot pancakes, maple syrup, blueberries, yogurt, my mouth, saliva, chewing, swallowing etc. Until the realisation hits me that I'm ON A DETOX. (aka NO SWEET SWEET DELICIOUS MMMMM FOOD). Furious, I storm downstairs demanding an explanation for such a cruel act. I notice that Paul (my father) has innocently set me a place at the table.

I explain (again) that I'm on a detox. He pleads ignorance. I forgive him. End result: I'm sitting at the table slowly munching on my oats+water, while Ingrid and Paul sit next to me, happily gorging on fluffy white pancakes.

6pm: Matthew and I are returning from a walk on the beach with Leia. He suggests we stop for food. I suggest Pizza (again, it's an reflex thought). We stop at this place called 'Dante's - We make, you bake'. The idea is quite self explanatory... for $15, they spend 2 minutes putting the pizza together and suffocating it in plastic glad-wrap - then you take it home and bake it for 10 minutes. Cool. But I'm not allowed cheese or gluten. So I pay (Matt pays) $2 extra for a gluten free base and they remove the cheese (surely they could have canceled each other out? I mean, why the 2 bucks?)

Anyway, so we get home and pop our pizzas in the oven. Mine - gluten free, artichokes, olives, onion and tomato. Matt's - smoked chicken, cranberry, mozzarella, camembert, sourdough base. Which pizza do you think looked the most delectable and smelt the most delicious as they were removed from the oven? It definitely wasn't the dried up, sans-cheese, crumbly gluten-free-base pizza (aka MINE.)

But today is a new day. Today is MONDAY. Today is NO MORE DETOX day.

Although, strangely, I haven't been overly excited to jump on the bread wagon. Or the milk wagon either for that matter. I had a coffee this morning. Which was nice. But I haven't had one since. I have this new awareness of my body I think. I look at food and I think 'what's going to happen to you when you get inside me? will I use you? Or will you blob around and make it difficult for me to go toilet?' Yes... so there's some insight into what goes on in my head!

I wonder how long this new feeling will last...

diary of a detox

I'd thought about it before. Many times actually. But this time I knew it was the time.

$50 for 2 sets of pills. I'm taking 21 pills a day. I started yesterday and it only lasts a week.

The rules? No bread. No milk. No sugar. No alcohol. No crap, basically. But worst of all - no Caffeine. I can't actually remember the last time I went without Caffeine for a day, so you must try to understand how serious this is for me. I spent all of yesterday unable to do much, as I moped around cringing from one of the worst headaches I've had in a while. Today it is better... although I am cringing at the thought of the cold brown rice and plain tuna I am about to consume for lunch.