Category: creativity

How AI Can Only Produce Mediocre Content

In this excellent post ‘Why AI Will Not Create Great Content Any Time Soon‘, Christopher Penn makes the point that AI can’t really be trained to make better than mediocre content. Still it can certainly create heaps of it!

The point is that AI needs to be trained, therefore it will be trained on existing content. And existing content is scrapped from the web. The post goes into detail on the origin of those training databases used to train content-generating AI. It is not a huge database, and while the people that have created them have tried to filter the worst, it mainly contains average content.

“Which means that natural language models will inherently be biased towards creating mediocre content, content that’s readable and coherent, but not compelling or unique, because that’s what the vast majority of the language is that they are trained on.”

The post continues with actual real life experiments on actual content, asking for an AI algorithm to fill-up the remainder of the text. It appears quickly that it can’t imitate unique writing styles or unique ideas.

Of course the problem is that AI generated content can be produced much more easily and may flood media, drowning the best content. On the other hand, people have learned where to find unique content so for the foreseeable future, as long as your content is unique in terms of style and content, AI will not be able to imitate you!

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How Face-to-Face Work is Needed for Innovation

This article ‘New Microsoft Study of 60,000 Employees: Remote Work Threatens Long-Term Innovation‘ provides much food for thought on the limitations of remote work in creative endeavors.

While productivity seems to remain stable or even benefit from remote work in certain areas, creative areas lag behind. “a massive new peer-reviewed study from Microsoft […] found that, while remote work is fine for plowing through day-to-day work, it has the potential to put a serious damper on collaboration and innovation long-term.“

Thus if one’s work is pure production without distraction, remote work is great. If it requires a lot of informal communication and exchange, nothing replaces face-to-face. While this is quite intuitive and not a discovery, the fact that it is described in a peer-reviewed paper enhances the validity of the findings.

“Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella calls this ability of remote work to simultaneously improve heads-down productivity and harm creativity the hybrid work paradox.” 

In a world where most value lies in innovation and creativity, a return to the office is inevitable at least for part of the time, and that’s exactly what most organizations are doing now.

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How Content on Any Social Platform Needs to be Curated and Administered

Seth Godin in this post ‘The inevitable decline of fully open platforms‘ shows how fully open platforms (i.e. without any content curation and filtering) fall pray to spammers and inappropriate content. Still, there is also a need to maintain some balance in the administration of the network so as to benefit from its full capability.

“The tension is simple: If a platform is carefully vetted and well-curated, it meets expectations and creates trust. If it’s too locked down and calcifies, it slows progress and fades away. […] Too much curation stifles creativity, opposing viewpoints and useful conversation. But no curation inevitably turns a platform over to quacks, denialists, scammers and trolls.”

Even on private social networks, such as the ones that can be implemented by large organisations, curation and administration is required. This is something that is often forgotten, and it is clear that it can sometimes be seen as purely censorship. The balance needs to be clearly set between removing offensive content and removing content just because it would not please the owners of the network. One does not want to end up like an autocratic regime where any content contrary to the currently acceptable political opinion is removed.

Debate rages whether the Facebooks, twitters and other social networks do curate sufficiently or too much; whether they use enough resources for that. The balance is not easy, but as any social network founder, curation is probably one of the most strategic activities when operating social networks.

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How Engineering Processes Need to Be Upgraded with Digitalization

In engineering circles, an interview of Elon Musk a few months ago has created quite a few ripples. Elon Musk expressed himself about his engineering philosophy, mainly in the context of SpaceX. This article for example summarizes his views: ‘Elon Musk’s Design Process Starts With Making Things ‘Less Dumb’‘

The 5 principles defended by Elon Musk are the following:

  • Make the requirement less dumb
  • Try to delete part of the process and of the design
  • Simplify or optimize (and don’t optimize something that should not exist in the first place!)
  • Accelerate cycle time (but not before you have sorted out the 3 first principles)
  • Automate the design process to move more quickly through the design cycles.

Those principles seem founded quite in common sense, although of course they are very hard to implement as experience shows. In my world of large industrial projects it is a constant battle to try to simplify requirements developed over decades and comprising of layers of knowledge and experience. No surprise that a newcomer like SpaceX can do better without the institutional history.

What I find particularly interesting is the fact that Elon Musk recognizes that automation as a way to accelerate iteration today needs to be an intrinsic part of engineering approaches.

Digitalization provides new possibilities and we definitely need to re-interrogate the traditional engineering processes to take advantage of the new capabilities made available, simplify and produce more straightforward designs.

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How Modern Streaming Leads to Watching and Listening Faster

Have you noticed this possibility on streaming portals to watch movies or listen to music faster? I discovered this feature in Netflix, but there now also tools to speed up any video on Chrome or other browsers – without having an effect on sound frequency or too much distortion.

I must confess I am using this feature regularly when I need to watch movies or series in a time-constrained circumstance. But now I tend to use it quite regularly even without such constraints. It is like accelerated reading and is an interesting evolution of the way we consume video or audio.

Of course this interferes with the original intent of the creator of the video or audio track, who had probably decided on the original pace with much thought, and in a way this thus interferes with the creator intent. At the same time it is also the direction of modern usage of media that we try to cram as much in the limited time we have to consume those experiences.

I am quite convinced that the media producers will soon notice the trend and change the way they produce media to accommodate this trend of accelerated listening and viewing. Still it shows the current tension between our physically limited time and the wish to consume more media experience.

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How Many Startups Subcontract Hardware Production to a Single Company

This article “Your Favorite Start-up Might Not Have Made That Thing It’s Selling Meet Doris Dev” highlights that many startup companies rely on a single source for their hardware design and production: a company named Doris Dev.

Doris Dev is “an agency that handles product design, engineering, sourcing, manufacturing, and even fulfillment from its offices in Dumbo, Brooklyn, and Hong Kong.” – “a team of product development experts who can lead any project from idea to market, including design, engineering, sourcing, manufacturing, testing, distribution and beyond” according to their website.

This can easily be understood taking into account the amount of design and production knowledge that is needed to produce hardware. Start-ups then focus on defining the product, brand and marketing. I find that it is a clever positioning for the Doris Dev company. “Doris Dev clears a path for founders, taking on the managerial load of product development (a huge plus for the many first-time entrepreneurs with minimal experience managing a team) and enabling more types of entrepreneurs and more types of products to go to market“.

The start-up ecosystem has thus evolved to enable outsourcing of hardware production. Still I can see some drawbacks in this approach, because the product may fail to deliver and it can certainly be cheaper to own its own supply chain in the longer term. At some stage the start-up companies will have to become more industrial. Still, actual value chains never stop astonishing us!

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How to Take Delight in Uncertainty

Leo Babauta in his post ‘Delight in Uncertainty‘ explains how most people have difficulties with uncertainty in our lives, and highlights the positives associated with appreciating this uncertainty. As a recovering foe of uncertainty, this certainly resonates with me!

“We don’t like uncertainty, we want to avoid or control uncertainty, we get stressed when we can’t. And uncertainty is unavoidable: everything is uncertain all the time!“

So what can we do? First take stock that certainty is too boring: “We might instinctively dislike uncertainty, but in truth, we would be so bored without it.” Uncertainty is also the place to learn and to grow.

It is not easy to welcome uncertainty, and it does require an amount of practice. The usual corporate world generally does not provide it. Personally, I am practicing since I have started my company and I am not quite too sure who my clients and what my activity will be in 3 to 6 months! And I end up enjoying it because I know this provides space for unexpected opportunities.

Leo Babauta insists on some practices to learn to welcome uncertainty: notice the uncertainty, dance with it, set the joy in it and dance with it.

Whatever your approach, it is very satisfying to have a confident relationship with uncertainty. And yes, it takes time and practice because our Industrial Age education taught us about how to behave in a certain world. Nevertheless we can embrace uncertainty, and dance with it!

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How Intuitive Approaches Are Better Suited to Opening New Markets

Following up from our previous post ‘How to Recognize Crazy Innovative Ideas that Aren’t so Crazy‘, and taking a slightly different viewpoint, this article from the Conversation addresses one of the main aspects of decision-making: ‘Gut feel or rational analysis? Both may be vital in finding winning ideas for new markets‘. It summarizes some research on the processes followed by companies trying to find winning ideas to penetrate new markets. And the conclusion is clear: intuitive approaches are more powerful to uncover new markets.

Like individuals, “Some [companies] will instigate procedures that encourage more analytical decisions – for example, using formal idea evaluation tools such as grid analysis techniques and weighted point-rating evaluation matrices. Others may opt for more informal ways of evaluating ideas, which leave more room for evaluators to draw on their intuition.”

The conclusion of the research is quite clear:

  • Rational idea evaluators tend to seek out ideas that focus on a company’s current strengths.
  • Intuitive evaluators focus more on identifying opportunities to enter new markets.
  • For intuitive evaluators, a highly formalised evaluation process reduces their emphasis on finding opportunities in new markets.

Hence it appears that intuitive approaches are more suited to exploring new market opportunities, and it also appears important not to introduce the rational approach too early in the process, letting intuitive approaches identify opportunities first!

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How to Recognize Crazy Innovative Ideas that Aren’t so Crazy

In this interesting post ‘Crazy New Ideas‘, Paul Graham sets the scene about how to deal with breakthrough ideas that look crazy at first. And he proposes a workable scheme of how to deal with these, to decide whether they are worth supporting.

As a Business Angel I am constantly wrestling with this issue when faced with business plans of startup companies. “Anyone who has studied the history of ideas, and especially the history of science, knows that’s how big things start. Someone proposes an idea that sounds crazy, most people dismiss it, then it gradually takes over the world.“

The first criteria proposed by Paul Graham is how reasonable the person proposing the idea is: “If the person proposing the idea is reasonable, then they know how implausible it sounds. And yet they’re proposing it anyway. That suggests they know something you don’t.” While we then need to beware of the expert trap, there is still an opportunity to ask questions and try to understand the viewpoint of the proponent.

The second issue is that the world will resist to the new idea. Free criticism is easy and socially rewarding, vested interests in the current state of the world widespread, current paradigms cloud our judgment. In addition the new idea is weak and fragile so it may easily be crushed away.

“If you’re nice, as well as wise, you won’t merely resist attacking such people, but encourage them. Having new ideas is a lonely business. Only those who’ve tried it know how lonely. These people need your help. And if you help them, you’ll probably learn something in the process.” That’s an interesting call to action for innovation if I have ever read one.

Thus if a reasonable and sufficiently expert person proposes what looks like a crazy idea at first, don’t dismiss it: investigate, try to overcome those current paradigms that cloud your judgment, and support them.

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How Memes are Selfish

Since the inception of the concept by Richard Dawkins in 1976, memes behaviors have been considered analog to genes in their way of reproducing and evolving. This Gapingvoid post ‘the mean meme‘ reminds us that when one wants to design memes that spread, those need to have certain characteristics. And that memes are selfish: they can spread whether they are useful or harmful.

According to Wikipedia a meme is “an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme.”

The Gapingvoid post reminds us that “Memes, like genes, are designed to be spread. Which means they must take on characteristics most likely to ensure spreading. There is art and science to how this is done.”

Luckily the art of creating a meme is not yet infallible although many people work daily on this (advertisement agencies or book writers, for example). There is a lot of psychology involved.

Memes are necessarily tainted by culture and education, and they also may need to evolve with our knowledge and understanding of the world.

The post also reminds us that “memes, like genes, are selfish. They don’t care about us.” Bad memes can also spread if they have the right characteristics, and it is up to us to be alert to keep them under control. And there are definitely also some specialists in creating harmful memes around.

We should probably try to be better at recognizing memes and their origin, and also better analyzing if they are useful or harmful. In any case this concept leads to some fruitful consideration of what our culture is made of.

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How We Make Maps to Leave Things Out

In this interesting post ‘The map is not the territory‘ Seth Godin reminds us powerfully that the intrinsic power of maps is that it leave things out.

Maps are representations that are always done with a particular purpose and therefore, are adapted to the intent: be it scale, features included or left out, and design aspects such as graphics and colors.

“We make a map so we can leave things out. By leaving things out, we can help people focus on the core concepts we’re trying to get across. And so, the map of the London subway is not actually the London subway. In fact, it’s not even geographically accurate. That’s okay.”

Reminding us that the power of a representation is not just what is included and how it is included, but also what is left out, is quite powerful. And this does not just applies to maps: it applies to texts, books, powerpoint presentations, and any graphical representation.

What will you purposely leave out in your next production?

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How We Hold to the Past Too Much In Creative Endeavors

Seth Godin in this post ‘Sunk costs, creativity and your Practice‘ provides a need reflection on the fact that creative endeavors entail leaving behind things we have invested in learning in the past – in effect, overcoming the sunk cost syndrome.

“We hold on to the old competencies and our hard-earned status roles far longer than we should. The only way to be creative is to do something new, and the path to something new requires leaving something else behind.”

Moreover, Seth Godin insists that this capability of leaving stuff behind that we have invested in learning or practicing is an actual capability in itself, that should be practiced regularly for the creative person.

I do believe that what we have made the effort to learn in the past will never be lost and will be useful in hindsight, but that we certainly should not be burdened by it when we start something new. This is not easy and certainly requires a lot of experience and thoughts.

Creativity requires overcoming what we know to produce something new to the world, and therefore requires overcoming the sunk cost syndrome as a matter of habit. Let’s practice!

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