Technology and Creativity - Why I Returned My iPad - Peter Bregman - Harvard Business Review

A little more than a week after buying the iPad, I returned it to Apple. The problem wasn't the iPad exactly, though it has some flaws. The problem was me. I like technology, but I'm not an early adopter. I waited for the second-generation iPod, the second-generation iPhone, and the second-generation MacBook Air. But the iPad was different. So sleek. So cool. So transformational. And, I figured, since it's so similar to the iPhone, most of the kinks would already be worked out. So at 4 PM on the day the 3G iPad was released, for the first time in my life, I waited in line for two hours to make a purchase. I set up my iPad in the store because I wanted to make sure I could start using it the very moment I bought it. And use it I did. I carried it with me everywhere; it's so small and thin and light, why not bring it along? I did my email on it, of course. But I also wrote articles using Pages. I watched episodes of Weeds on Netflix. I checked the news, the weather, and the traffic. And, of course, I proudly showed it to, well, anyone who indicated the least bit of interest. (That could be a whole post in itself. We proudly show off new purchases as though simply possessing them is some form of accomplishment. Why? I didn't create the iPad. I just bought one.)

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Seeking Common Ground in Conversations Can Stifle Innovation and Reward the Wrong People : Research: Stanford GSB

The best baseball players don't always get elected All-Stars. And the Nobel Prize doesn't always go to the most deserving member of the scientific community. This, according to a pair of recent studies, is because such recognition can depend upon how well known an individual is rather than on merit alone. Moreover, because it's human nature for people to try to find common ground when talking to others, simple everyday conversations could have the unfortunate side effect of blocking many of the best and most innovative ideas from the collective social consciousness. "In our research, we found that people are most likely to talk about things they think they have in common with others, rather than topics or ideas that are more unusual or striking," said Nathanael J. Fast, a PhD student at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Fast is one of three authors of the paper "Common Ground and Cultural Prominence: How Conversation Reinforces Culture," with Chip Heath of the Stanford Business School, and George Wu of the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago. "This has the effect of reinforcing—or even institutionalizing—the prominence of familiar cultural elements over ones that are perhaps more deserving."

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R.D Laing on the Nonsense of Categorisation, Homogeneity and Modernity

Famous Scottish psychiatrist, Dr R.D Laing offers prophetic insights given this video was originally recorded in the 1980's. The implications of categorization and homogeneity, in a modern world dominated by IT infrastructure, for creative leadership means it has become harder and harder for an individual to express and have accepted unique views if they cannot be categorized for later tagging on the world wide web. This video beautifully captures the nonsense of this prevailing ideology and suddenly we begin to see the cultural damage of homogeneity forced on the world by the IT industry.

The Most Important Leadership Quality for CEOs? Creativity | Fast Company

For CEOs, creativity is now the most important leadership quality for success in business, outweighing even integrity and global thinking, according to a new study by IBM. The study is the largest known sample of one-on-one CEO interviews, with over 1,500 corporate heads and public sector leaders across 60 nations and 33 industries polled on what drives them in managing their companies in today's world. Fast Company's annual list of the 100 Most Creative People in Business just took on a whole new depth. And this year's list will be revealed later this month.

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The Death of A Truly Great 20th Century Innovator - Malcolm McLaren

Last week one of the world's truly great innovators passed away. Malcolm McLaren, the inventor of the punk movement. McLaren's life work was that of a Renaisance man, an ideas man who changed popular culture both as an entreprenuer and as an artiste. His journey of invention was often misunderstood by artists, academics and the industry in which he operated because he continually moved outside the norms to create new forms and new products that questioned the accepted practice of his peers. As a manager, he was not a traditional band manager. He interfered artistically. As an artist, he was held in deep suspicion by musicians and practicing artists alike because he was seen as an entrepreneur first, part of the profit making machine artists inherently mistrust. Even worse, he couldn't play a musical instrument used digital sampling technology to create his work way before it was the accepted norm.

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