20.8.09


Practical wisdom - doing the right thing, at the right time - has dimensions (e.g. moment of making a decision, active parts of the brain and (un)consciousness). Malcolm Gladwell gives us some insight into the power of making a right decision, an ability everyone has, in Blink. He not only argues the power of blink, trusting on your insights, snap judgements (that take place behind a locked door: the unconscious) and your gut feelings, but also explains errors of this. Some solutions can only be found in a blink of a moment. "Taking our powers of rapid cognition seriously means we have to acknowledge the subtle influences that can alter or undermine or bias the products of our unconscious." In this way, according to Malcolm, if you take charge for the first two seconds, you can see someone for who they really are...

6.8.09

The importance of EQ & Wisdome in New Business

To add up to the story about left brain / right brain, I found this nice TED movie about the importance of different elements regarding to the EQ of people: improvising, social meaning, inspiration, wisdome, breaking the rules are tags for this movie. Enjoy.

15.7.09

Why whole-brainers will rule the world

In popular research the distinction between different functions of the left part and right part of the brains is very common and known. (for example this book). It is argued creativity is something that is located on the right side of the brains, and straight-forward thinking is located on the left side.

However, just to relate to this matter from another perspective Peter Weiler states in his book Mindmapping (ISBN: 978-90-438-0832-3), that it is absolute nonsense that creativity is located in the right part of the brains. Two parts of the brain indeed have different capabilities. This concerns at the left side for example speech and at the right side the capability to understand a situation as a whole. For the Dutch people, this article states the same.

As a result, is is not about which side of the brain is dominant but in what way the parts work together. If the brain were not functioning as a holistic part, humor would be impossible to understand and long texts would be impossible to understand since this is a result of both parts of the brain. Therefore, if you decide to only use 50 percent of your brains, thats fine. But very likely whole-brainers will rule the world.

29.6.09

Favela rising


Last weekend i saw this documentary on one of the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and how the corrupt police and drug dealers were taking over and causing violence and killings. The documentary is about one man who decides to turn the situation around and with the help of music, start a social project in the slums. It is very inspirational documentary and shows that all it takes is a few guys, an idea and a strong belief in the idea to improve the situation. And look out for the good metaphore at the end! The website of the documentary is http://www.favelarising.com/ and maybe you can also find it in youtube or google videos...otherwise just buy it! :) Enjoy!

19.6.09

Oh happy days!


Lots of people will be very happy today. According to British psychologist Cliff Arnall, June 19 is the happiest day of 2009.
The scientist created a formula which includes several elements that influence the mood of people.

According to Arnall, the Friday that is closest to the start of the summer is the day that most people are typically happy. It is almost weekend and people realise that their holidays are on its way.

Enjoy!

(source: www.nu.nl)

15.6.09

The world's first and only web-community owned football club

Ebbsfleet United is a football club located in England, owned by its members.
Quoted from the website:
"Situated in Kent, England, Ebbsfleet United play in the Blue Square Premier, which is four divisions below the Premiership.

In February 2008, the members purchased the football club for £600,000. Just three months later, Ebbsfleet United won the FA Trophy at Wembley – the club’s greatest achievement in a history that dates back to 1890."




Imagineering student wins T-mobile battle


Hereby I can proudly say that I won the T-mobile battle at battleofconcepts.nl. Their question was: "How can we positively influence the perception of waiting time in the T-mobile shops".

A total of 129 concepts were sent in. The T-mobile jury was very enthusiastic, and rewarded my concept with the first prize and an amount of 1500 euro. The concept is now under consideration within T-mobile to see how they can make it operational. The company does not yet want to reveal anything about what the concept entitles...so I will not either. This achievement ensured me with a 34th place in the category students and Young Professionals. My victory contributed to NHTV Breda’s rising to 8th place in the ranking of Universities (of applied sciences). NHTV is currently represented in the Battle of Concepts by as many as 12 students.


What is Battle of Concepts?

Battle of Concepts is a crowd sourcing platform to which institutions and companies can introduce issues that will be resolved by students and Young Professionals (bachelors and masters up to age 30). This platform makes it possible for companies to generate the most innovative ideas and to get in touch with the people behind them. Contestants have the opportunity to win money and to be discovered by the participating companies. With a Talent Pool of 4000 members, Battle of Concepts is the largest brainstorming institution in the Netherlands. Participating companies are (a.o). Rabobank, Nuon, TNT, Mars, Dutch national and local authorities, TNO, Nationale-Nederlanden en Prorail. These companies have already made almost 300.000 euro available in prize money.

For more information...Battle of Concepts

13.5.09

Brainsurfen

How to help your ideas survive.... brainsurfing?

6.5.09

We think, therefore we are

In addition to Sabria's contribution, another video about mass collaboration and innovation on the web (2.0). This movieclip belongs to the book We Think by Charles Leadbeater. He posted early drafts of his book on the web where people could make comments on, so eventually the book has got 257 co-writers. I can really recommend to read this book, both the content and the way it is published is very inspiring.

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5.5.09

Together we can make the internet the safest place on earth

Take a look at this video. It makes you realise that we might want to rethink "trust"

23.2.09

The need for a chief innovation officer

I was reading the innovation part of businessweek.com and the following title grabbed my attention:

"Obama Needs a Secretary of Innovation"

After one phrase about how innovation should be merged into the new government of the USA, the writer of the article, Thomas D. Kuczmarski, continues with some very interesting thoughts about how innovation is a must for companies in the present crisis-situation.

"I often debate with chief executives about the importance of hiring a chief innovation officer. They often don't see the need. They argue that innovation is everybody's job. Or they confuse it with research and development and say it already is being done. My point—and it applies to economic recovery as much as it does to product development—is that innovation is a multidisciplinary and disciplined process that needs to be managed and led. If everybody is in charge, then nobody is, and little gets accomplished, if anything at all. Or worse—and this may sound familiar to anyone who has followed Washington—there is a lot of action based only on guesswork, not on a careful exploration of what really is needed."

"Now, in the midst of recession, companies need to innovate more than ever. Yet too many are choosing instead to hunker down, postpone investments in R&D, and avoid risk-taking until the market has stabilized. The companies that continue to build an innovation culture and make modest investments to keep the innovation pipeline full will be the ones that enjoy a big competitive advantage a few years from now."


Read the whole story here

11.2.09

I got something you can touch right HERE!

Without expressing my opinion...watch this movie...

It is truly hilarious !!!

10.2.09

Endlessly zooming on Tokyo

In addition to the message of Dirk below, I will add a link to an extraordinary picture. It consists of 602 photos of 6 Megapixels each. They are merged into a photo of 112,794 x 55,100 pixel or 6,2 Gigapixels. This results in the possibility to zoom almost endlessly. Awesome!

http://photoartkalmar.com/ZOOMIFY/tokyo.html

Enjoy discovering Tokyo!

There also is the website of the memorabilia of The Hardrock Café:

http://memorabilia.hardrock.com

6.2.09

New way of browsing

I added a picture which seems to be an ordinary picture. But experiment with it after clicking on it (fullscreen would be nice). Pretty awesome isn't it?! It is a made with a program of Microsoft called Seadragon. They say this will be the, hassle-free / scroll-free, new way of browsing...



And what about this one:



It looks like the navigation of picture-viewing on the iPhone. Now we can also do it with pictures on the internet and with our mouse.

Of course, the picture of our class, beside our beautiful faces, is a little bit dull. Imagine what you can do if there is a picture in a picture and an overall rich background. Experiment with the next example (link):

Website Bike

Again it looks like an ordinary picture, but look at the squares. There is text in it and also pictures. Zoom in on them. You can see things that were not noticable in the general picture at the beginning. When you are zoomed in and you press the home button in the screen you go back to normal again and you can see how far you were zooming in without noticing it.

Am I the only one who finds it rather addictive??

19.1.09

'The hidden side of everything'


Definitely worth reading is Freakonomics in which Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner search for the hidden side of everything.

Steven en Stephen also decided to create a weblog dealing with important questions. Take a look!

Additionally, one of the questions answered in the book is Why crack dealers still live with their moms; definitely worth watching is the following movie in which Steven Levitt gives an answer on this question. Definitely worth watching!



15.1.09

A regular day at Logica

4.1.09

I love the smell of Whoppers in the morning...

As a reaction to the contribution of Dirk, the Duracell Energy Drink, I also found quite a sensational brand extension...

Does the smell of grilled meat make your mouth water?

Fast food restaurant Burger King captured the scent of America's favorite burger Whopper. "Behold the scent of seduction, with a hint of flame-broiled meat" (see www.firemeetsdesire.com)

For only 3,99 dollar you are the proud owner of Flame, the fragrance for non-vegetarian men...