The MFA (master of fine arts) is the new MBA December 14, 2007
Posted by kevinpaulmorris in A Whole New Mind, Asia, Dan Pink, Dennis Littky, MBA, The Big Picture, Tom Peters, design, education, innovation, learning, technology.1 comment so far
This from a Tom Peters post in September:
Describing Dan Pink’s A Whole New Mind.
Fundamental premise: “The last few decades have belonged to a certain kind of person with a certain kind of mind—computer programmers who could crank code, lawyers who could craft contracts, MBAs who could crunch numbers.
But the keys to the kingdom are changing hands. The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind—creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers and meaning makers. These people—artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers—will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys.”
Pink makes a sound analytic argument for all this, based on the Rise of Asia and the New Technologies, among other things. One other zinger I cotton to:
“The MFA [master of fine arts] is the new MBA.”
The other book is The Big Picture, from the person I consider to be the most innovative educator in America … Dennis Littky. Dennis considers the current school system a disaster.
He’s working on a new model, piloted in Providence, RI, and now spinning out across the nation courtesy a big grant from the Gates Foundation. Littky’s work dovetails brilliantly with Pink’s. He believes we need to get beyond the rote learning and teach-to-test shackles … and get kids to engage in activities that mean something to them.
Consider: “From the media, we hear these great tearjerker stories of kids who succeeded despite the odds. But all of our kids are instead facing the odds of an education system that is all wrong. The odds are against them because the system works against them instead of with them. … I see it every day: kids who people have dismissed as ‘dumb in math’ or ‘uninterested in science’ or ‘nonreaders’ doing incredible things in these exact same areas because they were (finally) allowed to start with something they were already interested in. A 9th-grade kid who ‘hates science’ sees a movie about freezing people, then decides to read a college biology text on cryogenics, and then gives a presentation on it that blows your socks off.”
Peters then goes on to explain that he thinks the state of education in the world is as important as terrorism. “I don’t think I’m crazy,” Peters says. “I think this is the equal of security concerns … perhaps the ultimate security concern?”
Image credit.
Rush-Hour Relief Via Cell October 3, 2007
Posted by kevinpaulmorris in India, technology, traffic.add a comment
Bangalore’s traffic is among India’s worst. About 700 new vehicles hit the IT hub’s roads daily, turning a normal 25-minute drive into two hours at rush hour, so executives often work on cell phones and laptops in their cars. In June, software outfit Mapunity Information Services roped in India telecom giant Bharti Airtel, and Bangalore’s traffic cops, to track traffic via cellular signals. These are used to create Web maps like the one above, of a recent evening rush, and Bharti sends customers text messages about which roads to avoid.
By Nandini Lakshman
BANGALORE DIARY
Photosynth Technology Preview September 17, 2007
Posted by kevinpaulmorris in Microsoft, Photosynth, TED, milan, surface, technology.add a comment
New from Microsoft, a unique architecture allowing images to be put together in order to recreate a real space. Use the space bar to scan from image to image, use your scroll button to zoom; its incredible. Combined with Microsoft Surface Technology, or what has until now been labeled as “Project Milan”, there are some really unique applications; retail, navigation, education, ebooks…
Check out the beta version of Photosynth and play around with it! You can’t yet add your own photo collections, but you can play around with collections uploaded by Microsoft.
“In our collections, you can access gigabytes of photos in seconds, view a scene from nearly any angle, find similar photos with a single click, and zoom in to make the smallest detail as big as your monitor. A Photosynth experience begins with nothing more than a bunch of digital photos. They might all have been taken by one person, or they might be a mixture of images from many different cameras, shooting conditions, dates, times of day, resolutions, and so on.
Each dot represents an extracted feature
Each photo is processed by computer vision algorithms to extract hundreds of distinctive features, like the corner of a window frame or a door handle. Photos that share features are then linked together in a web. When the same feature is found in multiple images, its 3D position can be calculated. It’s similar to depth perception - what your brain does to perceive the 3D positions of things in your field of view based on their images in both of your eyes. Photosynth’s 3D model is just the cloud of points showing where those features are in space.”
Check out the initial unveiling of Photosynth at a recent TED conference:
