no straight lines: making sense of our non-linear world

Making sense of our non-linear world

@alansmlxl

We are at the edge of the adaptive range of our industrial world. At the edge, because that world, our world is being overwhelmed by a trilemma of social, organisational and economic complexity. We are in transit from a linear world to a non-linear one. Non-linear because it is for all of us socially, organisationally and economically ambiguous, confusing and worrying. Consequently we are faced with an increasingly pressing and urgent problem, WHAT COMES NEXT? And also we are therefore presented with a design challenge: HOW do we create better societies, more able organisations and, more vibrant and equitable economies relevant to the world we live in today? No Straight Lines presents a new logic/literacy and inspiring plea for a more human centric world that describes an entirely new way for true social, economic and organisational innovation to happen.

http://ht.ly/7OAod

The mind is like a parachute it only works when it is open “ “

| www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

My story, my narrative,

my song-cycle, my fable my folk culture,

my truth


Faultlines


WTF Frank

Looks like faultines in

society Steve

#ows #sovereign debt

#eurocrisis #pensions


trailblazers

hospicing of old system

the emergence of a new system

collapse of system

the life and death of eco-systems



Cultural

Obsolete skills



Legal

A non-linear world | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

The trilemma of a non-linear world

Social Organisation

Economic

complexity

complexity complexity

Organisational, social, economic

change



“Big firms have allowed themselves to be seen as detached from society” andrew witty, glaxosmithkline


A more unfair world

£12.7bn failure Patient records project Rise MRSA


“You judge a modern society, not by what it consumes but – by what

it throws away” zygmunt bauman


I + We = why?


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Human nature is not a machine


BUT WE ARE ASKED TO LIVE A MACHINE LIKE LIFE

Freedom?


Existential cowboys & the fetish of choice


no choice but to

improvise

alex

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itar

enko

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shad

ows-

03


Noisy ghosts in the machine

called life


Fearfulness leads to fundamentalism…


Social Organisation

Economic

Me, We. Jung re-wired for the 21st Century


“Me We” Ali’s shortest poem


“I” Needs “We”

to truly be “I”

carl jung


Me

Single Many

We Family

Community

Self ?


Identity, community, communication, communion

Communication? | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

Communion | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

Transcendence




POWER

Access to, and, the (RE)distribution of knowledge allows us to renegotiate the relationships of power; church,

state, government, society, commerce


Q: did the Catholic church see Gutenberg coming?



Gutenbergs little wooden printing press was used as the tool by Martin Luther to overthrow the hegemony of the church in Europe and change the direction of political power

A technological revolution…


…or, a social one? | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

“What does technology want?


What do We want?”

OPPORTUNITY FREEDOM

EMPOWERMENT MUTUALISM DIVERSITY

EFFICIENCY INDEPENDENCE

BEAUTY


“A revolt of the spirit against… a world in which man was threatened by a monstrous moral and metaphysical materialism”


Coordination Vs.

Cooperation


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Institutional failure, people are learning to get what they need from each other



Trust networks challenge outmoded models of organisation & control ETSY.COM / MUMSNET / MONDRAGON / GROWVC / LEGO

System Upgrade


HOS Human Operating System


Participatory culture


“Drift towards mutualism is moving towards an old dream: to maximise both individual autonomy and the power of people working together”.


A connective communications

membrane wrapping itself

around the earth


2500 years ago

within 20 generations all humanities major religions came into

the world

Surplus of abundance of agriculture – so if the fastest growing resource is knowledge and information if we have a surplus what happens next?

Folk culture ?


Folk culture ?


Culture made by the folk by us you and me - participatory

2005 YouTube

36 hours video every 60 secs of every day

Facebook A congregation of 800 million

Myspace Destroyed by News Corp


http://www.,lickr.com/photos/nathaninsandiego/2723981272/

Fan fiction


“Precedents for conceiving political change. 18th Century France, it was the language used by pamphleteers, and journalists as the rhetoric of public action. ” tony judt, ill fares the land


the limits of our language is the limit to our world “ “


We need a new literacy


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Craigslist and the

“paid for” classified ad

market


Newspapers did not

understand the language

of a non-linear world


“The production of shared software is communism” steve ballmer


Learn from the music industry, adapt or die


Mutuality is our business strategy” Evolution engineers mutualism into biology because the benefits are win-win. Individuals work benefits the group – building upon the work of others.

“


Language enables us to properly describe the world around us, and engage in meaningful action


“Convivial” Compatible with life


Everyone has a voice || The tools of creativity are widely distributed || It’s easy and cheap to experiment || Capability counts for more than credentials and titles || Commitment is voluntary || Power is granted from below || Authority is fluid and contingent on value-added || The only hierarchies are “natural” hierarchies || Communities are self defining || Individuals are richly empowered with information || Just about everything is decentralized || Ideas compete on an equal footing || It’s easy for buyers and sellers to find each other || Resources are free to follow opportunities || Decisions are peer-based.


read & write

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The new media landscape is liquid and linked

Interconnected business models


Ubiquity = Everywhere


An “old-new” cultural economy: markets are conversations


“20th Century economics mistakenly assumed that market transactions are an ideal and even default model for human interactions. But some kinds of value can’t be created by markets, only by a set of shared and mutually coordinating assumptions – cultural”. clay shirkey


org+ values

passions needs

Communities of interest & the economics of sharing


Producer, co-creator consumer evangelist

Business foundations

connectivity

commerce

culture

community


Markets are conversations

participatory

consensual deliberative

associative


blendedrealityBlended reality Its not online or

offline…


People embrace

what they

create

Technologies of co-operation Technology does not come out of nowhere it is a human invention in the first place and it succeeds or not to the extent that it meets fundamental human needs


Embedded Sociability

http://www.,lickr.com/photos/an_untrained_eye/1195966967/


Open | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

The default setting is

Deconstructing organisation


What if ?


The ‘WHAT’S NEXT’ for business

What if we could build sustainable, green cars 5x faster at 100x times less the capital cost?



What if we could build an €83m business that sells fashion via mobile devices?



What if our customers co-created the future of our company, meaning we created better products, services, and increased revenues?



What if the next Silicon Valley was not a place but a platform? That would ignite entrepreneurship and unleash innovation at an international scale?



What if we could create a service to better manage people’s chronic health care? Reducing; wrong diagnosis, over prescription of drugs, clogging up hospitals and specialist time?


Does this language suggest new ways of doing/making/creating? How does this affect you and your clients? 5 min discussion


Disruption does not ask permission


Broadcast culture: disconnected, walled, centralized: Traditional telcos, legacy media, Network-TV...

You no longer need to rent someone else’s audience


Booz & company estimates that by 2015 the $ volume of physical goods sold through social media should rise six fold to $30bn from $5bn this year – and sales of services through social media are equally promising

Disrupt yourself before someone else does it to you


Nokia will never release a touch-screen phone!


So somebody else did…


Apple’s market cap the 2nd/3rd largest in the world. Nokia had 40% market share and makes $1bn Apple has 3% and makes $1bn


Open: To new ideas

To new ways of doing things To fail

To transform Of minds

Of Borders (http://ht.ly/7ODc1)


Lets talk about Android…


… Android could earn Google $10bn per year – Eric Schmidt


What does mobile mean?


A converged eco-system


What is disrupting you? Are you aware of who, what, where and how? And – are you ready? 5 min discussion


Curation of content, packaging of content, filtering and sense making


Refined data the black gold of the 21st Century

Alex Pentland, director of MIT’s Human Dynamics Laboratory, “Using location data, I can say a lot about the music you like... for example, your financial risks.”


What on earth has a 3D printer got to do with marketing? Everything.


Mass customisation


Recommendation engine, usage based, data fed


ux? | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

Interface without interference

interactive + connected + human


the cultural

organisation assets

Rolling Exhibitions

Permanent collections

Archives

Lots of stuff in storage

Implicit Knowledge: curators

communities of

interest

Public

Corporations

Universities/ academia

Business

Other museums / cultural institutions

motivation

Money

Pleasure

Self improvement

Status

Professional information

Inter-related | www.no-straight-lines.com | making sense of our non-linear world | 2011 |

The link economy: create a bundles of products and services

Data driven: Amazon data architecture – recommendation engine, Apple genius and iTunes, personalisation


Data driven business


My Yoad?


Yoad /‘jэυd/ 1. n. a file in database storing a person’s profile information and consumer lifestyle preferences for use as an interface between companies determining whether to send a highly relevant commercial communication to that person (normally to their mobile telephone). [orig. unkn.]

Qustodian innovating with communities of passion, with data, with technology, & revenue models – Exhibit [a] Atletico Madrid. http://uk.qustodian.com/


Mass Niche Communities Of Interest


Girlswalker created in 2003 is for young women that love fashion. It is what I call a mass niche community of interest. The girls are not in anyone location but spread out across Japan, in fact heavy usage comes from young women that do not live in Tokyo, Kyoto or other major cities but are desperate to belong to a fashion tribe.


45% response rate €83m revenues in 2008


Be realistic imagine the impossible then create it!


The story of Local Motors reinventing the automotive industry


http://www.flickr.com/photos/10359714@N03/3056979962


what if…

we build the car of your dreams?

it was green?

we made it in your town?

we listened

we did it?


The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible


Competition & Community

Threadless Local Motors


A community of practice

Markets are conversations

Lessons


Fundamentally changes the relationship to supply and demand by rethinking and redesigning the process from conception to final production

whole systems


Fundamentally changes the relationship to supply and demand

Distributed knowledge network both Hyperlocal & Superglobal

knowledge


Open Source & Creative Commons Inoneyear44,000designsweresubmittedtoLocalMotors,and3600innovatorshavesharedtheirknowledgeandinsights.

legal, innovation, community


In one year 44,000 designs were submitted to Local Motors, and 3600 innovators have shared their knowledge and insights.

accelerated innovation with community


5X faster than traditional methodologies, and with more than 100X less capital From $200m development costs to $1.5

velocity and cost


Micro-Factories Locally which provide an engaged experience for customers, money flows into local communities, local jobs for local people.

economics, people, regions


C

Constant Feedback loop

aka: the learning organization

learning


The company: as a community, as a media platform. Competitions as risk mitigation & innovation accelerator, markets are conversations, mutuality a business strategy.

summary

6principles challenges


The cultural challenge of

how we get from here to there

philosophy skills

process motivation

tools


These are some of the organisations we have worked with, studied, and, talked to have have designed for transformation


[1] Participatory cultures

& tools


[2] Craftmanship

The maker of civilisation


[3] Adaptiveness

The capability to learn is not just nice to have; it has become a key factor for survival – not only for people, but for organisations, and industries.


[4] Ambiguity

Learning to deal with an uncertain

world


Openness [5]


is resilience

[6] Epic: seek epic wins


To seek Epic Wins we use synthesis’ & we design for transformation

To bring unlikes in close proximity To use our literacy To use our vision To use our tool box To identify patterns – not risk To Prototype


VIDEO http://smlxtralarge.com/2009/08/04/no-straight-lines-why-no-straight-lines/

What if ?


In the classrooms of our hospitals. The floors of our factories, in our villages, town and cities we are no longer content with the current status quo and we are asking so what comes NEXT.

So how do we see and connect to our best possible future potential instead of continuing to operate from the experience of the past?


http://ht.ly/7OAod


smlxtralarge.com no-straight-lines.com

no straight lines: making sense of our non-linear world

Business

unfair world

sense of ournon

morehuman centric world

straight lines introduction

new system trailblazers

systemhospicing of old

relationships of power

economic complexity