It was 15^th January of 1999 and we were celebrating ‘Vasi-Uttarayan’ at Chintan’s Nani’s place.  India had just finished a three-test series against New Zealand and Rahul Dravid, was the best batsman for India. He had scored two wonderful centuries at Hamilton in the last test and saved the test for India. Something he repeated on numerous occasions for the next 13 years. Salil, my friend and an underrated cricket talent himself was telling me, “Rahul Dravid is the find of the tour” but soon we started talking about Sourav Ganguly’s flamboyant century in the same Hamilton test. That was the summary of Dravid’s career till 2001. He was the most reliable and the most consistent batsman of the side but was always overshadowed by Tendulkar’s legendary status and by Ganguly’s glamour.

Rahul Dravid is the second highest run scorer in the test history. According to many he is the second best batsman of the modern era after Sachin Tendulkar, and that has been his fate always, or definitely was so for the first half of his career. He was always the second best. Even when he was the best, he was the second best. It started with his debut. He played a gem of an innings at Lords and missed a century by five runs and followed it with a flawless eighty at Old Trafford. But another Test Debutant Sourav Ganguly scored two centuries in the same consecutive tests and Rahul was the second best. Dravid was a master of defence. He valued his wicket. Unfortunately that led to him being tagged, quite unjustifiably, as slow or a ‘test’ batsman. Had Sourav Ganguly not insisted on him using as Wicket Keeper, he might even have lost his place in the one-day squad.

But Rahul Dravid never complained. He symbolized grit and determination. He just hung on. He kept playing beautiful match saving silent knocks in every condition. If there was one game which served as tipping point that made converted India from a decent side to a champion side it was Kolkata test, 2001. After following on India were still trailng by 44 runs and had already lost 4 wickets. And Rahul Dravid went out to bat at no.6. He had to vacate his favourite no.3 position for in-form batsman VVS Laxman. Dravid joined Laxman in the middle and what followed is history. Dravid made an impeccable 180. Once again he was overshadowed by 281 by VVS Laxman – One of the greatest innings in the history of the game. After this series Dravid established himself as the most reliable batsman of the squad and the year 2003/04 placed him among the greatest batsmen of Indian cricket. In the successful tours to Australia and Pakistan (where he even captained the side in two tests) Dravid played a big role. In fact his innings of 233 at Adelaide not only proved to be match winning but sowed seeds of confidence and courage that later Indian sides showed overseas.

He had all the qualities to be a great leader. He was well respected, he was a fantastic performer and he had a deep understanding of the game. Unfortunately his tenure as captain coincided with one of the controversial coaches that India had had, Greg Chappel. But even during such a tumultuous period he didn’t allow his batting to suffer. In fact his two half centuries at Sabina Park Kingston not only got India a victory but inspired Brian Lara to remark that it was the finest piece of test batting that he had seen.

Rahul Dravid has been so consistent over years that it’s difficult to remember a lean patch of his. His brilliance lies in the fact that he always looked comfortable while batting. He succeeded where everybody else failed. His posture and stance with eyes oozing determination and the left elbow with an outward kink were a symbol of graft. His technique was so sound that even when he faced the first delivery of the innings it looked as if he had been there for hours. In the age of shortening attention spans and increasing influence of T20 cricket, he protected value of grit and technique.

Long back Kapil Dev used to present a series called ‘Different Strokes’ where he interviewed a young Rahul Dravid. By the end of the interview Kapil Dev asked him, “You were a good student in school. You were the best in cricket. You were a nice kid at home. How is it possible? How can anyone be perfect in everything?” Rahul Dravid had just smiled in response. But that’s what Rahul Dravid has been for all of us all these years. A great batsman, a gentleman cricketer, a fantastic team player and a humble individual. We may get better batsmen than him in future, but will there be another gentleman like him?

Thank you Rahul. Thanks a lot!

Fun Theory campaign was all about motivating people to come up with creative solutions to mundane issues. However, the idea was, how can a social/behavioral problem be solved by making it fun to deal with? For example, we all know that people should obey speed limits on city streets as well as on highways, but still many don’t obey speed limits. Can we make more people obey speed limits by making it fun to do? We all are advised by doctors, friends and colleagues that we should use stairs instead of escalators or elevators, still we don’t. Can we make more people take stairs by making it fun to do so? Can we make more kids clean up their rooms by making it fun to do so?

Volkswagen’s Fun Theory campaign got many interesting viral video entries in response to this.  This entire campaign has touched on two important aspects of creativity. First, the assumption that fun or enjoyment is an integral part of creative behavior. In my Creativity workshops or Negotiation classes, I have observed a ‘circular’ relationship between fun and creativity. In other words, when a participant seeks joy, he starts getting ideas that are out of the box. On the other hand, at times, even though seeking joy might not be the main objective, when participants are able to come up with very creative solutions, they always qualify their experience as ‘fun’.

But why did DDB take up the theme of Fun for a Volkswagen theme? Volkswagen had introduced Bluemotion technology in 2006 and wanted to generate widespread interest around that. Bluemotion technology’s theme was that of reducing environmental impact without compromising the joy of driving. Volkswagen asked DDB to design a campaign around a theme. DDB saw that Volkswagen was actually solving a problem, by making it more fun to do. DDB decided to carry out experiments in different spheres of our lives where a problem was solved by making it fun to deal with. DDB’s decision to deal with actual ‘Fun’ videos and not going for traditional advertising paid off. It generated massive interest and in the end DDB rightfully grabbed the Cyber Grand Prix.

Another insight that can be drawn here is the effective use of media in making use of, what can be termed as, ‘social creativity’.  This campaign does show the possibility of using creativity of people in solving a common problem, by being able to create the appropriate platform.

One of the most popular Fun theory experiments is the one, now known as, ‘Piano Stairs’. Here is the video, look at it and enjoy.

It’s impressive that he, without losing patience and perseverance, worked for more than 10 years to construct an entire stadium, players and spectators. He has shown greater patience in filming these very neatly and meticulously designed animations. He was first discovered by bild.de and then by Guardian. England goalie Robert Green provided him the material for the moment of genius. Look at the video attached below and please wait till the Robert Green howler. It’s truly priceless! (Those who understand German, can listen to Moritz himself in an interview..click here).

Video courtsey – www. guardian.co.uk & www.legofussball.eu

I Don't Cry for You, Argentina

Tremendous rivalry between Latin American neighbors, Brazil and Argentina is providing inspiration to some businessmen for coming up with new creative marketing schemes.

Boteco Olé, a bar well recommended to the Cariocas to go and watch world cup soccer games, has an interesting marketing gimic. It offers free beer shots to all those who are present, when Brazil scores. Understood! So what? Well, they also have a special offer for games played by Argentina. They offer free Beer shots (or chopes as they call it), for every Goal scored against Argentina. So far rivals of Argentina have troubled the bartender just once (S.Korea Vs. Argentina)  though.   The title of this scheme is…’não choro por ti, Argentina‘ (I don’t cry for you, Argentina).   An interesting twist on Evita!

Source : www.hardware.sk

Larrabee is dead! Intel has announced one of the most ambitious graphics ventures’ demise on a blog post by Bill Kircos, Intel’s Director of product and technology . Intel didn’t announce it explicitly though, but fFortunately, Ryan Smith at Anandtech has deciphered it for us.

Four years ago rumours surfaced that ‘a shadowy organization called Larrabee Development Group‘ had launched itself to do the unthinkable in the High-end graphics chip industry. It had decided to take head on the two big crocodiles of the pond, namely NVidia and AMD. However, Job vacancy postings on Intel’s website did little to hide that Larrabee was an Intel venture. After a few months Intel proudly announced launch of Larrabee, a multi-core processor design which was supposed to compete with other GPGPU based (General Purpose Graphic Processing Unit) future products from competitors NVIDIA and AMD. Larrabee was supposed to be something like a combination of GPU/CPU. A chip that would have a full programmability of a CPU and throughput computing feature of a GPU. (see image below)

However, Intel’s foray into producing a Multi-core GPGPU Chip didn’t bother Nvidia and AMD much. On the contrary their strategies were not at all affected by Intel’s apparent plans. Both of them rather steadily went ahead with their strategy of Integrated Graphics.

After missing their initial product launch deadlines, last December Intel delayed the Graphic Processor launch and decided to downsize Larrabee to Software Development Platform. The product was now slated to arrive sometime in 2010. However Bill Kircos in his blog at Intel’s website has discretely written, “We will not bring a discrete graphics product to market, at least in the short-term.”

This means, Larrabee – the product is not coming to shelf. This case brings us back to the issue of abandoning innovation that was discussed here at Creatologue in the light of Microsoft’s abandonment of Courier. However, Larrabee’s case is quite peculiar. Larrabee, if it would have been launched would have been quite a radically innovative product. As is shown in the  image below.

What Intel has done by abandoning Larrabee is effectively imitating its competitors by focusing on Integrated Graphics rather than thinking about a CPU/GPU hybrid.

It would really be interesting to explore when a company might abandon a radical innovation project? One obvious reason was that it wasn’t giving expected results. But then, in an uncharted technology category, it will always be difficult to estimate performance. On the other hand, while its competitors in the graphics processing segment, have a strong presence, especially NVIDIA being stronger in gaming segment, overall Intel is incomparably bigger than these competitors. Given it’s size Intel shouldn’t worry about economies of scale or scope. The only other probable expectation is shift in strategic importance of the innovation (Agarwal, Barry and Tripsas, 2005). Why such a touted innovation lost its importance before it could see the light of the day, only time will tell.

Reference

Agarwal, Rajshree; Bayus, Berry & Tripsas, Mary. 2005. ‘Abandoning Innovation in an Emerging Industry. ‘ Working Paper.

The study also mentions that creative people share certain psychological traits (e.g. ability to make bizarre associations) with schizophrenics due to Dopamine D2 receptor genes. Dr. Frederik Ullén and his research team basically studied the brain and the Dopamine D2 receptors. Dopamine receptor genes are linked to the ability for divergent thought. In the mentioned study, people who showed higher levels of creativity (divergent thinking) also showed a lower density of Dopamine D2 receptors in thalamus, which is also a trait commonly found among the schizophrenic. Thalamus (see the image) is that part of brain which filters and relays information before it reaches cortex, where cognition and reasoning take place. Lower density of D2 receptors means less filterning and a greater flow of information, which in turn increases the possibility of more bizarre associations and imaginations.

So if you’re crazy, you might be creative; and vice-versa!!! or in the words of Dr. Frederik Ullén, “Thinking outside the box might be facilitated by having a somewhat less intact box”.

Reference

de Manzano O, Cervenka S, Karabanov A, Farde L, & Ullén F (2010). Thinking outside a less intact box: thalamic dopamine D2 receptor densities are negatively related to psychometric creativity in healthy individuals. PloS one, 5 (5) PMID: 20498850

Songs of Football – click here to listen online or download. (Courtsey : RNE 3. Program – Cuando los elefantes sueñan con la música)

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A Jugaad Vehicle (Courtsey - Wikipedia)

I was surprised to see this article in Businessweek. The article introduces ‘Jugaad’ (pronounced as joo-gaa-rh) as the next management buzzword in making. Translating ‘Jugaad’ is rather difficult. It rather means ‘getting something done by any means’. In this article Jugaad has been presented as a new Innovation philosophy. As per the article, the term has already entered MBA classrooms and in-company training sessions.

Interestingly Jugaad also reminds us of ‘Jugaad vehicles’ we normally find in rural parts of northern India. These vehicles are made by using a diesel engine and a wooden cart. But, how different is Jugaad from improvisation, ingeunity or creativity? Well, only time will tell, how the term evolves within management lexicon.