Paul Moller on the Skycar

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/paul_moller_on_the_skycar.html

I want to be an engineer; more specifically, I want to make, modify, construct, and deconstruct things until I've come up with a way to make something useful out of it. This TED talk, given by Paul Moller, is one about tinkering with the two things required for invention: necessity and creativity. Since I was little, I loved legos, puzzles, and all kinds of building materials. As of recently, I've become interested in physics and how things work. Combining the two has led me toward the path of invention.

Paul's talk involves many parts of the invention process: the idea, his first approach, problems, misconceptions, then a repeat. I watched this talk to get a closer look at this process and how he went through it; I got an added bonus since he was talking about one of my long-standing interests (since grade school), flying from the comfort of your own home. He admits that many people have doubted this possibility countless times ever since Henry Ford predicted it back in 1940. But having the power to overcome people's (and sometimes your own) doubts is one of the main reasons I enjoyed watching Paul's talk. Many people will attest to his statement―that without a strong drive, the invention process fails.

Paul Moller is the president, CEO and chair of Moller International, which directs its efforts toward developing Moller's Skycar. His company also works on the M200, a low-flying disc, or volantor, that may go into production later in 2009. A partner company, Freedom Motors, builds the Rotapower engine. Moller developed the Aeronautical Engineering program at UC Davis while a professor there from 1963 to 1975. In 1972 he founded SuperTrapp Industries, and also led the group that developed the Davis Research Park Complex between 1975 and 1983. He's been working on "Vertical Takeoff and Landing" personal vehicles since the late 1960s.

I'm going to study Computer Science and Engineering at Santa Clara. Like Paul, I want to be able to take an idea and mess around with it until I can produce something useful or fun, like a computer program. Computers are becoming more and more a part of society; more and more they are becoming necessary to every day life: mainly in cell phones and home computers. I hope to make something that will be of use to many people, or something innovative that will change the way people live life―for the better. I can start by getting some experience by getting an internship or a job. Santa Clara is a great school for Computer Science and Engineering; with its 4-1 program, I can earn a bachelor's degree in four years and quickly upgrade to a master's degree in just one more year. Santa Clara is also great not only for its outstanding program, but because of its location in the heart of the Silicon Valley. I think I should be able to get plenty of experience and be on my way to using ideas to create new, useful products that people will enjoy.

Grace Chen - Seth Godin on Standing Out

http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_sliced_bread.html

The TED talk I watched was presented by Seth Godin, a marketer, author, public speaker, entrepreneur, and blogger who specializes in the marketing of ideas in the digital age. Godin’s blog is perhaps the most popular in the world written by a single individual, and he has written books about marketing, the spread of ideas, leadership, and initiating change. Because I have always valued the importance of creativity and being unique, the title of the TED talk—“Seth Godin on standing out”—is really what caught my eye. In addition, I saw that the speaker was referred to as a “marketing guru” and “marketing god,” and so, being interested in marketing and advertising, I decided to find out more about what he had to say.

Godin's main purpose in his TED talk was to emphasis the importance of spreading an idea and to make that idea “remarkable.” He starts out with the example of sliced bread; for the first 15 years since the invention of sliced bread, no one had heard about it, no one wanted it. It wasn’t until a company called Wonder came along and recognized the need to promote the product that sliced bread finally became a food phenomenon. Godin repeatedly claims that change fundamentally comes from whether or not one can get one’s idea to spread, and this principle applies to everyone, regardless of what they do. According to Godin, we are living in a century of idea diffusion, and all the products that succeed have done so because someone figured out how to reach people who are interested in those products. However, he says that the TV industrial complex, in which a company makes a larger profit by showing more ads through the media, is no longer working, because modern-day consumers now have way more choices and way less time than they used to, so they have simply become accustomed to ignoring ads. The key to getting noticed, therefore, is to be “remarkable.” Godin uses the metaphor of someone driving down a road next to cows. Since cows are “average” and “common,” one would generally ignore them. However, if a cow was purple, one would notice it, at least for a while. Therefore, the question that ultimately decides what gets noticed is: “Is it remarkable? Is it worth making a remark about?” And not only does one’s idea need to be different, but it also needs to be delivered to people with “otaku,” the Japanese term for obsession. The traditional marketing strategy was to target products towards the “average” crowd, but now, the “average” crowd has learned to ignore ads; the better strategy today is to target towards those with otaku, those who actually care and are willing to listen, and as a result, they will tell their friends, and the idea will continue to spread. Godin says that companies like Krispy Kreme and Apple have figured out otaku; they did not become successful by advertising excessively, but by being remarkable. The riskiest thing one can do, Godin says, is to be safe. Instead, it is crucial to be at the fringes and to be remarkable, since a “purple cow” is the only thing worth noticing.

Godin graduated from Tufts University in 1979 with a degree in computer science and philosophy, and he earned his MBA in marketing from Stanford Business School. In the mid-1980s, he worked as a brand manager at Spinnaker Software. After leaving Spinnaker Software in 1986, Godin founded Seth Godin Productions, primarly a book packaging business, out of his New York City studio apartment. He later founded his first internet company, Yoyodyne, and sold Seth Godin Productions to his employees in order to focus on Yoyodyne, one of the very first online marketing companies. It was with Yoyodyne that Godin came up with the concept of permission marketing — the idea that companies needed to rethink how they reached customers through the use of ethical direct mail online. After Yahoo! noticed his efforts and bought his company in 1998, Godin worked as Vice President of Direct Marketing at Yahoo! (Yahoo! currently has a model of a purple cow in the lobby of its Sunnyvale campus) before leaving to become a full time speaker, writer and blogger. Godin also founded Squidoo.com in 2005, a website started with the tagline “Everyone’s an expert (on something),” allowing anyone to create pages, called “lenses,” about any topic they are passionate about. The website raises money for charity and pays royalties to its more than a million members. As of October 2010, it is one of the 100 most popular websites in the United States.

According to Forbes.com, Godin is a “demigod on the Web, a best-selling author, highly sought-after lecturer, successful entrepreneur, respected pundit and high-profile blogger. He is uniquely respected for his understanding of the Internet.” A significant factor to Godin’s success and reputation as a leader in his field is his persistence and determination. As an entrepreneur, he founded dozens of companies, many of which failed. Nevertheless, he stayed consistent with his hard work and did not give up. Also, for a time, Godfin commuted every week between California and Boston in order to simultaneously work at his new job and complete his MBA, demonstrating his high level of dedication. By watching his TED talk video, it is also apparent that Godin is a strong leader through his confidence and assertion. He also gathers knowledge from experience, mentioning his own failures and pointing out mistakes that led up to those failures in order to reinforce his message. In addition, Godin knows how to reach his audience by talking about numerous examples that help to prove his point, and he inserts bits of humor throughout his talk to further attract his audience. And, of course, Godin is creative and thinks out of the box, which is the key to making something “remarkable” and spreading ideas for success.

In regards to my own life after high school, I’m thinking of majoring in either Marketing or Business Administration/Management and hopefully going to graduate school to earn an MBA, or at least a master’s degree in one of my areas of interest. As for internships, I worked as an intern at NAVAJO Marketing Communications last summer, so I might resume my internship there again this summer, or I may try and look for an internship elsewhere in order to expand my horizons. This summer I am also attending the American Legion Auxiliary's Girl State Leadership Conference to gain further leadership and management experience. I am not entirely sure of what specific jobs I want to apply for in the future yet, but they will most likely be in the area of marketing, business, advertising, management, or something where I can help come up with new ideas, since I am really just looking for a career in which I will be able to apply my creativity and leadership/management skills in order to help make an impact in the world, and eventually I want to direct those efforts towards serving others and making a direct difference in their lives. And although that may sound like an ambitious aspiration, to quote Edward Everett Hale: “I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do.”

Monica Chen - TED talk featuring Dan Phillips

Dan Phillips: Creative houses from reclaimed stuff~

After watching several thought-provoking TED talks from various areas of expertise from using mushroom polymers as an alternative to the harmful effects of plastic, to being exposed to the majesty of our world’s oceans and the horrors being afflicted upon its marine life, I ended up choosing one pertaining to architecture. Although I am still very much undecided on what I would like to study in college or the career I want to pursue, architecture has always been one of my, if you will, random, interests. Usually when someone brings up “architecture,” they think of perfect angles, symmetrical shapes, and practical styles. Yet there are those who break out of that mode of expectation and instead opt for uniqueness, which is why my speaker, Dan Phillips, and his message resonated so strongly with me. His specific talk is titled “Creative houses from reclaimed stuff” – essentially what he does is salvage all kinds of materials that were headed to the landfill because they were deemed “waste” and use them to build low-cost sustainable housing. These houses are custom-tailored to the eventual owners of each house, but in of themselves they are all individually wildly creative and usually thematic. Disturbed by the irony of landfills choked with building materials and yet a lack of affordable housing, in his talk Phillips describes what causes waste in the building industry in an attempt to help the audience better understand why he does what he does.

Among his many points, he expounds on the natural human tendency to want to maintain consistency and a familiar continuity, as well as the conflict between Apollonian perspective (premeditated and flawless) and Dionysian perspective (organic and intuitive). To Phillips, almost anything discarded and durable is potential building material: “It doesn’t matter if you don’t have a complete set of anything because repetition creates pattern, repetition creates pattern, repetition creates pattern.” Decorations that adorn his creations include hickory nuts, chicken eggs, branches, bones, bottle caps, broken tiles, and such, where almost everything was previously unwanted because things mismatched, were warped, or had blemishes. A lot of problems in the building industry are rooted in human behavior. According to Jean-Paul Sartre’s “Being and Nothingness,” human beings act differently when they know they are alone than when they know someone else is around. Because of this, we are constantly unconsciously living up to other people’s expectations of how we should live our lives, something that Phillips is distraught over when he sees it in the building industry as evidenced by all the monotonous and woefully mundane urban subdivisions. He is dedicated to sustaining the environment by forging his own path of architectural style that encompasses originality, passion, spontaneity, and an unwavering work ethic.

Now 66 and still going strong, Dan Phillips has had an astonishingly varied life, working as an intelligence officer in the Army, a college dance instructor, an antiques dealer, and a syndicated cryptogram puzzle maker. His many life aspirations only affirms his personality of being willing to try different things while putting just as much effort into each endeavor that he pursues. Phillips holds several academic degrees including a doctorate in education, and is a Professor Emeritus at Sam Houston State University. In 1996, he began his cause as a designer and builder based in Huntsville, Texas. He and his wife Marsha mortgaged their home to finance their own socially-conscious company, The Phoenix Commotion, a small local building initiative created to prove that constructing homes with recycled and salvaged materials has a viable place in the building industry. No two are alike due to the myriad of materials used, so there is an artistic element that makes these homes truly one-of-a-kind. Entirely unconventional, The Phoenix Commotion requires the homeowner to be involved with the planning and construction of his or her own home. The result is a person who is empowered, not only by the useful knowledge of building skills, but by the opportunity to become part of a community as a vested participant.

Phillips’ mesmerizing and eye-opening talk was genuinely inspiring for me in that it not only made me think about the boundless unnecessary waste of our daily lives, but also his resolute tenacity in defying the norm to work towards a better change in the world. His line of work allows him to take pride in doing his part in protecting Earth’s resources and preserving that spark of human creativity slowly being extinguished. Phillips said that his biggest reward was giving less-fortunate people the opportunity to own a home and watching them develop a sense of satisfaction and self-determination in the course of building it. As an artistic and open-to-many-possibilities type of person, I find his work fascinating and would be interested in being able to harness my creativity while also being able to work with my hands and contribute to environmental conservation. Because I am a junior, I still cannot clearly envision who I will be in the future, but Mr. Dan Phillips has definitely given me a lot to think about, especially his closing statement: “What we really need to do is reconnect with who we really are,” which in turn reminded me of Gandhi’s “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need but not every man’s greed.” One man’s trash is indeed another man’s treasure.

Darcy Kesterson - Life After High School

TED Talk: Changing Education Paradigms - Ken Robinson

In this specific TED talk, Ken Robinson talks about how most kids are getting their creativity educated out of them. When kids are young, they have massive amounts of potential to think creatively and use their imagination, but as they grow up their minds get solely wrapped up in learning. Before I really figured out what I wanted to do after I graduated high school, I spend most of my summers volunteering with kids. I began to fall in love with their imaginations, the way that they were always positive and coming up with brilliant idea after idea. I’ve always wondered why children seemed to be so inspiring with their perspective on life and this TED talk caught my eye.

Sir Ken Robinson was born and raised in England. He went through all his minor schooling and then attended at the University of Leeds to study English and drama. Once he got his Bachelor of Education there, he received a PhD at the University of London. Robinson spent most of his life in England, working through different programs all throughout Britain with an initiative to develop the arts educations. He talked mostly with the teachers and administrators rather than the children themselves. His main purgative was to stress the importance of the mind and letting its creative juices to flow. In 2003, Robinson was knighted for everything he did for inspiring creativity in education and the arts, as well as the economy. He wrote several books on the topics of the arts and the necessity of creativity. After listening to this TED talk, Robinson seems like a very well spoken man. He carriers himself in a very high manner and is very eloquent in his speech. His mind is clearly one of a creative genius. When he explains his ideas to the crowd, his point is easy to understand and clear. Since most of his time is spent reaching out to adult audiences, these qualities are necessary for his line of work.

Out of high school and into college, I think I would like to study education. I’ve been working with kids throughout my entire life, and I couldn’t imagine myself doing anything else as a career. Over the summers before I graduation from college, I hope to intern at a school and sit in a few classrooms. I’m still in contact with a few of my elementary school teachers and a few of them have already opened the possibility of me observing their classroom if I ever wanted to. One of the only things I am uncertain about is once I am a teacher, which age group I would like to teach. In Robinson’s talk, he stressed the difference in between young children and teenagers – the children had such creativity and imagination. In the past, I have volunteered at summer camps and worked with kids aged from six to fourteen. The smaller kids always seemed to have a wonderful time with all the crafts and they always seemed to have a positive outlook on what was going on. The older kids weren’t as spontaneous, but I felt as if I could hold a (somewhat) intellectual conversation with them.

My first paid job was as a head coach for a middle school softball team. Coaching a bunch of girls who had never even seen a softball before was challenging, but I was up for the task. They all had positive attitudes and I used that to help propel them forward. While working with them, I had several animated conversations that I’m pretty sure I’ll remember for a while, whether it was just joking around with them or actually conversing about the sport itself. Sometimes, I struggled to find new things to do with them. I didn’t want them to get discouraged and want to give up something that they had barely learned the basics of and I wanted them to have fun. Having a creative outlook on this definitely helped me think up new ways to do drills and scrimmages.

I hope that when I’m a teacher, whichever age group I end up teaching, that I will inspire my kids with a mature sense of imagination. My past work experiences should help me with this, and if I keep the goal in mind to keep children’s creativity running strong, I’m sure the future will be a brighter place.