On Jan 1, 2010, at 9:54 PM, Ed H.Chi wrote:
In my comments, I said:
"Ultimately, the measuring stick that we ought to use is the amount
of impact each (tech vs. design) brings to the innovation process.
... It is much easier to think of major disruptions coming from the
technology side. ... To wit, that's why it we call it a
"disruption"! It disrupts current ways of doing things. There is an
element of surprise in the "disruption", suggesting that the need
might not have been there yet."
You did say that and I apologize for removing that part of the quote.
However, I don't completely buy it.
There's both active and latent needs. Active needs are what we know
right now, what we can elaborate. (Right now, I need a chocolate chip
cookie.) Latent needs are needs that I have, but I can't elaborate
because I don't have a context to put my words into.
Fax machines changed the world of communication, giving us the ability
to transmit documents over huge geographical distances almost
instantaneously. But the need to do that wasn't new. It went back
thousands of years, which is why emperors and wealthy business men
used messengers.
However, if you went back to one of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty
and asked them what they needed, they would never say they needed a
fax machine.
And to Don's point, the ethnographers of the time wouldn't have come
up with that design solution either.
The question about disruptions is: could the disruption happen earlier
than it does? Or do latent needs require time to hatch?
Jared
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