Google Patent
The second I read about Google Patent on ZDnet, I rushed to write this post. Google making patent search easy gives me so much to talk about I can’t possibly cover it all in a single post. This could break open the flood gates of invention and hopefully innovation.
I’ve been talking about Google doing this for several years. The reason I’ve been so interested is the OutCompete method for predicting future innovation. Think about this for a moment. If you had a list of all possible innovations and an easy way to see which ones were already patented you could go down the list and patent the new ones before anyone else did.
Talk about idea factory! This is systematic innovation!
Of course for someone to do this they need the financial resources to file those patents. And to turn it from invention into innovation they need the engineering & marketing capability. Which company has a lot of cash, a bunch of smart people, and the ability to reach a global market? Google! So will they do this? I don’t know. We haven’t shared the OutCompete method with them yet, we would be glad to do so. Since they are opening up a location in Ann Arbor we’ll be neighbors. So, who knows?
What does all of this mean to you? If your company has a specific niche and you want to secure your market or grow a new one you now have some serious tools for doing it.
Its impossible for one company to patent everything, as I said in my last post “Google is an Innovation Amateur“ there are on average 50,625 ways to achieve any goal. That is a whole lot of patents. And how many goals are there? Infinite!
So, you can block off threats to your niche, and quickly generate a series of innovations to ensure your success for many years to come.
When I first learned the OutCompete method I sat down and applied it to a couple of industries, just to see what I came up with. At the time I was working with BitTorrent and trying to figure out new business models so artists could prosper in an environment where file sharing was now impossible to stop.
In a few hours I created about a dozen solutions to the file sharing problem. One of these doubles the artists profits and give them more artistic freedom, pretty cool. I also discovered a serious threat lurking that could completely disrupt Network TV. And it had nothing to do with copyrights. Even better I found a way for Network TV to triple their return on investment.
With a map of every possible innovation it’s easy to find super valuable opportunities. And possibly more important it’s easy to see vulnerabilities while you still have a chance to do something to save yourself.
Action Items
- Use Google Patent to search for term related to your top product
- Estimate the cost of loosing your current top product, including needing to replace it
- Estimate the value of 12 new inventions, including reducing risk from competitors.
Attention Economy
Economics is defined as the study of production, distribution, and consumption of scarce resources. The key word is scarce. In the ever-increasing information age we are finding that scarcity is a fiction. Even when we look at physical items there is no practical limit and when we consider non-physical items broadly classified as intellectual property there is absolutely no limit. In fact intellectual property becomes more valuable as it is consumed and more people have it. It operates exactly the opposite of scarcity.
As the amount of information increases exponentially we are discovering another phenomenon. Instead of a shortage we have information overload, too much information. As copies of information are made it leads to discovery of new information and the cycle increases even faster.
The overload of information points to something that does have a natural scarcity, attention. Each of us has limited amount of ability to pay attention to any thing. Since we only live for a maximum of 120 years that sets a cap on the total amount of attention any one of us has to give
Hopefully you see that the total amount of attention is unlimited as long as there are more people. But at any given point in time and for each individual attention is a scarce commodity. And since scarcity leads to increased demand attention is becoming realized as the item of value.
In an Attention Economy the people that become rich are those that can efficiently attract and maintain attention. In the past that meant controlling the information distribution systems such as print, then radio and television. Now that the Internet exists no one controls the information distribution system. The playing field is equalized in that regard. There still are some physical barriers such as bandwidth and server capacity but even those have been conquered with technologies such as BitTorrent and other peer-to-peer systems.
To compete in an Attention Economy you must provide the desired information in the most efficient manner. Allowing and encouraging people to share and copy is an essential tool. Providing formats that are easily converted to other languages, media or methods of distribution increases the attention you receive.
All of that flies in the face of the scarcity model, and that is the point. If you want to do well in the Attention Economy you need to operate by different rules. But those rules have always existed. Give and you shall receive.
Action Items
- Note how many sources of information you look at before feeling its enough or even too much.
- Notice the types of media you prefer to get information through such as radio, television, Internet, newspapers, person to person.
- Ask other people which types of media they prefer and why.
Predictive Innovation Training
Predictive Innovation: Core Skills Book
RoundSquareTriangle.com