THOUGHTS TRIGGERED BY A MAGAZINE

Years ago I used to subscribe to lots of magazines which I rarely had time to read. I now realize that part of my problem finding time to read them is that most magazines don't interest me.

The Internet has so much information that it lessens the excitement of waiting for a magazine in the mail to learn some of the new things contained. Tonight I was in a Library, trapped in a chair listening to music without my iTouch or anything with which to keep more senses engaged. At intermission I went out of the room and found numerous magazines from which I selected one. Since I am not interested in decorating my house, cooking exotic dishes, sports, racing vehicles or other of the myriad subjects available, I chose Technology Review, an MIT enterprise. Jason Pontin wrote a stimulating editorial on Innovation, defining it as: 'needing to be valuable, meaning it must exist in a market or some more generic social context.' He believes that understanding technology is easy, but thinking creatively about it is not. Innovation is not inventing but improving something already there.

Needless to say, since innovation creates new ways of doing things, there is great resistance by institutions 'whose function is to promote continuity and stability', a quote from the Organisation for Economic and Co-operation Development. ( The OECD brings together the governments of countries committed to democracy and the market economy from around the world to: • Support sustainable economic growth
• Boost employment
• Raise living standards
• Maintain financial stability
• Assist other countries' economic development
• Contribute to growth in world trade The OECD also shares expertise and exchanges.

You can tell that the OECD has not been present in America our nation flunking all 6 of the points made.and the fact that Organisation is not spelled with a 'z'.

Traditionally, big cooperations have squelched innovators by buying their ideas and then letting quietly die on the shelf. Unions are not often interested in improving ways of doing things better, or even at all, if it means that it might cost a worker's job. Churches have little reputation for encouraging change or innovation. Our political structure is a bastion of rigidity, fighting change on most levels.

In 2006, Fortune Magazine wrote an article on Fighting Innovation Stagnation. It was a pleasure to read Science Fiction when we could only dream of some of the things that have become a reality. Reading Technology Review was like reading Science Fiction that might have been written in the 50s.