My BIL signed me up for a magazine that I read regularly, yclept Innovation.

A recent article [link] reminded me of the HB, thought y'all might enjoy the comparison. It seems to have an (over)simplified UI = 2 buttons :“Add an Idea” and “Discover Ideas.”

One interesting statistic - for one company, the method "generated about 900 ideas in six months, and seven of them have already been adopted. "

Has anyone here used this at work?

[link]
-- csea, Nov 05 2009

Computer Assisted Brainstorms http://www.innovati...x.php?articleID=572
Simplified (not necessarily better) UI = 2 buttons: “Add an Idea” or “Discover Ideas.” [csea, Nov 05 2009]

half-siblings http://www.halfbake...ditorial/links.html
you could add it to this list. [xaviergisz, Nov 05 2009]

Going by the article, the two buttons are just the simple entry point; there's a lot more behind that surface: a tag-based category system and some sort of task-management / idea development support. I haven't seen it.

Nothing of this is brainstorming, which is fine, since brainstorming is not a particularly useful way of making ideas - but they should have thought of a better title.

<whine> I think I know how those articles come into being - these companies have tame industry journalists that they take to lunch; they give them a pitch, then a demo, they introduce them to a happy customer, and the result is the nice round "here's how we thought of this" story that presents the finished software as a very simplified softball narrative, with zero competitive analysis, zero background, to an audience who presumably has never heard of the genre because they just moved here from planet Mars, where they're more concerned with oxygen and water and such. </whine>

I don't want to throw it on the half-siblings list because it's actually in a different market segment - they're selling software to enterprises, not allowing users to post something on a website.
-- jutta, Nov 05 2009


//brainstorming is not a particularly useful way of making ideas //

Depends on the use. Participants in a brainstorming session may feel more committed to the results than if they weren't consulted.

[jutta]'s <whine> looks like a fairly accurate assessment of the current journalistic practice. There's a second-order effect in that journalists are typically paid by publications, who rely on advertising revenue from the companies whose products are being pumped.

IIRC, the term of art is "puff piece."
-- csea, Nov 06 2009



halfbakery