Inventor and Founder
The Bootstrap Institute
Fremont, California
These days, the problem isn't how to innovate; it's how to get society to adopt the good ideas that already exist. Sure, innovation is critical, but it doesn't amount to anything unless the rest of the world does something with it. I've spent years spinning my wheels, trying to get the world to act on the potential that's out there. I invented the computer mouse in 1963, and the world didn't adopt it until nearly 20 years later. When the mouse first came out, people thought that it was too hard to use! So Apple's mouse has just one button on it.
Why? Because everything has to be easy to use! That mentality has retarded our growth. Everything must be easy to use -- but from whose perspective? From the perspective of a brand-new user? What about the user who has a little more experience?
The business of knowledge work can and should move ahead more quickly. Computers can help us augment the human intellect -- if we let them. I'm trying to get the world to wake up and to start taking advantage of this potential.
Douglas Engelbart (engelbart@bootstrap.org) debuted the first mouse -- his best-known invention -- at a San Francisco conference in 1968. At that same conference, he also demonstrated an array of visionary applications. The Bootstrap Institute (www.bootstrap.org), which Engelbart founded with his daughter Christina, offers colloquiums, management seminars, consulting services, and educational publications and videotapes.
Artist and Author
Englewood, New Jersey
Creativity comes from our earliest desire to play. I often hear people say that when you get older, you forget to play. I disagree. After all, if you aren't having any fun doing whatever you do, then you're probably not going to do very much of it. We adults play all the time. We have tons of "toys" to play with, and when we get involved with our toys -- our computers, our cameras -- we lose ourselves. Fiddling with our toys is a form of meditation: It takes us away from our physical selves and away from the reality of life, and it allows us to dream. It mesmerizes us. Our gadgets enable us to work and play at the same time. When we're using them, time zips by. That experience is a great gift, and it's why some people work all the time.
The great enemy of creativity is fear. When we're fearful, we freeze up -- like a nine-year-old who won't draw pictures, for fear that everybody will laugh. Creativity has a lot to do with a willingness to take risks. Think about how children play. They run around the playground without thinking about where they're going. They trip, they fall down, and then they get up again and run some more. They have a wonderful belief: that everything will be all right. They feel capable; they let go; they play. Good businesspeople behave in a similar way: They lose $15 million, gain $20 million, lose $30 million, and earn it back. If that isn't playing, then I don't know what is!
No matter how many facts and figures you have, you can't predict the future. There will always be surprises. Things that are supposed to be successful won't be, and things that are supposed to fail will succeed. Creativity helps us realize that we don't have to understand everything. We can enjoy something -- feel it and use it -- without ever fully comprehending it.
Faith Ringgold (any1canfly@aol.com) creates colorfully painted quilts that document the lives of African Americans by telling vivid stories of race, politics, and identity. She has turned some of her narratives into children's books, the first of which, "Tar Beach" (Crown Publishers, 1991), won a Caldecott Honor Medal and the Coretta Scott King Award for Illustration. Ringgold's work can be viewed in many museums, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art. Learn more about Ringgold on the Web
(www.artincontext.org/artist/ringgold).
Chemist
Wilmington, Delaware
If you want to innovate, you have to have three things: a certain level of knowledge about your field; a great desire to do something useful, either for society or for an industry; and an objective. Your objective may be broad or narrow, but you must have one. You must be willing to try different approaches to a problem, and you must not give up until you find an answer.
There is one other necessary quality: a receptive mind. You have to be open to the unexpected, so that, if you come upon a discovery, you'll recognize it and act upon it. If I hadn't had an open mind back in 1965, I never would have discovered how to make the fiber that is used in bulletproof vests.
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