Generational Cycles – A Star Is (Re-) Born

Darrell Mann

The Star Is Born story has become an iconic one: Fading star discovers and nurtures the next generation star, and then dies. It is a classic Hero’s Journey tale. One with, quite literally, a death of the ‘old’ … Read More

Short Thort

Darrell Mann

“It is because Humanity has never known where it was going that it has been able to find its way.” Oscar Wilde

Related posts:

1. TRIZ India Podcast- Murali interviews Darrell Mann

… Read More

Biology – Spittlebug

Darrell Mann

The froghoppers, or the superfamily Cercopoidea, are a group of hemipteran insects in the suborder Auchenorrhyncha. Adults are capable of jumping many times their height and length, giving the group their common name. They are perhaps best known, … Read More

Investments – Prosthetic Voice

Darrell Mann

“In my head, I churn over every sentence ten times, delete a word, add an adjective, and learn my text by heart, paragraph by paragraph,” wrote Jean-Dominique Bauby in his memoir, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.” In … Read More

Physical Contradictions: Solving Or Managing?

Darrell Mann

“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” Albert Einstein

For me, the physical contradiction part of TRIZ/SI still remains the weakest part of the toolkit. Something has been niggling … Read More

Wow In Music – No Me, No You, No More

Darrell Mann

I was reading the inspiring book, ‘Your Song Changed My Life’, by Bob Boilen a few weeks ago. In the book, Boilen interviews a number of my favourite artists asking them, per the book’s title, which music changed … Read More

Patent of the Month – Strengthening Member

Darrell Mann

We head to the Motor City for our patent of the month this month, to a trio of inventors at Ford. Their strengthening-member patent, US10,279, 842, was granted on 7 May. Here’s what the trio has to say … Read More

Best of The Month – Zucked

Darrell Mann

“Move Fast, Break Things”. The Facebook corporate motto. An, as it turns out, iconic example of reaping what you sow. A strategy that Roger McNamee amply demonstrates, not only allowed the most rapid rise of any corporate entity … Read More

The Innovation ‘Golden Triangle’

Darrell Mann

98% of all innovation attempts end in failure. 98% of all TRIZ-originated innovation attempts end in failure. 98% of all Design-Thinking-originated innovation attempts end in failure. The same 98% figure applies to almost every problem-solving tool, method or … Read More

The Coffee Panacea

Darrell Mann

Upon learning this month that caffeine makes perovskite photovoltaics more stable, thus enhancing their commercial potential in the next generation of solar-cells https://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/green-tech/solar/java-takes-the-jitters-out-of-solar-cells, it made us wonder what other miracles coffee was capable of achieving. Turns out quite … Read More

Patent of the Month – Nerve Stimulation Method

Darrell Mann

Our patent of the month this month takes us to the New Jersey-based enterprise, Electrocore LLC. US10,252,074 was granted to a trio of inventors at the company on 10 April. The company has been around and offering non-invasive … Read More

Short Thort

Darrell Mann

“In the received wisdom, which assumes that the problem is resistance, it follows that what is needed to overcome the resistance is leadership. So when the project fails, this is seen as resulting … Read More

Investments – Material Design AI

Darrell Mann

Discovering how atoms – such as a single layer of carbon atoms found in graphene, one of the world’s strongest materials – work to create a solid material is currently a major research topic in the field of … Read More

Systems (Three Different Kinds)

Darrell Mann

Ask ten systems engineers to define what a system is and you’ll get at least eleven answers. Worse: they’re probably all correct. Worst: the differences, valid as they might be, create enormous potential confusion and as a result … Read More

Wow In Music – First We Take Manhattan

Darrell Mann

With 20/ 20 hindsight, it makes perfect sense that Jennifer Warnes’ exquisite 1986 album, Famous Blue Raincoat: The Songs of Leonard Cohen, became a critical and commercial success. After all, Cohen is now widely regarded as one of … Read More

Biology – Long-Tailed Tit

Darrell Mann

Long tailed tits, recognisable by their undulating flight, a tail much longer than its small, pinkish body and generally flying in a small flock, are also known as ‘flying teaspoons’. You generally hear them before you see them … Read More

Generational Cycles – How The LP Saved (Baby Boomer) Lives

Darrell Mann

I wasn’t sure whether to put this one into the ‘Best Of The Month’ or ‘Wow In Music’ sections of the ezine, but ultimately, this month’s publication of (Baby Boomer) David Hepworth’s homage to the long-playing record could … Read More

Best of The Month – The Science Of Storytelling

Darrell Mann

Budding authors have literally hundreds of books to choose from if they’re looking for ‘help’ to make their writing better. Nearly all of them seem to be weak imitations of Joseph Campbell’s ‘Hero With A Thousand Faces’, or … Read More

The Resilience Zone

Darrell Mann

At the end of last month, I published a blog article regarding, what I think is a better way of mapping complexity (Reference 1). It was a bit of a strawman. Something I thought might burn on exposure … Read More

40 Inventive (Shoe) Principles

Darrell Mann

After last month’s criticism of the fashion industry’s lack of creativity, we faced a backlash. Armies of angry fashionistas carrying placards outside our offices. Chants of ‘you’re not fit to wear the shirt’. It was, frankly, time for … Read More