Alrighty... day two. Apple computers as far as the eye can see. Must be a design panel. Good morning, "The Imagination Challenge: Points of Departure for Design in the Knowledge Age." I don't know about you, but I'm already tired.

We are here for Alexander Manu, Director of the Beal Research Centre (although he's been identified as from the Ontario College of Art and Design). Notes follow...



- He's going to do a magic trick. Yup. He just did a magic trick. It's an icebreaker. "Reminds you that there is a mystery in the universe." "Design is magic... requires the same tools as the tricksters [he means shamans here] of old..."
- give meaning to technology through imagination
- "we create things in our mind, and if we see them on paper we give them life"
- [discusses the Fosbury Flop (a backwards leap)...a defining moment in high-jumping... the commentators were silent because the experience was outside of their previous sphere of knowledge]
- How to trigger imagination: We have to become children-- no, what children call a "grown-up" (not an adult).
- [anecdote about mismatched socks... too difficult to explain here ;)]
- Essence of human nature is to not take ourselves too seriously... except that we do...
- Talks about the Pingu kids' television show, and its universality due to having a nonsense language "my life is dedicated to understanding Pingu."
- [talks about bringing new ideas to corporations]
- Debuts a "new product": It's a Treo600... he notes the speaker of the Treo... notes the MP3 player... modulates the music coming out of the speaker with his mouth ("wah wah" style)
-"A year from now, we'll see speakers of enormous power in the mouths of people"
- Talks about Microsoft and notes how much of their budget is devoted to gaming
- "To create these new things, I've implemented an ecology of imagination."
- Notes the show "Art Attack," compares this to Martha Stewart (fast vs. slow).
- [discusses Barbie as a huge industrial force (uses 25% of fabric in USA)] By 2052 there will be more Barbies than people. What drives us to collect Barbie?
[begins a slide presentation featuring his son Sasha as a baby (Sasha is now 10 years old)]
- "Sasha likes balls." Recommends DJ Krush. Heh.
- Talks about how imagination is lost as we age... cites a conversation between a child and Piaget... a product of the industrial era... dichotomy between work and play... "There is no difference between work and play... Play has been subcontracted to other people [cites Tiger Woods]." Tiger Woods plays golf because we can't. He is like a hero of old... people who could do things we could not do. If you subcontract play, imagination, creativity dies.
- The Corporate Banner: "Don't play with your food." Notes irony that parent who introduces food through play eventually tells child not to play with food.
- "Corporations need imagination for business concepts..."
- New proposition: Play. Play all day. Play with numbers, with Barbie ideas... Use play as working method.
- "The ecology of possibility" Free, Separate, Uncertain, Unproductive, Governed by Rules, Make-Believe
- "Play is never a task." No deadlines. When it's done, it's done.
[Slides of daughter Sophie...now aged 5]
- "What could be possible"- had to unlearn... the accidental grown-up... wants to be seen as a child by children, and invited to play. Allowing yourself to play is a strength.
- Design and the human condition have sometimes been good friends, sometimes not.
- Things have a purpose... purpose leads to function... function leads to performance
- Being is an experience.
- "To become mature is to recover the sense of seriousnesss which one had as a child at play."
- Are "having" and "being" conneted to "imagination"
- For Sasha, there is no distinction between work and play.
- "Play means knowledge and mastery of the present in order to plan and deal with the future."
- Play: Things one must master (simplicity itself), in Tiger Woods' case, putting the ball in the hole
- Tactical execution requires imagination.
- "Creativity is an application... imagination is the pre-requisite."
- Human centered approach requires us to think of people as experential people.
- Trickster: A medium into the possibilities... shows Albert Einstein, Margaret Thatcher as examples
- "Hands don't play, the brain does."
- Tools and methods of possibilty: Discover, define, design.
- "I am interested in disruption" [not trends]
- Tactial protects, Strategy creates. "Lego adds value to plastic."
- Cites Bionicles as a refreshment of Lego strategy... "...adds value to plastic way more than bricks."
- The creation of new pathways as the future of design
- New business archetypes = new social invention
- "The camera is becoming an experience." Camera is all about memory, memory has many different components."
- The organized exploration of possibility
- We don't want computers, we want the benefit of the computer (in the home)
- Curiosity and imagination is triggered... a magical experience... how far do we go with our ideas, and where do we start.
- "We want to be gods."
- Nintendo DS looks better than the first-generation PDAs... the envy of any adult... "If you grow up playing with this toy, you will grow up being a different type of user... in what you expect in a method of control over every product you purchase."
- What do people really want, and how can we give it to them... How do we create new products and services today... What are the questions?
- Questions come from the play instinct: "What if your toilet could speak?" "What if your toothbrush could speak?" (These are domestic diagnostic tools). If you could ask your toothbrush a question, what would it be? If you could ask your mirror one question...?
- "If every person, object, and place could speak to one another, what would be the subject of their conversations?" "If they could look... what would they see?" "What does a place want to know?"
- "The future enters into us long before it manifests itself into the world."
- The challenge is not about triviality... in effect it is about designing the dream catcher
- "Sasha is in every one of you"
[Applause]