Lesson for software engineers from a filmmaker

Picture from: Shekhar Kapur's Website

 

What could a filmmaker say to CEO’s attending a software conference?

Probably very little, unless you are Shekhar Kapur and unafraid of opening up your thoughts to scrutiny by strangers.

 

Giving up Control

Mr Kapur started by asking how a symphony is created? Does it happen by exercising control or by giving it up?

He didn’t provide an answer but rather hinted at it by asking more questions and describing his own experiences.

For instance, he recalled body surfing—something he did in his younger days. And he cited the experience of filmmaking, for which he is acclaimed now.

He says he prefers to work from loose scripts because the rigid ones leave little room for creativity. How do you create anything, when all you do is follow instructions?

His method is to be obsessed with the subject, and to do all the hard work and research in the preparatory phase. And then to panic!

This serves to disrupt the stranglehold of earlier preparation and frees him to live in the moment and make his decisions on the fly. It’s not unlike being in the zone, which is what breathes life into his work.

Just like with body surfing, his other example. You need to learn how to control your body in water. But you really surf only when you give up control.  It happens in the moment when you allow your body to follow the wave, rather than controlling anything. That’s when you cease to exist because you’ve become one with the wave.

It is, perhaps, also how symphonies are created. Beethoven’s fifth (my example), has a very precise structure in terms of group theory. But no mathematician has created a comparable work following the discipline of mathematics. And Beethoven, who created the masterpiece, is no mathematician and wasn’t following a mathematical procedure. 

We all know that Beethoven never really studied advanced mathematics. Yet he incorporates a surprising amount of math in his music, at very high levels. The beginning of his Fifth Symphony is a prime case, but examples such as this are legion. He "used" group theory type concepts to compose this famous symphony. In fact, he used what crystallographers call the Space Group of symmetry transformations! This Group governs many advanced technologies, such as quantum mechanics, nuclear physics, and crystallography that are the foundations of today's technological revolution. At this level of abstraction, a crystal of diamond and Beethoven's 5th symphony are one and the same!

Source: Chapt. One, IV.4, Mozart, Beethoven

Yes, the mathematics is there. But it was formed into the symphony when Beethoven let his imagination discover its structure, unfettered by any control. If there was discipline, it was went into training the musician and composer that Beethoven was, not in the actual act of creation of the symphony.

Okay, so what is the lesson for the software engineer?

Here, it is (and I hope Mr Kapur agrees):

Great software doesn’t come from following the detailed SRS that you or someone created. It is more likely to emerge when you do an obsessive amount of preparatory work, but respond to the requirements as you see them when the action begins.

 

Technorati tags: Shekhar Kapur, Catalyst2008, software development, SOA, filmmaking

Predicting Success

Scott Adams says he didn't foresee that Dilbert would be successful as a workplace strip.

When Dilbert launched in newspapers, the response was underwhelming. In the early years, it wasn't a workplace strip. It was about Dilbert's life in general. He just happened to have a job. I was surprised to learn, via my e-mail, that readers loved the relatively rare comics featuring Dilbert in the office. Personally, I didn't think those were my best work. My ego told me to do it my way. My readers told me I was wrong.

The Dilbert Blog: The Loser Decision

However, while discussing hypnosis not too long ago, Scott had told us:

... Dilbert is designed using tricks I learned from hypnosis. The reason Dilbert has no last name, and the boss has no name, and the company has no name, and the town has no name is because of my hypnosis training. I remove all the obvious obstacles to imagining Dilbert works at your company.

Were Dilbert comics carefully designed for a target audience. Or did Scott realize, with help from his audience, that a comic featuring Dilbert at the workplace is the way to go?

Could it be both?

Bloggers, some very successful ones, often admit that they aren't good at predicting their successful posts.

I guess it's the same with songwriters, filmmakers, entrepreneurs, and managers that plan the displays at departmental stores. They must try different things and adopt what seems to work.

In other words, you don't create a successful strategy, but rather discover it.

A lot of intelligence lies in being quick to learn.

 

Related: Conversation in the digital world

Technorati tags: Dilbert, predicting success, attention, natural selection, intelligent design, Darwin

Clinical trial gone horribly wrong?

In Mobilizing Opinion, Herding Butterflies I compared trying to mobilise bloggers' opinion with herding butterflies.

While holding that the comparison remains valid, I'd like to revisit the story of the baby with one eye that Scott Carney presented at BlogCamp. He gave more details of the case in this post later the same evening, where he also provides a link to the original story he'd done for Wired News.

The facts, in very brief, are as follows:

It’s suspected that the child’s mother, Gomathi, was prescribed cyclopamine at a fertility clinic. (Some anticancer drugs are known to promote ovulation and have been tried for this purpose in the past.)

However, cyclopamine can cause birth defects, specifically cyclopia: the name given to the otherwise rare congenital disorder that means only one eye in the foetus.

It is irresponsible to administer this drug to a pregnant woman, much less to prescribe it for fertility problems. The question is, did this actually happen?

1. Was the fertility clinic trying a reckless shot in the dark?
2. Was an unapproved and unethical trial conducted, with or without Gomathi’s knowledge or consent?

Can the bloggers help unravel the truth?

If you would like to help, a good place to begin your research would be Scott's update at Finding the Birth Certificate and Cyclopamine.

Tags: chennaioneeyedbaby, cyclopamine

Use del.icio.us for Managing Contacts!

David Brunelle has some good tips at: Become a del.icio.us Power User.

I've been using del.icio.us to also manage contacts. Here is how.

Almost everyone has a company (or sometimes a personal) URL on their business card. You can bookmark that page with:

1. His or her name


2. The place you met


3. Person who introduced the two of you


4. Interests you share, or whatever

For example, you could bookmark http://sunilbajpai.blogspot.com with "Sunil.Bajpai BlogCamp city.Chennai Kiruba piano government", etc. And you could write your impressions about me, things we chatted about or promises made (let's meet for a drink at the Club).

You'd now discover my other affiliations, if I ever walk into your office and present my business card with the company URL. And you'd automatically link me with other people in the same company, city, etc.

It hardly takes a few seconds, the date and time is saved with the item, and it beats scribbling behind business cards by a wide margin.

Bonus: Others may have bookmarked the same pages. You might learn something interesting or important there!

Tags: BlogCamp, power user, del.icio.us, lifehack, lifehacks

Is blogging any use for politics?

A young lady, Veena of http://netandhost.com, started a discussion (not a presentation, despite the powerpoint) on political blogging. It soon looked took on aspects of the political debates we have seen on TV.

Here are the questions and my responses to them:

1. Would a politician blog? How many would be willing to give you something in writing when they may have to stand by it?

Politicians make statements all the time. They get widely reported in print and get captured in video. That never frightened them off!

2. There has to be a criteria for selection of politicians. Many are not even literate? And when their constituents are illiterate people, why would somebody use a medium like blogging?

When the majority of Indians are illiterate, why do have largely politics discussed in our mainstream newspapers?  And that too in English?

3. Can bloggers not focus the attention of politicians on issues by blogging about them?

Yes, I am sure. Especially if they pick on current hot topics. Nuclear deal with the US. Reservations. Political interference in criminal investigations. The proposed amendments to RTI.

4. Political blogging and politician blogging are different.

That's a valid point. We must not confuse the two.

5. It would get reduced to PR agency handling the blog!

Probably. But do we care when a politician's office answers your letter, if it's under his signature? Do company CEO's answer all their letters? Atul Chitnis doesn't allow comments and may not respond to mails he gets. Big politicians would probably have bigger problems than his for similar reasons?

6. Free bags of rice get votes whereas technology could lead to a negative, "out of touch with the constituent image" for a politician.

Let's not forget that the rice could be more important to someone than rhetoric.

Tags: BlogCamp, BlogCampLive

They help the most, who collaborate

As the local community in Nagapattinam district struggled to respond to the devasting impact of the December 2004 tsunami, some bloggers created an "on the fly" internet resource to direct help and focus. In the process they also created and archived a snapshot of the unfolding story. And many other independent bloggers documented, with pictures and poems, the reality that so easily gets hidden in statistics.

Last year I was in this district on a two-week study with three other officers of the Government of India. These blogs were an invaluable resource in understanding the situation and each actor's response to it.

Earlier today I met two of these bloggers: Peter Griffin and Dina Mehta. Hats off to both of them!

Tags: BlogCamp

Mobilising opinion, herding butterflies

Scott Carney presented a case of a child born with one eye. He posed the question:

Would bloggers take up stories like these and pressure the authorities into investigating what may have caused it?

Dina made an immediate and very valuable suggestion. Set up a Technorati tag and let people blog about it. Very soon you'd have mobilised an opinion. How simple and effective!

Someone pointed out that the actual story has appeared in the main stream media. You'd expect that, won't you? A story like this is conventional news.

Yes, it was something horrible to have happened to the child and the family. But is it the most important thing that bloggers need to take up? I don't think so, especially when we have little more than vague suspicions about a drug being the reason.

You can mobilse blogging opinion, but not in any direction that you wish it would take. Sorry folks, you don't get my vote here.

Tags: BlogCamp, collaboration, mobilisation of opinion, mobilization

Update: Tags: cyclopamine ChennaiOneEyedBaby