Catalyst Awards And ROI: The Innovation Equation, Conference.

Next week I'll be handing out Catalyst awards to the best-selling, best designed products of 2006, juried by the IDSA, at the ROI conference in NYC. There's still some room so check it out. The focus of the conversation will be on how to sustain innovation at your corporation. Getting beyond the one-shot win is a key problem in business culture.

The conference begins on Thursday, Dec. 7 and goes through Friday, Dec. 8 and has some great speakers. The high-powered talent includes Steve Kaneko of Microsoft, Philip Thompson of Whirlpool, Jim Wicks of Motorola, Dev Patnaik from Jump Ass., Alistair Hamilton from Symbol and many others.

This will be a small group, not an enormous conference, with plenty of time to network and talk. Come.

Is The Wal-Mart Model Dead?

Wal-Mart may be facing a crisis in its business model as its low-price strategy appears to hit a wall, with the company posting the smallest December sales gain since 2000. This comes after Wal-Mart's worst monthly performance in 10 years in November. Meanwhile Target is doing much better. What's going on?

I think Wal-Mart, like Dell, is seeing the commoditization of price erode its competitive edge and reduce the value it brings to shareholders and consumers. The great supply-chain innovation that drove Wal-Mart's success is being replicated by others. Competing on price doesn't do it in the marketplace for Wal-Mart. It needs to compete on product differentiation--design and innovation--and here Wal-Mart needs lessons from Target. Wal-Mart's efforts at selling fancier fashion are disappointing to date.

In fact, Wal-Mart's retreat from Germany and Korea imply that it is having problems moving away from its core culture of selling low-cost products in the US south and West. It appears to be doing well in Mexico with its low-cost approach and perhaps in China, although that remains unclear. But it hasn't hit the sweet spot in the more sophisticated cities of America because it doesn't "get" urban cultures.

Wal-Mart is now trying to move into India and faces similar issues. Indian middle class consumers tend to buy on brand, not just price and expect great personal service.

Dell is pushing hard into design and is making great efforts to learn more about consumer cultures. It is moving away from its own supply-chain innovation, which has become commoditized, to focus on empathy, authenticity and individualization. Wal-Mart needs to make a similar effort to learn about consumers cultures. It's original price-based business model is eroding. It needs to adopt a design/innovation-based business model now.

India, A New Frontier For Innovation And Design.

Niti Bhan is giving a speech at the upcoming Design With India conference next week in New Dehli and she posted a second draft on her site. I'm posting it here because it is an important statement about India, global warming, green tech and opportunities for growth moving into the 21st century.

November 29, 2006
Second draft of my talk
The Chartered Society of Designers, UK had recently issued a statement following Sir Nicholas Stern’s Review Report on the Economics of Climate Change highlighting the opportunities for the design industry in light of this global crisis. They said, in summary,

As a profession we influence products of all sorts and buildings and the energy they use. In design development and service design we are also able to reduce the energy used in delivering them. But in order to do so the designer must posses the knowledge needed to deal with such matters. This will involve collaboration, new working methods, knowledge transfer and a new attitude to design research.

If Stern is taken seriously then designers will see new opportunities for their services, they will need to adopt a business language in order for design to become embedded in the range of businesses strategies and to take a seat in the boardroom, and they will enter new overseas markets which need to invest in products that allow them to trade in carbon emissions. For those economies that are loathe to invest the figure suggested by Stern for fear of inhibiting their rapid economic growth, design and innovation will be paramount in ensuring they are not disadvantaged.

The world is now looking to design to provide answers to complex problems and sustainability issues - as resources become increasingly scarce - and I think that Indian designers can lead the way in the search for answers. I believe that as designers, we are comfortable with ambiguity and have learnt to make order out of chaos. And as Indians, we are comfortable straddling the disparity of urban and rural markets, understanding that products and services need to withstand a wide variance in infrastructure and environment, the diversity of our multicultural, multilingual nation and finally, the daily understanding that there are millions among us who are overlooked, underserved, and often have very little or nothing at all.

This is a corporate social opportunity for Indian industry and the design community. We have here the foundation of a cooperative movement that could conceivably create health, wealth and the freedom to choose. Not just for a fortunate few, but for the vast majority across our nation. What is the current landscape in this area globally?

A few data points come to mind, the increasing shift towards social design issues, the need for responsible design and development of products, and of course, the increasing awareness of our shrinking resources etc. All of these point to the search for solutions for everyday problems [what designers do best] but within the tightest constraints possible. Minimal footprint, the optimum solution - a balance between materials used, energy consumed yet elegantly solving the problem at hand. Operations Research provides the trick - I’m not saying the Carpenter’s Problem should be applied directly, but if you look at the concept of solving for the optimal solution within the constraints and inequalities given, then one can derive a similar concept when considering the next source of innovative thinking and new product solutions. Furthermore, the concept of rapid prototyping within the design constraints can be mapped on to the shaded area under the graph [representational of concept only]. Where do we find these ideas and answers?

There are already numerous social entrepreneurial initiatives that are based on innovative business models that create wealth and opportunity even for the poorest - from SEWA to ICICI, eChoupal to the Jaipur foot - all of these and more provide micro finance, healthcare, cooperatives and information tailored to their needs. Design studios already work with disparate segments assisting in augmenting the quality of their user’s lives - Icarus designed a solar powered lamp, etc etc [will fill in] but this opportunity is for more than just the design industry. Sir Nicholas Stern stated in his presentation that this could not be left solely to government and that individuals would not take it seriously if business did not play its part.

What I propose is that take Prof Anil Gupta’s work at the National Innovation Foundation, where teams of field workers keep their eye open for inventions in their travels through rural India and expand this into a global network. Numerous ingenious solutions have emerged, and as they have been developed under the most adverse conditions, are as ecologically sound as possible in terms of materials, recycling, energy etc consumed. Why can’t multidisciplinary teams of designers, engineers, marketers and others from industry look to developing these concepts emerging from the bottom up? Take these rough ideas and prototypes and reform and reengineer them for markets across India and the world? With a combination of good design, native ingenuity and an innovative business models that incorporate micro finance opportunities, cooperatives for small business owners - example etc Add to this our technological and informational capabilities on the world wide web and create a flow of information and value to AND fro between the haves and the have nots. Create our own markets, for our products, within the constraints - something we’re already good at - of the increasingly resource constrained Earth.

This “mash up” as they say, where information meets technology meets rural innovation can arguably provide a solution to not only India’s most pressing needs but also to more pressing problems facing all of us in the world today. A two way exchange of information that empowers, permits cocreation and connectivity, communication and commerce, will ensure that the next inventor in remote Bihar who develops an amphibious bicycle would not need to travel cross country to be noticed, funded, or noticed globally. India herself would have put him on the world map.

To follow all the important events going on at the Design With India conference, check into Niti's blog. If you still have time and the price of a ticket, get on a plane now and fly there. If only to hear Sam Pitroda give an amazing speech. You don't see many countries make a wildly successful entrepreneur the Chairman of the Knowledge Commission of India.

Is Nintendo's Wii Better Than Sony's PlayStation 3? Ask Tom Cruise in the Movie Minority Report.

I've been reading the tons of reviews of the Wii and the PS3 and the one thing missing in the flood of comparisons is the idea that Nintendo may actually have the better technology. The motion-sensitive controller picks up and transfers your hand and arm movement and transfers it directly to the screen. That means you personally and directly participate in the tennis, bowling, baseball, golf, boxing games onscreen. This is a huge breakthrough--bigger probably than the Blu-ray technology of the Sony PS3.

Remember that awful sci-fi movie Minority Report, off the book by Phillip Dick with pre-cogs. The one scene that is compelling is Cruise, who plays a detective, standing in front of a screen moving videos and data around by shifting his hands. Wii is like that--and the technology it reflects has the potential power to change the whole click and point mouse paradigm.

There are an enormous number of applications for motion-sensitive technology and Wii is showing the way. The military is already using it.

Much has already been written about how Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have different business models. PS3 and the Xbox are expensive and yet lose money because because of the fancy high-technology they employ. Profits come from games and lower production costs over time. Nintendo is much simpler and cheaper to make so Game Boy and now Wii generate profits from the get-go.

But we have something different here. The technology from Nintendo is a powerful innovation because it creates a new, very appealing consumer experience that goes beyond passively watching better graphics. Fascinating.

Best of 2006.

Check out David Armano's blog Logic + Emotion where he asks: "What was the most significant event/aspect of 2006 in regards to marketing, advertising or user experience?"

The comments posted are really insightful. One of of my favorites is this one from Scott Weisbrod: -
"Business and design get cozier
- Blogging (55 million+ tracked by Technorati)
- Ethnography
- Branded utility
- Widgets (though I think this may be the big story of next story)
- Democratization of analytics (e.g, Google Analytics)
- Cripsin Porter + Bogusky"

And another from Clay Parker Jones:
"Jeff Jarvis giving Dell a big, backhanded, blog-enabled slap in the face.
- Urban Spam and the advertization of (almost) every available inch.
- It was the year I started blogging. (I'm sure a LOT of people can say this one, and it's not isolated to 2006, but it's relevant for me)
- lonelygirl and the rise of "Oops Marketing"
- Fist-bumps and that sweet-a...agency pitch video
- Conversations like this begin:

Agency President: "Explain to me this 'blog' thing."

Young AE: [pauses] "Erm...well... there's these people, right? And they're writing about stuff online. And it's really easy, and search engines love it, and it's this amazing community of really engaged folks, and it's a lot of fun... but I never really thought about how to explain..."

Agency President: [interrupts] Get a blog up for us by Tuesday.

- Russell's APSotW and the beginning of free, decentralized adver-education.

- One million Flickr images geotagged in the first day of its availability."

Let's open it up--what are your picks for the best innovations of 2006?

Oh, and the hottest ad agency for me in 2006 is clearly Modernista--those Hummer ads were incredible and the Cadillac ads are wildly unexpected. And Modernista's design for Inside Innovation is totally outstanding.

Can Wal-Mart Make It In India?

Fresh from news that its November sales were disappointing in the US, Wal-Mart has announced that it will enter the India market in partnership with cell-phone provider Bharti Enterprises. If Wal-Mart wants to make a success of its Indian adventure and avoid the kind of mistakes it made in Germany and Korea, where it was forced to pull out, it should send its top managers to next week's Design With India conference in New Delhi to learn about local culture, branding, design and products. Organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry and the National Institute of Design, the summit will bring together hundreds of business people, scholars, designers, and government bureaucrats to discuss innovation and design in India. Entire sections of the conference will be focussed on European, American and other foreign companies seeking to strike partnerships with Indian corporations and enter India. This is one must-go conference.

Wal-Mart needs help in understanding customer culture. In the US, its foray out of it's low-cost business model into high fashion has been a failure. It's push into more sophisticated urban marketplaces, where opposition to Wal-Mart's low-wage model is strong, has been problematic as well. It's efforts to sell to German and Korean consumers failed. Wal-Mart is doing much better in Latin America but India and China are the big bets for the future and it's not clear whether the low-cost model will work for the growing Asian middle class smitten by the lure of luxury brand names and used to very personal service.

"Culture" is a growing theme in the innovation space, surpassing "experience." Nowhere is that going to be more important than in India. One of the smartest people I know who writes about Indian culture and doing business in India is Niti Bhan. She's going to be speaking at the Design With India conference next week. Check out her blog for her insights on Indian culture, marketing and innovation.

Yahoo and the Newspapers--In Search of Business Model Innovation.

The cover story on Kodak--Mistakes Made on the Road to Innovation--in the current issue of Inside Innovation, highlights the rush to change business models throughout industries. Nowhere is this most evident than in the newspaper space, where 176 newspapers just partnered up with Yahoo to exchange local news for placing local ads. Yahoo gets content and the papers get ad revenue.

Sounds good--for the short term. Newspapers get a new distribution system for what they produce and how they generate revenue. This is an important innovation for a fast-declining industry losing its readers and revenue.

But is it enough? Jeff Jarvis over at BuzzMachine thinks probably not. The new model--which we use at the Innovation & Design channel--is open sourcing content to get the very best anywhere and community-tizing your audience. Having a direct conversation with your audience and providing them with access and tools to deal with their own needs is crucial. We do that in the innovation/design space. That "content" includes direct communication with people in an open conversation.

Are newspapers doing that yet? Jarvis doesn't think so. Nor do I.

Gurupalooza 2--The Rotman Innovation Conference Rocked.

Larry Keeley of the Doblin Group coined the term "Gurupalooza" to describe the first gathering at a Toronoto conference of the "7 gurus" of innovation described in my cover on Creativity. That was put on by Roger Martin, dean of the Rotman School of Management in Toronto, last October. The second gathering happened last week in NYC and it was even better. Small, 150-200 people, friendly with very, very detailed presentations on innovation by the seven gurus. I like big conferences but these smaller ones accomplish much more. You meet the "teachers," network and really learn.

Let me quote from Doblin's Keeley and his incredible presention. It was among several that left the audience in awe.

First, his Four Big Ideas in 40 minutes:
1- "Sometimes things change--Leaders must sense when the business fundamentally shifts.
2- A fresh look at innovation fundamentals--To innovate, it helps to understand what it is--and isn't.

3- The building blocks of effective innovation--What to stop and what to start to innovate reliably.

4- Platforms rule--In an interconnected world, platforms matter most."

This is a great beginning to a speech on innovation. Then Keeley went on to say that a discipline--a discipline--of innovation is emerging. It will take 2-4 years to develop. Why? Operational excellence doesn't give you competitive advantage any more. All good companies are good at it. You need innovation. And there are at least 10 types of innovation. Apple combined 8 in the iPod.

I won't go into Keeley's amazing innovation landscapes, which he presented at the conference. If you haven't seen them, you have to check them out. They are powerful tools for innovation.

For me, the new insight came from Keeley's focus on platforms. He said "all the important stuff now cuts across companies and markets." Think about that. Competition is now among platforms.

Keeley ended with a short summary of how to boost your innovation success rate from the lowly average of 4% to 35-70%.
1- "Know the fundamentals--Get beyond products. Use many types of innovation. Use diagnostics to help.

2- Have an innovation goal-- Make customer discoveries.

3--Build fewer, bolder concepts--Use innovation toolkits. Use teams to build platforms.

4--Implement clearly and swiftly--use prototypes, not spreadsheets."

There's more from the conference...Later.

IN-- Inside Innovation--Is Out This Week. Good Timing.

The timing for the next issue of Inside Innovation, which comes out online Thursday night and in Business Week, the magazine, on Friday, could not be better. The Council on Competitiveness just came out with its Competitiveness Index: Where America Stands and innovation stands at the center of success.

Here is a quote from the report: "At the beginning of the 21st Century, America stands at the dawn of a conceptual economy in which insight imagination and ingenuity determine competitive advantage and value creation."

The report goes on to say that access to technology and information is now available globally, so "rewards go to those who know what to do with knowledge, information and technology once they get them."

Another quote: "The conceptual economy will favor nations that reach globally for markets, and those who embrace different cultures and absorb the diversity of their ideas into the innovation process. It will be fueled by the fusion of different technical and creative fields, and thrive on scholarship, creativity, artistry, and leading-edge thinking.

Another quote: "Innovation in advanced manufacturing, services and intangibles have become the primary source of value for US companies and US workers."

Final quote: "...innovation is increasingly the source of value and competitive advantage and managing processes and partners represents a growing part of value creation. ..."value increasingly comes from the 'service wrap' and the ideas bound up in products. Critical investments are not only those made into new fixed assets, like machinery and real estate but increasingly those in knowledge, branding and other intangible assets."

The upcoming issue of IN is therefore timely. It has a great story on business model innovation--and the mistakes made on the road to innovation. There's a piece on how Electrolux redesigned itself. A fascinating section on Tools and Trends--what's hot. And two terrific interviews--with Azim Premji, the head of Wipro on outsourcing innovation and Robyn Waters, the head of trend. We also have a story on the new hyrdogen fuel-cell powered motorcyle out of the UK. And lots more on innovation.

A Great Acumen Conference.

At the five-year anniversary of the Acumen Fund, I listened to Fareed Zakaria deliver one of the most insightful keynote speeches I've ever heard. Points: 1- Globalization is raising the global economic growth rate, pulling more people out of poverty in the last five years than at any other similar period in history.

2- Demand for oil has raised the income of Iran, Venezuela, Russia, Sudan and a dozen other countries, allowing their elites to be anti-American. For the many authoritarian oil states, it has allowed the ruling elites to be anti-democratic. Russia, for example, has backtracked on its democratic shift.

3- So while globalization is knitting the world ever closer economically, it is also setting other forces in play that are centripal.

David Kirkpatrick, senior editor at Fortune for technology told the audience that there were 1.5 billion cell phones in the developing world today and as they plug into mobile computing, they are connecting into new systems of health care, payment, and information. He thinks the cell phone may be the real platform for changing villagers lives, not the Negroponte $100 laptop, but David welcomes it and the Intel web communicator and anything else that might work.

Seth Godin talked about storytelling. A portion of the proceeds from his book, The Big Moo, is going to the Acumen Fund. He was up right before me and, unfortunately, I tuned him out a lot to focus on my own comments.

I spoke (we only 3 minutes so people really blasted through their presentations) about design thinking and how Acumen was using the same kind of strategies (consumer-centric, experimentation, iteration, etc.) that companies increasingly use to innovation and grow. Indeed, the line between profit and nonprofit is eroding as all organizations use design thinking to solve problems. What is the Bottom of the Pyramid but the consumer base?
I ended by telling Acumen that it is building a portfolio of innovation models at the Bottom of the Pyramid. that it should send up to the Top of the Pyramid. This is especially true in their health projects.

Acumen--Designing Better Solutions For Bottom of The Pyramid Problems of Poverty.

Next week, Acumen Fund one of the most innovative philanthropies I know, will celebrate its fifth anniversay and the Innovation & Design channel has a rather remarkable story on it. It illustrates how design thinking is being used beyond the business space to solve important problems in education, transportation, the legal system--and most importantly in ending poverty.

Let me quote just a bit from the story written so beautifully by Jessi Hempel-- "Acumen is a leader in the fast-emerging hybrid sector that straddles private industry and nonprofits. Technically a nonprofit, it invests in enterprises in developing countries with the strategy and discipline of a Silicon Valley venture-capital firm."

Another quote-- "Acumen's founder is Jacqueline Novogratz, a former banker with an infectious magnetism and a melodic voice that delivers a constant call to action. Under her leadership, the fund manages $20 million in investments that fall within three portfolios: health, water, and housing. But Acumen's goal is far larger than successful companies. Says Novogratz: "We're creating an overall design for how you provide goods and services to poor people."

Acumen is part of a larger conversation that includes TED, Google.org, IDEO, IN and other organizations designing a better way, a better future. Pay attention to it. Better yet, get involved.

How To Improve Your Innovation Success Rates--Don't Miss This Conference.

The Rotman School of Management is putting on a one-day conference in New York next Thursday--November 16--that is one of the most important innovation events of the Fall. I don't know who will emerge as the Deming of the Innovation Movement, but surely Roger Martin, dean of the Rotman School, is a major candidate. Martin is a major thought leader in turning innovation and design thinking into a systematic, predictable methodology that people can use to boost their "hit rate" of innovation initiatives. He is leading the move to redesign B-school education to focus on innovation, imagination, creativity--design thinking. An opportunity to spend a day with Martin is an opportunity that anyone interested in innovation should not pass up. The conference is small--up to 200 people only--so you'll be able to really talk to Martin and the rest of the speakers. Including me--BW is hosting the event and I'll moderate.

The conference also has a number of innovation deep-thinkers and practioners. David Rockwell of the Rockwell Group is one of the best experience designers in the world--hotels, restaurants, hospitals, spas, broadway shows. David has a remarkable book out just out called Spectacle, designed with Bruce Mau, that should be read by anyone interested in designing great consumer experiences.

Beth Comstock leads GE's digital media operation that is sure to explode in the near future. Before taking this position, she worked with Jeff Immelt to implement the company's imagination initiative--a transformative initiative. Beth will have seriously important things to say about making innovation work in a big corporation.

Larry Keeley of the Doblin Group is worth $1 million in IP alone. His work on innovative landscapes and metrics is brilliant and he advises many of the top CEOs in the country. If you're looking for tools and innovation measures, Larry is your man.

Yves Behar, founder of fuseproject, one of the hottest design/branding firms in the world, will present as well. His work for BMW's MINI and for so many other companies is brilliant. The $100 laptop that is about to go into production will reflect Behar's efforts to make a useable and useful laptop for children at the Bottom of the Pyramid.

Sohrab Vossoughi, founder of ZIBA, is one of the smartest design strategists that I know. He's expanded the use of design thinking way beyond product design to the design of great experiences and brands in all kinds of contexts, including banking and condos. When it comes to designing an emotional connection, Sohrab--and Yves--and David--can't be beat.

Finally, there is Jeneanne Rae of Peer Insight, who is one of a handful of innovation coaches helping CEOs understand and execute service innovation. UVA, Harvard MBA, IDEO, now Peer Insight, Jeneanne has the background and experience to really get granular.

The conference is at a W hotel, so that will be fun and is over at 4 with an hour for cocktails and networking.

There have been a slew of innovation conferences this fall and many people, myself included, feel conferenced out. But this Rotman one-day event promises to teach tools and analysis that can be applied the very next day in your work. It's worth it. Besides, fall in New York, with the leaves turning yellow and red, is incredibly beautiful.

The Republicans, Airbus and Wal-Mart--How Big Brands Blow It.

It's startling to see how powerful, established brands can make such enormous mistakes that loyal customers begin to doubt and leave them. Usually, they forget to stay in touch with their customers and/or fail to execute on what these customers expect of them.

Wal-Mart is a trusted brand that sells good stuff at low prices to solid middle Americans. When it marched into fancy, high fashion clothes, staged paid PR stunts by supposedly authentic people and appeared to treat its workers poorly, Wal-Mart's brand became tarnished. Just what does Wal-Mart stand for today? I don't know.

Airbus built its reputation as a high-tech European alternative to Boeing's near-monopy on commercial jets. Airbus built planes on time that passengers found very comfortable at a competitive price. Now Airbus can't finish its giant new double-decker jetliner, the A380, on time because it can't get the wiring right. Seems like the Germans and French use different software systems. Yikes. A two year delay in the delivery of the 380 led Fedex to cancel its order and other freight and passenger airlines may follow. This is a body blow to the Airbus brand.

The GOP brand once stood for small government, fiscal integrity, business-like execution and a strong foreign policy that projected US influence around the world. In recent years the size of the federal government has ballooned, a budget surplus has turned into a chronic deficit (to be sure, not nearly as big as many predicted), and the performance in New Orleans post-Katrina and Iraq post-victory has been poor beyond belief. The reputation of the US has plummeted overseas. Cronyism, corruption and personal scandals plague the party. So what does the brand now stand for?

Of course, the Democrats have a brand problem as well. Being the "non-Republican" may have got them the House and perhaps the Senate. But there is vast uncertainty as to what the Democrats really stand for these days. Unless Democrats rebrand themselves strongly before 08, a backlash against the current bashlash may result in the return of the political status quo.

Designing a Better Voting System--Please.

I just voted in New York City. There were three people at the desk by the door as I entered, looking up addresses and voting districts. Then another four people at another desk--Inspectors--making sure there was no fraud. Then into the voting booth--with little levers to pull for each choice and one big lever to make my choices official.

This is the 21st century. We've got to design a better way.

A Book For Going Green--A User's Guide to the 21st Century.

If you're looking for help in designing for sustainability--designing an economy, a society or a planet, check out this book from Worldchanging.com. At 600 pages, it is full of innovation and pragmatic solutions.

Yes, it leans left and it appears to downplay the role of markets as a possible solution (something that is working in Europe and the US). And I don't think it helps to have the first sentence to the intro on business be "Business doesn't have to be destructive." Nobody driving a SUV has to be destructive. Nice rich liberal folks building 10--50,000 square foot MacMansions in Aspen, Sante Fe or Montana don't have to be destructive. OK.

Here's just a bit of overview from the books site:

"The Worldchanging book contains over 600 pages, divided into 7 sections which include a vast range of topics.

green design, biomimicry, sustainable food, clothing, trade and technology

green building and landscaping, clean energy, water, disaster relief and humanitarian design

smart growth, sustainable communities, transportation, greening infrastructure, product-service systems, leapfrogging and megacity challenges

education, women's rights, public health, holistic approaches to community development, South-South science, social entrepreneurship and micro-lending, and philanthropy

socially responsible investment, worldchanging start-ups, ecological economics, corporate social responsibility and green business

networked politics, new media, transparency, human rights, non-violent revolution and peacemaking

big picture -- everything from placing oneself in a bioregion to climate foresight to environmental history to green space exploration "

The book was celebrated by a party at the NYC headquarters of TED and here are a couple of comments off the TED blog on it:

"Worldchanging is sometimes a bit visionary, but it's not naive. They have a sane optimism about the future that carries through the book, which covers topics as diverse - yet interconnected - as biomimicry, clean energy, water, disaster relief, green design and architecture, transportation, megacities challenges, education, public health, South-South science, social entrepreneurship, microfinance, start-ups, ecological economics, networked politics, transparency, citizen media, climate foresight, etc. It's a fabulous compendium of ideas."

Sounds great to me. And if you haven't read the Stern Report out of the UK, check it out. It goes into the economics of climate change--and the costs.