Information Availability vs Innocence Lost

As I watched my 6 year old daughter surf the web, looking up information on Samuel Pepys and the Great Fire of London, it struck me just how different her upbringing would be to my own. She will have the combined knowledge of the majority of modern civilisation at her fingertips. Doubt will last just a few moments until a definitive answer can be sought from Wikipedia or a myriad of other sites. It is hard to argue that this isn't a very good thing indeed.

But then again, some of the traditional ways of finding things out may be lost in the process. Pestering a busy parent (and learning the social skills required to do this without being shouted at) will be much less necessary. Thumbing through reference books and using a bit of lateral thinking about where on earth to even begin finding something out will be skills that are lost. Will we see a generation so dependent on search engines that they will stand around like little lost sheep in the event of a power cut?

And, given the time of year, how long can we keep our children believing in the Tooth Fairy and Father Christmas? What a shame it would be if we lost some of the less tangible beauties of childhood.

Funding and the evolution of ideas

Much of the investment popularly labelled "VC" or "Angel" is delivered not just as an endorsement of an idea, but rather more so the people behind it. The perception is that an individual idea will change over time, as the realities of market forces, further research and good old-fashioned "doability" collide with the vision that was held on day 1.

Now compare this with a model that I've been looking at in recent times, the corporate sponsorship of innovation. OK, what does that mean? Essentially it is trying to get a large blue chip organisation to pay a retainer with an innovation team or organisation that guarantees them first dibs on anything that may come out of the pipeline (and preferential rates). The model sort of encourages investment in the organisation rather than any individual ideas, which tallies as well I guess. The challenge is getting the funding organisation to believe in the idea-generation organisation. Where this has historically worked well has been the pharma/drug-discovery sector, where the big players will put independent researchers on a contract that prevents them selling anything of interest to rivals, whilst encouraging the development of promising drugs that have commercial application.

So, coming to the crux of this post, is it better to present fully-fledged ideas that have already been built up, with the opportunity to generate rapid returns (assuming they get "bought")? Or is a longer-term approach of investment in people a better decision?

It seems to me that it is possibly a combination of the two that works. Building up credibility through a series of discreet deliveries (that are successful!) opens up the door to a larger conversation about retainers, etc. I hope to try and put this to the test at some point, so I'll keep you posted about the reactions I get.