I spoke about design with John Collery (IDEO.org), Colin Harmon (3fE), and Laura Magahy (Irish Design 2015) in Dublin recently. Here are the highlights. As I wrote last year in The Irish Times, a happy customer is an extraordinary thing. So extraordinary that this first moment of happiness with a service can be a prelude to a long-term, perhaps even …
Design sprint with startups at The Irish Times for AIB Startup Academy
See full story at http://www.irishtimes.com/business/week-two-of-the-aib-start-up-academy-an-introduction-to-design-thinking-1.2088255 from 2 February 2015 Week two of the AIB Start-up Academy: An introduction to ‘design thinking’ Entrepreneurs to learn quick, inexpensive experiments to tweak or change a product This week, the 11 AIB Start-up Academy finalists will gather for the programme’s second module. The Academy lecturers will introduce the start-ups to “design thinking”. The instructors …
Redesigning your business model
Decision makers in business are challenged by complexity. This makes it hard to innovate and test out opportunities for future growth. Mastering simplicity is key to innovation. In 2004, Alexander Osterwalder wrote in his doctoral thesis that “all parts of a business have to be optimised and that details in a business model make the difference. Yet, few approaches and …
Applying design thinking with students inside the Wayra startup incubator
I brought innovation students from UCD into the startup incubator Wayra in 2014, and wrote the following piece on the experience in The Irish Times on 4 July 2014. See full story here . Applying design thinking to start-ups Students from the Innovation Academy at UCD brought design thinking to client start-ups at the Wayra incubator, with interesting results Johnny …
Q&A about the history of the Internet with the Epoch Times
The Epoch Times published a Q&A here with me about the book. We covered the idea behind the book and politics. Text below… The Internet has integrated itself into nearly every aspect of modern life, following users on the cell phone, at work, and at home. While the Web grows, however, its history and future remain a mystery to the …
Strategies for the music industry – I’m featured in India’s ‘Business & Economy’
The current edition of Business & Economy (apparently “India’s most influential business and economy magazine”) features a piece on “Global music industry: is this the end or a new beginning? A musical paradox”. The upshot is that declining sales of albums and slowing digital downloads mean that it must embrace innovative business models or go under, and I’m quoted offering …
2nd extract of my book in Ars Technica — The essence of the ‘Net
Chapter 3 of my book A History of the Internet and the Digital Future has just been published by Ars Technica. This is one of the 3 chapters (of the 13 in the book) that are being published for free. Here it is, or read at Ars. Johnny Ryan’s A History of the Internet and the Digital Future has just …
Making better presentations
In 2003, I delivered my worst presentation ever at the podium of the Royal Irish Academy. I stood and read an irrelevant academic paper, to a disinterested audience, and had planned my delivery so poorly that it was necessary to skip paragraphs at random to keep within time. Since then I’ve looked at how Hardt, Lessig, Kawaneski, and Zittrain present …