15Mb: yet another blog from Dave Birch

My tweets on 2010-02-09

admin — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

@maggiephilbin the Dumbo jet? The Global Warmer? Air Farce One? The Routemaster (it's a double decker)? Skytram, Blunderbus? in reply to maggiephilbin #
@maggiephilbin The Hippocopter; Planeasaurus; Tyrannosaurus Decks (or T-Dex, for short); the Wagonfly; Jetrack; Leflyathan; Planetechnicon in reply to maggiephilbin #
RT @Chris_Skinner: no person-to-person PaylPal in India (via @finnovation) http://digg.com/d31I9AK?t (regulatory #fail ) #

My tweets on 2010-02-08

admin — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

R5 NOW Prescott on "the network" hilarous, apparently his 140 word twitters are important, as was his negotiation of RBS bonuses (?!?) #
RT @ruskin147: http://tinyurl.com/ykrws3q Nick Cohen on fine form about UK libel laws #
Euro 2012 England and Wales in same group, good draw for England #
Actual job ad from Independent: applicant must have experience in "parascientific knowledge with psionic hardware" http://bit.ly/bcurmf #
Just curious and apropos of nothing, but is it actually illegal to flash oncoming drivers to warn them of a police speed trap? #
Sounds like prestcott's negotiations went well; ST reports RBS losses £7 billion, bonus payout £1 billion. Well done John. #
Home shopping stat du jour from ST: Ocado loses £6.40 on every delivery. #
ST legal column: I have just hired an employee who is hopeless, can I fire him? Answer: no, basically. No wonder companies move to Hungary. #
RT @privacyint Belarusians will soon be required to show a passport to enter Internet cafés http://bit.ly/aHm8kF ( can't happen here?) #
Non-news of the day: Goldman smarter than Feds. Goldman were ready to settle for few cents on dollar, Feds gave them 100 (of your money) #
Sorry, link NYT http://tinyurl.com/ydxpvq9 #
No.1 son and girlfriend to station then at last Dad's taxi service can knock off for the day. I'll miss it, of course. #
Gordon Brown is Berlusconi? First fixing up hot dates for Sarkozy, now choosing attractive young women candidates http://tinyurl.com/ygbtyvg #
Here's a tip: probably best not pick a candidate for Liverpool who (seriously) doesn' t know who Bill Shankley is http://tinyurl.com/y8nbox6 #
Of course, some animals are more equal than others http://tinyurl.com/ybfajhw #
Curious. Is your name on this list http://tinyurl.com/ydr38f6 #
If you have to have a back door, people will walk in http://tinyurl.com/yk8xel9 (http://tinyurl.com/yg6×468) #

My tweets on 2010-02-06

admin — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

BBC says that smarter people have cats, less smart gave dogs. #
@wpbenjamin "Tiger Woods in the desert has been replaced by elephant crossing a small bridge" What does it mean? Is the elephant their fees? in reply to wpbenjamin #
What is it with BBC this morning? Now they are saying having a dog is a bad for planet as having a car. #
Isn't offering to purchase stolen property an offence in this country? I thought the government was against IP theft? http://bit.ly/aMrfI4 #
@bowbrick DiskWarrior in reply to bowbrick #
This morning we're back down to 19.3Mb/s, I can't see a pattern yet, the Virgin speeds seem entirely random. #
OMG we're one ahead going into last round of pub quiz but we did really badly on detectives in final round #
Nooooooo. Lost by one. Told my team: remember how this feels. #

My tweets on 2010-02-06

admin — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

Me again: "Innovation and the Future-Proof Bank" at http://blog.dgwbirch.com/?p=803 #
RT @charispalmer: Dave the b(w)anker keeps his job http://tinyurl.com/ygxuqbl – good news! looking at pictures of nude women is OK in a bank #
Wow! MPs to be charged with false accounting. #
Good news. Novelist Martin Baker ("Meltdown") is going to chair kick-off session at Digital Money Forum http://tinyurl.com/y9xg546 #
RT @dngusev: Cost of #cash in #Europe equivalent to 0.6% of Europe’s GDP — RBR http://bit.ly/aSWZ4E (author Rob Walker at Digital Money) #
Wowza! Someone turned up the gas. My broadband is currently running at 52.24Mb/s down, 22ms ping. Props to Virgin after yesterdays moans. #
Yet another blog post at http://bit.ly/ajtZ4S this time it's "Fit and counterfeit" #
@atconc No I didn't do anything (except moan about it) in reply to atconc #
The world is turning upside down. I just agreed with George Galloway about something on Question Time. #
I've invented a new word. Craig Mundie's plan for internet WHO to keep the unfit off of the net makes him an e-genicist http://bit.ly/9tmunH #

Innovation and the Future-Proof Bank

admin — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 11:05:14 +0000

I’m very interested in James Gardner’s work on innovation and having had to the opportunity to interview him for our Consult Hyperion podcast series and involve him in one of my CSFI Research Fellowship roundtables, I was really looking forward to reading his new book on “Innovation and the Future-Proof Bank“. What a stroke of luck! I’d been meaning to order it as soon as my pile of business books had dwindled, when a review copy arrived from the publisher. But then I began to panic: I know James and admire his work, so how can I write a fair review? And I am violating new FTC guidelines by reviewing a book that I had been sent for free? And who would care what I think about the book anyway, since I don’t know about banking, only payments? Gulp.

In essence, James is setting out an approach built on two principles: that banks need an innovation process in order to move forward, not an innovation function, team or department, and that it’s a numbers game. Innovation isn’t about boffins toiling in underground labs waiting for the breakthrough that will change everything, it’s about a funnel of activity that needs to be constantly filled and then filtered to produce a huge amount of incremental change (more like Toyota than Barnes-Wallis). Less glamorous, but more effective.

The heart of the book, for me, is in James’ directed evolution of the well-known Shell scenario planning techniques into what he calls “futurecasting”: a shorter-term use of narrative structures to explore environmental changes and organisational responses. I was fortunate enough to be one of the experts invited to participate in the Shell process one year, and while I found it fascinating (and valuable), the quarter-century horizons and multi-year, multi-billion investment decisions that Shell is making are not typical of most organisations. In the excellent case study of P2P lending that James uses in the book, banks need 3-5 year strategies that are on a 5-10 year roadmap, so James’ approach of connecting “traditional” Delphi polling and perhaps more unusual innovation market approaches into longer-term narratives seems practical and effective.

For corporate practitioners I suspect that the most immediately beneficial part of the book concerns filling that funnel and then working out how to filter and progress the ideas that get over the hurdles. I am not qualified to judge the scoring approach that James sets out but it seems perfectly reasonable to me, and I did agree strongly with his comments about pilots and prototyping being used to learn more than simply whether the technology works.

If there is an area where the book might be developed further for a future edition it is towards the end, where the discussion about budgeting and allocating the costs of innovation (and its rewards) across business units seemed inconclusive. I’m at a loss to imagine what a more scientific approach to this topic might yield, but for typical practitioners in typical financial services organisations, accounting remains a great barrier to real-world innovation and that must be overcome at some point, perhaps by developing a grammar of innovation to connect the disciplines.

One final point: while the book is aimed at the banking sector, I thought that the processes and techniques described were capable of delivering to a much wider corporate market: if you don’t work for a bank, you will still find this book valuable.

In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen megabytes [posted with ecto]

My tweets on 2010-02-05

admin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

As Fark says, it looks like crime does pay after all http://bit.ly/drY8KT #
Speedtest says my 50Mb/s internet connection is cracking along at 4.5Mb/s. Woo Hoo! Digital Britain! Nearly a tenth of what I'm paying for! #
Loving the Private Eye cover. World Cup Willy. Outstanding. #
Loving the Hawkind "Warrior" original version of Motorhead. #
Loving my new book to read on the train "Meltdown". #
@davidhearn Ok, I won't email gigantic PowerPoint files except between 3 and 4. Go digital Britain, go! in reply to davidhearn #
@atconc where does custom firmware come from? in reply to atconc #
RT @charlesarthur Can you write a better haiku than Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz to explain its decline? http://bit.ly/bF1goP #
Lamb at the Cinnamon Club is unbelievably delicious. #
Just saw Nigel Lawson on the tube. He looked very old. Reminds you how long ago the 80s were. #
Stuck in the one way system, forgot that centre of Woking is a nightmare at the moment. #
@ruskin147 I blame those notorious filesharing pirates, such as Lily Allen. Perhaps we could persuade the government to bail EMI out? in reply to ruskin147 #
Yet another blog post at http://bit.ly/cMivAs this time it's "Victor Dostov, Russian Electronic Money Association" #
RT @khartmoney: Bank of America charged with fraud over Tarp funds http://bit.ly/cyvDko(do we get a perp walk?) #
@diane1859 if only someone would write a book about this kind of thing, you know sex, economics, maybe drugs too? http://bit.ly/ak1at7 in reply to diane1859 #
Mark Thomas claptrap on R4: "if you spend £1 in local area, 70p stays in area". Where do they grow coffee in Woking? Or make nails? #
My new wallpaper http://tweetphoto.com/10412842 #
Anyone in Northern California notice anything shaking? #
New word of the day, don't want to say where from, but I won't need to define it for you: hipposuction #

My tweets on 2010-02-04

admin — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

Supposed to be doing something important (filling out expenses form) but still being sidetracked by yesterday's meeting on local currencies #
@joannejacobs "internet + depression correlation is not a *causal* link" it is for me because I use the web to read the news in reply to joannejacobs #
Another grand project from our continental cousins http://bit.ly/aKl4DU #
Overwhelming 4% of teenagers interested in getting a proof of age card (of course) http://bit.ly/cbhTr9 #
@BenLaurie "we all know users hate having to use external devices" except phones, of course. in reply to BenLaurie #
"The following plugin has crashed: Flash Player" is going to cause screen burn-in (does that still happen with LCDs?) #
RT @jackschofield: Spray-on liquid glass about to revolutionize almost everything http://bit.ly/d9DrLR (nano! nano! gray goo! gray goo!) #
RT @ruskin147: RT @learnwithrav "Where's the demand for faster consumer broadband? I'm happy with 4mb" (640K is enough for anyone) #
Yet another use for gifts cards (via Boing Boing) http://bit.ly/9M3Mrr) #
Just as I thought: this is what will drive 3D TV into the living room (not my living room, obviously) http://bit.ly/9gIFuy #
Off to Connected Britain debate, see you all there. #
@ruskin147 how much do they charge if you pay in cash? in reply to ruskin147 #
RT @petervan Zune Phone to Arrive this Month. Who cares ? http://bit.ly/do4DYE (ouch!) #
@BenLaurie I'm not trusting the phone or the PC, just the SIM (I know, I know, wait until phones implement trusted processor) in reply to BenLaurie #
RT @FredericBaud @finnovation "73% of bank cust. use their online account pwd to access other sites" http://clicky.me/CiS #
Janet Street Porter looks much taller in "real" life than she does on the telly. Is this true of everyone from the telly? #
Oh, no, it's not. Evan Davis looks to scale. #
Stuart, your sister in law says hi. #
The debate is about whether everyone will work at home in the future, that sort of thing. I was working at home today, I'm in the vanguard #
Panelists: Janet Street Porter from grumpy old women, James Bellini "historian of the future", Mayor's transport advisor and guy from Orange #
Janet says she has three houses and that the Labour government isn't doing enough about the gap between rich and poor. #
Evan says people who can live anywhere want to live out in country, but surely one reason they want to live there is because others don't #
Kulveer says there will be another million people in London in 20 years, no wonder the well-off will want to leave #
Kulveer is getting "back to the future" mixed up with "bladerunner". I wonder if my borderline autism is undermining my understanding? #
Hurrah, first mention of Oyster! #
James says that London and SE utterly dominate UK, country is totally unbalanced. #
Orange survey shows that if people could move freely then Cornwall will be jam packed, Midlands empty. #
@edmundo "Possible" crisis? This wasn't a crisis? Help! in reply to edmundo #
Janet having a go at Evan "50% of working day at BBC is spent gossiping" #
Is this true? California survey says employees waste 7 hours out of every working week looking at dodgy websites. Or did I hear James wrong? #
Evan tells Janet not to fixate on "dick on table" architecture. This is a more interesting debate than I thought. #
I asked how we can stop MLF from connecting the poor so they don't move out of cities and spoil villages. #
More connectivity makes people travel longer distances but less frequently. Instead of taking bus to work, work at home 4 days, Paris on 5th #
Janet points out that as the young are illiterate, we need older workers. Hurrah for Harriet's plan to stop young from getting jobs. #
Shocked. Chatting to Evan Davis and the guy next to me genuinely had no idea who he was. Shocked. #

My tweets on 2010-02-02

admin — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

Just ordered my copy of Martin Baker's "Meltdown" http://tinyurl.com/yzah3ze #
Looking at the picture in Metro this morning, I've got to say that I look more like Michael Jackson than his "children" do. #
Off to local currency fest with NEF. #
Well, well. One of the UK local currency schemes is about to start offering loans in their own currency. Now that's what I call innovation. #
Alternative currencies based on the output of windmills, really interesting idea. #
30p for the gents at Marylebone! Keeps the riffraff out I suppose. #
@dngusev could #ipad replace my #moleskine ?? No, but it will replace carrying laptop around London all day. in reply to dngusev #
@tonyfish "why do you need a bank account for financial transactions" quite, we need to seperate payments and banking looking forward in reply to tonyfish #

My tweets on 2010-02-01

admin — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 22:59:00 +0000

More real-world results: if you have an ID card in your wallet then (as predicted) your Oyster card won't work. #
RT @khartmoney: Should Germany bail out Club Med or leave the euro altogether? http://bit.ly/bJ9Jqi (Vote now on 0845 xxxx xxx) #
RT @privacyint: Indian ID tender document. Estimated approx 6bn IDs http://is.gd/7sOGK (one of everyone on Earth or four for every Indian?) #
Home Office asked "Apples?", replies "Oranges." http://bit.ly/avJmST #
That chap from Arriva should never have given me his card. Where is my bus? #
Just to prove a point, I have come out without my wallet and I'm not going back for it. #
On my to Long Finance with no money, will ask Brian Eno for a tenner, will pay him back in 10,000 years. #
@bowbrick Brand is coming over to Long Finance shortly, is there anything else I should ask him to sign? in reply to bowbrick #
Talking to Stewart Brand and Martin Baker about Pol Pot #longfinance
http://yfrog.com/3njj0qj #
Phew! Human ATM @Chris_Skinner gave me tenner so I can get a coffee and I paypaled him the £10 from my iPhone. Can survive without wallet! in reply to Chris_Skinner #
"People shouldn't have to choose between their dignity and their flight" quite right, I'm never flying economy class again. #
Damn it! Just tore my suit on a South West Trains seat. #
RT @JPBarlow RT @trent_reznor: Grammys = Old Media Puppet Show #
Opa Loka #
RT @Chris_Skinner UBS should have just lost these peoples money instead of hiding it, Feds would have bailed them out http://bit.ly/9wkXtm #
Too funny. Being in the govt should be more important than football but we don't fire ministers who have affairs http://tinyurl.com/y9s8org #
New Scientist "Companies should be more open to external help… have independent experts inspect their systems" http://tinyurl.com/ye5cjxu #
We won't join any club that will have us a member. Oh, wait…. http://tinyurl.com/ybqcfxg #
Yet another blog post, this time it's "Taking the Long View" http://tinyurl.com/yggvv5d #
@brandmidwife You mean now, or today in general? If you mean today in general, then no. in reply to brandmidwife #
@victoriajane http://tinyurl.com/ycypg6k in reply to victoriajane #
Thinking of a new career? "What You Need to Know About Money Laundering with Mobile Payments" http://tinyurl.com/yf3rucp #

My tweets on 2010-01-31

admin — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:59:00 +0000

@jamescrabtree interesting idea. we already know the idea works (Singapore) but why would an African leader agree? in reply to jamescrabtree #
@jamescrabtree why would (eg) Mugabe want "better norms and rules"? People aren't dying in Congo because warlords want norms and rules. in reply to jamescrabtree #
UK government security failure will cause problems for a century, according to police http://tinyurl.com/y9ewc58 #
I am the special one! "Your browser fingerprint appears to be unique among the 412,476 tested so far" http://tinyurl.com/ykb827x) #
2-0 City! #
"Aren’t the current attendees at this conference the same morons who didn’t spot the current crisis ?" http://tinyurl.com/ydt9tjd #
UK court rules bank robbery is OK so long as someone else tells you it http://tinyurl.com/ygxff3v (so if we all tell person on our left) #
"Did you control for height?"brilliant observation on relationship between economics, statistics and politics http://tinyurl.com/yez9fny) #
Odd. Why is The Times surprised? Who on Earth thought that Baroness Ashton was going to do a good job? http://tinyurl.com/yzptaka #
More of Ozymandelson nightmare: copy music (like Lily Allen, but poor) and get cut off, YOU HAVE TO PAY TO APPEAL http://tinyurl.com/yd8rdzy #
@dngusev 3-1 there's still time in reply to dngusev #
BBC report on a brilliant scam (lawyers, not Nigerians, so much more inventive and dangerous) http://tinyurl.com/y9thduu #
Well, did anyone watch the match in 3D? What was it like? #
The European Court of Human Rights has 80,000 cases outstanding. I'm trying to persuade my kids to become lawyers instead of scientists. #
@diane1859 now who's The Passenger! in reply to diane1859 #
@diane1859 I'm parked on a double yellow line (seriously) while tweeting — you can't get much more rebellious (except for Billy Bragg) in reply to diane1859 #
R5 now: identity theft but for cars, I feel very sorry for these people, DVLA chief executive being grilled. #