We've been very interested in the experiences of accelerators over the last few years. These appeared in the US in the middle of the last decade, in IT and web sectors, and some have grown enormously. They bring together a cohort of start-ups and provide them with a mix of intensive support, a physical home and investment. In some cases one or two individuals have been the driving force - as guides, mentors and shapers.
An interesting event I participated in last Thursday, hosted by the Ove Arup Foundation and the Guardian, looked at future cities. I kicked off by complaining that despite thousands of years of learning about what does and doesn't work in cities, so much design and building results in unpleasant spaces.
A few days ago I went to the first Puma Creative Impact Award, organised by the remarkable BritDoc foundation, which is dedicated to promoting documentaries. I've been to a few of Britdoc's informal evenings, showing newly made documentaries, but this was a grander affair, reflecting the amazing renaissance of documentaries in recent years, from obscure late night slots on BBC2 to multiplexes.
I've just been on a brief fact-finding mission to Estonia - a country that counts a hunger to learn among its many virtues. Estonia has often been at the forefront of e-government, and at one point (almost) cut and pasted laws from other countries which it liked. A session with senior officials in the Estonian equivalent to the Cabinet Office also brought home how much we can learn from nimbler countries.
This week I'd like to share a couple of data graphics that have caught my eye over the past few weeks.
Steve Jobs was unique for combining high aspirations and a love of beautiful design with an acute business brain. It's marvellous, and surprisingly rare, to see an innovator honoured and mourned. But like any truly great changemaker Steve was contradictory.
I can't remember the death of a business leader ever having quite the impact as that of Steve Jobs. Part of the reason is that he saw business as a means and not an end.
Last week I was in Krakow in Poland chairing the plenaries at the European intersectoral summet on research and innovation. The event was organised by Atomium, an organisation I've been involved in setting up, which brings together 25 of the top universities across Europe and 25 top media organisations.
The last week has been all about ideas, a welcome antidote to the darkening economic outlook.
I gave a talk a couple of weeks ago at the Paradiso Conference in Brussels on the subject of collective intelligence. It's a topic that's going to be an important one for NESTA over the next year or two (we'll soon be publishing an overview paper on concepts, theories and uses of CI).
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