Halfway Reflection

So far I have had to adjust my behavior in many ways to fit the needs of this course. I have had to spend a lot of time trying to find interviews for people that fall into the category of my potential customer. Much of the time people are busy or uninterested in participating. This class also requires some time management seeing that many of the assignments can't be done at one time (either require multiple parts, or constant brainstorming throughout the week). I felt like giving up when we had to come up with the list of unmet needs in our own life and I ended up blanking after ten. What pulled me through was that it was the start of the summer semester so I wanted to get off on the right foot in this class.

3 tips:

1) you get out of this class what you put in

2) don't procrastinate

3) work hard & play hard (have fun with the assignments)

Swick (portmanwho?)

For my portmanteau assignment I decided to combine the words "sweet" and "sick" (which essentially have the same meaning in slang) into "swick". 

examples)

1. "check out this swick new song I found"

2. person 1: "hey you want to go to chipotle for diner?"

person 2: "yeah"

person 1: "swick"

At first no one else really thought much of the word because it kind of sounds natural and is easy to understand without explanation. One week into using this word one of my roommates asked me why I was using this word so much and after telling them, they actually started to participate as well.

Because swick can be used in almost any context I found myself saying it a lot. At first using swick did feel a little bit forced, but I've done it so much that I will probably continue to use the word past this assignment.

 

Idea Napkin no. 1

1)I am personally a musician, and write songs occasionally so that kind of inspired me to think of this idea. My software would be geared towards people who professionally or independently release music for profit. While I don't plan on becoming a professional musician in my lifetime, I might somewhere down the line try to release an album, and it would be nice knowing that this tool exists.

2)My product is a software that reads an audio file (of their recorded song) and evaluates the components of the song (tempo, rhythm, chords, melody), and gives feedback on how similar it is to other released songs. The point of this is to ensure one is not plagiarizing music (even if its unintentional). A good comparison is like turnitin.com but with music.

3)The customers would be Singer/Songwriters, musicians, and record labels. These are all in the music industry and release content to the public.

4)Its valuable because it...

-lets them know that their song is truly unique and their own creation. (did not have too much outside influence or inspiration)

-can provide a resource to ensure they won't accidentally get sued, or be liable for copy right infringement

5)What I have that nobody else does is this idea... I don't believe their exists anything like it currently.

I think all these elements fit together well. I have a musical background, I know there a need exists, I know that customers care about this need, and I would be the only serve like this on the market.

Need Awareness and Information Search

For this assignment I picked the segment of Musicians/Songwriters. As this is a pretty niche market, it was difficult to find people to interview. I was able to find songwriters through the Nashville Songwriting Association online and kept calling people until they were willing to do an interview.

Because most of the people I came in contact with aren't releasing big hits. They aren't likely to be worried about copyright infringement over songs. The importance of this issue also depends on the genre of music one creates. If someone is more likely to be writing Pop/rock songs which consist of similar 4 chord songs this software might apply to them more. Regardless it seems in the songwriting community the only method to ensure that you're not creating a song too similar to something else is to show the songs to others and get their opinions.

The people I interviewed, once aware of this need, stated that they would look up reviews online of the product before purchase. It was also discovered that customers would want the option of either a monthly/yearly subscription or a per song cost, in order to cater to people who write many songs as well as few.

It seemed the awareness is there for the segment of Singer/Songwriters, and that many would be interested in my concept as long as the interface is east to use and the software is proven to work. Because this is a unique idea, and there is not currently a market for music plagiarism software I would have to somehow advertise well enough so that these songwriters know this service exists. This is a product that one would have to know about and look up online if they were interested in buying. Its not a physical product, and there wouldn't be any stores, so this need only comes up once they have competed a song and want to post it (in no place in particular).

https://soundcloud.com/beau-britain/need-awareness-int-sheryl
https://soundcloud.com/beau-britain/need-awareness-int2
https://soundcloud.com/beau-britain/need-awareness-int-dustin

Reading Reflection No. 1

1) Steve Jobs

• What surprised you the most?

Steve jobs noted that being adopted (abandoned by his parents) affected his life greatly because he felt it made him feel very different, maybe sometimes special. However when he and his girlfriend had a child at a very young age Jobs ended up making the same decision as his biological parents did, giving the child up for adoption.

Steve Jobs dropped out of college, but kept attending classes. This showed his desire to obtain knowledge over just a degree.

I had no clue that Steve Jobs had any part in Pixar. He was CEO when it mainly dealt with computer graphics. He saw its potential in animation so they partnered up with disney and started created successful films. Even though Jobs played no role whatsoever in the making of these movies, he did in a way guide the direction of Pixar to where it is now.

Steve jobs was a hippie. At one point when he was younger he would only shower once a week because he thought his all fruit diet prevented body odor.

• What about the entrepreneur did you most admire?

He had very humble beginnings. His parents were high school dropouts, and Steve himself didn’t finish college. Somehow steve was still able to be tenacious and reach success. (walking into atari and getting a job, and then later using those connections to help apple). It also seemed that he truly did make the apple computer and other products “the best”, he sought perfection. Not only did he want his product to be functional, but he wanted it to be art as well.

For a number of years He accepted an annual salary of $1 a year, because he preferred the money that he would have made to be invested in the company and help stimulate growth.

• What about the entrepreneur did you least admire?

It seemed like he mostly took or stole others ideas and made them successful, rather than innovate himself. He was also cold-hearted towards many people, mostly employees during his lifetime. There was even an award given annually to the person who would resist or challenge Steve’s behavior. He was also very stubborn and controlling of his ideas.

• Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure? If so, what did they do about it?

Yes. Because steve wanted things to also be aesthetically pleasing, this sometimes drove up the cost of production. And when working on his business NeXT, they largely failed because the price exceeded what customers were willing to pay.

2) What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited?

Steve Jobs was a very smart individual. He started noticing at a young age that he was above average intelligence and skipped a grade because of it. In his childhood he enjoyed playing with electronics. Throughout his life he has been able to convince others into his way of thinking. He had the ability to combine science with art when he lived in a time where people thought there was no overlap.

3) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

I was confused why Jobs would leave Apple completely (after being kicked off the board), when he had the chance to at least stay on as a part of the creative team. This was confusing to me because Jobs seemed so attached to apple, and its ideas.

4) If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask? Why?

-Why did you feel animosity towards Microsoft for “stealing” your user interface idea, when it appears that you also stole the same idea from Xerox?

Why: because it seemed Jobs understood that the GUI isn’t an idea that one could posses it’s just an improvement to the system that was in place.

-Regardless of technological limitations, what do you believe is the future of computer innovation.

Why: Steve Jobs is a visionary and I would be interested to see where he thinks we’re heading and what the next steps are once we have the capabilities.

5) While Steve Jobs didn’t exactly do a lot of hands on work (that was designated towards engineers like Wozniak), he did spend a lot of time and energy into achieving perfection. Upon his return as CEO Jobs said that he was working hours that would go from 7 in the morning to 9 at night. Steve Jobs said that this had negative effects on his health, and was exhausting. Steve Jobs like many others may believe that hard work is or can be unpleasant, however when you truly want something you will work hard for whatever that is.

Tweaking the Innovation

My new idea is a iPhone case that provides an external hard drive (more storage space) this is because a lot of people run out out of storage on their iPhones, and most people buy a case anyways so this would allow someone to store music/movies/photos on the external storage. It would have to be plugged into the charging port as well. And It would just look like a normal case (not bulky)

Phone cases: their is really only the one general product idea, but I could provide many options (depth) to appeal to new customers (differentiate the product)

1) provide different colors (Black, White, Blue, etc...)

- the benefit/reason is that people want a case that matches their style

- the tangible is that it is the same exact case (function)

- augmented is the color change 

2) water proof/life proof cases

-the benefit/reason is people want a case that protects their phone

-the tangible is the same product of external storage, except change the external material of the case and the installation to provide the life proof service

-the augmented is that their is a guarantee of protecting you're phone with an unbreakable phone case. there is a lifetime warranty on the case in case it breaks

3)amount of storage space

-the benefit some people may require a lot more space on their phone (music listeners)

-the tangible is that the phone has a different amount of space to store 

- the augmented is the option of more space, or a cheaper option if you don't need as much

originally I only had the base Idea of the storage case. But this assignment allowed me to think of the innovations/additions of water proof/life proof, and amount of storage.

Elevator Pitch No. 1)

The Business is called Fresh Footwear. The main opportunity (problem) being that there is a certain stigma towards crocs, even though they feel like you're walking on a cloud. My solution is to make a crocs shoe with heely's wheels so that you can cruise in comfort. This will make crocs cool again and bring me a lifetime of riches. You're welcome America.