Hello Readers,
In this season of misleading political manifestos, promises, agendas, etc., I, myself, tried to lure some of the greedy brains to read something that may mean more precious than an iPhone! Safely, no one can sue me here because I didn't make any inappropriate remark on any inappropriate political reader. That is saved for the further reading, provided you buy the premise that this post has actually nothing to do with building an iPhone.
As usual, passing the time in the scorching summer of India, I was unusually invited to attend a regular academic conference where "they" were keen on "bridging the gap" between students and industry and were "mapping the brains" of their students. Now, as far as Indian inferiority complex and English language's jargony is concerned, such titles always attract the people who are NOT associated with the hosting institutions and are "invited" to attend their "brain storming conference", just because they "sound good". And just like the misleading title of this post and like you, misled readers, those industrial people (some of them out of certain obligations), attended the said conference.
Without falling off the topic, the conclusive terms coming up every now and then were those above mentioned jargons, which the management kept on repeating like some holy mantra. But I sensed something very awkward there. They wanted the industries to help the students to guide them for the projects. The industries will define, the students will work and boom, the problem ends a better society develops! Had it been that shit easy, Africa would have been the leader in innovation. [See TedTalks video: You Don't Need an App for That] The problem they equivocally and ambiguously discussed was the indisciplined approach to involve theindustries to get the students. The management sent out some erratic ideas which rather than being out-of-the-box were actually closing-the-box-for-eternity ideas. Amongst some 50 faculties as qualified as M.Tech/PhD, I was probably the only one holding a B.E. and a project coordinator. So there wasn't much of a case to put forward, when I had raised a doubt and was ephemerally heard while the listener picked up his nose in this already dry environment.
I have a primary question. Why would an industry, give you their problems? Why would they rely on a Bachelor when they can have the same thing, effectively solved by a better, experienced person? Amidst the haphazard policy framework, our industries lack the corporate social responsibility. One can easily blame them. I wouldn't.
Let's take this example. Why do you pick up a smartphone from Apple or Samsung or Google or Blackberry, when even a simple PDA was enough? Why do you purchase an Samsung S4 when you already had S3? Why would you think of purchasing an iPhone 6 in 2014 when you've already purchased the 5S in 2013? Some call it splurging, some call it utility and the others are Indians because for us, the name itself is enough! For anything to sell, the consumer must need to have a strong reliability
1. In company
2. Product's validity over the time
3. Product's utility
4. Innovation/New features
An intelligent consumer, will definitely keep in mind the above points and maybe start saving for a product sufficing all the above mentioned criteria. But the other splurges, the wrongly philanthropists, don't. The essence of the idea is briefly shown in the figure below:
The point is, when Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Narayan Murthy or Azim Premji become philanthropists, they don't turn themselves into ascetics. They are developing a model where not only their money is being poured into something fruitful, but in a way, it is actually helping their firm to innovate in different areas and fields. [Excellent interview at TedTalks: Bill and Melinda Gates]. In an indirect sense, they are innovating to create a wider scope and arena for their firm and towards the entire economy [Read the abstract: The role of innovation in driving the economy: Lessons from the global financial crisis by Angela Hausmana, Wesley J. Johnston]. If one thinks deeply, this connects somewhere with the academic institutions and their ties with the industries. An academic institute should be able to produce more innovative output (students) rather than focusing on (read, just!) policies to make the students innovative. Somewhere, down the line this is not going to happen.
The current educational system is destroying the curiosity, thereby strangling innovative approach of the students. Even one of my previous posts focussed on the same idea. It is a simple. How are you going to sell a product if it is as conventional as a decade? Will you purchase a Nokia 3120 at a price of Rs. 5500 in 2014? Will you purchase a Maruti Van priced at Rs. 5 lacs in 2014? Can you even think of selling a day old product at the same price as purchased? Unanimously, the answer is "No" for all the questions. If you, as a customer, do not purchase a product that is even a day older, how can an industry pour its earning into a system that is teaching them technology almost 20 years older than what they are using now? What is the meaning of giving the students a project of working on speech recognition software when they have a hard time decoding a simple C/C++ program? What is the use of asking a mechanical engineering student to design an aerodynamically efficient car when he hardly knows anything about the structure of the car? In this time of universal crisis and slowdown, industries are not that wealthy anymore.
Personally, I find the idea of fingerprint recognition in iPhone 5S as supremely idiotic. Although a great admirer of Apple products, but this really is a gimmick for any hardcore smartphone user too. But still, it can be sold. It has a new, innovative feature something the other competitors do not possess, yet. The leaked iPhone 6 is supposed to be made of Sapphire Glass, superior to suddenly-turned-into-obsolete Gorilla Glass. The quality of the glass being, it is the second hardest material after diamond! [Read: iPhone 6 and Sapphire Glass]. Isn't this a heftily paying innovation? What's the source? Curiosity. Apple designed and patented its own process to manufacture sapphire glass on its flagship iPhone 6. [Read: Apple's Patented Sapphire Glass Manufacturing Design]. There can be no money without competition. There can be no competition without new products. There cannot be new products without invention/innovation and there cannot be innovation without curiosity. See? There is no formal education in the cycle! ;)
That conference literally bored me to death by discussing the policies that can be framed to "make students innovative". Due to certain ridiculous circumstances, I had to bear the entire 3 hour ridiculous movie of this great innovators. A movie that was so realistic to get a mention in IMDb's Bottom 100!
Lastly, I want to bust a myth popularly termed as "Knowledge" in 2014. What we, as a students, are gathering, is simply information, which has been misnamed as knowledge! With all these Googling, Wikiing and App downloading, it is just that shared information being passed on. Try searching the patent sites (e.g. Wipo, USPTO, etc.) about the ideas you have or ever had. You will see, what the world really is!
Flick Suggestion: Inside Job. A gorgeous, Academy Award Winner documentary, which although has no direct connection with the post but actually shows the curiosity of director, which has lead to a fabulously researched and awesomely made documentary. Must watch!
Signing Off
*Dump*
