The problem with finches

In How Computer Games Help Children Learn I argue that innovation doesn’t mean just “thinking of something no one as thought of before.” Rather, innovation takes place within a social context–it is about learning to solve problems that don’t have routine answers as much as inventing things that are totally new.

A recent item in the news illustrates why:

At first glance, Japanese cellphones are a gadget lover’s dream: ready for Internet and e-mail, they double as credit cards, boarding passes and even body-fat calculators.

But it is hard to find anyone in Chicago or London using a Japanese phone like a Panasonic, a Sharp or an NEC. Despite years of dabbling in overseas markets, Japan’s handset makers have little presence beyond the country’s shores.

The problem is that these local adaptations, while incredibly successful in their own niche, don’t fit with technologies or social expectations in other parts of the world.

The term that is sometimes used to describe the situation is the “Galápagos syndrome”, after the islands where Charles Darwin found evidence for the theory of evolution by observing the unique and highly-specialized finches that from centuries of isolation had developed into different species from their mainland cousins.

What is innovative one place is just strange another, so learning to think in creative ways can’t just mean learning to work in ways that are different and unique. Innovation and creativity also require sensitivity to culture and tradition.