The Constant Observer

When I was a young boy I remember being fascinated by Johny Quest and the virtual World he always managed to slip himself into. I cant forget those days when I used to come back from school, grab my cup of milk and sit glued to cartoon network (they don’t do it like they used to anymore!). At that time, as a kid I used to think to myself – “il be lucky if I can ever go into another World where I can fight bad guys, play games and push the limits of my body without really pushing them”. Well with Second Life – my dreams can almost be fulfilled.

Second Life isn’t really the same as my Johny Quest fantasy because its not really ‘virtual’ in the sense that one cannot really optimize the ‘feeling’ of being in another World.

I’ll deal with the ‘reality’ of Second Life another time – what has really fascinated me this time round is the concept of how various people are using Second Life to optimize efficiency in whatever businesses they undertake.

Wipro has created a training center in Second Life. More firms are now using Second Life in an even more effective manner. CRY - Amul - Bollywood to name a few ---

When second life started out it had its skeptics. There were then the early settlers who soon started making a few bucks – and then the forces of economics took over and pushed more users into Second Life. More users – more often than not means more innovation in use patterns.

The US Army, healthcare providers, academics and companies other than Wipro are contemplating using Second Life to maximize use.

Before Second Life there have been games such as Sims Online, and Hitman etc., which have real life simulations. The only difference is that in Second Life, there is not a predetermined outcome.

So manifestations of Second Life are now being used to train paramedics, doctors, and firefighters in the case of disasters. Those people involved with disaster management now have the opportunity to forecast and figure out over and over again, in a realistic manner the outcomes of their actions. Thus the best possible plan of action can be derived and fewer mistakes can be made when an actual disaster occours.

Similar to Wipro, a British based company – PIXElearning is using Secong Life to train interns and freshers straight out of University. The interns and freshers are put through grueling tests that will prepare them for the ‘big bad world’. So they may face rude clients, unreasonable clients etc. This gives HR the scope to judge the new entrants on the basis of aptitude in a work environment and this may also help to optimize individual roles.

Cisco – the multinational giant is another company that is keyed into Second Life. They have been using Second Life to create conferences for heads all over the World and simulate an ‘as close to a real conference’ environment – something that is not possible solely through video conferencing and chat etc.

But get it right – Virtual Worlds are not cheap. This year itself, about $1 Billion worth of exchanges were made on Virtual Worlds. With such huge sums being made – there are bound to be the ‘wrong people’ attracted. Virtual or real, human nature is human nature. Our senses that easily misguide us are tuned to Sex, Violence, and certain crazily wild non sensical fantasies. So the opportunities to abuse the Internet on Second Life are more than what exists with the Internet as we currently know it.

There have been instances where people have been banned from Second Life for ‘life’ because they engaged in various forms of inappropriate behaviour – things that are not even worth mentioning.

Social World observers however, claim that things are not so bad, argues Dan Hunter of New York Law School, who is writing a book about the social significance of virtual worlds. “If you look at the numbers, there are so few events of fraud and problematic activity,” he says.

With any new innovation on the Internet – there are bound to be violators and detractors alike. Ultimately there may be certain problem makers but as long as there are companies and people who are consistently trying to find higher purposes for innovations, it will never always be only about fun and games.

“Well, it was kind of an accident, because plastic is not what I meant to invent. I had just sold photograph paper to Eastman Kodak for 1 million dollars” – that’s what Leo Baekeland, the inventor of photographic paper and early ‘light’ plastic called Bakelite said once he had patented Bakelite. Imagine if he hadn’t made that accident in 1907, or better still imagine if he had actually discovered all the possible uses of plastic way back in 1907 without the need of an ‘accident’ and spared all those years through which plastic ‘evolved’? Well now that’s possible – or almost at least.

An emerging technique for new product development and technology optimization called ‘evolutionary design’ makes sure that while solving the problem of developing the ‘optimum’ product; a computer possibly runs through more than tens of millions of possible solutions.

To be entirely honest, evolutionary design is not a completely new concept. It has been used for quite a while in the development of aerodynamics for cars (supercars mainly), the modification and optimization of plane wings, and other aerodynamic related fields. The problem with evolutionary design was that it was restricted only to the larger firms who could afford the super computing power needed to generate more than 10 million ‘product gene’ modifications. The interesting development has been that primarily, the cost of super computers has fallen and this technology now comes within the reach of firms, which may not be mammoth in terms of turnover and market capitalization.

As the name suggests, evolutionary design uses some mechanisms inspired by biological evolution: reproduction, mutation, recombination, and selection. This is done so with the help of an evolutionary algorithm, which takes into account all the possible solutions to altering a problem. It does so through the mutation of a basic blue print.

Anyone who knows the basics of evolutionary biology will tell you that most mutations are worse than the original. Few are progressively better. With respect to product and technology development, an evolutionary algorithm ‘identifies’ these better mutations and thus makes it possible for existing products to be more efficient.

The Evolutionary Algorithm for Products works like this:

1) It takes the design parameters such as length, width, height, current, voltage, material etc. into account.

2) It treats each aspect of the product as a different component.

3) It then tries to put together all possible combinations of the different aspects of a product and come up with the best possible solution.

Here are a few examples on product innovations that have come forth through evolutionary design

‘At the University of Sydney, in Australia, Steve Manos used an evolutionary algorithm to come up with novel patterns in a type of optical fibre that has air holes shot through its length. Normally, these holes are arranged in a hexagonal pattern, but the algorithm generated a bizarre flower-like pattern of holes that no human would have thought of trying. It doubled the fibre's bandwidth.’ (generated from The Economist)

There are also other uses, which have been developed with respect to cochlear implants. The cochlear implant is often referred to as a bionic ear. Unlike hearing aids, the cochlear implant does not amplify sound, but works by directly stimulating any functioning auditory nerves inside the cochlea with electrical impulses. External components of the cochlear implant include a microphone, speech processor and transmitter, which also provides an individual to adjust the sound for quality and amplification. So in essence, about 20 or more combinations of electrodes need to be precisely adjusted for EVERY individual in order to adequately stimulate the auditory nerve! Evolutionary algorithms are now allowing doctors to solve the problems of patients within weeks (a task that previously could often take years).

Evolutionary design could affect ‘super specialized’ businesses as well. A research team at Stanford University prepared a Wi – Fi antenna for a company that did not want to pay any patent fees to Cisco. The team basically fed in all the possible product dimensions and specifications into an algorithm and developed a product that worked around Cisco’s patent and was actually a better product!

So in a sense this is the death of new product development right? Well not really – as new individual needs evolve and people look for new benefits from technology, new products will automatically evolve. Also, evolutionary design develops the most optimum design for products with a given set of ‘raw materials’ so to speak. So in a sense it only develops the ‘best possible solution’ from what is fed in to it. There may be inputs for development that product developers and researchers may still not have discovered the use of. One must keep in mind that an algorithm is a list of well-defined instructions.

Also what Evolutionary design does is that it makes the product perform better. Now with respect to commercial and business products, this means that there will be fewer product defaults and a benefit in overall productivity hopefully. What evolutionary design still cannot do is this – it cannot create a better ‘use experience’, which may arise out of software that is culturally ingrained (eg. Linux is a better programming platform and technically the ‘superior software’ but Windows still sells more as it is psychologically and culturally accessible).

The aesthetic design element will thus play an even more important element in the purchase decision of consumers while deciding which product to buy because most of them will be ‘superior performers’.

It will all boil down to who understands the consumer better, creates a better brand and use experience keeping in mind culture, values, traditions, personal goals etc. (or will we have an optimizer for that as well?)

An emerging technique for new product development and technology optimization called ‘evolutionary design’ makes sure that while solving the problem of developing the ‘optimum’ product; a computer possibly runs through more than tens of millions of possible solutions.

To be entirely honest, evolutionary design is not a completely new concept. It has been used for quite a while in the development of aerodynamics for cars (supercars mainly), the modification and optimization of plane wings, and other aerodynamic related fields. The problem with evolutionary design was that it was restricted only to the larger firms who could afford the super computing power needed to generate more than 10 million ‘product gene’ modifications. The interesting development has been that primarily, the cost of super computers has fallen and this technology now comes within the reach of firms, which may not be mammoth in terms of turnover and market capitalization.

 As the name suggests, evolutionary design uses some mechanisms inspired by biological evolution: reproduction, mutation, recombination, and selection. This is done so with the help of an evolutionary algorithm, which takes into account all the possible solutions to altering a problem. It does so through the mutation of a basic blue print.

Anyone who knows the basics of evolutionary biology will tell you that most mutations are worse than the original. Few are progressively better. With respect to product and technology development, an evolutionary algorithm ‘identifies’ these better mutations and thus makes it possible for existing products to be more efficient.

The Evolutionary Algorithm for Products works like this:

1) It takes the design parameters such as length, width, height, current, voltage, material etc. into account.

2) It treats each aspect of the product as a different component.

3) It then tries to put together all possible combinations of the different aspects of a product and come up with the best possible solution.

Here are a few examples on product innovations that have come forth through evolutionary design

‘At the University of Sydney, in Australia, Steve Manos used an evolutionary algorithm to come up with novel patterns in a type of optical fibre that has air holes shot through its length. Normally, these holes are arranged in a hexagonal pattern, but the algorithm generated a bizarre flower-like pattern of holes that no human would have thought of trying. It doubled the fibre's bandwidth.’ (generated from The Economist)

There are also other uses, which have been developed with respect to cochlear implants. The cochlear implant is often referred to as a bionic ear. Unlike hearing aids, the cochlear implant does not amplify sound, but works by directly stimulating any functioning auditory nerves inside the cochlea with electrical impulses. External components of the cochlear implant include a microphone, speech processor and transmitter, which also provides an individual to adjust the sound for quality and amplification. So in essence, about 20 or more combinations of electrodes need to be precisely adjusted for EVERY individual in order to adequately stimulate the auditory nerve! Evolutionary algorithms are now allowing doctors to solve the problems of patients within weeks (a task that previously could often take years).

Evolutionary design could affect ‘super specialized’ businesses as well. A research team at Stanford University prepared a Wi – Fi antenna for a company that did not want to pay any patent fees to Cisco. The team basically fed in all the possible product dimensions and specifications into an algorithm and developed a product that worked around Cisco’s patent and was actually a better product!

So in a sense this is the death of new product development right? Well not really – as new individual needs evolve and people look for new benefits from technology, new products will automatically evolve. Also, evolutionary design develops the most optimum design for products with a given set of ‘raw materials’ so to speak. So in a sense it only develops the ‘best possible solution’ from what is fed in to it. There may be inputs for development that product developers and researchers may still not have discovered the use of. One must keep in mind that an algorithm is a list of well-defined instructions.

Also what Evolutionary design does is that it makes the product perform better. Now with respect to commercial and business products, this means that there will be fewer product defaults and a benefit in overall productivity hopefully. What evolutionary design still cannot do is this – it cannot create a better ‘use experience’, which may arise out of software that is culturally ingrained (eg. Linux is a better programming platform and technically the ‘superior software’ but Windows still sells more as it is psychologically and culturally accessible).

The aesthetic design element will thus play an even more important element in the purchase decision of consumers while deciding which product to buy because most of them will be ‘superior performers’.

It will all boil down to who understands the consumer better, creates a better brand and use experience keeping in mind culture, values, traditions, personal goals etc. (or will we have an optimizer for that as well?)