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Who pays for development time? | Victoria Tillotson | News“If we are going to grow, I have to move my business from a position of “work to hire” for ever-reducing margins to ownership of rights or IP”
Question: Was this said to me by a Chinese animation company, or a Bristol based digital marketing business?
Answer: Both, if I paraphrase – and therein lies a challenge.
In this post-digital landscape the cost of entry for new service businesses is lower than ever before, and competition is now global - with the result that regardless of whether you promote quality as your USP, there is pressure on price.
But at the same time this technology revolution is knocking down the traditional, aggregated distribution models and creating opportunity in entirely new emerging industries, and in new models of exploitation within rapidly evolving existing business sectors.
The difficulty for small companies (and true whatever your business - digital, design, marketing, publishing, production etc) is however the same as it ever was - how do I create the time away from core business to develop new products or services? And even if I create the time, how do I extract enough margin from existing business to fund this development time?
At a talk at the Pervasive Media Studio recently Evan Grant from interactive agency Seeper described a kind of internal “arms race”, the clients they work with constantly demand “the first” or “the newest” so Seeper is in a permanent state of development – luckily they have 12 year track record behind them so are able to invest to re-sell.
Darius Pocha from Enable explains their approach to the issue, launching a new agency called Moksha to create content and experiences for brands, “With Moksha our aim is to create innovative concepts where clients pay for the value of the idea rather than the number of hours it takes to develop and execute it.”
So is there a solution? – not a simple one, but there are opportunities for you to try to solve the problem in places you might not immediately look. And despite being public funding they do not have the stifling bureaucracy and constricting criteria you’d expect.
The Media Sandbox scheme was set up to tackle exactly this issue. Experimentation requires space and resource, so over the past two years Media Sandbox has made small development investments in everything from mobile services to ARG’s, software development to multiplatform content. The ethos of the Sandbox is about community and collaboration – open innovation – but since when did any idea emerge fully formed?
Simon from Slingshot, who received a Sandbox award in 2008, says “Sandbox was a great catalyst for us. The commission gave us the opportunity to develop a methodology and an aesthetic. The ideas we generated during this process needed further backing to take them from plans to services, which we received in the form of a TSB feasibility award. MSGE, the game system we developed, is now the core of our business and at the heart of the set of products we are commercialising.”
The call for ideas for Media Sandbox 2010 is open now and the scheme will make 7 x £10,000 investments to develop new projects using open data and/or pervasive experiences (link).
As referenced by Simon, another call currently open is with the Technology Strategy Board. Focused on the development of innovative products and services to pre-figure the internet of the future they will invest £18M in collaboration R&D over the next 12 months (link)
Last word to Andy Parkhouse from Team Rubber “we’ve generated real benefit in the past from our involvement with funding schemes like the Media Sandbox. Creating space for innovation has allowed us to develop new ideas for products, over time this has enabled us to diversify our sales pitch and delivered revenues to the bottom line.”
If you are a creative business who needs to find an answer to the question at the top, I’d recommend you take 5 minutes to look at these two schemes – gift horses and all that….
Contact Victoria (victoria@watershed.co.uk) or Mark (mark@markleaver.net) if you need any other information or advice.
Mark Leaver – July 2010
Applications are open | Victoria Tillotson | News
Passion is important. It's passion that fuels any great idea and when you mix passion with technology, content and context, you can make brilliant things happen.
The South West is full of passionate people, so to kick off this years' scheme we ran three ideas labs: Pervasive Experiences were explored in Plymouth & Gloucester; and in Bristol we challenged you to consider open data and the B-Open strand of this years' scheme.
From accessibility, to gaming platforms, to transport applications, to broadcasting - ideas were collectively shared and discussed and we know there are more ideas out there. So what are you passionate about? What needs do you or your audience have? What barriers do you foresee? How can you respond in future-facing ways?
Applications are now open for Media Sandbox 2010 (deadline 28th July):
- You can download the application form and learn more about submitting an application here.
You can also:
- Learn more about the two theme strands here.
- Find out what data is available from Bristol City Council here.
- Find out what other data sets people have requested here.We look forward to hearing from you.
Many thanks to all the ideas lab participants, Formation Zone, Tamar Science Park, Designed in Devon, Plymouth Media Partnership, Gloucestershire Media Group, Connecting Bristol and Bristol City Council who were instrumental in making this years' events a success.
Thanks also to Sirius, one of Europe's most experienced Enterprise Open Source systems integrators, for supporting the Bristol networking and drinks session.
More pics from all the events on Flickr.
B-Open: Available Data Sets | Victoria Tillotson | NewsWe're pleased to announce that Bristol City Council have provided an intial list of data sets readily available for use as part of the B-Open Strand of this years' Media Sandbox. Realtime data includes:
- Bristol Air Quality
- Bristol Harbour Water Quality
- Bristol River Water Quality
- Bristol City Council Energy Management
Statistical data is also available and includes:
- Indicators of quality of life in Bristol
- Bristol Census Data
- Bristol Crime Data
- Bristol Health Data
- Bristol Education Data (Key Stage Results)
- Bristol Population Data
- Bristol Department of Work and Pensions Data
- Bristol Deprivation Data
- Bristol Health Data
In the future feeds and datasets will be added for:
- Car Parks
- Venues
- Events
- Councilors
Existing RSS/Atom feeds you may be interested in are as follows:
- Online Services
- Leisure Online Services
- Libraries
- Museums
- Twinning
- Ask Bristol
- Avon & Somerset Police
- Bristol weather
- Consultations
- ePetitions
- Recruitment
- Web casts
If you have an idea that relies on content from a data set not included on this list please comment on the 'What data is available?' page, as we're keen to source other data sets you might need.So, get your thinking caps on and don't forget to book a place on the Ideas Lab next week.
B-Open: Media Sandbox Launches | Victoria Tillotson | NewsBristol City Council, Connecting Bristol and Media Sandbox are pleased to invite you to attend an ideas lab to celebrate, explore and develop applications for the open data strand of this year’s Media Sandbox:
Details: 30 June 2010 | 1 – 6pm | Watershed, Bristol | Free, booking essential
For full details about the event and how to book, visit: http://www.mediasandbox.co.uk/b-open-launching-media-sandbox%E2%80%99s-open-data-strand/
Book now for the Gloucestershire Minivation Lab | Victoria Tillotson | NewsMedia Sandbox and Gloucester Media Group are pleased to invite you to attend a mini ideas lab to generate ideas and develop applications for the Pervasive Experiences strand of this year’s Media Sandbox:
When: 6-9pm, Monday 28th June 2010
Where: Board Room / Room 2. Level 4, Llanthony Warehouse, Gloucester Docks, Gloucester, GL1 2EHBringing together leading technology, artistic and media talent, Media Sandbox is a commissioning scheme to support South West companies/organisations to research emerging possibilities in digital media.
In 2010, four £10,000 commissions will be awarded to research projects exploring innovative Pervasive Experiences - ground-breaking ideas that dovetail mobile, wireless and sensory technologies with content and context, to create meaningful experiences.
This free event will take the form of a mini ideas lab and will offer the opportunity to examine the theme, generate ideas, find out more about the scheme and meet some interesting people.
Media Sandbox will open for applications on 30th June 2010. The application form will be available for download from 23rd June. Whilst it is not mandatory to attend, we do advise anyone considering applying to come along.
The ideas lab will be held at Board Room / Room 2, Level 4, Llanthony Warehouse, Gloucester Docks, Gloucester, GL1 2EH.
This event is free, but booking is essential. To reserve a place, please email victoria@watershed.co.uk
This event is organised in collaboration with Gloucestershire Media Group.
