Something I struggle with is sharing my ideas. I equal parts want to take full credit for them and don’t want to show them to anyone and be vulnerable which really ends up getting me nowhere. What right can I claim to ideas that I never put out there? And what’s more, I’ll never improve if I don’t put myself in a position to receive feedback and collaborate. In the same way that running with people who are in better shape than you helps you improve, so working with more artistic or creative people than yourself develops your own creativity.
So then, am I in some way obligated to share my ideas so that others have the opportunity to improve themselves, and even build off of my ideas? What if “intellectual property” is killing collaborative ideas?
That’s where the theory of the “collective brain” comes in. It says we are all neurons and working together will get us places we can’t even dream of but if we doggedly claim innovations and concepts as “belonging” to anyone, we aren’t going to get anywhere. Patent laws are supposed to promote the progress of useful arts but they have become one of the major roadblocks for technological innovation because people are taking credit for things like ‘swiping to unlock’. Come on now, that isn’t promoting anything.
And how does any of this relate to VW?
Well if you remember the post about all ‘new’ ideas being remixes of preexisting material, you’d know that this discussion is sort of irrelevant. I fancy myself original and creative but chances are, everything I come up with has been done at least once before, if not over and over throughout the history of humanity. Maybe I did actually manage to add something new to it, give it a different spin; at least I hope so, but really we only want to think we’re special..
“Original”
A super quirky guy (dyed, edgy hair, tattoos, hip clothes) buys a used car. It has weird bumper stickers on it, a funky colored steering wheel cover, fuzzy dice on the mirror, the list goes on. He hates all of it so he throws out the dice, peels off the stickers, removes the wheel cover, and is satisfied. For a while. But little by little he finds his own personality becoming part of the car. He adds ‘save the earth’ bumper stickers, puts a dreamcatcher on the rearview mirror, and buys all natural fiber seat covers. One day he looks at the car and realizes that he has come full circle and he laughs, then gets in and drives off.
“VW, make it yours.”
Eh. It’s not terrible. It throws enduring value in there, sort of subliminally, there’s definitely some motoring pleasure, and while there isn’t much in regard to playing up innovative design, two out of three’s not bad.
Copy Write Paste 