Adam Alter

And Harris came in and said, well, look, we've got this product that's tremendously successful for young adults. We have older adults who want some versions of that, but they also want some versions of old phones, of traditional phones, of flip phones, phones with buttons. And she created a sort of hybrid in a phone known as the Jitterbug and ended up selling that business for a billion dollars.

And Harris came in and said, well, look, we've got this product that's tremendously successful for young adults. We have older adults who want some versions of that, but they also want some versions of old phones, of traditional phones, of flip phones, phones with buttons. And she created a sort of hybrid in a phone known as the Jitterbug and ended up selling that business for a billion dollars.

And Harris came in and said, well, look, we've got this product that's tremendously successful for young adults. We have older adults who want some versions of that, but they also want some versions of old phones, of traditional phones, of flip phones, phones with buttons. And she created a sort of hybrid in a phone known as the Jitterbug and ended up selling that business for a billion dollars.

So what she basically did there was she said, yeah, this is not novel. It's not new. It's not sexy. It's not original. But what it is, it's taking an existing market and an existing product, finding a new market that wants something slightly different and bolting these concepts together to form something that is tremendously successful but isn't really in any sense completely radically original.

So what she basically did there was she said, yeah, this is not novel. It's not new. It's not sexy. It's not original. But what it is, it's taking an existing market and an existing product, finding a new market that wants something slightly different and bolting these concepts together to form something that is tremendously successful but isn't really in any sense completely radically original.

So what she basically did there was she said, yeah, this is not novel. It's not new. It's not sexy. It's not original. But what it is, it's taking an existing market and an existing product, finding a new market that wants something slightly different and bolting these concepts together to form something that is tremendously successful but isn't really in any sense completely radically original.

Well, I think some people stumble on this, right? And it's interesting when you're in the business of creativity of whether it's art, music, writing, doesn't really matter the genre you're in, you naturally hoover up information, you hoover up the different strategies that other people in your field use. And without even realizing it, you become a sort of accidental plagiarist.

Well, I think some people stumble on this, right? And it's interesting when you're in the business of creativity of whether it's art, music, writing, doesn't really matter the genre you're in, you naturally hoover up information, you hoover up the different strategies that other people in your field use. And without even realizing it, you become a sort of accidental plagiarist.

Well, I think some people stumble on this, right? And it's interesting when you're in the business of creativity of whether it's art, music, writing, doesn't really matter the genre you're in, you naturally hoover up information, you hoover up the different strategies that other people in your field use. And without even realizing it, you become a sort of accidental plagiarist.

And when you ask people, where did these ideas come from? Naturally, those ideas, whatever their latest idea is, is going to be the product of everything they've ever consumed before. But humans are really bad at pinpointing the origin of new ideas and really the origin of pretty much anything that they think of.

And when you ask people, where did these ideas come from? Naturally, those ideas, whatever their latest idea is, is going to be the product of everything they've ever consumed before. But humans are really bad at pinpointing the origin of new ideas and really the origin of pretty much anything that they think of.

And when you ask people, where did these ideas come from? Naturally, those ideas, whatever their latest idea is, is going to be the product of everything they've ever consumed before. But humans are really bad at pinpointing the origin of new ideas and really the origin of pretty much anything that they think of.

And so when you try to backward engineer what we do when we do new things, a lot of what we're doing is just taking things whatever we've been exposed to, creating a sort of Frankenstein's monster out of it. And that's what our original product ends up being.

And so when you try to backward engineer what we do when we do new things, a lot of what we're doing is just taking things whatever we've been exposed to, creating a sort of Frankenstein's monster out of it. And that's what our original product ends up being.

And so when you try to backward engineer what we do when we do new things, a lot of what we're doing is just taking things whatever we've been exposed to, creating a sort of Frankenstein's monster out of it. And that's what our original product ends up being.

But once you understand that insight, it's incredibly valuable when you're stuck because it turns the mystical process of creativity into something quite deliberate and algorithmic. And I think a lot of people who understand this have become much more successful and generative as a result of that.

But once you understand that insight, it's incredibly valuable when you're stuck because it turns the mystical process of creativity into something quite deliberate and algorithmic. And I think a lot of people who understand this have become much more successful and generative as a result of that.

But once you understand that insight, it's incredibly valuable when you're stuck because it turns the mystical process of creativity into something quite deliberate and algorithmic. And I think a lot of people who understand this have become much more successful and generative as a result of that.

I think that's, on its face, that's excellent advice. The thing that most of us do instinctively though is we ask the wrong people. Our friends, colleagues who are trusted, they tend to be people who are a lot like us, demographically, in background, in attitude, in values. And, you know, there are really three kinds of people you can get advice from.

I think that's, on its face, that's excellent advice. The thing that most of us do instinctively though is we ask the wrong people. Our friends, colleagues who are trusted, they tend to be people who are a lot like us, demographically, in background, in attitude, in values. And, you know, there are really three kinds of people you can get advice from.