On Creativity

January 24th, 2006 | Filed under Quotes

I don’t use any software/services from 37 Signals. However, I would have killed (literally) for a product like writeboard back in school when we were writing our 140 page “campiagns book,” but it wasn’t offered back then.

I do however love the creativity and passion that goes into every single product they release. Two things absolutely floor me about this company. One, that they believe in creating product that are incredibly simple and easy to use, and 2, they believe in applying those ideas to how they run their business. Check out this quote from Jason Fried at the 2005 o’reilly emerging technology conference via it conversations. It is around the 8 minute mark.

“Constraints are where creativity happens. If you have unlimited resources and unlimited everything you’re never going to get anything done. You’re never going to launch anything, and you’re absolutely not going to come up with the creative solution, because you don’t have too. If you force yourself into situation where you have to come up with the creative solution, you will.” – Jason Fried

I think this quote completely sums up my opinion how to do things. Ever since I can remember I have been in love with creating something out of nothing with practically nothing. Whether it was music, or videos, or even this weblog, my goal and what has always charged me up was creating something with the materials at hand…not bitching that it couldn’t be complete without buying X,Y,Z. Let me tell you a little story that completely illustrates this point.

The idea that Jason stated above is something that I truly grabbed onto back in high school in Sally Bridge’s broadcasting class. We didn’t have much for equipment, and what we did have was becoming out of date fast…however, more than a couple classes were able to win national competitions by being creative with the equipment we had on hand. Once more, every time a senior figured out how to do something that, in our minds was revolutionary with the equipment we had, there was a sophomore or junior peering over his shoulder ready to adopt that idea into their next project. We weren’t stealing ideas, we were just adding to the collective knowledge of the department. People like Brandon M. and Nathan C. and people who I never even attended high school with (because they were so much older) like J.T. G. or David C. tested and came up with workflows that were amazing to a bunch kids with no formal training in media production and students such as buck, mendenhall, kelsey smith and myself took the combined knowledge of a 10-year-old department and won a ton of awards.

As a result of being nationally recognized the school district wised up and realized that they had a wonderful asset they could promote to convince students and parents to send their children to USD 308. While we only had 1 high school in the district, there were 5 other high school all vying for the students in the area. After a local bond issued passed we received an 80,000 dollar grant that would finish off our new studio with more than 5 times the equipment we had previously. It was a great gift from the community and even though I was graduating high school and wouldn’t be able to use the stuff on a daily basis, I was highly motivated to make sure we got the greatest bang for our buck and that the equipment would be able to last as long as the original stuff had.

To make a long story short, the district basically asked/forced my teacher out because she wasn’t turning the cable station we received (that she filled out tons of paper work for in order to get an education station from our local cable provider) into a free advertising station for the district that would be produced by the students in her class. She felt, and rightly so, that education for students was not about being indentured servants to the school district.

In addition to creating content for competition, we as a class had produced daily news summaries for the student body (very crude) and biweekly news casts (that were surprising funny and professional) under her supervision. Today the class (and I don’t blame the students) can’t even pull of either of the two shows even though they have purchased an additional $200,000 worth of equipment claiming that it was necessary for the students to create good content. Every time I go back to my parents house I make sure to double check the cable station praying that I might so some student generated content, carrying on the tradition that was started by many determined and creative students, but nothings shows up. Instead the station runs a loop of a AP news and weather service. It sucks.

I learned more about my own limits (and lack there-of) in that class than in any other class in school (college or otherwise) because we had problems like the lack of modern equipment. Since we didn’t have everything under the sky we were encouraged to come up with creative ideas on how to repurpose mixers and switchers and telephones and microphones and computers and cameras of every sort to pull off what was, although we didn’t know it at the time, a creative vision. Nothing felt better than doing something that everyone thought couldn’t be done with what was lying around in a closet or on someone’s desk collecting dust.

There are countless examples of this in the professional world as well, such as Fried’s company, the development of the mac (via Andy Hertzfield’s excellent resource), the original apple I by Woz or even films like Kevin Smith’s Clerks. Hell, even Plato agreed a couple of thousand years ago. People need to remember that sometimes you’re greatest strength can be what limits you. Sorry this is such a long post, but the comments Jason made (and continues to make on his blog) really jump started me today, and reminded me that I need to remember that every successful venture in my life has been born of creativity due to constraints.

Update: Jerry Kinser, the man who kept our equipment in working condition when we pushed the limits (and saved my ass more than a couple times), just posted in the comments that good ol’ hutch high is hiring an assistant to help produce the morning announcement and news shows. Huh, funny how they need 2 people do to what the person they pushed away could do by herself. Keep your spirits up Jerry…someday greatness will return to that studio, and thanks for reading!