Variety Systems
Variety can destroy variety.--Stafford Beer
If something has a glut of options, produce even more variety to push it to the limit at which point people will find creative ways to reduce variety. In creative work, it is looking beyond intended use, and exploring other possibilities beyond the obvious, until there are too many options again. Repeat.
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Post-scripts:
After watching Beer's lectures, I see the relevance of his theories about variety. I am reminded of the work of Alan MCollum whose forte is variety. Apps are like that: a designed system (not an object) that does one or a few things, and all are unique. Or like Ai Weiwei's seeds. The difference between fungible material like seeds and apps is that a seed has the same system as every other seed. Apps only have the OS in common.
If something has a glut of options, produce even more variety to push it to the limit at which point people will find creative ways to reduce variety. In creative work, it is looking beyond intended use, and exploring other possibilities beyond the obvious, until there are too many options again. Repeat.
***
Post-scripts:
After watching Beer's lectures, I see the relevance of his theories about variety. I am reminded of the work of Alan MCollum whose forte is variety. Apps are like that: a designed system (not an object) that does one or a few things, and all are unique. Or like Ai Weiwei's seeds. The difference between fungible material like seeds and apps is that a seed has the same system as every other seed. Apps only have the OS in common.
