Looking for a way to use a technology, rather than choosing the technology to fit the use

Trying to figure out how to add VR, AR or, of course, AI to a project is like sticking a load bearing pillar right in front of your eyeline.

How are you supposed to see your goal, or the best way to solve your problem, if you start with that in your way?

Creativity can be both held  back and empowered by constraints – I’ve reluctantly accepted this many times after seeing frustration turn into results – but starting with this particular one -we need to use this tool or tech-  puts you in a mindset where you are already overlooking if something isn’t great, because you’re stuck using this thing and have to come up with an idea.

So you start off disabling your own critical eye and it only gets worse from there. The option to not do this, or to try something else, simply isn’t there.

You’re designing something that maybe no one wants, because the goal isn’t a real one.

This is how a lot of grant applications start, and hackathons and design sprints and things – and of course great projects and businesses are born that way.

But after years of having seen and also made so much of the good, the bad, and the ugly,  it’s like there’s a news ticker scrolling in my mind when I think of or talk about ideas.

“WHY VR? WHAT DOES XR BRING HERE? WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO PICK THIS UP AND DO IT?”

It’s tricky and not always welcome, but saying yes great idea, let’s do it, to every idea puts you into that position again – your critical eye partially blinded from the start.

This isn’t about saying no to ideas – it’s about wanting to do work with two eyes open and no hands tied behind my back. (Apologies for the epanorthosis here, no AI was used in writing this or any post)

It takes experience to know that just because it’s new to a creator, doesn’t translate to that being the case for an audience. Or that, just because you spent lots of money turning a beloved idea into a (virtual) reality, it might not resonate or interest anyone else.

The bar isn’t high for XR – it’s all over the shop, high, low, depends on the audience. It’s not a bar at all, we’re leaping freestyle in this world. You can’t know how high is high enough until you jump. One person’s WOW is another person’s MEH.

The only way to have faith you’re doing it right is to rein in the excitement and do some work examining your motivations and goals. This is just fundamental. 

I’ve often worried that by being a Jack of all trades and not focusing on one, I’m emitting  (not giving – please, I am a millennial!) “master of none” energy. But I feel that staying platform agnostic and tool non-denominational my business is better placed to think in those basic terms where you can ask questions and figure out the best route forward.

I’m certainly not above thinking “what can I do with VR here” but I know how different it feels – how the good ideas just FLOW and how a positive route reveals itself, unfolding before you – when you start with “What do I really want to achieve here?” instead.

There are almost infinite things you can create with your unique combination of people, skills, tech, and goals. 

I don’t claim to have all the answers. But I have lots of questions.

And that probing and investigation stage is something you just can’t skimp on.

It’s why vibe coding doesn’t change the game – the limiting factor in making apps is the design process, not technical work.

Ideas need to be put under pressure. Thrown to the lions. Made squirm. 

The strong can take it, and get stronger. The weak don’t need to waste any more of your time or money. 

A friend of mine was upset that she didn’t get into a course she wanted. I thought back to my own experiences. When you embark on something, all other possibilities – the infinite ones swirling around you – fall away. The arrow points and you step forwards. This is life. I have no regrets really, although I could muster a few if I looked at things differently. I’ve done a lot of dumb things, but really the only thing I’ve done wrong is waste my own time. Waste my time doing something not harmful in itself, but INSTEAD of something else.

Relationships that turned out badly, I don’t care that I was older by the end of it, but that I spent too long in the company of the wrong person, and missed out therefore on spending that time and energy on someone more deserving – such as myself!

Similarly taking a job out of desperation and duty means missing out on something else (but we all have to do this at times). Conversely, not getting a job or a course is upsetting because you didn’t get what you wanted, but on the other hand, your ticket has just gone back into the great lotto drum of possibilities, ready to be plucked out by something even better.

And working on an idea that isn’t very good or could be better is just a waste of potential – a disservice to all those wonderful things you could be doing.