Posted June 30, 2009

In our work of inventing and designing toys and games, we utilize what is described by some as the Einsteinian approach to invention and development. It is a trial and error process; build it, test it, modify it, test it again, modify it, try it again, over and over until we get it to work satisfactorily. Most of the time. 

            

Then we try to license it, showing it to prospective client companies over and over sometimes over a course of years, until we sell it or give up. Actually, we never give up. And sometimes we may license a concept a decade or more after it was first created. "You can run but you can’t hide," is one of our unexpressed mantras. 

            

As we develop our Less-than-Lethal-Weapon System, like paintball on steroids, we are beset with gremlins. As a complex system, it is difficult to get to the desired end result using the unstructured trial and error approach that works so well in toy development. 

            

We have had to step back to the beginning and optimize one component at a time, make each one consistent in its performance, one subsystem at a time. We are being very scrupulous to change only one variable at a time so that we can be confident that we know the consequences of each change, and we carefully record the results of each change and series of tests. That is the essence of the scientific method. 

            

This may not be our usual modus operandi, but this is how it gets done when the complexity is beyond that of a typical toy. We have done a lot of hard thinking, analysis of results and processes to come to this (obvious in hindsight) conclusion. And it appears to be working. We don’t give up. Never learned that in school.

< Previous Page

  

Name

Email

Comment

smaller | bigger

I have read and agree to the Terms of Usage.

Add Comment