NVIDIA’s B-vue office was the lion’s share of a rented space in an office building. It was shared by dentist and dermatology offices, so new people were constantly competing for parking spaces with employees.

Matters were made worse when the owner mysteriously repainted the parking lot with much narrower spaces all labeled ‘compact.’ The entire lot was this way, not just a few spaces.

Since not everyone drives compact cars, this was unreasonable. It was next to impossible to turn a normal car well enough to fit into a space if its neighbors were occupied no matter how much slack they gave you. People parked in alternating spaces to have as much dynamic manoeuvring room as possible, so the lot could be at most 50% utilized before people had to start making tough decisions.

I got fed up with it, so I decided I was going to always park in the centroid of two spaces straddling the line. This had the result of (a) giving me a lot of room, (b) encouraging everyone else to distribute the rest of the area sensibly and stop alternating.

The final steady-sate behavior: the lot could always conveniently accommodate more people than it ever needed so long as enough people didn’t follow the rules. Seeing it work out this way was beautiful.

We don’t know why the owner repainted the lot for compact cars only though I suspect the city gives commercial landowners incentives for encouraging environmentally friendly transportation.

Focus: I just spit on car windshields if I’m upset about things. It’s slightly gross but not permanent.

I would say that the majority of innovations these days are primarily an upgrade of an existing concept or a unique application of an existing concept, rather than something entirely new.

Besides if you do come up something truly original, people will think you’re nuts. Originality is quite audacious.

“Find a truly original idea. It is the only way I will ever distinguish myself. It is the only way I will ever matter. “

Shaving with fire was mine….