This piece is taken directly from my blog post over at goagri.com. It applies to game development as well and I thought it best to share it here again.
While I was studying IT back in 1997 one of the projects I had to do was to develop a software application for a subject of my choice. I chose to develop a dairy farming application. The reason why I chose farming was because I grew up on a farm and I saw a great need for such a type of software.
Coincidently someone else had also chosen to create a similar project and at the end of the day his project was marked before mine and as such I was told by the lecturer that I “copied” my idea from that person and as such I got lower marks.
Do you see the irony? I developed a complete Dairy software program and someone else did exactly the same. How can ideas that relates to the same subject be copied from each other? Each software product covers the following subjects:
•A Farm
•With Cows
•That eat food
•Lives on fields
•And deliver liters of milk
•To a supplier.
That was the last time I developed a complete product for farmers since I was totally devastated by my experience. That is until now. I have come full circle.
As time passed I always had the yearning to attempt such a project again using the knowledge I gathered during the years together with the technology of the day. But always I will think of that lecturer and it will discourage me because, “What if someone else also have the same ideas?”
Today I am a wiser man and I know that there will always be the same ideas out there. It’s called Simultaneous Invention. I quote:
This image is copyright by http://www.kk.org
While I was studying IT back in 1997 one of the projects I had to do was to develop a software application for a subject of my choice. I chose to develop a dairy farming application. The reason why I chose farming was because I grew up on a farm and I saw a great need for such a type of software.
Coincidently someone else had also chosen to create a similar project and at the end of the day his project was marked before mine and as such I was told by the lecturer that I “copied” my idea from that person and as such I got lower marks.
Do you see the irony? I developed a complete Dairy software program and someone else did exactly the same. How can ideas that relates to the same subject be copied from each other? Each software product covers the following subjects:
•A Farm
•With Cows
•That eat food
•Lives on fields
•And deliver liters of milk
•To a supplier.
That was the last time I developed a complete product for farmers since I was totally devastated by my experience. That is until now. I have come full circle.
As time passed I always had the yearning to attempt such a project again using the knowledge I gathered during the years together with the technology of the day. But always I will think of that lecturer and it will discourage me because, “What if someone else also have the same ideas?”
Today I am a wiser man and I know that there will always be the same ideas out there. It’s called Simultaneous Invention. I quote:
“In any period, ideas are discovered at the same time. Even big ideas. This is true for the past, present, and in different culturess.”
This image is copyright by http://www.kk.org
