About the Summit

IDDS is a diverse group. We come from more than 20 countries around the world—from Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, South America, and Central America. We are students and teachers, we are professors and pastors, we are economists and engineers; we are masons and mechanics; we are doctors, welders, farmers, and community organizers. One of the things that makes IDDS a special conference is this richness of backgrounds. It is a conference about innovation, and we believe that innovation thrives in the intersections of disciplines that come from bringing together such an eclectic group.

IDDS is not strictly an academic conference, nor is it a technology training workshop. Unlike most academic conferences, we emphasize the development of prototypes, not papers and proceedings. Unlike technology workshops, IDDS is about creative processes, as well as products. It is part of the revolution in design that aims to create equity in the distribution of research and development resources by focusing on the needs of the world’s poor. We draw inspiration from several current models of innovation, design and community empowerment: co-creation, cross-disciplinary collaborations and crowd sourcing.

We believe very strongly in the idea of co-creation: the concept that it is better to provide communities with the skills and tools to become innovators and develop new technologies themselves than to simply providing the technologies. We believe that developing the capacity for innovation and creativity is critical for long-term sustainable improvements in the quality of life in a community.

It is our hope that members of the community will be transformed from being passive recipients of technology to active creators of technology. This is the type of capacity building that must take place in order for models of open innovation to be successful and sustainable in the developing world context. If you think about it, open source software gets developed because users believe that they can create new code that will enhance the existing state of the art. Open source hardware must have the same type of users—those who believe that they can and should advance the current technology. In the traditional model of development, communities receive donated technology, and while they may be trained in how to maintain and repair the technology, they are rarely taught or encouraged to evolve the technology and adapt it to their needs. It is our goal to demonstrate a model where a user-based community of active, creative designers can invent, innovate and inspire each other to create new technologies.

But not all of our participants are from communities in the developing world. More than half of the our participants are students, and we hope to inspire them with the opportunity to interact with field practitioners and to see that inventiveness is not restricted to those with formal education. IDDS also provides a forum where they can meet with like-minded people who are driven by the same desire to make an impact in the world. It is our hope that by creating a diverse global network we can empower individuals and their communities to tackle the tough problems that reside in the developing world.