Camosun—Capstone Commencement Address

Delivered by Tim Vasko, Dec 10, 2004

What has brought you here, to this point in your life - this launching pad into the world? Why have you studied technology? What are you going to do with this education? Why did you spend the time and money, the effort, to learn? Do you have these answers at this moment? Let me suggest that you do not!

People come up to me on regular occasion here in Victoria after I’ve said a few words and say, “you’re not from around here are you?” Assumptions, like those based only on an accent, or a limited view of the world of possibility, can be quite inaccurate.

I came to Victoria BC after a long journey where by the time of 35 th birthday I had risen to be CEO of a Public $30mm company. Then I saw my dream crumble under a hostile takeover attempt. After that I had no faith in business, little faith in my future and only a small amount of concern about what lay ahead. In 1997, I literally wandered into Victoria Harbor with no idea that I would live here much less that I would begin to study for my Ph.D. and become a Professor.

I had no idea that I would immigrate to Canada with my two children as a single father. That I would get married at Royal Roads and one day teach there, or that I would bring two more children into the world.

I had no idea that I would start a technology business here, that I would live here for nearly eight years.

When I began the second great journey of my life I was like Matt Foley, Chris Farley’s motivational speaker character from Saturday Night Live, “living in a Van down by the river …” except that the “van” was a 23’ sail boat down and the “river” was Oak Bay Marina.

I was an American. Now I am Canadian, a Victorian. And I’ve discovered an amazing island, an amazing life and am blessed to discover new and amazing opportunities everyday through technology along side people just like you who build and create this new frontier that is shaping the world we live in.

Death and taxes aside, change and discovery are the only things we can count on; they are what make the journey of life worth living (very much unlike death and taxes); to stop believing in discovery and seeking change is the beginning of inaccurate assumptions, assumptions that limit you and your vision. Consider these inaccurate assumptions that go far beyond a mistaken accent:

What if - based on any of these kinds of mistaken assumptions - we had stopped discovering? The potential you have in your life, the potential you have in you to make great things happen would remain untapped.

Today, 105 years after the Patent office declared that ”change” was dead, over two decades since Mr. Gates decided to limit the computing power to 8K, we can clearly see that the horizons of technology, as with the horizons of our lives, are unknown to us..

The math of life, like technology, is based on the idea that the power of discovery has infinite possibility. We all know a common term, “googol” (Google) – which was coined by the American Mathematician Edward Kasner. It means the number 1 followed by 100 zeros; or any very large number. That one idea has indeed become a “very large number.”

A very large number of people know about Google and use it on a daily basis – a very large number of dollars, $2.7 billion, were raised in the record setting historic Initial Public Offering – Google started with 1 idea and has created an infinite number of possibilities that can be searched and that can be seen. One day, one moment, one idea – can lead to your Google as the opportunity algorithm of your life.

It is a true honor to be asked to speak here to the Capstone Graduates at Camosun College. It is an honor to be able share with you these moments on this important day in your lives where you will show your parents, friends and teachers what they’ve helped you gain as you start your journey.

Every day, I wake up, whether at home here in Victoria, or in a hotel room somewhere else in the world (which I do nearly a quarter of every year), and I marvel at where Life leads us along the unexpected journey of discovery. Each moment is an opportunity to uncover a small bit or bite of unique, unexpected thought that can lead to amazing advancements.

But it is so often that in the mundane, the seemingly normal day, through the frustration and sometimes drudgery, whether it be in typing yet another line of code or, for me, in getting on yet another airplane, making another phone call or dealing with some business issue, that we are creating and contributing to the changes that shape our world; but it is each of these moments that we hold as our unique abilities and talents to build upon.

I’ve stated that you do not know where you are headed. But you do have a Unique Instinct and talent that is a raw and rare gift and that is the reason you are here – your life is yet to be programmed through your days of discovery.

If you follow your instincts - your gut - you will move naturally in the right direction. When you listen to that small almost-silent voice, you will have access to all the knowledge and wisdom in the world you will need. Your gut instinct has guided you to seek an education in technology. When you are in your career, in your job, your gut instinct will lead you through the code you’ve learned to develop, the structures you’ve learned to create - which are often unclear at the outset - but which enable you to create amazing advancements and ideas.

An Algorithm is defined as ”any special method of solving a certain kind of problem; specifically the repetitive calculation used in finding the greatest common division of two numbers – also known as Euclid’s Algorithm” Do you suppose the Greek Mathematician, Euclid, knew in the Third Century BC how life would evolve based on the many algorithms we experience in this Technomic (?) based world? As you repeat each day, what will the outcome of your calculations be?

Life’s changes are exponential as we grow - just like technology and the path it paves. If you relate the creation of code to the creation of your potential, you can see that every moment is another bit which is building upon discovery and innovation – this is the predictable reality of life and yet it is this that creates the magic and the mystery in our lives.

We often begin with only a vague idea of where we are headed. Did you know Mickey Mouse was created after Walt Disney started a business, went bankrupt, started again only to have a New York-based company hire his staff of animators from under him, cancel his contract and take the rights to his first successful character away … a character few have heard of named Oswald the Lucky Rabbit?

Disney was on his way back from New York after learning of this certain demise from losing the Oswald contract. He sent his brother Roy a telegram – that was a wireless device that was used prior to that useless piece of equipment called the telephone, (way before WAP, and Blackberry) which said, “don’t worry … it’s all fine, I’ve got an idea…” Disney drew the Mouse on his train trip back to LA. He was going to name him “Mortimer” but his wife, who was accompanying him said, “I like Mickey better”. As Mr. Disney was often fond of saying, “Remember it all started with a mouse.”

Walt didn’t have one idea, he had thousands, many of which he turned into reality. The difference between Disney and all the other talented animators of the world was he made his ideas happen. He persisted, never stopped trying and he created something that has become much greater than anything anyone could have predicted or imagined. Disney didn’t know anymore than you or I what would come of his little mouse or his legacy.

And, if you look further at his life, you’ll find that he had a great mind for technology - pushing the limits of film, sound and animation effects. Earlier this week I saw the “Polar Express” a film done completely with computer animation. The characters are often not distinguishable between real actors. Would that technology exist if that Mouse had not been drawn in those few moments on that train? Was Mickey drawn from frustration, desperation or inspiration? I believe it was an algorithm of all of those things.

There are three things you can learn from Mr. Disney and others like him to take with you in building your technology, and your life, that you can always rely on Confidence, Courage and Commitment. To believe in yourself and your ideas is the greatest thing you can do in your life. But that often takes a leap of faith – faith that in you exists unique abilities. Not everything you do will work out. But every natural instinct you have, coupled with your education and the belief that every day is another opportunity to learn and discover something new, will lead to your personal "brilliance", and those ideas will create the profound changing factors in your life if you have confidence, courage and commitment

It is much easier to research and theorize about some idea, or to consider a day as just another set of hours to “get through” than it is to take it upon yourself to see even the mundane moments as an opportunity to learn something new. Why take the risks? Why push your talents? Why not just relax and take each step cautiously and methodically? Certainly, there are reasons to do this and they may fit for you. But if you want to create something more of your life then consider the field of technology, where it has come in the last decade, and where it might be in the next.

Making a ground-breaking idea a reality is risky. It takes courage to face the facts that there are innumerable ways that ideas can be crushed. Einstein was right with the theory of Relativity - it proved to be correct. But what if Einstein's theory was wrong? What if he had the right idea, but never took the risk to be wrong about it; and so stayed in the lab and never published the theory? From the misguided assumptions I mentioned earlier, which of these people who made a statement then had the courage to prove their own statement totally inaccurate?

We always remember and know the people who risked humiliation and loss of credibility time and time again. We can name them off the tops of our heads easily - Da Vinci, Einstein, The Wright Brothers, Steve Jobs, Disney and yes Bill Gates who thought 8K was enough. We can find their companies on every corner, like the C-Rated Federal Express which now is a multi-billion dollar A-Rated company that has changed the world of distribution forever. And Starbucks that has found a way to get people to pay $6.00 for a cup of coffee. Why do we know these names? Because they didn't just take the safe route, they pushed beyond their study, failures, research; the didn’t shy away from the risk. In the words of Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could

(By the way, this is my first commencement speech and I was surprised to discover that the International Board of Commencement Speakers mandates that all commencement speeches must quote from Frost’s the “The Road Less Traveled.” My hands are tied folks.)

Risk and failure are discovery – they are what your professors have called research and it is what you have built your education in technology on up until now. Your Capstone program is a springboard to a better way of Thinking. Einstein said, "We can not solve the significant problems we face today at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." We must fail and fail and fail again; we must fail forward in order that we find success.

Failure it is at the heart of every true innovation. The only MYTH is that failure is … failing. Failure should always be viewed as research (except on your exams at school. Don’t ever try and tell your parents that the F you got on an exam because you stayed out at (CAmPUS PUB NAME) all night was research. Failing exams is not research, it is good old-fashioned failing) - research that ends at a cliff on the edge of innovation. If we view this "research" from failure this way, we will try to cross that abyss again and again. Once at this cliff of failure we can back away, stand frozen at the edge, or jump to our deaths. These are your options:

• If you back away, you can look for another route across the ravine of innovation.
• If you stand frozen at the edge, you will eventually sit down and be stuck there convinced there is no way to cross. You can theorize the many ways to cross the ravine – yet still you are stuck by that cliff - never moving.
• If you jump or step forward into the air, denying that there is cliff at all, believing you can avoid the fall that will kill you; you will likely die.

Some of us simply stand there frozen, some of us take action, walk away and try to find a different path, some of us stop and quietly think before we keep moving, taking full count of the facts, the landscape and what we've learned to try to avoid coming right back to the same stopping point. There are those that theorize their lives away about what could be, what we could do, but never take the risks to do it.

"Doing" is much different than "Thinking"; both alternatives are better than standing frozen at the edge of the cliff. It is those people who think through how to succeed and succeed most often that make a difference, that create new things. It is they that eventually cross that abyss and create a bridge for all of us to tread upon.

Discovery of your talents is a Journey. Your steps to a successful life and the impact that your career will have on where you end up will all depend on how well you’ve programmed your path bit by bit.

 Frost goes on to tell us:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Think, and Do, CREATE - You are the future of technology - we look to you to build a computer with more than 8 K of memory and that weighs less than 15 tons! But seriously, and find magic from the mundane. U nderstand that the road you travel is comprised of the bits and bites of life, and that your successful LIFE Code is built line by line, a character at a time.

Take the road less traveled and discover your unique strengths. You can discover more than you ever imagined possible

Remember, like with one of the famous innovators I mentioned earlier, it all starts with you and your mouse!