CHAPTER X. OF DIGGERS IN THE EARTH, BY EVA MARCH TAPIN. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain, recording by April 690, California, United States of America. THE OIL IN OUR LAMPS Probably the first man who went to a spring for a drink and found oil floating on the water was decidedly annoyed. He did not care in the least where the oil came from, or what it was good for. He was thirsty and it had spoiled his drink, and that was enough for him. We know now that oil comes chiefly from strata, of course sandstone, but we are not quite sure how it happened to be there. The sand which formed these strata was deposited by water ages and ages ago. We are certain of that. Another thing that we are certain of is that where the strata lie flat there is no oil. Hot substances become smaller as they cool, and as the earth grew cooler it became smaller. The crust of the earth wrinkled as the skin of an apple does when it dries. In the tops of these great sandstone wrinkles there is often gas, and below the gas is the place where oil is found. There is no use in looking for petroleum, where the folds of the strata are very sharp, because in that case the strata cracked and left the oil flow away. It is not in pools, but the porous stone holds it just as a sponge holds water. If you drop a little oil upon a stone, even much less porous than sandstone, it will not be easy to wipe it off, because some of it will have sunk into the stone. In many places the gas forces its way out and is piped to carry to houses for light and heat. Not far above Niagara Falls there was a spring of gas which flowed for years. An iron pipe was put down, and when the gas was lighted the flame shot up three or four feet. The gas came with such force that a handkerchief put over the end of the pipe would not burn, though the flame would blaze away above it. In the country of the fire worshipers, on the shores of the Caspian Sea, fires of natural gas have been burning for ages, kindled perhaps by lightning centuries ago. There is a vast supply of oil in this place, and indeed there is hardly a country that has not more or less of it. In the United States the colonists soon learned that there was petroleum in what is now the state of New York. But New York was a long way from the Atlantic's seaboard in those days, and they went on contentedly burning candles or sperm whale oil, for a little later a rather dangerous liquid which was known as fluid. The Indians believed that the oil which appeared in the springs was a good medicine.  Those were the times, as even if a medicine only tasted and smelled bad enough, people never doubted that it would cure all their diseases, and they gladly bought the oil of the Indians. When at last it became clear to the members of an enterprising company that oil for use in lamps could be made from petroleum, they secured some land in Pennsylvania that seemed promising and set to work to dig a well. But the more they dug the more the loose dirt fell in upon them. Fortunately for the company the superintendent had brains, and he thought out a way to get the better of the crumbling soil. He simply drove down an iron pipe to the sandstone, which contained the oil, and set his borer at work within the pipe. One morning he found that the oil had gushed in nearly to the top of the well. He had struck oil. This was about ten years after the rush to California for gold, and now that this cheaper and quicker method of making a well had been invented there was almost as much of a rush to Pennsylvania for oil. With every penny that they could beg or borrow, people from the east hurried to the westward to buy or lease a piece of land in the hope of making their fortunes. A song of the day had for its reframe, stock's par stocks up, then on the wane. Everybody's troubled with oil on the brain. In the course of a year or two the first gusher was discovered. The workmen had drilled down some four or five hundred feet, and were working away peacefully, when a furious stream of oil burst forth, which hurled the tools high up into the air. Hundreds of barrels gushed out every day, and soon other gushers were discovered. The most famous one in the world is at Lakeview, California. For months it produced fifty thousand barrels of oil a day, and threw it up three hundred and fifty feet into the air in a black column, spraying the country with oil for a mile around. The oil flowed away in a river, and for a time no one could plan any way to stock it or store it. At last, however, a mammoth tank was built around the well, and made firm with stones and bags of earth. This was soon full of oil, and with all this vast weight of oil pressing down upon it, the stream could not rise more than a few feet above the surface. Just why oil should come out with such force? The geologists are not quite certain, but it is thought to result from a pressure of gas upon the sandstone containing it. The flow almost always becomes less and less, and after a time the most generous well has to be pumped. An oil field may extend over thousands of square miles, but within this field there are always pools, that is, certain smaller fields, where oil is found. Any man thinks there is oil in a certain spot, sometimes he buys the land if he is able, but often or he gets permission of the owner to borrow a well, agreeing to pay him a royalty. That is, a certain percentage of all the oil that is produced. When this has been arranged, he builds his derrick. This consists of four strong upright beams firmly held together by crossbeams. It stands directly over the place where the well is to be dug. It is from 30 to 80 feet in height according to the depth at which it is hoped to find oil. There must also be an engine house to provide the power for drilling. An iron pipe, 8 or 10 inches in diameter, is driven down through the soil until it comes to rock. Now the regular drilling begins. At the top of the derrick is a pulley. Over the pulley passes a stout rope to which the heavy drilling, tools, the string of tools as they are called, are fastened. The drilling goes on day and night.  When the drill has gone to the bottom of the strata, which carry water, the sides of the bore are cased to keep the water out. Then the drilling continues. But now the drill makes its way into the oil bearing sandstone. There is nothing certain about the search for oil. In some places it is near the surface, in others it is perhaps three or four thousand feet down. The well may prove to be a gusher and pour out hundreds of thousands of gallons a day. Or the oil may refuse to rise to the surface and have to be pumped out, even at the first. Naturally no one is prepared for a gusher and millions of gallons have often flowed away before any arrangements could be made for storing the oil. Sometimes a well that gives only a moderate flow can be made to yield generously by exploding a heavy charge of dynamite at the bottom to break up the rock and it is always hoped to open some new oil-holding crevice that the drill has not reached. The petroleum is a dark and disagreeable, bad-smelling liquid and before it can be of much use it must be refined. For several years it was carried in barrels from the oil fields to Pittsburgh by wagon and boat. A slow, expensive process and generally unsatisfactory to all but the teamsters. Then came the railroads. They provided iron tanks in the shape of a cylinder fastened to freight cars, much like those employed today. There was only one difficulty about sending oil by rail and that was that it still had to be hauled by team to the railroad, sometimes a number of miles. At length someone said to himself, why cannot we simply run a pipe directly from the well to the railroad? This was done. Pumping engines were put in a few miles apart and the invention was his success in the eyes of all but the teamsters. In spite of their opposition, however, pipelines increased, before it had been necessary to build the refineries as near the oil regions as possible in order to save the expense of carrying the oil. But now they could be built wherever it was most convenient. Today oil can be brought at a small expense from west of the Mississippi River to the Atlantic seaboard, refined and distributed throughout that part of the country. Or loaded into tankers. That is, steamships containing strong tanks of steel, and so taken across the ocean. The pipes are made of iron and are six or eight inches or more in diameter. In using them one difficulty was found which has been overcome in an ingenious fashion. Sometimes they become choked by the impurities of the oil and the flow is lessened. Then a goat devil is put into them. This is shaped like a cartridge, is about three feet in length, composed of springs and plates of iron and so flexible that it can turn around a corner. It is so made that as it slips down the current of oil it whirls around and in so doing its nose of sharp blades scrapes the pipes clean. The pipes go over hills and through swamps. They cross rivers sometimes by means of bridges and sometimes they are anchored to the bed of the stream. If they have to go through a salt marsh they are lading concrete to preserve the iron. If these lines were suddenly destroyed and oil had to be carried in the old way kerosene would become an expensive luxury. Getting the oil out of the ground and carried to the refineries is not all of the business by any means. The early oils crusted on the lamp wicks their smell was unendurable and they were given to exploding. Evidently if oil was to be used for lighting it must be improved and the first step was to distill it. To distill anything means to boil it and collect the vapor. If you hold a piece of cold earthenware in the steam of a tea kettle water will collect on it. This is distilled water and is purer than that in the kettle. Petroleum was at first distilled in a rough way but now it is done with the utmost care and exactness. The crude oil is pumped into boilers holding 600 barrels or more. The fires are started and the oil soon begins to turn into vapor. This vapor passes through coils of pipe or long straight parallel pipes. Cold water is pumped over these pipes the vapor turns into a liquid again and we have kerosene oil. This is the outline of the process but it is a small part of the actual work in all its details. Kerosene oil is only one of the many substances found in petroleum. Fortunately some of these substances are light like gasoline and benzine. Some like kerosene are heavier and paraffin and tar are heaviest of all. There are also gasses which pass off first and are saved to help keep the furnace going. Then come the others one by one. According to their weight the stillman keeps close watch and when the color and appearance of the distillate changes he turns it off into another tank. This process is called fractional distillation and the various products are called fractions. No two kinds of petroleum and no two oil wells are just alike and it needs a skillful man to manage either. Even after this distillation the kerosene still chars the wick somewhat which prevents the wick from drawing up the oil properly and it still has a disagreeable smell. To fit it for burning in the lamps it must be treated with sulfuric acid which carries away some of the impurities and then with caustic soda which carries away others. Before it can be put on the market it is examined to see whether it is of the proper color. Then come three important tests. The first is to see that it is of the proper weight. If it is too heavy it will not burn freely enough. If it is too light then there is too much of the lighter oils in it for safety. The second test is the flash test. The object of this is to see how hot the oil must be before it gives off a vapor which will burn. The third, the burning test, is to discover how hot the oil must be before it will take fire and burn on the surface. Most civilized countries make definite laws forbidding the sale of kerosene oil that is not up to a standard of safety. Oil for use in lamps should have an open flash test of at least 100 degrees Fahrenheit and a burning point of not less than 125 degrees Fahrenheit. We say that we burn oil in our lamps but what we really do is heat the oil until it gives off gas and then we burn the gas to keep the flame regular and help on the burning. We use a chimney on the lamp. The hot air rises in the chimney and the cold air underneath rushes in to take its place and bring oxygen to the flame. In a close stuffy room no lamp will give a clear light because there is not oxygen enough for its flame. Let in fresh air and the light will be brighter. If you hold a cold plate in the flame before the chimney is put on soot or carbon will be deposited. A lamp gives light because these particles of carbon become so hot that they glow. In lamps using a mantle there is the glow not only of these particles but also of the mantle. In a wax candle we light the wick. It's heat melts the wax and carries it to the flame. When the wax is made hot enough it becomes gas and we burn the gas not the wax. Wax alone will melt but not take fire even if a burning match is held to it. The reason is that the match does not give enough heat to turn the wax into gas but put a bit of wax upon a bit of burning coals where there is a good supply of heat and it will turn into gas and burn. The products made from petroleum are as different in their character and uses as paraffin and naphtha. Some of them are used for oiling machinery. Tars used for dyes. Naphtha dissolves resin to use in varnish. Vensine is the great cleanser of clothes. Printers types and almost everything else. Gasoline runs automobiles, motors and many sorts of engines. Paraffin makes candles, seals jelly glasses, covers the heads of matches so that they are no longer spoiled by being wet and makes the ever-useful waxed paper. Printers ink and waterproof roofing paper both owe a debt to petroleum. Even in medicine, though a little petroleum is no longer looked upon as a cure-all, Vaseline is one of its products is of great value. It can be mixed with drugs without changing their character and it does not become rancid. For these reasons saps and other ointments can be mixed with it and preserved for years. End of Chapter 10 Chapter 11 of Diggers in the Earth by Eva March Tappin This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by April 6090 California, United States of America Little Grains of Salt The most interesting mine in the world is that of Wieliska in Poland. In it there are some 30 miles of streets and alleys. There are churches with pillars, shrines and statues. There are stairs, monuments and restaurants. There is a ballroom 300 feet long and 190 feet high with beautiful chandeliers. And in it is a caravan thrown whereon the Emperor Franz Joseph sat when he visited the mine. There are lakes crossed by ferry boats. There is a railroad station for the mule trains which bear the precious mineral salt. For this is a salt mine. And shrines, statues, churches, chandeliers, everything are all cut out of salt. This mine has been worked for at least 800 years and still has salt enough to supply all Europe for ages. The mass of salt is believed to be 500 miles long, 50 miles wide and nearly a quarter of a mile thick. It is so pure that it is sold just as it comes from the mine either in blocks or finely ground. This mine is a wonderful place to visit almost like an enchanted palace. For as the torch light strikes the crystals of salt they flash and sparkle as if the wall was covered with rubies and diamonds. There is nothing like an enchanted palace in any salt mine of the United States. No statues or chapels or chandeliers. There is only a hole in the ground where mining is carried on in much the same manner as in other kinds of mines. The shaft is sunk and lined with timbers to keep the dirt from falling in just as in other mines. In working salt mines however water is almost as bad as earth and therefore a layer of clay is put between the timbers and the earth. There are the usual galleries and pillars with roof and floor of salt. The workmen try to get the salt out in lumps or blocks as far as possible and so they bore in drill holes and then blast with dynamite or powder. The salt is loaded upon little cars running on tracks and is carried up the shaft into the top of a breaker usually more than 100 feet above the surface of the ground. There it is dumped upon a screen of iron bars which lets the fine salt fall through. The large lumps are sold without crushing or sifting and are used for cattle and sheep. One of the great deposits of salt is in southeastern California. It is thought that the Gulf of California used to run much farther north than it now does and that the earth rose shutting away part of it from the ocean. This imprisoned water was full of salt. In time it dried and the sand blew over it till it was far underground. A better way than digging was found to work it as will be seen later. But while digging was going on the workmen built a cottage of blocks of salt clear and glassy. The little rain that falls there melted the blocks only enough to unite them firmly together and there the house has stood for many years. Countries that have no deposits of rock salt can easily get plenty of salt from the water of the ocean if they only have a sea coast. About one-thirtieth of the ocean water is salt if the water is evaporated the salt can be collected without difficulty. France makes a great deal of salt in this way. When a man goes into the manufacturer or rather the collecting of salt he first of all buys or rents a piece of land perhaps several acres of it that lies just above high water and makes it as level as possible. Unless it is very firm land he covers it with clay so that the water will not soak through it. Then he divides it into large square basins making each a little lower than the one before it. Close beside the highest basin he makes a reservoir which at high tide receives water from the ocean. This flows slowly from the reservoir through one basin after another becoming more and more salt as the water evaporates. At length the water is gone and the salt remains. The workmen take wooden scrapers and push the salt toward the walls of the basins and then shovel it up on the dykes and heap it into creamy cones that sparkle in the sunshine. The dykes are narrow, raised pathways beside the basins and between them. As you walk along on top of them you can smell a faint violet perfume from the salt. Thatches put over the cones to protect them from the rain and there they stand till some of the impurities drain away. This salt is not perfectly white because the workmen cannot help scraping up a little of the gray or reddish clay with it. Most of it is sold as it is. Nevertheless, for many people have an absurd notion that the darker it is the purer it is. For those who wish to buy white salt it is sent to a refinery to be washed with pure water and then boiled down and dried. So it is that the sun helps to manufacture salt. In some of the colder countries frost does the same work but in a very different manner. When salt water freezes the water freezes but the salt does not and a piece of salt water ice is almost as pure as that made of fresh water. Of course after part of the water in a basin of salt water has been frozen out and what is left is more salt than it was at first and after the freezing has been repeated several times only a little water remains and evaporation will soon carry this away leaving only salt in the basin waiting to be purified. Not very many years ago one of the encyclopedias remarked that the deposits of salt in the United States are unimportant. This was true as far as the working of them was concerned but in 1913 the United States produced more than 34 million barrels. Part of this was made by evaporation of the waters of salt springs and a small share from Great Salt Lake in Utah the early settlers in Utah used to gather salts from the shallow bays or lagoons where the water evaporated during the summer but now dams of earth hold back the water in a reservoir. In the spring the pumps are put to work and the reservoir is soon filled with water. This is left to stand and give the impurities a chance to settle to the bottom. Then it is allowed to flow into smaller basins while more water is pumped into the reservoir. When autumn comes the crop of salt is ready to be harvested. It is in the form of a crust three to six inches thick some of it in large crystals and some fine grained. This crust is broken by plows and the salt is heaped up into great cones and left for the rain to wash clean. Then it goes to the mill for purifying. The water of Great Salt Lake is much more salty than that of the ocean. It preserves timber remarkably well and often salt from the lake is put around telephone poles 75 pounds being dropped into the hole for each one it has been suggested to soak timber in the lake and then paint it with creosote to keep the wet out and the salt in. Salt is also made from the waters of salt springs which the Indians thought were the homes of evil spirits. At Salton in California an area of more than 1,000 acres which lies 264 feet below sea level is flooded with water from salt springs. When this water has evaporated all these acres are covered with salt 10 to 20 inches thick and as dazzlingly white as if it was snow. This great field is plowed up with a massive four-wheeled implement called a salt plow. It is run by steam and needs to men to manage it. The heavy steel plowshare breaks up the salt crust making broad shallow furrows and throwing the salt in ridges on both sides. The plow has hardly moved on before the crust begins to form again. This broken crust is worked in water by men with hose in order to remove the bits of earth that stick to it then piled up into cones to drain loaded upon flat trucks and carried to the breaker. The salt fields are wonderfully beautiful in the moonlight but not very agreeable to work in. For the mercury often reaches 140 degrees Fahrenheit and the air is so full of particles of salt that the workers feel an intense thirst which the warm brackish water does not satisfy. The work is done by Indians and Japanese for white people cannot endure the heat. A large portion of the salt used in the United States comes directly from rock salt strata hundreds of feet below the surface of the ground. These were perhaps the bed of the ocean ages and ages ago. There is a great extent of the beds in New York, Michigan, Ohio, Kansas and other states. In Michigan there is a stratum of rock salt 30 to 250 feet thick and some 1500 to 2000 feet below the surface. To mine this would be a difficult and expensive undertaking and a far better way has been discovered. First a pipe is forced down through the surface dirt the limestone and the shale to the salt stratum. The drill works inside this pipe and bores a hole for a 6 inch pipe directly into the salt. A 3 inch pipe is let down inside of the 6 inch pipe and water is forced down through the smaller pipe. It dissolves the salt becomes brine and rises through the space between the two pipes. It is carried through troughs to some great tanks and from these it flows into grain settlers and then into the grainers proper where the grains of salt settle. At the bottom of the grainers are steam pipes and these make the brine so hot that before long little crystals of salt are seen floating on the surface of the water. Crystals form much better if the water is perfectly smooth and to bring this about a very little oil is poured into the grainers. It spreads over the surface in the thinnest film that can be imagined. The water evaporates and the tiny crystals grow joining to another as they do in rock candy. When they become larger they drop to the bottom of the grainers. They are now swept along in a trough to a pocket carried up by an endless chain of buckets and then wheeled away to the packing house. The finest salt is made by using vacuum pans. These are great cans out of which the air is pumped and into which the brine flows. This brine heated by steam pipes begins to boil and as the steam from it rises it has to pass through a pipe at the top and it is carried into a small tank into which cold water is flowing. The cold makes the steam condense into water which runs off. The condensed water occupies less space than the steam and so maintains the vacuum in the pan. For a perfect vacuum the brine is boiled at less than 100 degrees Fahrenheit while in an open pan or greener it requires 226 degrees to boil brine. The brine is soon so rich in salt that tiny crystals begin to form. These are taken out and dried. If you look at some grains of table salt through a magnifying glass you can see that each grain is a tiny cubicle crystal. Sometimes two or three are united and often the corners are rounded off and worn but they show plainly that they are little cubes. Most of the salt used on our tables is made by the vacuum process or by an improved method which produces tiny flakes of salt similar to snowflakes. The salt brine is heated to a high temperature and filtered. In the filters the impurities are taken out and this process gives us very pure salt. The tiny flakes dissolve more easily than the cubes of salt and thus flavor food more readily. With a few savage tribes salt is regarded as a great luxury but with most peoples it is looked upon as a necessity. Some of the early races thought a salt spring was a special gift of the gods and in their sacrifices they always used salt in later times to sit above the salt. Between the great ornamental salt seller and the master of the house of honor, less distinguished guests were seated below the salt to eat a man's salt and then be unfaithful to him has always been looked upon as a shameful act. And with some of the savages so long as a stranger ate his salt that is was a guest in the house of any one of them he was safe. To eat salt together is an expression of friendliness. Cakes of salt have been used as money in various parts of Africa and Asia. Attic salt means wit because the Athenians who lived in Attica were famous for their keen delicate wit. To take a story or a statement with a grain of salt means not to accept it entirely but only to believe it partially. When Christ told his disciples that they were the salt of the earth he meant that their lives and teaching would influence others just as salt affects the article of food and changes its flavor. Our word salary comes from the Latin word sal meaning salt or and salarium or salt money was money given for paying one's expenses on a journey. Living without salt would be a difficult matter. Cattle that have been shut away from it for a while are almost wild to get it. Farmers living among the mountains cattle to a mountain pasture to remain there through the summer and every little while they go up to salt the animals. The cattle know the call and know that it means salt and I have seen them come rushing down the mountain side and through the woods over fallen trees through briars and down slippery rocks bellowing as they came and plunging head first into a wild frenzy to get to the pieces of rock salt waiting for them. End of Chapter 11 End of Diggers in the Earth by Eva March Tappan


Well, it is 2 p.m. here at TFNN in God's country. And what do we have? Well, I have to say I've probably heard 15 different rumors today about things that would all make the market go lower. I'll discuss those on the show here in a little bit. But it is kind of interesting to see the movement. Now normally, I'd probably put more weight on these rumors if it wasn't options Delta Neutral Day, this is the day that option market makers go around and start getting ready for and basically hedging positions for the 18th for the monthly options expiration. So it's not uncommon to see wide ranging bars. We've talked about that the last couple of days. I thought we'd see it today and tomorrow. Some of the rumors are that and there's the thing with all of these is there's at least a few crumbs of truth to all of them. And they all are really would make a lot of people want to sell the market now. Are they true? Who knows? Like all good rumors, they have an element of truth or a little bit of truth. And you have to be nervous about not respecting those. But from crude being down 3%, some other things going on. It's just a very nervous market. Probably the biggest rumor being pushed on Wall Street today is the CPI numbers are going to be horrifically bad tomorrow at 8.30. That's kind of got the ball rolling this morning. We have a lot more about strategic the strategic petroleum reserve being used in finitum and a handful of other things. So literally probably everything and even gold a little bit down four tents today is showing a little bit of weakness. Like I said, this is a day where they like to push things down and then push them up. So we'll see if we get anything at the end of the day. If we don't, maybe one or more of those rumors are true. Down 1.6% at the moment on the S&P 500. The reality is that navigating financial markets can be risky. Markets can be chaotic and difficult to understand.


In the previous video, we saw how the FPS framework matched the software development process. Yes, in week 3, we saw another set of diagrams, the unified modeling language diagrams. The process of representing the solution design using representations like FPS and UML is referred to as software modeling. Modeling is a way of creating an external explicit representation of the system to be built. Based on the requirements, we create an FPS representation to expand an idea or concept based on the system which we want to build. So, once we have this representation, we can go into some more detail and create UML diagrams for the software system to be built. So, one of the key differences between these modeling representation is a level of detail in them, right? Yes, you are right. So, these levels of detail are known as levels of abstraction. Abstraction is a way of hiding details in the design at each stage of the design process. We create FPS graph which expands on the function structure and behavior of the design solution. It is an example of a high level abstraction of the system. We then add more and more details to the solution design. In week 3, we were introduced to the UML diagrams. They correspond to the medium level abstraction of the system. In the link, we saw how we can expand from the FPS model to the UML model. The functions in the FPS graph can be expanded to create use cases. Similarly, the class diagrams can be detailed from the structures. The sequence diagram actually describes the different behaviors in the system. Then these UML diagrams can be further detailed out to create models such that there is a close correspondence with the implementation code. For example, every class in a model could map onto one or more classes in the implementation code. There are also various tools which automatically generate code from such detailed UML diagrams. So what we are doing is that we are adding more and more details as we progress across the various levels of abstraction. Yes, this is an important takeaway. One way to create a software design is to continue adding implementation details as we progress. So another point is that these modeling techniques, they are not the same, right? So do they serve different purposes? That is a good question. Learners, let's reflect on this question. What are the different purposes for which these modeling techniques can be used? Pause the video, write your answer in the notebook and then resume. For example, the FBS graph is a vehicle for communication and idea generation. When we want to discuss key ideas of the software with other members of a team, a modeling technique like FBS can be used. These ideas are detailed out using modeling representations like the UML models. These UML models can be used for analysis and comprehension like what we saw in very soon. In the latest example, we saw that when we generate UML diagrams at greater level of detail, the automatically code gets generated. These detailed UML diagrams can be given to developers who can start implementation in a specific programming language based on these models.


Kotor has just handed me a little essay that he's written about Spyro and nostalgia. Apparently, he started working on it for a website he writes for, but he ultimately felt it was a better fit for here. You remember the 3D platforming mascot war of the 90s? Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, Gex, Croc, Donkey Kong, Conker, Sonic the Hedgehog, Mario, Banjo Kazooie. Every video game company with a few polygons to bash together made an adorable cartoon hero. And while absolutely none of these games have aged well, at the time, they were absolutely incredible. A lot of people fondly remember Crash, but while I had his first two games as a kid, I can't say they were ever my favourite. I always liked the simple charm of croc, even if nobody else did. As far as more mainstream platforming mascots go though, it has to be Spyro the Dragon. The character has fallen on hard times lately, as he got swallowed up in the Skylanders toy craze. But back when his first PlayStation game was released, he was the epitome of cutting edge. The game featured what were, back then, huge expansive open worlds with incredible draw distances. At the time, I figured that games companies might as well give up there and then. The pinnacle of this art form had already been reached. When rumours of an updated, remastered version of the first three Spyro games started circulating, I was understandably excited, but not a little apprehensive. The Crash Bandicoot Ensane Trilogy remaster from last year looked nice, but I haven't yet got around to playing it. From what I've seen, I can't say I feel that it adds an awful lot to the classic games, which I still have tucked away in an old shoebox, awaiting the day I bother to get a cable that will let me play my original PlayStation on a modern TV. I kind of like how blocky everything looks in the early Crash games. The new remake never quite grabbed my attention. This being the case, I've been wondering whether there really will be a benefit to a graphically updated Spyro title, considering that I'm already a big sucker for jagged low-poly nostalgia. Based on the internet's first look at the aptly named Spyro Reignited, I shouldn't have worried. This game looks gorgeous. Perhaps it's the fact that Spyro retains some of his blocky appearance from the original games. Maybe, alternatively, it's the tiny little details that have gone into every aspect of the design, filling the screen with life and variety. Whatever the reason, this game looks better than my nostalgia, and that's an incredible feat. My mental image of the original Spyro in particular has been so polished and embellished over the years that the version of the game that exists in my head is now completely different to how the title actually looks in real life. Sometimes, a simple art style is better than a more complex one, as the viewer can fill in the blanks for themselves. It's a big part of the reason why I draw with the cartoonish art style I use. I like to stay vague, so that my pictures can feel more relevant to a wider audience. How well that actually works in practice is not for me to say. Most of the early PlayStation era, by and large, haven't aged well. Within my head though, these early titles are so wrapped up in nostalgia that it's hard for anything to beat them. Perhaps the reason why I'm so enamoured of these Spyro screenshots is the fact that, in all their modern HD glory, they look like I'd always imagined the game to look in my head. The character designed for Spyro seems to sparkle with all the wit and personality I'd ascribe to him when I played the game as a preteen, and the world itself matches what I expect. As much as I am, in many aspects of my life, a bitter, jaded old grump, I have a lot of love for my 90s nostalgia. It's rare for a game to come along, selling itself on the premise of recreating my childhood that actually manages to deliver on its boasts. It remains to be seen whether Spyro Reignited manages to stick the landing. Certainly, if this game is to be playable, it'll need a drastically improved camera control system, as the weird viewpoints from the original PlayStation Spyro games are perhaps their biggest downsides. Then there's the question of whether the game will be any more enjoyable than its predecessor. I've heard a lot of negativity surrounding the hitboxes in the N-Sane trilogy that suggests that this kind of remake doesn't always feel the same as the game that's being remade. All this being said, I'm optimistic. Spyro Reignited certainly looks the part, and I'm willing to hold out hope that the game will be just as entertaining as I remember. It's not often that a game remake looks better than my nostalgia, but if any title is going to pull that off, it'll be this one.


stress is the desire for things to be different than they are in this present moment. So the very first step to lowering stress is mere acceptance, is saying that what's going on around me right now is outside of my control, and I might not like it, and it might not be my preference. But this is what is going on right now, and our stress doesn't come from events and circumstances. Our stress comes from our response or our resistance to those events and circumstances. And when I heard that, it was like a light bulb went off, and I find that incredibly empowering and liberating, because that means we are no longer victims or puppets to the events and circumstances happening in the world. We get to choose our response, and that to me, that means we always have the keys to the car.


Well, it is 11 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, here in New York City, so with that, I'd like to welcome everyone, hello, and good morning, good afternoon, or good evening, depending on where you're joining us from today. Welcome to Engineering for Change, or E4C for Short. Today, we're very pleased to bring you the latest in our 2016 webinar series on the topic of using the Lean Business Model for Social Innovation. My name is Yana Aranda, and I'm the Director of Programs here at Engineering for Change. I'll be moderator for today's webinar. I'd like to take a moment now to tell you a bit more about our webinar. Social entrepreneurs are concerned with solving urgent social challenges by applying business techniques and private sector approaches. To succeed, start-up social enterprises must first invest in defining their own business model, and articulating how they will achieve their intended impact. Thank You, Greater Villegro has worked with numerous social enterprises to do just that across India and Africa. So, we've invited Paul Belknap, the lead for Villegro's health incubation team, to share how Villegro utilizes the business model canvas to help their start-ups focus on finding scalable business models to solve in social challenges. Welcome, and thank you for joining us today. Before we get rolling, I'd also like to thank the E4C webinar series team. If anybody out there has questions about the series, or would like to make a recommendation for future topics and speakers, we invite you to contact us via the email address visible on the slide, webinars at engineeringforchange.org. The webinar you're participating in today is part of E4C's professional development offerings. Information on upcoming installments in the series, as well as archive videos of past presentations, can be found on the E4C webinar's webpage, and you can see the link right there on the slide along with our YouTube channel. If you're following us on Twitter today, I'd also like to invite you to join the conversation with our dedicated hashtag, hashtag E4C webinar series. Before we move on to our presenter, I'd like to tell you a bit more about engineering for change and who we are. E4C is a knowledge hub and global community of over one million engineers, designers, development practitioners, and social scientists leveraging technology to solve quality of life challenges faced by underserved communities. These can include access to clean water and sanitation, sustainable energy, improved agriculture, and more. We invite you to join E4C by becoming a member. E4C membership provides cost-free access to relevant and current news, professional development resources, opportunities such as jobs and fellowships, and a growing database of hundreds of poverty alleviating products in the Solutions Library. E4C members enjoy a unique user experience based on their site's behavior and engagement. Essentially, the more you interact with the E4C site, the better you'll be able to serve you resources aligned to your interests. We invite you to join E4C's passionate global community and contribute to making people's lives better across the world. Check out our website, engineeringforchange.org to learn more and sign up. This webinar is a collaborative effort with the ASME iShow, a hardware-led social innovation competition open to individuals and organizations taking physical products to market that will have social impact. Previous iShow sponsored webinars focus on issues related to hardware-based solutions and provide practical insights from the iShow Expert Network. We're going to check out the recordings on the E4C professional development page. You can see a list of the webinars we've previously hosted on the slide here. Now, a few housekeeping items before we get started. We'd love to see where everyone is from today. So in the chat window, which is located at the bottom right of your screen, please type in your location. And I will get us started off with my location so everybody can see what I mean. Here we go. I'm here from Brooklyn. I see folks from Minnesota, Lake Tahoe, Indiana, all over the United States, Michigan, New Hampshire. Fantastic. Welcome, everyone. Here we have some international attendees. Welcome to those of you joining us from Mexico. So if the chat is not open on your screen, you can access it by clicking the chat icon on the top right-hand corner of the screen. 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And welcome, welcome to everyone from Houston to New Jersey to Brooklyn to the Netherlands. We're very excited to have you here with us today. All right. And with that, I'd like to introduce our speaker, Ant Beltner, who leads the health incubation work at Velgro. He joined Velgro after spending five months working as an MBAs without board of advisors to the organization during which time he helped the company with business development and internal information flow. Paul holds an MBA from Penn State's Neal College of Business during which time he was the president of the Met Impact Chapter. Prior to completing his MBA, he worked for five years as a mechanical engineer designing capital equipment for the paper industry. Much of his time has been working on a number of new product development project teams. Paul also participated in and led multiple internal process improvement teams. So we're very excited to have Paul here with us today, joining us from India, and I will turn it over to him. Yeah, thanks for the introduction, Yana. And yeah, greetings to everyone today from Bangalore, India. I hope everyone's off to a good start to the day. So I guess if I can get a little more feedback from the audience, it would help me present a little bit today so you can just enter that in the chat window as well. It would be great to hear how many of you are currently starting work on a product that's intended to create impact for low-income people around the world. That can help me understand if you guys are more generally interested in just learning about the business model canvass or if you intend to kind of apply it to something you're already thinking about. So I guess before we get started, I just wanted to... was kind of a credit to Alexander Osterwalder and Steve Blank. A lot of this material is adapted from their work and definitely greatly appreciate it and encourage you to check out the great work that they've done and a couple of specific examples of that. We've definitely benefited greatly from it. Whenever we talk about the business model canvas, we always step back and think about what is really the purpose of the startup because that is... you have to kind of frame the purpose of the business model canvas within that. And so a startup is really a temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. And the startup really exists to iterate on that and pivot until it finds the thing that it's looking for. And then it often turns into more of a traditional organization, but it often looks very different until it accomplishes that initial goal. And one of the things that that organization needs to do is understand what its mission is and what is driving it, what context it is trying to build that business model within. And so you need to define the mission of the company and that really can be boiled down to who do you serve and for what purpose. And the goal here is to define a mission statement that is specific enough that it gives you some constraints to work within, but general enough that it will be durable through the inevitable pivots that you'll face as you try out different business models and different product configurations and really try to find that fit that is scalable and also makes the impact that you want to make. So we want to answer the question, and this is a good exercise to go through before you actually start working on your business model, is to identify this mission and answer these questions. The challenge here is to do it in roughly eight words, less than eight words, and that typically what we found is that that gives the right mix of specificity to give you some good bounds to work within, but also keeping it somewhat not too specific where you start defining, for instance, the product that you're building rather than the mission you're trying to accomplish to the people you're trying to help and how. So the challenge there is to limit it to about eight words. Vildrow has managed, as an example, has managed to get it to four, making impactful innovators succeed. And each word in here really has to hold its own weight and carry itself through and justify its position in the submission statement. So we started off with action saying, we're going to make these impactful innovators succeed and we defined who we want to help and how we want to help them. So this is something that I think we always suggest people start with before they actually jump into the business model canvas because it gives you a really useful context to work within and it's, you know, because there will always be trade-offs as you're developing your business model canvas and as you're, you know, really working through your startup and really the tough challenges really come when you start actually trying things on the ground and you need to make tough decisions about things that are working and things that aren't. One great example of this is we were working with some entrepreneurs interested in solving the problem of access to female hygiene products here in India and they started up this, you know, that was essentially their mission, was to make female hygiene products available to people in rural India. They started up a rural distribution network, came up with a, you know, and started working on education around menstrual hygiene and things like that. But then, and they started adding a few other products to the sales basket so that these women entrepreneurs could have a sustainable business. And what they found is after a few months is that the women were selling everything but the feminine hygiene products and they faced a really difficult decision to and ultimately shut down a successful distribution channel and business because they knew that they weren't accomplishing their mission. And I think that's why it's important to really understand what you're trying to accomplish before you set out and it's good to even understand that before you start sketching out your business model. So moving to the next slide, we're looking at what is a business model and it's really nine components that come together to really outline the business. And these, I think what we found is that they're, they fully define the business but they're also fairly flexible and they can fit a lot of different contexts. They define how the organization creates, delivers and captures value. The numbering of them is important. We kind of start with the core of the business and then build outwards from there. And I think there are a couple of other things to mention about the business model generally before we dive into how you build one. First of all, we prefer the business model canvas over a business plan because we see it as something that is more comfortable and more practical as a living document where something that you should be revisiting as you learn more about your customers, about your value proposition, about all elements of the business model. And so you want to, we see one of the strengths of this is that it should be iterative, it should be something that you have up on your wall that you're revisiting consistently. And so that's really critical. The other thing to mention is that you'll often develop multiple examples or multiple versions of the business model as you're even sketching it out initially. You may have multiple ideas about primary customer segments or value propositions that you want to deliver. And sometimes if you just have two customer segments, you can just list those on one version of the business model canvas. But if you start realizing that those two customer segments each require different channels, different customer relationship strategies, different key resources, partners, then it's time to create two different business model canvases. And that really is good to highlight to you how different those two customer segments may be and how difficult it may be to serve both of those segments as a startup because startups do have limited resources and it's important to kind of focus those resources. So it's a useful tool from that standpoint as well. And it can often highlight which ones, which of those two customer segments or which of those two opportunities say within the customer relationship management are more manageable for a startup and may direct your strategy in a particular direction. So with that introduction, we'll move into the beginning of the business model canvas, which is the value proposition, which is really at the heart of the business model canvas, which is why it's right in the middle. Before I proceed the whole, another kind of overall topic is that the value proposition and everything to the right of it are often referred to as the front stage and they're the customer-facing side of the business model canvas. You can kind of see the right side is really the customer-facing side. The left side is really the back stage or the delivery side of how you deliver that value proposition to the customer. So that's another way to kind of organize this in your head. Value proposition really defines what are you building in for who and we've actually argued about this a little bit internally. The customer segment and the value proposition really could both be labeled one. You can't think about one without the other, but the value proposition is really most core to this and it could potentially be delivered to multiple customer segments. So you really have to start thinking about those two things almost at the same time and start iterating between the two. So we'll move on to thinking about how you actually design a value proposition. So this is an area where Alexander Osterwalder really developed the business model canvas and the materials around how to put this together and realized that the core and the foundation of the business model is really in the value proposition. So he then went back and wrote a book specifically zooming in on designing the value proposition. I've gone through this book. I've presented on this book and it's absolutely fantastic. If you're at the stage of your business where you're really trying to understand your customer and figure out what you are trying to build for them, I would definitely recommend looking that book up and using some of the materials. It's a very practical way to structure your thinking and I definitely think the materials walk you through a really structured logical process about how you understand your customers. So I would highly recommend looking that up if that's a place where you are with your idea at this point. And so we're kind of going to do just a quick dive into that but you can really go into detail on this and this is really important to get right. If you get this right, everything else will flow from that very logically. So you start off by understanding your customer jobs and really to do that you need to talk to, I often say 50 to 100 customers. Now in some cases in a kind of a B2B sitting there may not be 100 customers out there within your context but I think that the point of really making sure you talk to a large number of customers is really important. And so the first thing you want to understand is the customer jobs. What are they trying to accomplish within the context of the product or service that you're trying to develop? And some of these jobs will be just the functional jobs of getting a task done. Some of these jobs will be emotional jobs. So for instance, if I'm thinking about the customer job of hey, I want to go on a date on Friday night, the functional job would be I want to spend time with somebody.  But another example is thinking of one of our entrepreneurs has developed a neonatal temperature monitoring product which helps with maintaining healthy weight gain and keeping infants out of hypothermia in India. And there's the functional job of just alerting the mother if the child's cold but there's also a lot of social jobs that the customer is trying to accomplish in terms of satisfying extended family and things like that that are really critical and the product can help the customer with. And so along with the customer jobs there are also pains and these are risks that the customer sees related to accomplishing that job, negative consequences socially, functionally, etc. that the customer faces as they're trying to accomplish these jobs. And those are things that make them kind of dread doing these tasks and things that obviously you'd like to help them avoid if possible. And there are also gains. So there are more positive things like if you can provide a really great experience on my date night on Friday night then that can be a really positive thing for me as well. So it's not all bad, it's also there's some positive opportunities there. So there are a number of human-centered design tools that you can use to get to that to the customer profile. And as I've brought up here you can use the empathy map. That's one that we've used a lot. What does the customer think and feel? What does the customer see? What does the customer hear? What do they say and do? What are their pains and gains? And this would all be within the context of those jobs that they're trying to accomplish related to what you're developing. As I alluded to before the materials within the Value Proposition Designer book are also really good in a structured way to step through this. So that's one way that you can handle this. And then if there are other tools that you're more comfortable with I think they all work really well. And as long as you use something to structure your thinking I think they all kind of do a very good job of it. I would say that what I have what I've seen is that some entrepreneurs don't approach this in a structured way and they tend to struggle. So the key takeaway here is use whatever tool you like to get to understanding the customer jobs the pains and the gains. Just make sure you use a tool so that you're structuring your thinking in a meaningful way and making sure you're asking the right questions. So once you've kind of gathered that information you need to rank the customer jobs in terms of importance to the customer. You need to rank the pains and the gains in terms of importance to the customer. Then you really start on designing the Value Proposition. And the Value Proposition is a list of products and services that you're putting together and it may be a mix, it may be a couple of products or features that the products need to have. This is really defining the requirements for what it needs to deliver to the customer. And then you're putting those things together in a bundle and then you're defining how those that bundle relieves the pains that the customer has and also creates gains for the customer. And the key here is to really you're not going to be able to define a product or a bundle of products and services that necessarily addresses every single customer job every single pain and every single gain. Otherwise I think we as engineers have often been accused of trying to create things that are a little too have too much going on and over engineered. You really need to focus in here and the way to address that is to focus in on the top two or three most important jobs, the most important gains, and the most important pains. And if you can address the top ones with a nice concise product then you'll be off to a really good start in terms of establishing a value proposition that your customer will be willing to pay for. So with that you now have kind of created a value proposition and another way to think about this is that your customer segment is all understood through observation and it really explains the why of why you're building what you're building and what you're developing, what you're developing. And so then the value proposition is what you end up creating in order to address the customer's needs. And so that's done through design and you end up creating a value proposition. So we've already kind of drilled into the customer segments. There are a couple of notes here. I think we've already talked about how to stand your customer segment. But there are a couple of things that I think are particularly interesting when you're doing this for a social enterprise. And one of the key things here is to understand that your customer segment is often your purchaser and beneficiary. Maybe different people. Social entrepreneurs often end up with even more stakeholders than that who may have an influence in the purchasing decision. And so that's something to keep in mind here is you need to understand potentially multiple customer segments and it's good to list those here. So in the case of medical devices where I work the customer in India or the US, the user of many of the products is not necessarily really the decision maker because the doctor has most of the information and the patient does whatever they say. And so it's important here to define who's making those purchasing decisions, who is the decision maker potentially on other criteria and then who is the actual end user. And you need to make sure that things are lined up for everyone otherwise there's a strong value proposition for at least the most important stakeholders or your product will struggle with adoption. So this is an important criteria to keep in mind as you're designing your product and you're designing your value proposition. I think that's something that other entrepreneurs face in terms of having to deal with multiple customer segments and disconnect between beneficiaries and purchasers and things like that. But I think social entrepreneurs often end up with a more complex web of stakeholders than others. So just something to keep in mind as you're building this. Moving along to channels you also need to define how does your product get to the customer and that's a really critical piece that is particularly challenging in many developing countries where the distribution channels are often much more fragmented and challenging to navigate. I had a friend who worked at a multinational both in the US and in India and was working in the supply chain side of things and was just spent about a year here in the middle of his time with this company and was just shocked with how much more challenging it was to do logistics here in India. And so that's an example of how it is potentially just something you need to keep in mind as you're building your product. The other thing you need to keep in mind is that you need to take into account how complex and how big of a behavior change your product or service is for the customer. And the more complex more education is needed the more behavior change is needed for your product or service. The further to the right of this slide you'll probably need to go in order to get your good adoption of your product. The downside is the further to the right that you go the more expensive the channel is to the company and the more direct expense to the company where you're taking on a lot of risk if the product doesn't sell. Because you typically as a young entrepreneur will only have or a young business you only have one product and if that's selling you've got a fixed expense of your sales force and not much revenue coming in and that can be a tough thing to deal with as a small business. If you do have a product that's more a pulp product very similar to other products in the market then you can move towards the left towards whole saleers, partner stores and those are cheaper ways to sell but they typically can't do any concept selling for you. They can't do any real customer evangelization for you. And I think the company that I worked for here SustainTech was selling commercial wood cook stoves small roadside eateries here in India they've been in business for I think six or seven years now and they've had to maintain their own sales force even with a product that isn't a huge behavior change from the existing products but it does require a fair amount of education to explain to customers why it's better than the competition partly because it doesn't look so much different than the competition and so that's something that you have to consider and build in as you're kind of thinking about your business model. So those are some examples of our channel operate again thinking about different ways that your distribution will work. These are just some examples really kind of get the juices flowing there are many other opportunities here there are a lot of times that you will need to innovate here to really reach your customers develop partnerships with aligned organizations like NGOs and things like that and that can fit into your channel strategy sometimes. The other thing is you know that I think a social entrepreneur needs to think about is how you manage your customer relationships really deal with once you attract your customers once you get them to buy your product how do you keep them and how do you grow them and I think I've seen this can be particularly challenging for entrepreneurs working in emerging markets where connectivity isn't quite as good sometimes or customers are more likely to change phone numbers or move their business without informing somebody things like that and so it's something that is increasingly a challenge I think that you know there are solutions in terms of digital platforms that can help with this this is just again a few kinds of customer relationship management options that are there ranging from personal assistance really as some of the more hands-on and costly options all the way down community and co-creation type customer relationship and self-service customer relationship management which are maybe a little less expensive. Again you need to match this to the value proposition that you're delivering and the customer segment you're working with how capable will they be to manage an automated service how you know you have a very concentrated customer base of a handful of five clients you probably need personal assistance because every client counts a lot if you have thousands of clients personal assistance probably won't be an option but you really need to match that to the skill level of the client the complexity of the product and all of the things that really you already will be thinking about in terms of developing your value proposition and understanding your customer segment you just need to make sure that this is aligned with that those two buckets and so then moving along to the last box on the right hand side revenue streams and so this is how you make money and you make the business sustainable and scalable and I think this is an area where social entrepreneurs have really that the most traditional business model is really the asset sale I sell you a widget and a watch or a solar lantern and then you pay me cash for that up front more and more we're seeing things like solar power delivered on subscription models I think we've seen increasingly here in India an example a lot of farm equipment is needed on a seasonal basis it's often not particularly affordable for a small farmer to buy certain implement because he only needs it for a handful of days a year but it also gives him significant labor savings and so we've seen a lot of people doing product as a service so potentially through an intermediary somebody buys this equipment and then rents it out and when you think about the fact that maybe this product will be delivered as a service you need to think about the fact that there's a farmer is your end beneficiary and an equipment renter who is or a service provider really who would be the actual paying customer and this comes back to thinking about those multiple customer segments that you need to address in order to really make your product successful so we've seen a lot of interesting models springing up there where potentially where people are seeing good results with the rental of agricultural equipment for some of these very seasonal products that are needed but not necessarily something you want to have around all year so moving along just kind of stepping back and realizing that we've just completed the right side of the business model canvas which is really the customer facing side it's the understanding the customer and creating a value proposition based on that it's building up our channels and customer relationships how we manage our relationship with that customer segment and then also come in based on that now we'll start with the left hand side and just to note we've actually renumbered the key activities, resources and partners because we think it makes a little bit more sense to think about it this way so just in case you notice that discrepancy that was intentional and so I think we'll walk you through why we're thinking about it that way so the key activities are what's the most important thing for the business to deliver that value proposition what does the business need to do in order to really you know, wow the customer with a value proposition that they have to have and so there are three three main buckets that that lives under and those are production and then potentially also service delivery platform and so production is really what you're thinking about in terms of a physical product or even some other options there problem solving service is often associated with consulting but it can also be you know the what I just talked about where an enterprise might choose to provide some kind of physical product as a service to its customers and then finally a social media platforms and there's other platforms that can help farmers construct agricultural linkages et cetera networks of information that help them understand how to get better prices for goods, understand best planting practices et cetera and so you know as you're defining your key activities for your business you want to get into a lot more detail and I'm really discussing here but you know these are three buckets that can kind of get you started some businesses will really only have activities under one of these others will have a few activities listed under two or three of them depending on the nature of the business that you're trying to provide keep in mind that you know as a startup with limited resources you need to focus your activities pretty carefully. So next is key resources and we really look at the fact that the key resources are the things that are the most critical parts of the key activities of the business and so what are the most important assets that your company has in terms of delivering your value proposition what of the key activities do you really want to take control over understanding that you're a startup with limited bandwidth you know what do you are you not comfortable sharing with a partner so those may be physical assets in the case of a production company those may be intellectual assets in the case of you know if you've developed some interesting intellectual property for your business or also in the case of a consulting type firm they may be human resources in terms of developing a distribution or sales force and they also could be financial resources in terms of providing financing to individuals in the case of finance or other innovations where people are helping low-income individuals access improved livelihoods through financial services and again these are kind of the buckets that you would want to arrange your resources under but you should go into some detail here in terms of kind of identifying those key resources and understanding which ones you really have to have internal to your company and so the key partners really if you take, if you start with your key activities and you list out your key resources the things you have to do internally the key partners should really add up to anything that's left from your key activities and there may be a few additional things under key partners but if there's anything in key activities that isn't accounted for under key resources and key partners then you have a problem and you need to figure out how you're going to accomplish that and so you know it's things like partners suppliers of raw material designers, anything you're outsourcing whether that's some of your production activity whether that's design in R&D and there's a lot of reasons to do this for a social entrepreneur often times the product development process may be a one-time activity or something that needs a specific input from something that's a fairly highly specialized skill set but then won't be needed and doesn't make sense to have a client over the long term for the business there's also a lot of key partnerships that social entrepreneurs would form that would help them reach their customers and they may not quite fit into the channels bucket but they would be an important partner in terms of really maintaining a customer relationship or some other organization that just gives the entrepreneur the reach that they need to reach their customers and they do provide you some more flexibility than necessarily developing every single capability in-house from day one and these can be fluid as your business evolves and you understand your business model better I think that's one of the key takeaways here is to make sure that you're always evaluating whether or not a partnership or a key partner needs to change to something you're doing in general or vice versa based on what you learn about your business model and so finally the cost structure really takes into account all of the activities on the left side of the business model canvas and says what does that cost us to deliver this value proposition and our channel strategy and customer relationships to the customer and you know you want the basically you want box nine to end up to be less than box five and then you have a profitable business and that's a pretty big simplification but ultimately that's what it boils down to and that's the kind of businesses that we're supporting at Vilgro is ones that really do have a sustainable and scalable business model that can really grow and serve a large number of customers and so it's important to understand your costs to think about those up front and make sure that you have something that makes some financial sense before you embark on that journey there are lots of opportunities often to reduce your costs as you scale up but you need to understand and think realistically about how that's going to happen as you scale so now we've kind of walked through the business model canvas and covered all the buckets here and what they each contribute to you know really how you you know how you reach your customer and deliver that value proposition wanted to reiterate at this point that it's often good to develop two or three different versions of the business model canvas based on you know potentially different customer segment strategies different propositions different channels etc that you think are highly probable ways that it could turn out and then those are things that you can go test and as you're doing this you should always be designing the whole business model canvas from the customer perspective that's really a critical element here is that you think about this from the customer perspective you design your channels you design your key activities about what the customer needs and I want to think of this you know if you're familiar with lean manufacturing only do what the customer needs so thinking back to those customer jobs the gains and pains and thinking about what they need in that value proposition and then making sure that every activity every resource, every partner that you're designing in this business model canvas is something that they need and if they don't need it then it shouldn't be there and lean would think of it as waste so to kind of translate this into that language try to keep this whole thing lean in terms of how you're designing the business model canvas now what we've done here is talk about how you would sketch out a business model realistically even if you spent a fair amount of time talking with some of your customer segments there's still probably a lot of assumptions and it is admittedly quite difficult often to get real good answers from customers when you come to them with a bunch of conceptual questions and so what you've got now is some things that to varying degrees are assumptions and you're basically guessing about what all of these boxes are and so the next job is to really admit that to yourself and identify two or three really critical assumptions that you're making you know is it the channels that kind of make or break your business is it the key resources within your team that are going to make or break your business and then your next job is to really go test those in a structured way go out go back to the customers with an MVP prototype with a box that you know is starts that conversation figure out how you can do it in a lean way to start testing each of the boxes on the business model canvas starting with the ones that are really the make or break aspects of your business and so that's the next step once you think you're done you start testing and you really walk through and test the whole thing and so with that I think we've kind of been through the whole business model been through the process of how you then identify the most important parts to test and hopefully that's helpful in terms of thinking through how your ideas can really create an impact for low-income individuals in the emerging markets and I think now we can open it up for questions. Thank you so much Paul this is very insightful and very visual so I think that our listeners are very appreciative of that and we already have some questions coming into our Q&A channel so I encourage those of you who have questions to please populate them there so the first question is this individual says we have several products at the Enterprise Institute that these are the comments for another individual. Alright so replacing the revenue and cost with a customer focus on the revenue and cost i.e. what will they earn and pay for the product and how does that relate to achieving the value promised to the strong customer ROI? So I think I'll just restate the question to make sure I've understood it well. Yeah so I think you do want so that's a great thing to think about this. You too you want to think about this from a customer perspective and you know really start with understanding and we encourage entrepreneurs to do that and that's a key piece of understanding you know what you can charge for a product so you start with okay my customer and this is where I went back to so this is a good example to talk about agricultural equipment so if there is a for instance sugar cane planter here in South India and the planting season for that is say 45 days long twice a year and you know your machine costs $5,000 and that you have to understand you know if this equipment rental person is going to buy that piece of equipment how much can the market bear you know how much can a farmer afford to pay that rental agency to rent this machine out so if you can kind of multiply through okay this guy can get you know X dollars for 90 days a year it starts to give you an understanding of whether or not this is going to be a good rental value proposition for that customer you know for the equipment renter and then you also understand from the sugar cane farmers perspective okay so what's the how much is he paying for labor today you know that's going to be a big driver of how much he's willing to pay for a rental to somebody that might own this piece of equipment and so you know we do encourage the and we work them on this where we think through okay what's what are the economics for the farmer what are the economics and the value proposition for the equipment renter and then how does that translate into is this a a profitable product for you to even produce so I hope that answers the question but yeah you can apply this at different levels to really kind of understand whether this makes sense for everyone involved yes and I think you've actually addressed another question I came into the chat about the importance of having people or communities in developing nations pay for at least some of the product so in the case of this particular organization they are developing low cost aquaponics and they want the customers or the users to be able to maintain the systems after you know this group leaves but also don't want finances to be a deal breaker so perhaps can you speak a little bit to maybe hybrid models or approaches where you know costs are shared somehow across a number of organizations perhaps from your experience in terms of this cost structure yeah so you know I think those are those are complex and so I'll start with that but I think we've seen interesting models there and we do always we have always shied away from companies that are giving away anything I think a really good example of this is you know a lot of the clean cook stoves that have gone out there I think there's multiple case studies about adoption challenges with some of the clean the household clean cook stoves that were given away now some of the ones that have required some payment by the customer have turned out to do pretty well and so I do think that you know to the question or the question to ask the question's point making sure that the customer has some skin in the game is really important and so you know I think what you have to do is look for a cross subsidy model where you know the value proposition and the economics make sense for everyone involved and so that is often a tricky balancing act I think we've seen a lot of places where that hasn't necessarily worked out but I think it comes down to really in management consultants speak aligning incentives for everybody and you know it takes a lot of study and probably a lot of experimentation to get that piece right but I think it's about understanding what value the product delivers for each customer segment and then going from there one thing that we're seeing on the medical devices side is that there are a lot of opportunities to sell some of these products at significantly higher prices both in upmarket situations in India the higher end private hospitals as well as in developed markets like the U.S. and Europe and so some companies are able to kind of develop a couple of versions of products off the same core technology and then charge a higher price for one and then the low cost version they have a lower margin on they still make money the customer still pays for it but they maintain profitability and scalability by having multiple product versions that offers a couple of different segments so that can be one way to kind of cross subsidize Absolutely and if folks and listeners out there are interested in checking out some really specific examples the Engineering for Change Solutions Library includes the BioLite Cook Stokes since you spoke about Cook Stokes Paul which is an organization that in fact uses that type of hybrid model whereby they have a high end product that is targeted for developed markets that subsidizes the cost for a portion of the cost for a much more scaled down version with still good performance in developing regions so I'll include a link to that later for anybody who's interested in diving deeper into this particular example number of questions are coming in so hopefully we'll be able to tackle most of them With the Business Model Canvas obviously it is a great tool for continued experimentation to refine your value proposition and really arrive at the right business model for your organization The question here is should it be shared? Is it also a good alternative to a traditional business plan for the purpose of sharing with potential financiers or funding ranchers? Is it appropriate? That's a great question. Thanks for asking that. I forgot to mention that up front. One of the primary benefits of the Business Model Canvas is that it is a good common language for entrepreneurs and investors to kind of come together around We encourage entrepreneurs to share them with us when they're doing fundraising or when they're fundraising from other investors I think I obviously want to think about who your audience is and what level of detail you're sharing Make sure you're comfortable with that I think the more you can share with investors about even the risks that you see within your business model the more seriously they'll take you I think it's a great communication tool to share with investors and really get that conversation started about where the opportunities and the challenges are One very specific question is and perhaps you can speak to some of your experience if anybody within the Velcro Network has applied the Business Model Canvas to Sanitation Services in the developing world So I think the question hopefully was how do you gather customer insights and I'll answer that question Hopefully that's the right one So I think it really depends on your context and I'll speak to the a couple of examples that I know So one of them is agriculture What we found is that at least in India there's an active agricultural outreach program that's been in place for quite a while and is very effective So the entrepreneurs often start with really approaching them getting some introductions from the local extension officer and then once they start networking into the local farmer community as long as they're asking good questions and having treating their farmers respectfully the farmers will make introductions to other people and they're able to move out from the initial set of farmers to additional farmers The other one is similar in the healthcare space where I do a lot of my work I think what we found to be particularly effective is to reach out to You typically can find a few people within the med tech sector that can introduce you to again a few doctors that are really interested in understanding you know or in helping innovations come along and then they'll introduce you to some of their colleagues and that kind of moves on and on through hospitals and other you know other care organizations So I guess what we've seen is that you get a few initial connections in the space that you're interested in through you know potentially your own network or through an industry organization and then a branch out from those initial connections just by saying hey I'm trying to do this research for you to suggest any of your colleagues, friends that would be good to talk to So I hope that that was useful for people and I think we're Yes, I'm back Was that the question? That was absolutely the question even though I only caught a portion of the answer I think that telecom is not always stable in Brooklyn either as it is not in many parts of the world So with that we are quite over time but thank you so much Paul for staying a little bit longer and thank you to all of you who have joined us for this webinar For those of you who are interested in professional development hours for this webinar, the code is listed on the current slide We will have a recording of this webinar up within a week or so on a professional development page If your question wasn't addressed and you have a burning desire for an answer please do email us at webinars at engineeringforchange.org We encourage you all to join us as members to get information and invitations for the upcoming webinars in our series With that I would like to thank Paul again Thank everyone for joining us and we look forward to catching you on our next Have a fantastic morning evening or afternoon wherever you may be Thank you


last game in Philadelphia you guys had a poor shooting night from three-point range Joe only took two shots didn't make either one Was there a concerted effort? To get back to your game at from three-point range and to get him involved in particular You know, I think just typically, you know Philly's a I think second best defense in the league and and it was a little tougher opponent Especially shorthanded a little bit whereas tonight, you know Charlotte, you know, they play really hard They're a good defensive team, but they do give up threes and so it's just a component of the game and you know I think Joe got a got a look got some rhythms, but overall obviously we shot over 50% from three move the ball pretty well And we're efficient offensively other than the turnovers Brian Lewis with the New York Post See from that point Maybe what midway through to first the midway in the second where you kind of seized a little bit of control that looked to be the only time you really got a handle on Them defensively being able to get stops. What was the key and that's right for you I thought the second unit was outstanding. Just matching their intensity. I think they did in the second half, too I thought that that was also a place where we got a handle on them You know for for a period when the second unit was in there, so they just played really hard They play together. They were active in both their stints. I think you look, you know blank Landry Nick Bruce It's plus 22 plus 25 plus 14 plus 24 So just outstanding effort from that group matching their energy and being physical and and making it difficult for them Alex shiver with the athletic Hey Steve, we've talked about you guys being a bit thin in the backcourt because of injuries and having to get creative with Paul handlers and playmaking get 37 assists on 47 field goals and I think four guys with five or more Assistants, what do you think of the playmaking by committee, especially given, you know your roster situation? Great. I mean You know, I think we got bogged down at times trying to isolate against a team that really loads up and kind of zones well on Isolations we had 18 turnovers, which you know, obviously we want to clean up but the you know the assist totals were great and You know for us to move the ball like that and create opportunities and to not think as much as just continually attack attack attack You know, I think that helped us out and especially in the second half where we kind of got going offensively Christian winfield with the New York Dilly News a coach to two semi related questions one Kevin I believe had 11 assists tonight Just what did you see from him from a playmaking standpoint and two Kevin can just dribble up the floor and shoot over anybody. It seems like so How do you balance that his ability to do that whenever he wants to versus getting into the flow of the offense? Yeah, I mean Kevin has the freedom to dribble up and shoot and he's he's good at that However, you know, I think you you want to be on top of people's rim and on their paint and constantly put pressure on the Defense let them make mistakes. So it's not all home runs, you know, you know, they foul you they miss a rotation they You know, they they make a mistake and it's a three or it's a layup or whatever it may be or they're in Rotations you get on the glass, you know, that's you know, that's a really efficient long-term sustainable kind of offensive theory in my My eyes, but you know, they've loaded up really well and Kevin's isolation tonight and he delivered made some great passes You know, I thought really Brilliant in that he kept it simple a lot, you know, he had a few turnovers early But then he kept it simple and just made, you know, the correct read put it on the money And that's a facet of his game that may be underappreciated Tom dad with Brooklyn at calm Steve just look at the three pointers again with that comparison to the other night Do you feel like defenses generally impact volume more than a percentage of the team shoots as a percentage kind of come back More to just make or miss on your God's part There I would say generally that could be the truth, but there are teams that give up threes, but But really fly at you and do a good job of holding your percentage down So I don't think that's like a black and white thing I think, you know, there is a gray area where some teams speed you up So it feels like you're getting a lot of threes, but you're maybe rushing them or you feel under duress So I think it depends on the team and also depends on the night and But this is a team that the way they kind of get in the gaps and and try to keep people out of the paint They do give up threes. They do get in closeouts, which can give up threes as well So just their style, you know, they are I think a 13th defensive team in the league So they're a good defensive team, but but they do happen to give up threes and we have threes point shooters and it is