I’ve been getting loads of questions about the Ministry of Ideas. It recently opened it’s portal to English speakers so I’ll try to explain it a bit in this post.

A few weeks after this small economic thing we had in Iceland one of our serial entrepreneurs, Guðjón Már, called a group of peers and asked them to meet at a local pub. We talked about all the great things that could come of this and decided to meet weekly, the topics for each meetup where to be posted at our facebook page.

This was the beginning of the Ministry of Ideas. A think tank focusing on the brighter side of a total economic meltdown. A grassroot organization set up to communicate knowledge and facilitate networking among Icelandic entrepreneurs. Operating without any constraints, strings to financiers or favors to politicians.

During this past year the Ministry has exceeded everyones expectations, with loads of powerful stuff originated within, and spun of to make the world, starting with Iceland, just a little bit better.  Those project include;

• An TEDxReykjavik event bringing great Icelandic minds together for some talks.
• Society Initiative (Samfélagið Frumkvæði). An online meeting place for A) Ideas B) Location and C) Knowledge.
• A one pager to the leaders of the G20 nations. Outlining how Iceland is the perfect country for prototyping a more sustainable world. It got Obama to say; “let’s check Iceland out”
• House of Ideas. The mission is to create 500 new jobs in two years. The University of Reykjavik and the Academy of Arts are running the show. So far so great!
• Ministry of Ideas dot is - Getting great ideas into the right channels for execution. I’ll explain in more detail:

The Ministry of Ideas dot is

It’s purpose is to get the truckloads of great ideas in front of the right people, and make them happen!

You simply post your idea, it’s as simple as posting a new status on Twitter or Facebook. Then your idea gets it’s own life, people can agree or disagree, they can enter arguments or counter-arguements against it. People can even vote arguments helpful, or not. The purpose here is to bring the discussion up to a greater level. Have people discuss it from both sides and let newcomers make up their own mind.

On to the next great bit of The Ministries Garden, or whatever a thing like this is called, Social-voting?… The active users, those who take part in the discussions, vote on ideas and comment, get ‘Karma-Points’, a made up quantity that is used to get a better idea about who cares the most and has the most to say about certain topics.

Once a week, the most prominent ideas get a chance to be featured in a radio talk show in front of about 40% of the nation. Thais gets more people excited, or worried, about the idea and brings another wave of civilized discussion. When ideas are thoroughly though out, they are brought to a dicision maker. If it’s an idea on schools, the gyus with the most related ‘Karma-Points’ get an hour long meeting with the Minister of Education.

If it’s an idea about creating a Start-up competition that ends with an prototype (but not a business plan) it’s brought to the attention af a VC, an incubator and maybe a Ministry. And that, me deer friends is exactly what happend today!

Prototyping

An idea i posted only 7 weeks ago gained great traction and is now in the hands of Auður Capital, who runs BJÖRK VC. Innovit, Innovation and Enrepreneurship Center and the Minister of Industry.

Here’s a short video where I explain the concept in Icelandic.

If you look at the bigger picture here it’s not that we have a voting system. Democracy is, hopefully, not new to most of us. It’s the process and getting great ideas in front of those who can make it happen.