Last month, BusinessWeek’s Bruce Nussbaum pronounced the word innovation “dead” and introduced transformation a key concept for 2009. My take: Is innovation dead? No, it’s more alive than ever. Its meaning is dead.

The problem with innovation is that people have abused the term and taken something that used to signify a technique for creating breakthrough ideas to solve confounding problems and have turned it into a simple marketing scheme. The word has become marketinguese, overused in meetings, pitches, magazine advertisements, television commercials, and even design school presentations. What does it really mean anymore?

I just finished reading an article in IDSA’s Innovation magazine and was shocked to read a three page article that sited the term over 80 times. In many instances, 2 to 3 times in the same sentence. Is innovation a noun, verb, adverb…? After reading the article I still did not know. Is the obsessive, rampant use of the word innovation by people trying to generate quick revenue for their companies a dying trend? Let’s hope so, since it cheapens what we are all interested in creating.

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Tonight I went bowling with Krista, Chris, Luke, Mom and Dad. After warming up with a little Wii bowling and some dinner we went to the lanes, played a couple games, ate some popcorn and drank a few beers. Good Times. 

p.s. Wii bowling really gets your hopes up.

Wii bowling score: around 140

Real bowling score: well under 100