An ASCII Art Anecdote

 

For those of you who have gone through the era of Bulletin Board System (BBS), the picture on the left would have struck a nostalgic chord in you. It is a pity for the latecomers (Gen Y & Z) who have missed the funs before the age of Internet. For the sake of the rest who have no clue what I am talking about, this is ASCII art. In those days where we were limited to CGA/VGA graphic displays (forget about 3D), ASCII art is one of the few text-based graphic design techniques that consists of pictures pieced together from the printable characters defined by the ASCII Standard. The simplicity and ease-of-display of this technique lead to its proliferation in bulletin board systems, newsgroups, IRCs and emails in the 1970s and 1980s. If you have yet to be mesmerized by the beauty of ASCII art, take a look at the ASCII-based Star Wars movie below and get inspired. The psychedelic effect created by some of those great ASCII art pieces reflects, in its purest sense, the ingenious creativity of what people can do when they are bounded by environmental constraints – Creatio Ex Nihilo!

It is exactly this same spirit that a productive and successful project team should have. So, stop grieving over budget cuts and headcount shrinks. Work with and work over your constraints. Do not let the constraints cloud over your creativity. It is always the ability to continue to excel in the toughest situation that separates the bests from the mediocrities. Show your boss that you and your team, too, can be creative.