I like one of the comments; that everything gets commodified in time, the only thing that will stand is ongoing creativity. - The same spirit as the message of 'The Whole New Mind' (I'm surprised similar books haven't come out, it's not like he can possibly have said all there is to be said on it).
A lot of interesting viewpoints in the comments, but no one mentions the real reason for Walmart's floundering: that most people would rather go to the dentist than Walmart. IT has little to do with it. Implementing back office and supply chain software is like striking out the pitcher; everyone can do it. Where is the real business innovation based on technology? That's what people here want to talk about.
Carr is still beating that dead horse. His silly assumption that IT is a commodity has been refuted by dozens of researchers, CIOs and CEOs. Carr still doesn't wanna let it go... He's like a more cultured version of John Dvorak.
In that vein, John Gero (http://mason.gmu.edu/~jgero) and Rob Saunders (http://wwwpeople.arch.usyd.edu.au/~rob/publications.html) are researchers in exploring design space, and automatically generating novelty, creativity.