What's Next? discussion

“ … pursuing an idea takes … fourteen times as much effort as having it.”

“If an idea begat a discovery, and a discovery begat an invention, then the innovation defined the lengthy and wholesale transformation of an idea into a technological product (or process) meant for widespread practical use. Almost by definition, a single person, or even a single group, could not aline create an invention.”

“… marketing studies could only tell you something about the demand for products that actually exist.” [Sometimes] “people had to imagine [what] might exist.”


History of Bell Labs from the late 1930 to the mid 1970s, when the hub of innovation was in NJ and not Silicon Valley. Essential reading for innovators and engineers.

Bell Labs worked b/c scientists were embedded in a business with regular needs for innovation, and protected by a government-approved monopoly. The monopoly also offset the innovator’s dilemma; the company was guaranteed a business even if it disrupted itself.

In addition to the inventions, Bell Labs pioneered the benefits of a multidisciplinary approach, grouping experts across physics, chemistry, metallurgy, process engineering, etc., to tackle problems together.

Bell Labs’ track record of success is incredible, and paved the way for the move from analog to digital. The (non exhaustive) list includes transistors, Information theory & computers, semiconductors, solar powered cells, satellite communications, the Unix operating system and C computing language, technology for digital photography, and the foundation for cell phone technology.

4.5 rounded up.