Steve Johnson shares some fascinating stories behind six things we very much take for granted in How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World
Innovative ways to manage big business: In the chapter in sound, he points out how important the AT&T antitrust settlement in 1956 was, in ensuring that the new ideas coming out of Bell Labs would be available to all. "Americans had to pay a tithe to AT&T for their phone service, but the new innovation AT&T generated belonged to everyone".
Innovation driven by social good: In the chapter on sound, Johnson tells the story of 20 year old Danish immigrant Jacob Riis who used the emerging technology of flash photography to literally shed light on the terrible conditions of immigrants in New York. "Using his halftone printing techniques, Riis published the photographs in his runaway bestseller, How the Other Half Lives" This helped create a shift in public opinion and action.
In his conclusion, Johnson advises us that being true to ourselves is not enough. "Better to challenge those intuitions, explore uncharted terrain, both literal and figurative" His stories show that there is no guarantee of success, and in fact success is often surprising. So only by keeping ourselves open minded can we be open to those new paths that open up when the one intended closes down.
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