'Somewhere, tinkerers in a garage are producing the first highly inefficient specimens of the next Big Thing. But where – and what?'<blockquote>'Steam-powered industry suffered a gigantic stock market crash in 1873, which was followed by two decades of downward pressure on wages and prices, even though globally productivity growth remained rapid as entirely new industries were created. After 1869, innovation in steam-powered engineering was modest, and new investments of capital such as the major railroads of the 1870s through the 1900s proved marginally profitable at best.
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The early years of information technology were similar to the Savery/Newcomen years in steam engines. The first computers were designed to solve very specific, minor problems – the British Colossus, the first such, designed to break German codes, remained a state secret for 30 years. Though today we mock Thomas J. Watson, the CEO of IBM who in 1943 is said to have forecast the world market for computers as five units, a similar forecast would have been made about steam engines around 1710 – both machines were initially so underpowered, expensive and inefficient that they had very few imaginable uses. Until the invention of the personal computer in 1974, the sector remained economically unimportant.
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Curiously, the one innovation that may preserve Silicon Valley's ability to amaze us for another decade or so involves the automotive industry also: the driverless car. Google has been testing these on the streets of Silicon Valley, reportedly satisfactorily, and if bugs can be ironed out and regulatory Luddism overcome, it seems likely that they will play a major role in our lives over the next generation.
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Somewhere, tinkerers in a garage are producing the first highly inefficient specimens of the next Big Thing. But where – and what?'
- Martin Hutchinson,
The Fading of Silicon Valley Innovation, January 07, 2013</blockquote>
Context<blockquote>
Open Source Revolution - 'Why are a million people a day turning to Linux..' - Linux goes mainstream (Open Innovation)The Raspberry Pi Education Manual Teaches You Basic Computer Science Principles(The Electric Universe) - '..The vast majority of the public have never heard of any real problems with solar and comet theory..'(Project C - Phase 1) - '..a Workerless Society.' - Take the work out of work - '..the Art of Being Human'