Worlds first computer mouse

Another image and facts I found on a friends Facebook page:

The world's first computer mouse was made by Douglas Engelbart in 1964, it consisted of two gear-wheels positioned perpendicular to each other -- allowing movement on one axis. Ergonomic shape, great button placement -- and it's made of wood.



We have came a wee way since then!

We have used a variety of different mice since then, some of which are:

• Optical and laser mice -  They make use of one or more light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and an imaging array of photodiodes to detect movement relative to the underlying surface, rather than internal moving parts as does a mechanical mouse.
• Inertial and gyroscopic mice - They do not require a surface to operate, inertial mice use a tuning fork or other accelerometer to detect rotary movement for every axis supported. The user requires only small wrist rotations to move the cursor, reducing user fatigue.
• 3D mice - These devices generally function through ultrasound and provide at least three degrees of freedom and was worn on a ring around a finger, which enabled the thumb to access three buttons. The mouse was tracked in three dimensions by a base station.
• Tactile mice - It contains a small actuator that made the mouse vibrate. Such a mouse can augment user-interfaces with haptic feedback, such as giving feedback when crossing a window boundary.
• Ergonomic mouse - It is designed to fit natural hand position and movements, to reduce discomfort and to avoid injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome, arthritis and other repetitive strain injuries.

YOUR SMARTPHONE IN THE 80s

Found this image on a friends facebook page and thought I would blog it.



It was accompanied with the following words:

"This image beautifully portrays how far technology has come in 30 shorts years. All of the gadgets seen here effectively reside in the palm of your hand. When you sit back and think of the computing and multimedia powerhouse [many of] us have at the touch of our fingers, it’s quite remarkable.

Now try and imagine 30 years from now when we look back at our technology of today!"

I wonder what we will have 30 years from now?

Solar Powered Cellphones

Wouldn't it be great to have a solar powered cellphone?
To be able to charge it on the go just by leaving it in the sun?



In the book I am reading at the moment mentioned, the main guy, was trying to create a solar powered cellphone.

I wondered if it was possible or if it had already happened so I decided to google the possibility.
It turns out there have been trials by Nokia but it did not work very well.
Nokias commented

"When carefully positioned, the prototype phones were able, at best, to harvest enough energy to keep the phone on standby mode but with a very restricted amount of talk time. This means there’s still some way to go before a workable and care-free solution is achieved."

and

"The most substantial challenge is the limited size of a phone’s back cover, which restricts the extent to which the battery can be charged. What’s more, to ensure mobility, it is essential that the phone’s weather protection doesn’t cover the solar charging panel."


But you can by a Eton Mobius, which is a phone case, for an iPhone 4, with a battery and solar panel on the back. When the phone is inside the case, a 30-pin connector can draw power from the charged battery. When fully charged, the 1800mAh lithium ion battery provides five hours of talk time, or up to 32 hours of audio playback, Eton says. Depending on conditions, estimates have each hour of direct sunlight providing around 25 minutes of talk time.

 
 

Also the phone does not need to be in the case for the battery to charge. The case can be left in the sun while the phone is used elsewhere and you can just slip the phone in when you need a little more battery power. It will keep its charge if the power switch is left in the off position and an array of LEDs lets the user know that power is or is not being transferred to the phone.

 

Invisible Ink

I was just watching the build up to the All Blacks playing against Argentina and a lady was interviewing a guy from weka workshop and mentioned a map with invisible ink.
It got me thinking about whether there was in fact invisible ink, so I decided to research it over the internet.



It turns out there is at least four ways of making invisible ink.

1. Making it with lemon juice
• Squeeze the juice of half of a lemon into a bowl.
• Add a few drops of water. Stir the juice and water with a spoon.
• Dip a cotton swab into the lemon juice mixture and write a message on a piece of white paper. A feather, a toothpick, a fountain pen, a paintbrush or a calligraphy pen will also work in place of the cotton swab.
• Allow the invisible ink to dry. As the ink dries, your message will disappear.
• Hold the paper that contains your invisible ink message over a light bulb. Keep the paper near the bulb until the message reappears.
2. Making it with baking soda
1. Mix 1/4 cup (60 ml) of baking soda with 1/4 cup (60 ml) of water in a small bowl using a whisk or a spoon.
2. Dip a cotton swab into the baking soda and water mixture. Use the swab to write a message on a white piece of paper.
3. Wait until the ink is dry.
4. Dip a paintbrush into some grape juice concentrate. Paint the grape juice over your message and wait for the message to appear.
    
3. Making it with milk
1. Dip a cotton swab into a shallow dish of milk.
2. Use the cotton swab to write a message onto a white piece of paper. Allow the milk to dry.
3. Place the paper over a light bulb. The milk will heat up at a slower rate than the paper, which will cause the message to reappear.
    
4. Or using a white carayon
• Use a white crayon to write a message onto a white piece of paper.
• Paint over the message using watercolors and a brush. The message will reappear.

Not as magical as I had thought, in my imagination when I heard the words "Invisible Ink" but it is something fun I could do with my girls on a rainy day, which we are getting a lot of lately.

Hmmm,human microchipping?

Why would we, as humans, need to be microchipped?

The thought of human microchippng scares me.
As someone who is very private and enjoys being pretty much anonymous, I do not like the thought that my every movement could be traced!
And why would my every movement, or anyones movements, need to be traced?

What is contained in a microchip?
A microchip typically contains a unique ID number that can be linked to information contained in an external database, such as personal identification, medical history, medications, allergies, and contact information.

You can see why the people, who are into the idea of being microchipped, would want to promote it as it would be good to have all that information on you at all times so that no matter what happens it is available.
But it is all the thoughts of people getting hold of all that information and what and how they use it which scares me and possibly many more.
There would have to be strict control and regulations when it came to using and accessing the information.
But even then would you totally trust "Big Brother" to stick with the rules and regulations?
Maybe it would be good to microchip repeat offenders etc. so authorities could keep an eye on them and make sure they do not offend again.

It is nice, though, to have my dog microchipped although it would suit me better if I was the one who was able to do the tracking so that everytime he wandered off I would be able to find him.

The Human Genome Project

The Human Genome Project was a 13 year project which started in 1990 and was coordinated by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health.



Its goals were to:

• identify all the approximately 20,000-25,000 genes in human DNA,
• determine the sequences of the 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA,
• store this information in databases,
• improve tools for data analysis,
• transfer related technologies to the private sector, and
• address the ethical, legal, and social issues (ELSI) that may arise from the project.

Even though the Human genome Project has finished,the  analyses of the data, will still continue for many years.

You can look at the timeline of major events of the Human Genome Project on this website http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/project/timeline.shtml

There were many ethical, leagal and social issues with the Human Genome Project. Some of these were:

• Who should have access to personal genetic information, and how will it be used?
• Who owns and controls genetic information?

To deal with these two issues there are two primary pieces of federal legislation which directly apply to genetics nondiscrimination:

1. The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008
2. The 2000 Executive Order to to prohibit discrimination in federal employment based on genetic discrimination.

Other issues which have arisen are:

• How does personal genetic information affect an individual and society's perceptions of that individual?
• How does genomic information affect members of minority communities?
• Do healthcare personnel properly counsel parents about the risks and limitations of genetic technology?
• How reliable and useful is fetal genetic testing?
• What are the larger societal issues raised by new reproductive technologies?

 There were many more issues whci have arisen and they can all be answered on the following website http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/project/about.shtml.

Luddites

Luddites, a social movement of 19th-century English textile artisans who protested against the changes produced by the Industrial Revolution, which replaced them with less-skilled, low-wage labour, leaving them without work and changing their way of life.



You can understand why the Luddites smashed the new machines which were replacing the workers.
Its a hard life when you are stuggling to feed and clothe your family and when you lose your job because of a machine which replaces you of course you would want to take action against it.

This is something that happens all the time. Not just workers being replaced by machines but also by companies gettting there products made overseas, in places like Taiwan and China, to cut costs. you put the words "Manufacturing in China" in Google and get lists of websites, such as http://www.manufacturingchina.com/ and http://www.made-in-china.com/, who can help you with finding the right manufacturer for your product and most of them mention the cost savings you can have.
Even when you ring a big company in New Zealand, the phone gets answered by someone in India, which I have always found frustrating as I am always repeating what I am saying and asking them to repeat what they are saying as we never seem to understand what the other has said.
But do the companies care?
No!
Why?
Because they are saving themselves money by having their customers enquiries answered by someone in India.

People are being replaced by computers and machines all the time and the reason always is more about the company saving more money than anything else.
At the end of the day most business' and companies are obsessed about making money and if there is a way that they can save money, they will do it.

RFID in Supermarkets

Having had worked in a supermarket myself, for two years, at Countdown, I have had experience with using little hand held devices which I had to carry everywhere, to send reports to an upstairs computer.
I and my work collegues found it all a bit too ridiculous, as we were only a small supermarket, with, at most, one person in each department at a time, that we felt it a waste of time having to send a report on what stock needed to be put into the store, then take 15 minutes to run upstairs, find the report on the computer, print it out and then run back down stairs, across to the otherside of the store and start filling the shop up.
Before we had to work with these handheld devices all we did was take a pen and a scrap of paper, spend 5 minutes in the shop jotting down what we needed and then start filling the shop up. Much less time and hassle!!!

So after watching the following video clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eob532iEpqk
I decided to do some research of my own.

This article http://www.thinkspain.com/news-spain/7483/getting-rfid-of-supermarket-queues is a brief one about a German supermarket tagging RFID chips in their grocery items, with information such as the price and product information, which is transmitted to a computer via antenna. Which is what the youtube clip above is advertising.
This article, however was written in 2004. So why do we not see it being used in our supermarkets? Was it because the idea did not work as well as was hoped? or was this just their starting point and they have moved on to a new improved idea?

Reality Mining

What is reality mining?
According to Wikipedia, reality mining is  the collection and analysis of machine-sensed environmental data pertaining to human social behavior, with the goal of identifying predictable patterns of behavior. It was declared, by Technology Review Magazine, to be one of the "10 technologies most likely to change the way we live".
Reality mining studies human interactions based on the usage of wireless devices such as mobile phones and GPS systems which provides more of an accurate picture of what people do, where they go, and who they communicate with, rather than from more subjective sources such as a person's own account. Reality mining is one aspect of digital footprint analysis.

I found a video, on the Science Channel, that you can watch here on reality mining.
I actually found it rather diturbing as I am not sure whether it is a good thing that I can be tracked where ever I go.

"If all this movement-tracking sounds invasive, that's because it is, privacy advocates say. Guilherme Roschke, a staff attorney at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, or EPIC, in Washington, D.C., says that while reality mining may have some legitimate uses, it can also be abused. He's also concerned when people are monitored without their consent. "There is a lot of new information being collected, and it brings significant new capabilities, some of which are privacy-infringing," Roschke says. "The first thing is to let people know this data is being collected, and how it's going to be used. And whenever it's put to a new use, then it must be disclosed." " (Hesseldahl, 2008)

On the otherhand it would be very useful to use on my girls when they become teenages!

Hesseldahl, A (March 24, 2008). There is Gold in Reality Mining. Retrieved September 1st, 2012 from http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2008-03-24/theres-gold-in-reality-miningbusinessweek-business-news-stock-market-and-financial-advice

Medical Informatics

What is Medical Informatics?

Simple definition: Computer applications in medical care

Better definition:
Biomedical Informatics is an emerging discipline that has been defined as the study, invention, and implementation of structures and algorithms to improve communication, understanding and management of medical information.  The end objective of biomedical informatics is the coalescing of data, knowledge, and the tools necessary to apply that data and knowledge in the decision-making process, at the time and place that a decision needs to be made.  The focus on the structures and algorithms necessary to manipulate the information separates Biomedical Informatics from other medical disciplines where information content is the focus.

What do people trained in Medical Informatics do?
Many people who train in medical informatics have professional degrees in a health related area.  Nurses, physicians, medical librarians, and computer scientists will each find their professional niche in a different area: Consultants with management consulting firms, hospital record managers, data analysts, librarians, senior staff in state health departments, programmer/analysts in industry, and just good old family doctors.

More on the Robot Car Calling 911

Touching more on my previous blog . . . .

The robot, which was installed in the car, could have been what is called a Ford SYNC. Which is an integrated in-vehicle communications and entertainment system that allows users to make hands-free telephone calls and control music and other functions using voice commands. The system consists of applications and user interfaces developed by Ford and third-party developers that run on the Microsoft Windows Embedded Automative operating system.

It's features:
Mobile Phone Integration

• Voice activated, handsfree calling
• Automatic phone book transfer
• Uninterupted connections
• Supprot for advanced calling features
• Ring tone support
• Audible SMS messages

Entertainment

• Digital music player support
• Instant voice recognition
• Multilingual intelligence

It's aplications:

• 911 Assist†
•  AppLink†
• Traffic, Directions and Information
• Vehicle Health Reports†
• Ford Work Solutions
•  Crew Chief
•  Garmin Nav
•  LogMeIn
• Tool Link

I could write an explanation about what all these features and application but as I was only curious about how the car made the 911 call i am only going to put an explanation about how that part worked. If you want to read more click here.

So what does the 911 Assist† application do?

The 911 Assist† application places a direct call to a local 911 emergency operator in the event of a serious accident with an air bag deployment. Before initiating the emergency 911 call, SYNC will provide a 10-second window to allow the driver or passenger to decide whether to cancel the call. If not manually cancelled within the 10-second window, SYNC will place the emergency call. A pre-recorded message will play when the call is answered, and occupants in the vehicle will then be able to communicate directly with the 911 operator.

Robot Car Calls 911, Man Saved

This heading for a news article, just now, caught my eye and I just had to blog about it.
The article read:

"Some might say it's equivalent to an automotive Lassie, but it's more akin to Knight Rider.
A Texas man is lucky to be alive after being trapped unconscious in a car that had ditched in a river.
The Ford Mustang belonging to one Michael Hicks had in-built technology that called emergency services after he had the accident, according to Fairfax Media.
He had the accident in a remote area, in a black vehicle difficult to spot by passers-by.
The automatic 911 call led rescuers to the vehicle and Hicks was rescued.
"I heard the crash and the last thing I saw was the dashboard flashing calling 911. Where it happened was so remote and so unlit, there was absolutely no chance of anyone seeing me because it was a black car. It gave me my life. That's the ultimate technology right there. It's got my back," he said." (Yahoo, 2012)

I will do some more research on it, when I have more time, and add it to this blog. :)



Yahoo(August 31st, 2012). Robot car calls 911, man saved. Retrieved August 31st, 2012 from http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/world/14697622/robot-car-calls-911-man-saved/

Time Travel

I was at work yesterday chatting to one of my regular customers and he brought up the topic of time travel. Apparently he has spent years researching time travel and is therefore interested in any movie which has a mention of time travel (I work in a video store).



He has come across, over the years, a lot of evidence which suggests that people have come considerably close to doing actual time travel. In some cases people have time travelled but not survived the journey. I found it very interesting talking to him as he tried to explain to me how time travel works.
He told me how it all comes down to physics, the speed of light.....I did not quite understand as I did get into physics at school. He also believed that the UFO's etc. that people have seen are in fact people time travelling as that too would look like the lights in the sky of a UFO. And time travellers would also look like the aliens because of the special suits worn to protect them from harm while time travelling.
He had some interesting theories.
So I have decided to do some research myself to see whether I could back up his theories.

This is what I have found:

"Some scientists have proposed the idea of using faster-than-light travel to journey back in time. After all, if time slows as an object approaches the speed of light, then might exceeding that speed cause time to flow backward? Of course, as an object nears the speed of light, its relativistic mass increases until, at the speed of light, it becomes infinite. Accelerating an infinite mass any faster than that is impossible. Warp speed technology could theoretically cheat the universal speed limit by propelling a bubble of space-time across the universe, but even this would come with colossal, far-future energy costs." (Bosnor & Lamb)

I found this video clip, which the customer had mentioned:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViwcqNQk4BY
it tells of time travel which happened in 1943 and how it was covered up.

There seems to be many theories and being close to making a time machine which actually works like the Large Hadron Collider which
"the most powerful particle accelerator in history located on the border of Switzerland and France. In its 27-kilometer ring scientists are trying to collide beams of protons accelerated to nearly light speed." (Pravda, 2010)
but for this one to work it would need to reach at least the design capacity (now it is working at half capacity) and stop breaking down.

In an articleI found by Dr Michio Kaku he mentions that a guy called Kurt Goedel, who was perhaps the greatest mathematical logician of the past 500 years, found a new solution to Einstein’s equations which allowed for time travel but Einstein concluded that as the universe did not rotate Goedel’s solution could be thrown out for “physical reasons".

With all the research, and trying to find actual evidence, I found many theories and almosts but, besides the short YouTube clip, no evidence to say time travel had happened unless of course it is one of those issues which is always going to be covered up so we are never to be allowed to know about it?

Will time travel ever happen?
Will someone from our future turn up on our doorstep?
Or will it simply stay as a thing of science fiction films?



Bosnor, K & Lamb, R (N.A.). How Time Travel Work. Retrieved August 29th, 2012 from http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/time-travel2.htm

Pravda, K (2010)Time Machine Built in Europe, Russian Scientists Say. Retrieved August 29th, 2012 from http://english.pravda.ru/science/tech/06-08-2010/114515-time_machine-0/

Nostradamus

Michel de Nostredame (aka Nostradamus) was a 16th-century French "seer", used astrology and various "occult" sciences to get his predictions of the future.



Some of his top predictions were:

1. "From the enslaved populace, songs,
   Chants and demands
   While princes and lords are held captive in prisons.
   These will in the future by headless idiots
   Be received as divine prayers"

Which was thought to be the French revolution. It was interpreted as:

The peasants ("the enslaved populace") rising to power, the aristocracy taken down and beheaded (the "headless idiots," now "princes and lords ... held captive in prisons"). In another verse, the "great wall" falling is said to mean the storming of the Bastille.

       2.  "The blood of the just will commit a fault at London,
             Burnt through lighting of twenty threes the six:
             The ancient lady will fall from her high place,
             Several of the same sect will be killed."

Which was thought to be the Great London Fire of 1666. Some of it's interpretations:

Medieval London ("the ancient lady") within the old Roman walls. Only six deaths were recorded (hence "the six" in the second line).

        3. "Near the gates and within two cities
             There will be scourges the like of which was never seen,
             Famine within plague, people put out by steel,
            Crying to the great immortal God for relief."

Which was about the Atomic Bomb.
It is apparently a good description of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. "Scourges the like of which was never seen," people "crying to the great immortal God."
        4. "The two greatest ones of Asia and of Africa,
             From the Rhine and Lower Danube they will be said to have come,
             Cries, tears at Malta and the Ligurian side.'             And
            "From the depths of the West of Europe,
             A young child will be born of poor people,
            He who by his tongue will seduce a great troop;
            His fame will increase towards the realm of the East."

Which is about World War II and Hitler.

Question is do are all these prophecies what we are making them out to be?
Or are we just trying to make big events, which have happened around the world, fit with what Nostradamus has predicted?

Innovation Processes

There are four different processes to innovation:

1.  Identify opportunities for new products and services
Antcipate future needs for customers and identify the needs for new products and services.
 
2.  Manage the research and development portfolio
Once ideas for new products and services have been, decisions need to made on which ones to fund and which was to cut. The ones which are being funded need to be kept under review
in case of new opportunities and resource constraints and whether to continue supporting the project at the current level of resources e.g. money, capital equipment, and people or to reduce resource commitments, or  to stop the project because of limited progress made to date or more attractive opportunities which may have recently been identified.
 
3.  Design and develop the new products and services
A successful design and development process finishes as a product which has the desired functionality, is attractive to the targeted market, and can be produced with consistent quality and at a cost allows satisfactory profit margins to be earned. The development process also has to meet its own targets for completion time and development cost.
This process follows these stages:
Concept development
Product Planning and
Detailed product and process engineering
 
4.  Bring the new products and services to market
 In this stage the product team releases the the product for initial ramp-up into commercial production and starts pilot production to finalize the specifications for the production process and tests whether the new or modified manufacturing processes can produce the finished product at commercial level of production.
They then start a commercial production at low levels and the marketing ans sales teams start selling to customers. When customer orders start rising the product production increases and when the company achieves targeted levels of sales and production, at specified levels of product functionality, quality, and cost, the development project concludes.

Apple vs Samsung

Well it seems the US jury verdict is in and Samsung are to pay Apple $1 billion in damages for patent infringement.



"After just three days of deliberations on the complex and technical case, the jury has ruled that Samsung violated six of Apple's patents, including utility and design patents. Samsung has been ordered to pay Apple $1.05 billion in damages, which is about half of what Apple had originally asked for in its lawsuit against Samsung. The jury found that Apple had not infringed on any of Samsung's patents and was not fined a penny." (Johnson, 2012)

Samsung responded by stating

"Today's verdict should not be viewed as a win for Apple, but as a loss for the American consumer. It will lead to fewer choices, less innovation, and potentially higher prices. This is not the final word in this case or in battles being waged in courts and tribunals around the world, some of which have already rejected many of Apple's claims."
But in Seoul, South Korea, on Friday, the court ruled that even though Samsung didn't copy Apple's iPhone design, both of the companies were guilty of patent infringement against one another and as a result of this verdict, the court is imposing a partial sales ban, in the country, on both  Samsung and Apple, which will apply mostly to the older products and not necessarily to new devices. It yet to be seen if they will do the same in the US.

Bibliography
Johnson, B.A(August 25th, 2012).Apple vs. Samsung Lawsuit Verdict is in; Jury Orders Samsung to Pay $1 Billion in Damages, Patent Infringement.  Retrieved August 26th, 2012 from http://www.latinospost.com/articles/3290/20120825/samsung-apple-trial-verdict-is-in-jury-orders-samsung-to-pay-1-billion-in-damages.htm

BSA

BSA meaning the Balanced Scorecard Approach (not to be confused with Broadcasting Standard authority or Birmingham Small Armies)

The balanced scorecard is a strategic planning and management system which is used in business, industry, government, and nonprofit organizations worldwide to align business activities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve internal and external communications, and monitor organization performance against strategic goals.
It was brought in by Drs. Robert Kaplan, from the Harvard Business School, and David Norton as a performance measurement framework which added strategic, non-financial, performance measures to the traditional financial metrics, to give managers and executives a more 'balanced' view of an organizations performance.


A graph showing the BSA's startegic planning and management system.

Business Drivers

What are business drivers?
Business drivers are the main factors and resources which provide the essential marketing, sales, and operational functions of a business.



The best way to find out what the business drivers are for a business is to ask:

• What drives the sales figures?
• What drives the costs?
• What drives the cash flow?

An online survey conducted among a sample of technology decision makers selected from the Ziff Davis Enterprise Service Provider database concluded that the top 10 business drivers for 2008 were:

1. New Customers
2. Existing Customers
3. Sale of Solution
4. Incremental Services Revenue
5. Managed Services
6. Operational Cost Savings
7. Large Customers
8. Higher Per-Hour Services
9. Application Development
10. Software

 

Innovation

Do you think that innovation can only occur after development of a new technology, or can innovation be achieved with an existing technology?

Innovation can definately be achieved with an existing technology.
How did Dr Martin Cooper, of Motorola, invent the very first cell phone without first the invention of the telephone?


Dr Martin Cooper making the first US analoguemobile phone call.

In fact most of the new technology around today has been based on already existing technology.
a lot of innovation occurs because inventors are trying to make existing technology etc. better and more efficient.

Some examples:

• The toilet would not have come about if it were not for developments such as the running water in the home - indoor plumbing.
• If it wasn't for the wood burning oven and the invention of electricity, the electric oven, most of us have in our homes today, would not have been invented.
• If it wasn't for the first lawnmower, which was made of cast iron and featured a large rear roller with a cutting cylinder (reel) in the front, then the petrol ones we use today would not have come about.

These were just some examples but there are many more.
So repeat Innovation can definately be achieved with an existing technology.

Sparking the Fire of Innovation

Do small organisations offer more oportunity for inventiveness, in particular, through research and development?

Without first reading 'Sparking the fire of invention' my first thoughts, on the above question, were that the bigger the business, the better they are financially for reasearch and development and the more staff to come up with new developments. But it soon became apparent, while I was reading, that my thoughts were slightly wrong as I didn't realise that what was meant by a 'small company' was a company that was solely for coming up with inventions, not a company which had a portion of its employees, who were inventing.


After reading 'Sparking the fire of invention' I will like to state that I do not agree with the way big businesses diregarded the impotance of the invention stage of 'technological change'. The following statement from the reading says: 

"Companies adopted the view that invention by itself was only a tiny part of business success; for every $1 spent on basic research, the conventional wisdom went, $100 would be spent on development and $1,000 on commercialization."

If it was not for the invention there would be no innovation, where the invention is transformed into products and services, and then there would be no diffusion, where the products and services are maketed. The invention is the most important part of the process.
It is little wonder that smaller companies do very well at inventiveness when that is the way big companies think. That is where little companies spend their time and money, with researching and developing new ideas.

This following extract from the above reading is what holds back bigger companies"

"Invention is so steeped in the myth of accidental discovery that one might conclude it’s like playing the lottery."

Some inventions may come from accidental discovery but most come from lots of research and 'trial of error'.

I very much like the following, from the inventor Jay Walker.

"invention is about taking risks that will almost certainly fail in order to find the unlikely breakthrough."

Which is basically the theory the small businesses like Myhrvold's Invention Science,  and others referred to in the reading, go by.

So to answer the question which was asked at the start, do I agree that small organisations offer more oportunity for inventiveness, in particular, through research and development?
I believe they do but only because big companies do not value the inventiveness stage of technological change. If big companies were to change their way of thinking then maybe they would have a better chance against the little companies.