America Lacks Meaningful Innovation • Hacker News Board

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#51

Post by dxbydt » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:06 PM UTC

chailatte wrote: post #38

mrshoe wrote: post #29

It's pretty easy to disprove statements like "America Lacks Meaningful Innovation" by counterexample. The iPhone. kiva.org. Tesla. SpaceX. Something along the lines of "Much of America's so-called innovation is meaningless" might be more accurate. But any environment that is sufficiently conducive to innovation will produce a lot of meaningless innovation along with the meaningful stuff. Innovation consists of a huge…

So you're saying that if people just keep making photo sharing apps (flickr, facebook, color, instagram)....eventually those people will invent space travel or nuclear fission?

Heh. That was quite funny, the way you put it.

Seriously though, the chap who figures out controlled nuclear fusion will quite likely work out of a physics lab in a University both of which are funded by the ad dollars I you & the rest of humanity spend on facebook.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#52

Post by pnathan » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:13 PM UTC

Most serious innovation happens behind the scenes and out of the public's eye. Among other reasons, most of the public (the laypeople) do not understand the actual innovation concepts and technologies, so even if time was spent marketing it, it'd still end up as...

internet = tubes

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#53

Post by chailatte » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:14 PM UTC

Apocryphon wrote: post #45

chailatte wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So....after wasting a few years on failed useless ventures, then 10+ years on a successful useless ventures, then hopefully being one of the dozen companies in a decade to make billions either thru an exit or revenues, enough to finally launch your world changing venture and accomplish success in another 10 years or so? Yeah, that explains why America is morally and monetarily bankrupt.

What other nation in the world offers a better approach?

America, early 1900.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#54

Post by [deleted] » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:17 PM UTC

jff wrote: post #4

I see all this potential, and I see it squandered. God damn it, an entire generation selling ads, making social media startups – slaves with white collars. Internet hype has us chasing VCs and tweets, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no AI Winter. No Project MAC. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our…

[deleted]

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#55

Post by yakshaving » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:23 PM UTC

Not to make this a mutual admiration society, but I couldn't agree more. I sent that BusinessWeek article to all of my friends that work for Google and eff-book.

One of the problems is that doing innovative things is, by defacto, riskier. I perceive that the general appetite for risk has decreased a lot for whatever reason.

People are happier than ever hitting singles or doubles rather than opting for the grand slam that really revolutionizes industries and... solves the goddam problem. It's been the hardest thing for me to hire smart/talented people to join an awesome team with a bold vision alone when well capitalized companies can provide safety, enticing salaries, back massages, free food/beer.

One thing that I think could help are solving problems that are really concrete and tangible -- Like putting a man on the moon. We need more of that sort of drive in order for people to be inspired to swing for the fences.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#56

Post by ikono » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:30 PM UTC

enjayhsu wrote: post #3

I don't really agree. It's more that innovation isn't publicized and talked about as much as companies that are looking to score big. It also takes longer to mold innovation into something that can be sold; in the end, we still need to eat. Also, why America? How is it different in other countries? Genuinely curious.

I don't think the author thinks it's better elsewhere. I assume he's American and is just lamenting that this generation isn't living up to his standards. I don't really know that it matters how much innovation there is or isn't. We can always get better. I'd rather see this argument than the opposite.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#57

Post by Apocryphon » Fri, May 13, 2011, 9:41 PM UTC

chailatte wrote: post #53

Apocryphon wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What other nation in the world offers a better approach?

America, early 1900.

I'm pretty sure lofty world-shattering inventions are physically and financially more difficult to create nowadays.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#58

Post by lupatus » Fri, May 13, 2011, 10:00 PM UTC

forgottenpaswrd wrote: post #19

nlawalker wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that's the real lament then - that so many people fresh out of school have such a strong desire to be independent that they don't contribute to efforts to solve the problems you listed in your quote. I'm not saying people aren't justified in wanting to not "work for the man". I'm just saying that maybe the fact that working for the man is perceived as such a bad thing (or is such a bad thing) is a bit closer to…

"working for the man"(in his 60s) is the fastest way to stop innovating fast. They are earth grounded not "pie in the sky" reasonable people. “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” – George Bernard Shaw Get a traditional job on your youth and wait to have a family to sustain and no…

Baloney

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#59

Post by jff » Fri, May 13, 2011, 10:19 PM UTC

SiVal wrote: post #28

jff wrote: post #4

I see all this potential, and I see it squandered. God damn it, an entire generation selling ads, making social media startups – slaves with white collars. Internet hype has us chasing VCs and tweets, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no AI Winter. No Project MAC. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our…

Oh, boo-hoo. You've also apparently been raised to believe that someone (probably the government in some form) owed you the life of your dreams, and as it dawns that you might have to work for a living, you assume your "rights" are being violated, have a tantrum, and compose yet another leftist manifesto. I suspect there is something wrong with how you were educated by "the system," but it's not what you think.

Here I was thinking that everyone on the Internet had seen Fight Club, and you go and prove me wrong.

Re: America Lacks Meaningful Innovation

#60

Post by jshen » Fri, May 13, 2011, 10:21 PM UTC

thorwed123 wrote: post #31

jshen wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

true, but why is working for the man perceived as a bad thing? Could it be "the man's" fault? I happen to work for the man and here are some issues. I can't release code as open source, I get paid the same regardless of whether I work my ass off or just do enough to be ahead of the curve, I have virtually no say in our products because I'm just an engineer (we have product people for product design), I have to get an…

You're ideal man is a university professor, he gets funding from NSF and NIH, and if you do work your ass off, Yes you do get significant share of the credit. Go to a CS PhD program if you really want to innovate, forget all the crap that is spread on HN if you do get into top 5 or top 10 school, you will have equal amount of resources and at University even though they do have their own interests, they still want to…

There are a few assumptions I'd like to question in your comment.

First, innovation is not limited to what is of interest to a CS PhD program.

Second, I'm not interested in "innovating" per se, I'm interesting in creating things that add value to peoples lives and not being pigeonholed as either an engineer or a product person. I don't care if the ideas I'm using are new or not, only if what I'm building is enriching someones life and that my product has users.

Third, I've never been a replaceable number at a company, even large companies. If you work on hard problems, and are good at it, you aren't easily replaceable. People realize this, even when you're working for the man.

Finally, at university you often don't have access to real world data to do research. I know some big universities like epfl do partnerships where they work with researchers and engineers at companies in exchange for access to that companies data for research and publication.