Odd, it one mention of ‘hunger’ that I’ve seen in this discussion…
Bell labs, Watson labs, others all had hungry researchers that were passionate about an area of research and simply needed the resources to realize it. That is all, and guess what, they churn out some pretty damn amazing research. Almost like clockwork. Turning that in to an actual product? A product the market wants? That is a whole different can of worms; that doesn’t diminish the research though, and when it’s really done well the research trickles into many products.
A very wise episcopal priest told me once that you should seek discomfort, too much comfort leads to complacency, too much suffering leads to anything that feels like it can end the immediate pain, but just a little discomfort and that’s where you learn, are challenged and grow. I think it is generally true. ESR wrote I the Catherdral and Bizaare that an “itch” is the source of a lot of great software. I’m not disparaging anyone, but you have to wonder when a single “engineer” can earn $120m+ from a company without delivering a product or world changing research. It’s hard to imagine that there is a lot of hunger there, it’s also hard to imagine what some of the really hungry folks that make a lot less than 1% of that think there.
Not saying it can’t be fixed, I expect google to be around and make a lot of money for a long time, but it will be different.
Bell labs, Watson labs, others all had hungry researchers that were passionate about an area of research and simply needed the resources to realize it. That is all, and guess what, they churn out some pretty damn amazing research. Almost like clockwork. Turning that in to an actual product? A product the market wants? That is a whole different can of worms; that doesn’t diminish the research though, and when it’s really done well the research trickles into many products.
A very wise episcopal priest told me once that you should seek discomfort, too much comfort leads to complacency, too much suffering leads to anything that feels like it can end the immediate pain, but just a little discomfort and that’s where you learn, are challenged and grow. I think it is generally true. ESR wrote I the Catherdral and Bizaare that an “itch” is the source of a lot of great software. I’m not disparaging anyone, but you have to wonder when a single “engineer” can earn $120m+ from a company without delivering a product or world changing research. It’s hard to imagine that there is a lot of hunger there, it’s also hard to imagine what some of the really hungry folks that make a lot less than 1% of that think there.
Not saying it can’t be fixed, I expect google to be around and make a lot of money for a long time, but it will be different.