Quotes About Innovation

No great improvements in the lot of mankind are possible until a great change takes place in the fundamental constitution of their modes of thought.

There is always need of persons not only to discover new truths, and point out when what were once truths are true no longer, but also to commence new practices, and set the example of more enlightened conduct, and better taste and sense in human life.

That so few dare be eccentric marks the chief danger of our time.

Persons of genius, it is true, are, and are always likely to be, a small minority; but in order to have them, it is necessary to preserve the soil in which they grow. Genius

All good things which exist are the fruits of originality.

What the State can usefully do is to make itself a central depository, and active circulator and diffuser, of the experience resulting from many trials. Its business is to enable each experimentalist to benefit by the experiments of others, instead of tolerating no experiments but its own.

We have discarded the fixed costumes of our forefathers; every one must still dress like other people, but the fashion may change once or twice a year. We thus take care that when there is change it shall be for change's sake, and not from any idea of beauty of convenience; for the same idea of beauty or convenience would not strike all the world at the same moment, and be simultaneously thrown aside by all at another moment.

People think genius a fine thing if it enables a man to write an exciting poem, or paint a picture. But in its true sense, that of originality in thought and action, though no one says that it is not a thing to be admired, nearly all, at heart, think that they can do very well without it.

Energy and environmental regulation, transportation, and broadband policy all benefit when legislators have a basic grounding in the technical concepts behind business models, products, and innovation.

Not since the steam engine has any invention disrupted business models like the Internet. Whole industries including music distribution, yellow-pages directories, landline telephones, and fax machines have been radically reordered by the digital revolution.

The American formula for creating business is not to have the government create business.

The Internet creates as well as destroys. Social networks, search advertising, and cloud computing are multibillion dollar industries that didn't exist 10 years ago. They are products of the same force that has rendered the Postal Service's core business obsolete.

At the moment we are in a transitional or 'bridge' moment in our literary world. The electronic 'faux book' format which we cling to is an example of what the critic Marshall McLuhan called 'rear-mirrorism'. What he meant by this is that we always see the new in terms of the old. We hold on to the past because we are nervous about the future or feel unsure how to handle it. Children and comfort blankets come to mind.

Speaking of photography Baudelaire said: "This industry, by invading the territories of art, has become art's most mortal enemy." And in his own terms of reference Baudelaire was half right; certainly the new medium could not satisfy old standards. The photographer must find new ways to make his meaning clear.

Honoring artists on a par with military heroes was a humanistic innovation intiated at Brunelleschi's death in 1446.

If Brunelleschie provided the intellect for the creation of Renaissance sculpture, Donatello supplied the heart.

What we need is NOT a Green New Deal but a Green Smart Deal.

The man primarily responsible for the Empire State Building was not trained as an architect, city planner, or engineer. He was not in the construction business, nor in the real estate business. His only direct dealings in real estate were of a personal nature—a mansion here and an apartment or summer home there—until he made the momentous decision to build the world's tallest building.

The deal fell through, but what emerged was Raskob's desire to outdo Chrysler in his new real estate venture. Raskob wanted a building that would literally and figuratively put Walter Chrysler's building in the shade. But nobody at the time could say with any certainty how high the Chrysler Building would be.

Plans for running two elevator cars—a local and an express—in the same shaft were being developed by Otis engineers in 1929.

Academic terms did not concern them. American architects never called their style Art Deco at the time

In all likelihood Smith planted the seed of the Empire State Building in the head of Raskob sometime in the spring of 1929. If Raskob was going to build a skyscraper and if he was going to make a go of it, he could do worse than financing some of it himself and finding others to join in the venture, while having his friend Al Smith serve as the front man.

Richmond H. Shreve, William F. Lamb, and Arthur Loomis Harmon, who teamed up to design the Empire State Building

As a writer, politician, scientist, and businessman, [Ben] Franklin had few equals among the educated of his day—though he left school at ten. (...) Boys like Andrew Carnegie who begged his mother not to send him to school and was well on his way to immortality and fortune at the age of thirteen, would be referred today for psychological counseling; Thomas Edison would find himself in Special Ed until his peculiar genius had been sufficiently tamed.