What is Reddit's opinion of The Idea Factory?

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For anyone interested in the technical history of how we got here, The Idea Factory (Amazon Smile link) is a really fascinating read. It details the major players within Bell Labs (the research division, not business or development) from the 30s up until the 90s/today. While I'm sure the antitrust suit was beneficial for the average person, by the end of the book I was really rooting for Bell Labs to keep the guaranteed funding ensured by the monopoly.

The people who worked in this lab were responsible for the vacuum tube, transistor, solar panel, laser, satellites, cellular phones... the research for all of those breakthroughs was done in a single lab, funded by the monopoly. A huge part of why the modern world as we know it today exists is because of the monopoly that was dismantled in the 80s.

> We have a lot to thank AT+T Bell Labs for.

I read a great book about this a couple years ago. The good thing that came out of that monopoly was a steady stream of income from subscribers. It allowed AT&T/Bell to super-over-engineer its network and invest in pure research. Imagine if Google or Amazon used even a chunk of their monopoly money on stuff like this. Companies just don't have "labs" anymore where they pay genius scientists to work on hard problems that don't have a six-month ROI.

Although -- I don't miss having to pay 50 cents a minute to make long distance phone calls anymore. Not sure where that tipping point lies these days...I'm in the minority that would happily pay Google for a non-spyware verstion of its services.

The Idea Factory

It was a great read and gives a glimpse into the minds behind some of the most impactful technological revolutions of the 20th century. It also was a huge inspiration booster because i saw so many of my own traits in some of those incredible people.

"Oh wow, an aloof scatterbrained person who can't bear to work on anything that's not engaging or personally interesting for more than 5 minutes? That's me!"

It really helps shatter the illusion that you have to be like...the picture of an ideal Mr./Mrs. Professional Employee to make an impact on the world and to not only thrive but to achieve great things.

But even if you don't care about that aspect of it: it's just a really interesting book!

Does he like to read? Then I would suggest the book The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143122797/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_ENWWDHS4939EVXYMWF68

What are his specific interests does he like circuits? Programming? Designing? Do you know what his area of emphasis was?

As someone going through the same thing, with an entire hugely stocked EE lab sitting idle, I might actually recommend a few books.

Or rather, the idea of books more than specific books. Hopefully others can chime in with a few recommendations. Sometimes when you lack inspiration to do a thing, it helps to read something inspirational instead of just hoping it will resolve itself if you power through it.

I just read The Idea Factory and man, it really made me want to go build something.

OTOH though, who doesn't love more test equipment. I have a couple dozen bench PSUs (Topward), and some other odds and ends I might be able to part with (for the cost of shipping) if you think a nice PSU and a grab-bag of electronics goodies might help re-ignite the spark. I need to clear some space anyway so let me know if you're interested!

The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation

If you are interested in doing some reading, there is a book called The Idea Factory, it is about Bell Laboratory, which was AT&T's industrial laboratory. The book goes over the invention of electronic devices, from the radio tube to the cell network. The book does a really good job of explaining how things worked and what went into making the whole telephone system work from the move from telegraphs to microwave communications.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Idea-Factory-American-Innovation/dp/0143122797

http://www.amazon.com/The-Idea-Factory-American-Innovation/dp/0143122797

Great book that covers some of the key players at Bell labs. Its certainly not a thorough technical history reference but I thought he did a nice job of laying out the relationships of the engineers, the inventions, and motivating factors.

You should check out The Idea Factory

Which among other great pieces of history catalogs the history and development of cell phones.

It follows almost the exact same timeline as personal computers. Here's the 1947 memo where the underlying technology was first invented: https://web.archive.org/web/20120207062016/http://www.privateline.com/archive/Ringcellreport1947.pdf

> 1, Wouldn't this require massive investment? Not just in terms of cash, but more in terms of relocating people, if possible could you elaborate on what you mean by free up more land, do you mean more efficient use of land, or redesigning kuwait?

It would require investment. This investment can be done through a PPP arrangement. By free up more land, I mean that land that is currently unzoned to be designated for housing/commercial/industrial, not re-using or re-designing currently used zones. Although this is also a possibility (e.g. turn some areas from single-family to multi-family)

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> 3, So the budget of kuwait 2019 was 22 billion kwd, according to sources, the government spends 76% of its budget on salaries, how would the kuwaiti government go about solving the issue of the budget? Would salary reduction be the solution?

Not directly, because people with less salary will spend less, making economic growth less likely. You might find that certain jobs are paid too much and should be benchmarked properly (this is more the case the higher up the hierarchy you go. The US president gets paid $400k/year. Thats a good benchmark for me!)

Are you sure the figure of 76% is correct? Looking at this it looks like Employee Compensation is 35.7% of total expenses. Either way, here's what can be done:

1. start moving people from low-productivity to high-productivity jobs.
2. cut wasteful spending (capital expenditures, etc.)
3. reduce corruption
4. slow down or stop government hiring - streamline government services
5. shrink government - merge departments, flatten hierarchies, etc.
6. decentralize
7. Defund completely useless government agencies and programs. Stopping making new ones.

> i'd say re-distribute the funding going into engineering/other degrees and fund all degrees, with the ones in highest demand being funded a bit more.

Yes but you cannot let pure market demand determine funding. Basic sciences MUST be there for funding as they are a driver for everything else. How many innovations came out of the field of physics? Intel's founders were physicists. A lot of innovations flowed out of Bell Labs, and there were entirely based on physics and mathematics. Currently, Biology forms the foundation of many innovations.

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> you state the best in finance come from STEM fields, can you provide a source for that statement?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-quants-run-wall-street-now-1495389108

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note that quantitative finance is considered a STEM field. Also here is an interesting quote from Michael Lewis' "Flash Boys" on who was dominating the high-frequency trading field:

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> “In his searches, Schwall noticed something else, though at first he didn’t know what to make of it: A surprisingly large number of the people pulled in by the big Wall Street banks to build the technology for high-frequency trading were Russians. “If you went to LinkedIn and looked at one of these Russian guys, you would see he was linked to all the other Russians,” said Schwall. “I’d go to find Dmitri and I’d also find Misha and Vladimir and Tolstoy or whatever.” The Russians came not from finance but from telecom, physics, medical research, university math departments, and a lot of other useful fields. The big Wall Street firms had become machines for turning analytically minded Russians into high-frequency traders.”

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I agree with your sentiment that education is very important, but its not just education - read Taleb on education Taiwan for example.

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Labs#Nobel_Prizes_and_Turing_Awards

This is a great book about Bell Labs

https://www.amazon.com/Idea-Factory-Great-American-Innovation/dp/0143122797