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I don't agree with the downvotes, but I disagree that inventing is any more dead now than it has ever been. As far as I know, successful inventors have always

I don't agree with the downvotes, but I disagree that inventing is any more dead now than it has ever been. As far as I know, successful inventors have always needed the startup skillset. If you look at historical inventors' stories, it is very rare to see the classical case of an inventor who builds a prototype, patents it, and the world then beats a path to their door. Instead, typically an inventor will partner with someone who has more business skills than themselves and they develop a market for it together. That sounds a lot like a startup to me. Considering how the vast majority of patents end up protecting intellectual property which is worth nothing, the real barriers to professional inventing don't seem to be in the patent arena, but in the business arena. It has always been hard to sell an invention to a large company for commercialization. At least today the option of making an invention-based startup which could then be acquired by a big corp provides a business path. If there is a problem with that path, it is only that startup funding seems to focus on internet marketing more than actual invention these days.

Animats 10y ago
"It is very rare to see the classical case of an inventor who builds a prototype, patents it, and the world then beats a path to their door." Yes, that's a problem. There are some notable successes, though. A famous one is the electronic florescent lamp ballast, that little piece of electronics in the base of CFLs. It took a lot of litigation, but the inventor finally won and made over $100 million.[1] It used to be easier to sell inventions to big companies because they feared an injunction, putting them out of business. That went away in 2006, with the decision in eBay Inc. v. MercExchange. Previously, it was possible to get a permanent injunction, as Polaroid did against Kodak when Kodak tried to move into instant photography. Kodak had 30 days to get out of the business and had to buy all the cameras back. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/01/business/award-to-lighting-inventor-upheld-on-appeal.html http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/01/business/award-to-lighting...
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Animats 10y ago

"It is very rare to see the classical case of an inventor who builds a prototype, patents it, and the world then beats a path to their door." Yes, that's a problem. There are some notable successes, though. A famous one is the electronic florescent lamp ballast, that little piece of electronics in the base of CFLs. It took a lot of litigation, but the inventor finally won and made over $100 million.[1] It used to be easier to sell inventions to big companies because they feared an injunction, putting them out of business. That went away in 2006, with the decision in eBay Inc. v. MercExchange. Previously, it was possible to get a permanent injunction, as Polaroid did against Kodak when Kodak tried to move into instant photography. Kodak had 30 days to get out of the business and had to buy all the cameras back. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/01/business/award-to-lighting-inventor-upheld-on-appeal.html http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/01/business/award-to-lighting...

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