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Why not be that risk-taking company yourself?
(I did it, crashed and burned, but learned...and I think I am better for so doing)
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I know my limitations. I'm not the strategic type of person. I'm a tactician. I'm not much on being able to come up with the ideas, but I can make things happen.
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When a company reaches a certain size, it is taken over by accountants: and they know only the cost of everything, and know not the value of anything. Big companies can - and do, sometimes - take risks (even huge risks) but it needs a person of foresight and ambition at the helm to see the potential rather than the outlay.
Sadly, there aren't many of those in the top echelons because the accountants weed them out...
One of the reasons I prefer small companies - risks are the reason they exist at all!
Those who fail to learn history are doomed to repeat it. --- George Santayana (December 16, 1863 – September 26, 1952)
Those who fail to clear history are doomed to explain it. --- OriginalGriff (February 24, 1959 – ∞)
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+1 on the bean-counters bit, wouldn't blame it solely on accountants, but they do deserve special mention.
I've seen companies transition from the small/flexible to the bigger/hidebound and it's never pretty.
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How about Google?[^]
It's had multiple project failures, but can easily absorb them and occasionally comes up trumps with something fantastic.
Problem is for you've got to be able to continue despite the failures. I reckon small companies have the flexibility to do this for a small number of projects, and big companies can abosrb the costs, I think the problem lies in the middle?
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The problem is that that you are using the benefit of hindsight and are doing selective analysis. Most companies "shooting for the moon" and being "willing to fail numerous times" look like a bunch of crackpots to contemporaries. Working for these companies is typically rather brutal since they expect you to carry the risk without much of an upside--are you willing to go without pay for months? Are you willing to work 80 hour weeks with no weekends or vacations? Are you willing to work with outdated hardware and software?
Do you want to take the risks or do you want someone else to take the risks while you collect a salary and nice benefits?
(BTW, I've done all of that. It was great fun, but I had to sell my house, almost declared bankruptcy and am still paying the price vis-a-vis retirement.)
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J Julian wrote: And I realized that the reason there is no companies like this anymore, is that they only worry about the bottom line.
Sure there are, but they don't make themselves known because they're usually startups where folks work out of their garage (or their college dorm room) and they're hard to find unless you know the right people. For example, I happen to be working with a few people that are doing some really interesting things, potentially completely revolutionary -- here's one example,[^], sorry, it's "invite only."
Another thing is, a lot of great ideas don't need to start with a technology solution -- the technology comes later. I'm talking about social structure changes, like local economies, un-monetized transactions, information organization / management, and so forth. For example, look at what these folks[^] are doing -- technology obviously helps but isn't the core impetus. And in my opinion, that's where the most interesting and revolutionary ideas are.
Anyways, I think you're view is inaccurate.
Marc
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An interesting site Marc, but there's nothing in there, technically, that's revolutionary: that kind of simulated 3d linking to represent semantic relations/correlations has been around, conceptually, a very long time, and, in terms of a full-fledged incarnation, available to mere mortals with home computers, since 1997 when Plumb Design brought out the "Visual Thesaurus" which is still going strong as ThinkMap.
Marc Tinkler, the creator, and ThinkMap, won the World Technology Award for Education in 2010: [^].
In the early 1990's, I and a colleague from Adobe visited a developer in Berkely who was prototyping a virtually identical object-graph program for representing complex hierarchies with degrees of semantic relatedness on a PC: it was dog-slow, but he was actually using 3d graphics.
However, MetaMaps may indeed be using the concepts in "revolutionary" ways, socially, or otherwise, for all I know. It will be interesting to see what they (and you) come up with.
I wish them, and you, best of luck !
“But I don't want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can't help that,” said the Cat: “we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.”
“How do you know I'm mad?” said Alice.
“You must be," said the Cat, or you wouldn't have come here.” Lewis Carroll
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BillWoodruff wrote: Marc Tinkler, the creator, and ThinkMap,
Wow, I hadn't come across that before. Too bad the SDK is $5,000!
But your points are well taken. I find it interesting (puzzling, actually) that these technologies haven't taken off more. Reading some of the research stuff that's been going on (the Metamaps guys have connections to a lot of stuff, and there's research projects being funded apparently by Ford and even EU governments) it's weird to me that people are seeing this stuff as "new", when, as you said, it's been around for 20 years.
Marc
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J Julian wrote: And I realized that the reason there is no companies like this anymore, is that they only worry about the bottom line
Pretty sure Edison was all about the bucks.
And companies that don't "worry" about the bottom line don't have a bottom line. Which means you don't get paid. Plenty of opportunities for that online - join an open source project or three.
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I can't agree with the broad generality that big companies don't take risks.
Yes, it's true in the hardware and software world that legacy support is a ball-and-chain around development; I do not believe from that you can assume that risks are not taken.
In fact, large companies spend substantial amounts on R&D, and groups in large companies, like ATG at Microsoft, Google Labs, Apple Labs, are busy prototyping hardware and software whose "payout," if any, may be years off.
The catch for mere-mortal developers is that to get a job as a developer in those groups at large companies you have to be a very remarkable programmer, and person ... as in "world class."
And, there are serendipitous ways one can get in a position of being on the "cutting edge:" when the start-up I worked at in the late 1980's, Emerald City Software, in which I held the (ridiculous) title of "Director of PostScript Development" (perhaps the equivalent of being a Bolivian ... Bolivia is land-locked ... Admiral) was acquired by Adobe, John Warnock, deliberately, I believe, used us newcomers as "guerrillas" to create the prototype of what became Acrobat, having been very frustrated with trying to get his existing technology groups to deliver his vision.
Now that "skunk works" project, which I nick-named, "Carousel," was fun and games galore, which included vicious assaults by other groups in the company, some of whom actually accused the four of us of trying to "destroy Adobe"  High-risk, high-stress, insane deadlines, and no immediate glory. But, the moment we had a demo going where a NeXT machine, a Mac, and a PC, were all displaying the same richly-formatted document almost identically ... that moment was worth a lot.
Are you willing to take the risk to make yourself a "great programmer" ? They don't call it the "bleeding edge" for nothing.
“But I don't want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can't help that,” said the Cat: “we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.”
“How do you know I'm mad?” said Alice.
“You must be," said the Cat, or you wouldn't have come here.” Lewis Carroll
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There must be venture capitalists and romantic people founding companies like Ubuntu, but the rest are like you describe for a very good reason. They are controlled by managers who easily migrate from one company to another and thus think only about the bottom line. Even worse, they think only about the tomorrow bottom line at best.
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"trying to find a company to work for that was willing to take risks "
Now that seems to me like a bit of introspection is in order. The statement to me reads something like this "I am disappointed that there are no companies out there willing to go out on a limb whilst still offering me a risk free salary"
To me there seems to be something fundamentally wrong with that statement, I just can't place my finger on it ....
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.
~ Albert Einstein
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Yes, you're wrong. I work for one. But privacy issues prevent me from naming it publicly.
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It is possible to dare, despite the fact that you work for invertebrates.
My product emphasizes usability, even though everyone else's response to a 'situation' is "just pop up a dialog". This is for a machine that is printing on paper at 17 feet per second.
I persist everything in human-readable XML files, even though everyone else thinks comma-separated values are "good enough".
I use C# and WPF. 'Nuff said.
Software Zen: delete this;
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I have to agree. My career ranged over 40+ years, and the only company where I worked that did anything creative was a mid sized one (approx 500 employees) that was still controlled by the original founder. Neither the lawyers, nor the accountants ran the company. He (the founder) had both lawyers and accountants to tell him HOW to do what he wanted, not tell him why he couldn't do it. He knew his industry inside and out, and had a knack for identifying what products would be needed in a couple of years, not what his competitors had today. In that company, not trying was the sin. Failing was OK, as long as there weren't too many failures.
I remember a story about the development of the Boeing 747 where Bill Boeing and Juan Tripp (CEO of Pan-Am) essentially bet their companies on the 747 airplane, and that plane turned out to be one of the most successful planes. Much later, after Boeing had passed away, some executive at Boeing said with some pride, that that could never happen today (too many checks and balances in place).
Most likely the only places where you can find the leading edge product development you're seeking is in very small start-ups, where the founders are actively engaged and everyone shares "the vision".
My two cents worth.
volee1968
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Companies taking such risks are not hiring people who get paid...
These ideas start with people who are not working to feed their families.
I disagree, I see it all of the time.
I was just helping someone (for free) do some web work to help their company take money from dwolla.
The setup... He does not have to work, but he is starting a company "in his garage", that some day may make a lot of people good money (and him rich, again)...
Keep in mind. It was Edison, who promised Tesla a big bonus if he increased the efficiency of his motors, and then told him ~"No. I was joking. I am not paying you." So, keep in mind, you might get what you are looking for. I have been there, too.
So, the ones doing what you describe, are not marketing, and usually don't have a big budget to hire people with great skills. They need some level of VC money to start hiring.
Otherwise, go check out some of the incubators that might be in your area.
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As an academic (in areas of science) I have a very similar experience about research in universities - the people who hold the reins (grant providers) want guaranteed results, so everyone does the easier stuff. Still, things can progress slowly, step by step, in this manner. However, like you I find such approaches largely uninspiring and I wonder whether progress overall is being slowed, since historically leaps and bounds were very important. Money never drives innovation, though it is a necessary ingredient it often holds innovation back.
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J Julian wrote: trying to find a company to work for that was willing to take risks and shoot for the moon... there is no companies like this anymore
They exist. They're called startups.
Once people start depending on the company for a paycheck, that kind of risky behavior must stop.
You're looking for a company trying to invent a new technology.
We can program with only 1's, but if all you've got are zeros, you've got nothing.
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Your points are well taken. There's the other side to it too - when we say "companies", we shouldn't forget that that means "people". Every company starts with some individual person, or a partnership of persons. Some no doubt are interested in just a bottom line - and that's not such a bad thing itself - but many begin businesses because they have a passion to move an interest forward and see it take on its own life, and are willing to take personal & financial risks to do so.
When things fail in a business, those taking the risks must deal with the consequences. Sure, an employee of a company that fails may lose a job, and that's not something to dismiss. But that employee certainly can pursue another job with a different organization. The business owner though - that individual may very well have risked his or her life savings, a house, future retirement security, reasonable health care to establish the capital to create the company. Failure in the company means something entirely different for that individual that took the risk. This shouldn't be dismissed either. If a company is nervous about taking risks and shooting for the moon, understand it comes down to another person, such as yourself, who has to deal at a very different level with the consequences of potential failure.
I started a small business a couple of years ago. The experience so far has been fascinating to me, particularly in expanding my own perspective about what it means to accept financial risk in the pursuit of a passion.
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J Julian wrote: And I realized that the reason there is no companies like this anymore, is that they only worry about the bottom line. They no longer care to challenge or make a real difference. Only make more money.
Boy, you nailed that one on the head.
Companies like you describe do exist ... well, at least I know of one: Me. I have always just developed stuff because I thought it would be useful and I enjoy coding. Have several things developed but it just hasn't become about money yet. What's funny is that I've become SME (after many years of working with it) to a product that will eventually be phased out but, in the meantime is paying me pretty well. You might say I hit the "mother lode" with that one but as for products I've developed myself, maybe one will catch fire someday, or not. Still like making them, though. If you want to see one of them: http://www.simplesoftwarebydesign.com
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I feel sure there are more companies like you are searching for than ever before. The thing is, companies like that are invariably young, small companies - companies that are just starting out with the dreams and aspirations that you seek. They don't all succeed at all, but those that do often eventually turn into those companies that you dislike, that only want to make more money.
The answer is to go and be that company that you seek. Do it yourself, you clearly have the desire.
Bill P.
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Yes, I'm with you on this. In the software industry there's nothing "new" for decades now. Always same-old-same-old dressed up in new clothes (at best). There's another issue here ... most of what we do now was "invented" prior to the 70s, new things are hard to even think about.
I'd give my left armpit to be the next John McCarthy! (Note not anything mundane like Gates/jobs) But I realise it's extremely difficult to think of a new WAY to instruct a computer to do what you want, much more difficult than inventing your own brand of syntax/semantics to do exactly the same thing as Fortran did ... only "different".
Partly the reason I like the job I have now ... Construction Architecture ... at least here the chance of doing some new design no-one's ever done before is greater than 0 (if you can find the right client).
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