Dealers of Lightning

“This book details the history of Xerox PARC, which set up a research lab that invented many aspects of modern computing and then failed to capitalize on it (at least to the extent that many people thought they should have). I was happy to see the author resist the obvious and often-retold narrative of a corporation that was simply too dumb to realize what their visionary research division had. The book instead paints a more realistic picture, mentions some of the tensions present between a corporation and a research lab and dispels the overly simplistic notion that Xerox would have clearly become immensely successful if they only followed up on the research. This is mostly our benefit of hindsight and there are many other variables at play. You'll get a sense of the history, some of the drama, some of the background story behind the inventions. But unfortunately the book doesn't spend a lot of time talking about the layout of the lab, or some of the philosophy that led to its success in research. Neither does it try to generalize, observe, or contrast. Therefore, sadly the book felt mostly as an enumeration of facts rather than an attempt at their interpretation in a wider picture. This is understandable because the former is relatively easy, but the latter is not. 3/5 - I liked it. 3/5”

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