Marc Andreessen is obsessed with the idea that tech companies need to focus on innovation above all else. He believes that the “output” of technology companies isn’t products — at least not the way the “output” of Ford is cars. The “output” of tech companies, he says, is innovation. Andreessen’s second theory of innovation is […]
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Posted inEditor's Pick
The Rise of Nintendo: A Story in 8 Bits
An account of Nintendo’s rise from a playing card manufacturer in 1889 to a video game industry giant in the ’80s and ’90s. Adapted from Console Wars, out this month: After several decades of staggering success, Fusajiro Yamauchi retired in 1929 and was succeeded by his son-in-law Sekiryo Yamauchi, who ran Nintendo efficiently for nineteen […]
Posted inNonfiction, Top 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Below, our favorite stories of the week. Kindle users, you can also get them as a Readlist. Sign up to receive this list free every Friday in your inbox. * * * 1. Mother’s Mind Pam Belluck | The New York Times | June 16, 2014 | 22 minutes (5,482 words) A look at new […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Problem With 'Fan Service' in Television
At PopMatters, Anita Felicelli discusses why TV shows get ruined when they’re written and produced with their fans in mind rather than for their own sake as pieces of creative work: We know that television writers read fan responses on Twitter, that some of them read blogs and speculation. They know what fans want because […]
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Truth About Google X
Space elevators, teleportation, hoverboards, and driverless cars: The top-secret Google X innovation lab opens up about what it does—and how it thinks. If there’s a master plan behind X, it’s that a frictional arrangement of ragtag intellects is the best hope for creating products that can solve the world’s most intractable issues. Yet Google X, […]
Posted inNonfiction
When Mary Martin Was the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up
In the 1950s, a musical adaptation of J. M. Barrie’s ‘Peter Pan’ starring Mary Martin became a sensation, attracting the fourth biggest audience of all time for a scripted TV show when a live production was broadcast on NBC.
Posted inNonfiction
The Rise and Fall of John DeLorean
“It was the end of the story of John DeLorean as part of the American Dream—how a humble kid from Detroit could rise to the very top.”
Posted inMember Pick, Nonfiction, Story
A Very Naughty Little Girl
The extraordinary life of Janet Vaughan, who changed our relationship with blood.
Posted inEditor's Pick
This Is the Man Bill Gates Thinks You Absolutely Should Be Reading
The author of nearly three dozen books on the decline of manufacturing in America, and a future in which innovation can’t save us but reducing our consumption might: Most innovation is not done by research institutes and national laboratories. It comes from manufacturing—from companies that want to extend their product reach, improve their costs, increase […]
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction
The Rise of Joan of Arc: How a Visionary Peasant Girl Defied a Dress Code and Challenged the Patriarchy
Following the guidance of the voices only she could hear, Joan, a peasant girl living in a world dominated by aristocrats and men, left her home to convince the dauphin—and many men along the way—that only she could save France and make him king.
