Eureka! On the clustering of geniuses

networks—in part, because networks have been shown to be more creative and adaptable than hierarchial systems.

Many of history’s great innovators managed to build a cross-disciplinary coffeehouse environment within their own private work routines.

Ideas rise in crowds, as Poincaré said. They rise in liquid networks where connection is valued more than protection. So if we want to build environments that generate good ideas—whether those environments are in schools or corporations or governments or our own personal lives—we need to keep that history in mind, and not fall back on the easy assu

When we look at the history of innovation from the vantage point of the long zoom, what we find is that unusually generative environments display similar patterns of creativity at multiple scales simultaneously.

As our science and technology develop further, individual achievements may become increasingly rare as distributed groups become necessary to bring together all the knowledge required to solve hard problems.