innovation

Microsoft & Google adding generative AI into office apps is a classic pattern of incumbents making the new thing a feature. But the new thing generally also enables completely new ways to solve the problem. ‘Easier spreadsheets’ is less important than ‘why is that a spreadsheet?’

Never forget that time Mckinsey told AT&T that cell phones would be a “niche” market and it ended up costing the company $12B+. https://t.co/HMoLD5jJNe

Bill Gates on Microsoft's "hard-core detractors" December 4, 1993

The idea in my head vs the first draft

You only get to be early and right about a lot of things by trying a lot of things. Early.

The Google AI team is in such a tough place: the targets will keep moving as their competitors advance. Any launch will hurt the brand that doesn’t live up to expectations which are rising. Throwing thousands of engineers to accelerate typically will slow things down. It’d be… Show more

observed: don’t expect customers to celebrate a major innovation before they get use to it. at first blush most customers prefer familiarity, even if a step-function improvement awaits.

Wondering if chat GPT plug-ins are the new App Store or the new Alexa skills. And, by extension, an admission that this is orders of magnitude less powerful than it looks.

@TrungTPhan: Went down a rabbit hole for cross-industry innovations (when one industry borrows from another). Here are 8 gems. 1. James Dyson made a bagless vacuum after seeing how sawmills used cyclone force to eject sawdust. ![](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpL8_bRaEAA4oiJ.png... See more