Social Networks in the History of Innovation and Invention

Social Networks in the History of Innovation and Invention
Author: Francis C. Moon
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 206
Release: 2013-11-19
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 9400775288

This book integrates history of science and technology with modern social network theory. Using examples from the history of machines, as well as case studies from wireless, radio and chaos theory, the author challenges the genius model of invention. Network analysis concepts are presented to demonstrate the societal nature of invention in areas such as steam power, internal combustion engines, early aviation, air conditioning and more. Using modern measures of network theory, the author demonstrates that the social networks of invention from the 19th and early 20th centuries have similar characteristics to modern 21st C networks such as the World Wide Web. The book provides evidence that exponential growth in technical innovation is linked to the growth of historical innovation networks.

Big History

Big History
Author: DK
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 442
Release: 2022-05-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 0744067804

From the formation of the Universe to today, countless major events have changed the course of life on Earth. Aligned with the online Big History Project supported by Bill Gates, Big History puts a wide-angle lens on 13.8 billion years of remarkable history and shows you how and why we got where we are today. With stunning visual timelines and special CGI reconstructions, you can see history's greatest events. Look back to our origins in the stars, explore everything from the birth of the Sun to modern technology, and see what the future holds for humans. Weaving together multiple disciplines including physics and sociology, and with a foreword by TED speaker Professor David Christian, Big History is a truly unique look at the history of the world.

Explorations in the History of Machines and Mechanisms

Explorations in the History of Machines and Mechanisms
Author: Teun Koetsier
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 590
Release: 2012-04-05
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 9400741324

This book contains the proceedings of HMM2012, the 4th International Symposium on Historical Developments in the field of Mechanism and Machine Science (MMS). These proceedings cover recent research concerning all aspects of the development of MMS from antiquity until the present and its historiography: machines, mechanisms, kinematics, dynamics, concepts and theories, design methods, collections of methods, collections of models, institutions and biographies.

Origins of Human Innovation and Creativity

Origins of Human Innovation and Creativity
Author: Scott A. Elias
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 141
Release: 2012-12-31
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0444538224

Innovation and creativity are two of the key characteristics that distinguish cultural transmission from biological transmission. This book explores a number of questions concerning the nature and timing of the origins of human creativity. What were the driving factors in the development of new technologies? What caused the stasis in stone tool technological innovation in the Early Pleistocene? Were there specific regions and episodes of enhanced technological development, or did it occur at a steady pace where ancestral humans lived? The authors are archaeologists who address these questions, armed with data from ancient artefacts such as shell beads used as jewelry, primitive musical instruments, and sophisticated techniques required to fashion certain kinds of stone into tools. Providing 'state of art' discussions that step back from the usual archaeological publications that focus mainly on individual site discoveries, this book presents the full picture on how and why creativity in Middle to Late Pleistocene archeology/anthropology evolved. - Gives a full, original and multidisciplinary perspective on how and why creativity evolved in the Middle to Late Pleistocene - Enhances our understanding of the big leaps forward in creativity at certain times - Assesses the intellectual creativity of Homo erectus, H. neanderthalensis, and H. sapiens via their artefacts

Re-inventing the Ship

Re-inventing the Ship
Author: Don Leggett
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2016-04-08
Genre: History
ISBN: 1317068386

Ships have histories that are interwoven with the human fabric of the maritime world. In the long nineteenth century these histories revolved around the re-invention of these once familiar objects in a period in which Britain became a major maritime power. This multi-disciplinary volume deploys different historical, geographical, cultural and literary perspectives to examine this transformation and to offer a series of interconnected considerations of maritime technology and culture in a period of significant and lasting change. Its ten authors reveal the processes involved through the eyes and hands of a range of actors, including naval architects, dockyard workers, commercial shipowners and Navy officers. By locating the ship's re-invention within the contexts of builders, owners and users, they illustrate the ways in which material elements, as well as scientific, artisan and seafaring ideas and practices, were bound together in the construction of ships' complex identities.

Handbook of Social Media Management

Handbook of Social Media Management
Author: Mike Friedrichsen
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 858
Release: 2013-05-28
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3642288979

Digitization and Web 2.0 have brought about continuous change from traditional media management to new strategic, operative and normative management options. Social media management is on the agenda of every media company, and requires a new set of specialized expertise on digital products and communication. At the same time, social media has become a vibrant field of research for media economists and media management researchers. In this handbook, international experts present a comprehensive account of the latest developments in social media research and management, consistently linking classical media management with social media. The articles discuss new theoretical approaches as well as empirical findings and applications, yielding an interesting overview of interdisciplinary and international approaches. The book’s main sections address forms and content of social media; impact and users; management with social media; and a new value chain with social media. The book will serve as a valuable reference work for researchers, students and professionals working in media and public relations.

The Evolution of Social Innovation

The Evolution of Social Innovation
Author: Frances Westley
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2017-12-29
Genre: Organizational resilience
ISBN: 1786431157

In a time where governments and civil society organizations are putting ever-greater stock in social innovation as a route to transformation, understanding what characterizes social innovation with transformative potential is important. Exciting and promising ideas seem to die out as often as they take flight, and market mechanisms, which go a long way towards contributing to successful technical innovations, play an insignificant role in social innovations. The cases in this book explore the evolution of successful social innovation through time, from the ideas which catalysed social and system entrepreneurs to create new processes, platforms, projects and programs to fundamental social shifts in culture, economics, laws and policies which occurred as a result. In doing so, the authors shed light on how to recognize transformative potential in the early stage innovations we see today.

Where Good Ideas Come From

Where Good Ideas Come From
Author: Steven Johnson
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2010-10-05
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1101444207

A fascinating deep dive on innovation from the New York Times bestselling author of How We Got To Now and Unexpected Life The printing press, the pencil, the flush toilet, the battery--these are all great ideas. But where do they come from? What kind of environment breeds them? What sparks the flash of brilliance? How do we generate the breakthrough technologies that push forward our lives, our society, our culture? Steven Johnson's answers are revelatory as he identifies the seven key patterns behind genuine innovation, and traces them across time and disciplines. From Darwin and Freud to the halls of Google and Apple, Johnson investigates the innovation hubs throughout modern time and pulls out the approaches and commonalities that seem to appear at moments of originality.

Writing on the Wall

Writing on the Wall
Author: Tom Standage
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2014-09-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 1620402858

Chronicles social media over two millennia, from papyrus letters that Cicero used to exchange news across the Empire to today, reminding us how modern behavior echoes that of prior centuries and encouraging debate and discussion about how we'll communicate in the future.