Inventing is NOT Fun

James Jorasch Discusses Misconception that Inventing is Fun: What do you think?

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00:01:54

I’d like to talk briefly, since we are talking about ideas, innovations, some myths and mistakes, some of the misconceptions that people have about inventing and about innovating. And number one I would say is that inventing is easy and it’s fun. Lots of people have this image that inventing is a bunch of people sitting in an empty conference room with Nerf guns kicking their feet up going, hey dude, you know, let’s do some inventing for a while. Oh, how about like Internet-based watches that beep when you use your credit card or something. Ah, dude, that’s cool. Okay. Yea well let’s go home now. That is not inventing. That’s just goofing. Inventing is incredibly hard. Coming up with ideas is easy. Coming up with good ideas is unbelievably hard. And at Walker Digital we spend a tremendous amount of time reading for example. If you are going to invent in the casino area, and we have lots of patents in the casino area, that’s because we read every book on games and gambling. Everything. I’ve read more than one hundred and fifty books on games and gambling, using software, going to conferences, talking to experts, participating in the games. You’ve got to really infuse this into your head, load up to your head, and then when you get into a brainstorming session, you are much more productive, and lightning starts striking multiple times when your mind is prepared like that. But it is hard work. You have to spend sixteen hours a day reading to become a good inventor. It’s not just kicking back and shooting Nerf toys around. It’s a lot of hard work. But that’s why there isn’t a whole lot of innovation. When I started this conversation, I asked what the biggest innovation in 1999 was, and really no one came up with something quickly. That’s because innovation is very hard. If it were easy, there would be lots of innovation around. It’s incredibly hard.

Source: http://www.eclips.cornell.edu/themes.do?id=526&clipID=1039&tab=TabClipPage