This is the ideology that has been slowly and quietly ruining America and the world. Innovation has nothing to do with entrepreneurs. Innovation happens when craftsmen, not businessmen, find better ways of practicing their craft. The people that built/are building the technologies that are radically improving the lives of the public do so out of a drive to build. We don't need more Carnegies, and we _certainly_ don't need more P.T. Barnums. We need Benjamin Franklins.
Innovation has nothing to do with entrepreneurs. Innovation happens when craftsmen, not businessmen, find better ways of practicing their craft.
That's categorically false, unless you have very narrow definitions of entrepreneur and craftsman. It seems like in practice, the line gets pretty blurry. Aren't all entrepreneurs craftsmen in some regard (if not with respect to their product, then to customer experience, process, or something else)?
For instance, Honoré le Blanc, Eli Whitney, et al pioneered the concept of interchangeable parts for business purposes. Were these guys businessmen or craftsmen? On the one hand, they eliminated a lot of the art of gunmaking, but on the other hand, they made more reliable guns.
I would have to go with businessmen first. The advent of the interchangeable part directly contributed to the development of the assembly line, and with it, the emergence of the unskilled or semi-skilled worker, the very antithesis of craftsmen.
There's nothing ruinous about holding the entrepreneurial spirit on a pedestal. It's the entrepreneurial spirit that drives innovation, whether it's inside the R&D department of a massive corporation (one can still be entrepreneurial while an employee - it was entrepreneurial ism that brought us Gmail), or someone's basement, or a few friends in a loft on the east side of Milwaukee.
That said, one cannot completely dismiss "business" as a skill. Management, business direction, and market "intuition" are all skills, and when properly used, they give the necessary direction to the true creators: engineers, craftsmen, etc to allow them to excel.
Agreed. I think that saying that people mistaking entrepreneurship for innovation is an "ideology that has been slowly and quietly ruining America and the world" is a bit of a dramatic overstatement.
Entrepreneurship is directly related to innovation. Innovation does not have to mean inventing the light bulb. It can also mean coming up with new ways to do things (e.g. Southwest Airlines). Entrepreneurship is an integral part of what makes capitalism work.
Additionally, just because you're a craftsman doesn't mean you can never be a businessman also. Any individual craftsman that wants to make any money from their creations will have to at some point become involved in business. Even if you're just selling your new technology to a big corporation and not starting your own company, you're still having to make a sale (which I'm pretty sure would go under the business category).
Benjamin Franklin _was_ a successful businessman/entrepreneur. He became very wealthy as a publisher, and retired at 42 to pursue science and politics.
He made money, but he was not primarily an entrepreneur. He ran a publishing house to feed himself and then was able to turn its management over to his partner so he could focus on furthering the enlightenment. If he were really an entrepreneur he would have kept a monopoly on the franklin stove, or bifocals, or any number of his inventions.
This is alike to saying Paul Graham is not primarily an entrepreneur, he made money to feed himself and later sold it to focus on furthering his ideas of a second enlightenment.
Amen! Unfortunately, it seems popular "Western" culture is inspiring lots more Carnegies and Barnums than Franklins. But how can a shift in culture be brought about?
In hindsight, the tone of my comment seems condescending to business and marketing types. This was not intended, and I apologize if any offense was taken.
Those are just as important to economic progress as the engineer type. Assuming there is a real global shortage of a given type of skill and an excess of others, we all benefit if appropriate reallocation is inspired.
A shift is impossible so long as the Western culture doesn't care how exactly you make money, that is, whether it's out of thin air or out of the thick urge to create wealth. Luckily, the laws of free markets are on our side and the present crisis seems to be trying to fix just that. I understand this view may be too simplistic, but it's probably the best explanation of what's happening in the world now. And what's happening is potentially a slight positive shift in culture.
True; although, both have a place in the conversation.
Dale Carnegie = Marketeer
-He authored the bestseller: "How to Win Friends and Influence People". The book continues to sell today even though it was first published in 1934. I'd recommend it even to non-Marketeers.
Andrew Carnegie = Business Guy
-He's remembered as a Business guy for doing titanic mergers and acquisitions in the Steel industry. However he did not come from a wealthy family and started his first steel company from the ground up.
Also, it is my hope that all those who have commented on "craftsman v. entrepreneur" and the glut of "business types" have personally built companies and met the challenges of payroll & bringing a product to market.....but I really doubt thats the case.
"Change the world" is only part of the equation. But what drives the hacker entrepreneur day to day? It's the adrenaline and focus supplied by the promised emotional payoff of a completed mission. Any veteran of a website launch knows what I'm talking about. This is why we're entrepreneurs, and it's the subject of this humorous video.
they're trying to sell stuff to entrepreneurs (who've never heard of grand central / google voice). Obviously this video is a cynical viral marketing ploy... lame.
Aa marketing ploy with an underlying purpose of selling stuff isn't necessarily lame. The video is good and does not mention them. This is a fair mention and I love the idealism that it promotes.
There is no shame in the fact that great causes are sponsored.
1) It ends with "See how Grasshopper empowers entrepreneurs to succeed" and "grasshopper.com" bouncing up and down to call attention to itself.
2) What "causes" are sponsored?
I completely disagree with your statement that "a marketing ploy with an underlying purpose of selling stuff isn't necessarily lame"- in general one should run screaming away from anything that can be described as a "ploy" with an "underlying purpose".
I'm a user and their service is different from Google Voice. It's a professional sounding 1-800/voicemail system intended for business, not personal use. "Push 1 for customer service, Push 2 for sales" type of thing.
marketing ploys aside, cool video, little dose of inspiration and while google voice/grandcentral has been sitting idle for years this company as been out in the market acquiring customers and making money, so more power to them.
