"On almost anything someone does in the computer business, you can go back in the literature and prove someone had done it earlier"
About this Quote
In one neat sentence, Ken Olsen punctures the tech industrys favorite myth: that its always inventing the future. His line reads like a seasoned executives eye-roll at the endless parade of "firsts" and "breakthroughs" that turn out to be rediscoveries with better packaging. The intent is corrective, almost disciplinary: stop confusing novelty with importance, and stop mistaking a product launch for a conceptual leap.
The subtext is about power and credit. In computing, origin stories are currency: they secure funding, confer prestige, and justify market dominance. Olsen reminds us that the archive is a quiet adversary to hype. If you can "go back in the literature" and find precedents, then much of what gets celebrated as genius is really selection and timing: who had the resources to ship it, who built an ecosystem, who convinced customers it mattered.
Context matters because Olsen came from an era when computer science was maturing into an institution, with papers, conferences, and an accumulating record. That literature is both a memory and an indictment. It suggests that technological progress is less a clean line of inventions than a recurring loop of ideas that become feasible only when hardware, capital, and taste align. Theres a sly humility here, too: if everything has ancestors, then todays "disruptors" are heirs, not gods. The quote works because it deflates the industries self-importance without denying its achievements; it shifts the spotlight from originality to execution, from mythmaking to material history.
The subtext is about power and credit. In computing, origin stories are currency: they secure funding, confer prestige, and justify market dominance. Olsen reminds us that the archive is a quiet adversary to hype. If you can "go back in the literature" and find precedents, then much of what gets celebrated as genius is really selection and timing: who had the resources to ship it, who built an ecosystem, who convinced customers it mattered.
Context matters because Olsen came from an era when computer science was maturing into an institution, with papers, conferences, and an accumulating record. That literature is both a memory and an indictment. It suggests that technological progress is less a clean line of inventions than a recurring loop of ideas that become feasible only when hardware, capital, and taste align. Theres a sly humility here, too: if everything has ancestors, then todays "disruptors" are heirs, not gods. The quote works because it deflates the industries self-importance without denying its achievements; it shifts the spotlight from originality to execution, from mythmaking to material history.
Quote Details
| Topic | Technology |
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