How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World

From the New York Timesbestselling author of Where Good Ideas Come From and Everything Bad Is Good for You, a new look at the power and legacy of great ideas.In this illustrated volume, Steven Johnson explores the history of innovation over centuries, tracing facets of modern life refrigeration, clocks, and eyeglass lenses, to name a few from their creation by hobbyists, amateurs, and entrepreneurs to their unintended historical consequences. Filled with surprising stories of accidental genius and brilliant mistakes—from the French publisher who invented the phonograph before Edison but forgot to include playback, to the Hollywood movie star who helped invent the technology behind Wi-Fi and Bluetooth—How We Got to Now investigates the secret history behind the everyday objects of contemporary life.