The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution

Walter Isaacson

Oct 2014 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this eBook

Following his blockbuster biography of Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson’s New York Times bestselling and critically acclaimed The Innovators is a “riveting, propulsive, and at times deeply moving” (The Atlantic) story of the people who created the computer and the internet.

What were the talents that allowed certain inventors and entrepreneurs to turn their visionary ideas into disruptive realities? What led to their creative leaps? Why did some succeed and others fail?

The Innovators is a masterly saga of collaborative genius destined to be the standard history of the digital revolution—and an indispensable guide to how innovation really happens. Isaacson begins the adventure with Ada Lovelace, Lord Byron’s daughter, who pioneered computer programming in the 1840s. He explores the fascinating personalities that created our current digital revolution, such as Vannevar Bush, Alan Turing, John von Neumann, J.C.R. Licklider, Doug Engelbart, Robert Noyce, Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, Tim Berners-Lee, and Larry Page.

This is the story of how their minds worked and what made them so inventive. It’s also a narrative of how their ability to collaborate and master the art of teamwork made them even more creative. For an era that seeks to foster innovation, creativity, and teamwork, The Innovators is “a sweeping and surprisingly tenderhearted history of the digital age” (The New York Times).

Ratings and reviews

I can't review this ebook because Google stole $14.84 play credit from me and never sent the book. Google stole from me... 11/28/19 Still no response from Google. The help pages simply don't work. The book shows as purchased but does not download. Google stole from me.

This is an insightful book not about the computers as a thing, but about the men and women behind it and how it changed the world. I really like Isaacson's way of emphasizing the collaboration between the founders and inventors that made the invention fruitful. It's very recommended for everyone to read this, to know that the technology that we have nowadays is not to be taken for granted.

A really great walk-through on the different eras of the digital revolution and how they tie together.

About the author

Walter Isaacson, the CEO of the Aspen Institute, has been chairman of CNN and editor of Time magazine. He is the author of Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; and Kissinger: A Biography; and the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. He lives in Washington, DC.