Introduction
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Introduction In 1957, seven of the world’s top scientists, the consequences. You have essentially turned engineers and physicists set out to convince traitor. You have broken what everyone knows Robert Noyce — a brilliant 29-year-old is the contract that you make when you start Midwestern physicist — to leave their jobs working at a company, which is: You’re there at Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory and forever. You’ve changed the rules of the game join them in a new business venture. These and you’re never gonna live that down.” seven men were some of the best minds in The group’s decision to leave Shockley electronics, and they knew their collective was unprecedented. They looked for outside abilities far outweighed the opportunities financing and charged forward into the presented to them at Shockley, a Palo Alto, unknown world of entrepreneurship, with Calif.-based company that built transistors trust in their brilliant minds and one another. and was started by Nobel Prize-winning They gave up security and a consistent physicist William Shockley. They also knew paycheck to build products and a company they needed Noyce to lead them. based on their own ideas and beliefs — and Noyce was hesitant. earned a new moniker, the “ Traitorous Eight.” Mid-20th Century American culture Sherman Fairchild — an inventor, serial encouraged young, aspiring employees like entrepreneur and son of IBM’s cofounder, Noyce to put in their time, climb the corporate George Winthrop Fairchild — came to the ladder and eventually retire from the same group’s aid as their financial backer. They company in which they started. They were founded Fairchild Semiconductor, commonly taught to believe in the ideas and vision of known as America’s first venture-backed their employer. Hierarchy was king and startup. In a few short but unpredictable traditional values celebrated loyalty. Risk years, under Noyce’s leadership, Fairchild and entrepreneurship were reserved for grew to become the leading producer of the privileged few. technology — in what was then known as When Noyce’s attempts to convince his the Santa Clara valley — and nurtured colleagues to stay at Shockley failed, he joined employees who founded more than 100 of them, and the group announced their plans to their own companies, called Fairchildren, quit. They received a letter from their superiors over the next 20 years. that read: One of the Fairchildren, started by Noyce and “This is a shameful act, you need to consider another one of the Traitorous Eight, Gordon 15 14 15 Moore, opened in 1967 under the name Intel. careers, business models, and assumptions.” make itself comfortable and productive. The designers in this book might not have Based on Noyce’s original integrated circuit The “ status quo ” is an obsolete framework for It’s every person in the world, connected to been invited into Robert Noyce’s inner circle innovations, Intel developed memory devices innovation, so there is little choice but to invent every other person in the world, and no one four decades ago but they channel the and went on to create the world’s first new ways of doing things. And invention is no fully understands how to make best use of this Traitorous Eights’ spirit. They are like us. They commercial microprocessor chip in 1971. Santa longer reserved for the world’s best and new reality because no one has seen anything are brilliant because they have the audacity to Clara Valley became known as Silicon Valley, brightest scientists, physicists and engineers. like it before. The Internet wants to hire you to try. They took an idea they had at the bar, in and our world changed forever. It took Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory build stuff for it because it’s trying to figure out the shower or at the office, and figured out how More than 40 years later, we live in what to bring together eight minds that forever what it can do. It’s offering you a blank check to make it happen. Whether they grew an idea Robert Safian describes as a place where the changed our world, but today the Internet and asking you to come up with something slowly as a side project, or quit their jobs and future of business is chaotic and impossible to has connected us all. We have the tools to fascinating and useful that it can embrace en raised capital, they all embraced the risk of predict. Employees no longer sign up to work collaborate, to educate ourselves and to build masse, to the benefit of everyone.” failure. They boldly moved toward an uncertain for companies for their entire careers — they the things we want for our lives — we are the Today’s designers are equipped with the future and made their dreams a reality. work in uncertain economic times; they watch inventors of our day. skills necessary for critical thinking, empathy Celebrate them, for they have made it a little as traditional institutions struggle to find new Online learning communities, crowdfunding and powerful storytelling. They are trained bit easier for the rest of us. Our hope is that we structures to fend off disruptors, and they platforms and social media outlets have to identify problems and invent solutions. can learn from them — not to follow in their listen to warnings of a dim future. removed barriers and increased the ways people No longer a sign of treason, entrepreneurship footsteps, but to chart our own course in In his article for Fast Company, “ This Is can define and share their stories. In today’s is essential. Those who do it best are not parallel, one that allows us to thrive, add value Generation Flux: Meet The Pioneers Of The world, it takes a well-told story to rise to the ostracized but are held in high esteem. to the world and love what we do. New ( And Chaotic ) Frontier Of Business,” top — one that connects the dots for us in new This book celebrates these design We all have a decision to make. We can put Safian writes, “ When businesspeople search ways — and designers are well-suited authors. entrepreneurs. We interviewed 30 individuals our time in and hope to be promoted, decorated for the right forecast—for the road map and These digital tools have broken down who embrace uncertainty and take risks. or noticed. We can retire from the same company model that will define the next era—no geographic boundaries. Billions of people These designers manufacture products, start that we sign up for, or, we can take matters into credible long-term picture emerges. There is access and connect to an overwhelming side projects, self-publish books and found our own hands, invite our talented friends along one certainty, however. The next decade or two amount of information daily, and they startups. They ask themselves important, for the journey, and run as fast as we can into will be defined more by fluidity than by any search for ways to parse through the chaos. hard questions and use design to discover the the unknown. There is no better time than now. new, settled paradigm; if there is a pattern to In his blog post “Dear Graphic and Web answers. These designers are seasoned veterans, all of this, it is that there is no pattern.” Designers please understand that there are Internet sensations, and self-taught young Safian calls those who succeed under the greater opportunities available to you,” Ben guns — but their résumés and degrees are not pressures of today’s conditions Generation Pieratt writes: “ The Internet, at this time in why we chose them. We chose them because Flux. “ What defines GenFlux,” he says, “ is a history, is the greatest client assignment of all they hustle; they are passionate, and they have mind-set that embraces instability, that time. The Western world is porting itself over a perspective. They are fully equipped for tolerates — and even enjoys — recalibrating to the web in mind and deed and is looking to success in today’s self-made environment. 16 17 16 17 USA. 1960. The Fairchild / Shockley 8, who left the lab of Nobel Prize winner William Shockley to form Silicon Valley’s first startup, Fairchild Semiconductor. From left: Gordon Moore, C. Sheldon Roberts, Eugene Kleiner, Robert Noyce, Victor Grinich, Julius Blank, Jean Hoerni and Jay Last. The Fairchild / Shockley 8, Fairchild Headquarters; Photo, © Wayne Miller/Magnum Photos 18 19 18 19.