Steven Johnson: The Actionable Network Key to Innovation

Melissa Withers
March 17, 2009

It was a great pleasure to welcome Steve Johnson to BIF yesterday for a conversation about his new book, "The Invention of Air." In a forum with a few dozen members of the BIF community, Johnson discussed the story of Enlightenment-era innovator Joseph Priestly and the emerging social networks that enabled his ideas to flourish.

Harkening back to the dawn of London's coffee house culture—a phenomena that fueled the ‘open source' information exchange that defined the Enlightenment's intellectual awakening—Johnson chronicled the outcomes of a convergence of time, place and cultural milieu that enabled Priestly to link his fervor for experimentation with new modes of networked learning and a rising tide of scientific patronage.

Of course, this wouldn't be a story without a few twists and turns, culminating in Priestly and his family being (literally) driven from England by an angry mob. Tying in the story of Priestly's friendships with intellectual giants like Benjamin Franklin and the still significant tale of how small communities of interest organized to validate and support each others work despite the lack of tools like modern modes of travel, email and telephone, Johnson offers readers a quick trip through the dynamics of innovation centuries ago and a conversation about what it might mean to how we understand innovation in today's interconnected and information-overloaded global economy.

Here's a quick video of Steven talking about the book. A full interview with Steven and video coverage of his presentation at BIF will be available later this week.

A virtual conversation about the book also took place in the BIF on-line Book Group at http://bifbookgroup.ning.com/.

Related Links

• Steven Johnson discusses "The Invention of Air" at BIF
• Slideshow of Steven Johnson at BIF, March 16, 2009