There is a conspiracy to prevent innovation. It’s widespread, strong and effective, more in some domains than others. Like all conspiracies, it goes to great lengths to conceal its actions and goals. The members of the conspiracy are desperate not to be revealed, because they would certainly be subjected at least to ridicule, if not total ostracizing. More important to the active members of the conspiracy, they would lose power, if not their jobs.
The anti-innovation conspiracy is at war with the transformative power of radical improvements of computer and networking technology. Computer evolution, which continues to follow Moore’s Law of exponential growth, without precedent in human experience, largely powers innovation, directly or indirectly. The exploding growth of computer power and network speeds with similarly amazing reductions in size and cost are an overwhelming force, practically begging people and organizations to tap its power and make things better for everyone. See this:
https://www.blackliszt.com/2013/12/fundamental-concepts-of-computing-speed-of-evolution.html
As anyone can see with the transformation of rotary, wired phones into wireless, mobile computer phones, the forces of innovation are winning.
Victories of the Conspiracy
The entrenched anti-innovation forces refuse to concede defeat and give up. Decades into the computer revolution, the conspiracy lives on, showing few signs of weakening. It has established entrenched positions in a surprising array of places. Even when it can’t prevent innovation, the conspiracy manages to slow the pace of innovation to a crawl in places where conspirators maintain positions of power. They force innovators to slog through sodden, muddy paths, when in other industries, innovators are whizzing along on mag-lev trains. There are also wide-spread pockets of resistance, in which the conspirators manage to hold off the application of proven innovations to their industry, often by decades.
Skeptical? An amazing fraction of what appears to be innovations are little but taking advances that are proven in a narrow domain and applying them to a new one. Here is the story of an algorithm that was standard practice in oil refinery operation over 50 years ago that, decade by decade, is still crawling its way into new domains.
Here is an example of a truly beneficial innovation proven over 50 years ago that is still not used in medical imaging.
https://www.blackliszt.com/2019/07/barriers-to-software-innovation-radiology-1.html
https://www.blackliszt.com/2019/08/barriers-to-software-innovation-radiology-2.html
There are many more examples of the effectiveness of the anti-innovation conspiracy.
It's Secret!
Among the greatest strengths of the anti-innovation conspiracy is that it has not been “outed.” No one talks about an “anti-innovation conspiracy,” or even about “the forces that slow or prevent innovation.” The fact that innovation takes place widely, touching all of our personal lives, leaves everyone in awe of what innovation has wrought. And rightly so! What is not discussed are the deep forces that prevent and/or slow innovation. Without the resistance, the innovation that would be unleashed would make today’s by-itself-amazing innovation look sluggish by comparison.
The anti-innovation conspiracy has two major wings.
The first wing is particularly pernicious, since it establishes positions inside the people and groups who innovate and implement innovation. In this wing, the conspiracy concedes that innovation will take place, but assures that it will be as expensive, slow and ineffective as possible. The first wing is essentially an effort to cripple and co-opt the “offense,” the efforts of the innovators.
The second wing operates silently and secretly, often waving flags supporting innovation and supporting innovation efforts. It operates inside the institutions that will be affected by innovation, and inside the organizations such as regulatory bodies that control the institutions that are targeted by innovation. The second wing is essentially an effort to bolster the “defense,” the ability of institutions that could be impacted by innovation to resist the efforts of innovators.
One of the great strengths of the anti-innovation conspiracy is that the vast majority of people benefit to some extent by the innovation that does take place, and naturally compare what is available to them today compared to ten or twenty years ago. Progress has happened, and it’s a good thing. Of course I agree with this.
But meanwhile, the conspirators are rubbing their hands together and mumbling something like “heh, heh … still got ‘em.” The reason for the acclaim for the results of innovation and the near-complete lack of awareness of the conspiracy against it is simple: very few people are in a position to see the amazing innovations, true advances that would make everyone’s lives better, that have been and are being today prevented and/or drastically watered down as a direct result of the efforts of the anti-innovation conspiracy. If there were widespread knowledge of “what could have been,” people would see the results of innovation in a completely different light. It would be like a starving person in a room being given a bit of bread and water; they eagerly consume it and are glad to have it. But how would their attitude be different if they knew that, just through a door in the room, there was a sumptuous feast all laid out, ready to eat, and the person giving them the bread and water was preventing them not just from going through that door, but even from letting them know it was there? Gratitude for the bread and water would suddenly be transformed into fury at the person keeping them from the food they so desperately need, even hiding the fact that it’s there! The vast majority of people are like the starving person in the room, grateful for the food they now have, completely unaware of the feast they can’t eat because the conspiracy successfully hides it from them.
I know these are strong claims. But after decades of writing innovative software and more decades of looking deeply at innovative companies and their spread of innovation in various companies and industries, this describes the patterns I have observed.
Finally, let me make something clear: There is no cabal of anti-innovation conspirators who explicitly communicate among themselves that their goal is to prevent or slow innovation. If there were such a cabal, it would have been exposed and shamed long ago. The long-lasting conspiracy is fueled by a wide variety of goals that appear to have nothing to do with preventing innovation; the conspirators, as they deserve to be called, don’t say or even (for the most part) tell themselves that they are trying to prevent innovation. It’s always something else: they are trying to protect the public, prevent people from being harmed, assuring that things are built to proper standards, trying to maintain stability in a well-oiled operation, avoiding wasteful distractions, and on and on. Most of the people involved might sincerely claim they are promoting innovation everywhere they can. The trouble isn’t their thoughts or words; the trouble is their actions, which have the net effect of preventing or slowing innovation.
I have already written about some of the issues involved in the anti-innovation conspiracy.
https://www.blackliszt.com/2023/07/summary-software-innovation.html
There is more to be written, for example to shame those who promote themselves and their institutions as being leaders in innovation. I hope others will take up this long-neglected issue.
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