Tesla worked for Edison and was a person who could finish things and some of them changed the world. He was also person with vision, so I think Linus is either wrong or he is trying to put emphasis only on hard work. What if you have person like Tesla with both qualities?

He is simplifying the situation to make his point, that if you have to choose between inspiration and execution, he would choose execution by a wide margin. It's not meant to be an accurate historical commentary or to portray any sort of reality.

I agree -- you need a little bit of both qualities. The vision of what to create and the execution to carry it out. The two go hand in hand. I think Linus is putting the emphasis on hard work because we mere mortals aren't endowed with the same genius that Tesla had and for us, the best way to achieve something great is through hard work instead of "divine" inspiration.

The Chinese made a whole industry out of executing without visionaries. It's called cloning products of visionaries. Or slightly improving them based on marketing feedback.

>The Chinese made a whole industry out of executing without visionaries. It's called cloning products of visionaries.

That's how the US got its start too. In the 19th century still, most inventions were from Europe (England, France, Germany, etc), from the steam engine to the refridgerator, and from the radio to the internal combustion engine, cinema and photography. All European inventions.

And the Japanese post-WW2. Toyota was considered to be the poor man's Ford until at least the 1970s. Samsung and LG were mocked as artless copiers of Sony/Panasonic/Pioneer products as recently as the 90s.

Everybody starts with copying. You need a certain amount of proficiency in a given subject to be able to innovate. China will get there at scale too.

They start with a bit of copying then follow with originality. This is true even for high schoolers doing programming in US. China's copiers in imdustry didnt for a long time. So, it's not as simple as you suggested. Shenzhen is in opposite situation where it's both cloning and innovating so fast there's no stability in offerings.

>China's copiers in imdustry didnt for a long time.

What "long time"? China has been the "factory of the world" for mere 2 - 2.5 decades now and has done huge leaps since the early 90s when it started.

For contrast, it took from '45 to the mid-70s or so for Japanese companies to start innovating.

I think maybe you should go back to the history of the Industrial Revolution in the United States, which hinged initially on industrial espionage.

They didnt invent anything? Only duplicated others' work identically or with uglier, shoddier construction at lower prices? Im interested in a link with evidence of that if you have it.

Until quite late, with Edison and co, they didn't. And that's like 2 centuries after independence. All major inventions (and their first major uses in production) came from Europe until then, from the steam engine (UK) and the radio (Italy), to the car engine (Germany), the refrigerator (Germany, UK), the battery (Italy), telephone (Scotland), etc.

>Only duplicated others' work identically or with uglier, shoddier construction at lower prices?

Also, "uglier, shoddier construction at lower prices"? You seem to be under the impression that the Chinese just build cheap knockoffs.

Actually they also build also the high quality, high precision stuff you buy, from iPhones to BMWs (as of now 1 million BMWs have been assembled in Chinese plants).

Many important railroad technologies were developed by the US, even very early on: the US invented the cowcatcher and leading trucks on locomotives, and built the first locomotive to be duplicated. The Janney (automatic) coupler and the Westinghouse air brakes are major railroad innovations developed by the US, albeit in the 1870s. Geared steam locomotives (i.e., the Shay locomotive) were also developed by the US for mountainous logging operations.

"Also, "uglier, shoddier construction at lower prices"? You seem to be under the impression that the Chinese just build cheap knockoffs."

That's what they did in the past as I stated. They were renown for it. Later on, they started innovating a ton on top of that. The transformation was covered very well in the Wired Shenzhen documentary.

That's a false dichotomy, but also, this is a well-known phenomenon. It was taught even when I learned history in high school here in California.

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2013-02-01/piracy-an...

http://foreignpolicy.com/2012/12/06/we-were-pirates-too/

I think it's a really interesting phenomenon how quickly we as a culture are able to imagine that what we're experiencing right now is without precedent.

It's not a false dichotomy. It's what the Chinese did to American goods until they developed innovation centers. The other person said America was the same. I wanted references. Yours seem to illustrate that was true. Hilariously, too.

They brought in Englishmen who'd memorized the design of the textile mills so they could copy them in Massachusetts.

have you actually spent sufficient time in China recently? I go there every quarter nowadays and find the innovation and impact of mobile tech on the everyday life of people a couple of years at least ahead of the West. I also see India beginning to leap ahead - kind of where China was 3-4 years ago.

Historically, it's only taken a decade or so for copying to move into innovation in Japan. China's already completed that decade now.

> What if you have person like Tesla with both qualities?

Like Elon Musk for example (who Torvalds seems to be making a gentle dig at, in the quote above).

Ironically, Musk likes Edison better too.

Source: http://insideevs.com/elon-musk-bigger-fan-edison-tesla/

Linus is right that it's about the work you put in, but he's wrong if he thinks Tesla didn't work hard to develop his visualization abilities

There's a myth that some people are born with amazing powers (Tesla, Einstein) but what people don't see is the hours they put in from a young age

Therefore, both Tesla and Edison worked hard, except Edison bragged about it

Of course he bragged about it. He actually wanted people to use his technology to fund other ventures. Whats the point of creating things if no one actually knows about it?

Is it so hard to believe that some people just like to create for the sake of it?

No, but who changes things.

Those who create? Or those who share their creations?

You could say that if an invention is any good it speaks for itself, in which case you've saved yourself the effort of bragging and people still get to know about it

Good inventions usually look bad from outset. Otherwise someone else would have come up with them much earlier. So, you still need to sell your inventions and get people to see the potential.

A good invention might speak for itself if you give it 20 years and wait. But you can't run a business if your marketing strategy involves "wait 20 years".

This has to be one of the biggest fallacies in tech.

I'm pretty sure that the "work" Linus is referring to is work on the project, not work educating yourself and building up your abilities ahead of time.

> but who actually changed the world?

All the production of electric power in the world and most of its distribution today is based on the Tesla's methods. Not accidentally: Edison's were simply ineffective.

(Some also claimed that the first ever AND electrical logical circuits, today minimized in every chip in every computer, were the ones that Tesla built as the part of his wireless remote controlled boat in 1898. Here the article: https://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/dt/2007/06/mdt2007060624-... just mentions http://www.tfcbooks.com/teslafaq/q&a_024.htm but I can't find other sources. So let's stay by the electric power today. Tesla.)

Edison and Tesla both changed the world. Tesla (and Ferraris) are responsible for the invention of first viable AC motor, without which we would rely on DC for our grid.

The Edison quote was during a live radio debate between the two of them.

Tesla's response was : if you thought a bit more, you wouldn't have to sweat so much