An inventive commons: the invention of the airplane and its industry

Transcription

1 An inventive commons: the invention of the airplane and its industry by Peter B. Meyer, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Findings and views are those of the author, not the BLS Convening Cultural Commons conference Sept 23,

2 Fixed wing shapes Cayley, 1799 Penaud, ~1872 Lilienthal 1870s-1880s Wrights wind tunnel & wing models,

3 Trying to make a mechanical bird Le Bris 1868 Albatross Was pulled by a horse; took off from the cart. Mouillard 1881 Hargrave 1891 model ornithopter Ader s 1890 Eole Full size; wings flap, powerful engine

4 Stacked wings Stringfellow 1868 triplane model Hargrave box kites 1893 Chanute-Herring glider, 1896 Phillips multiplane,

5 Big powered craft Maxim s motorized aeroplane 1894 Santos-Dumont 1901 Langley 1901

6 Getting in the air: Otto Lilienthal 1890s: Flew inspirational hang gliders tried to control in air... to soar upward and to glide, free as the bird -- Otto Lilienthal,

7 Parallels to open source software Autonomous innovators (not hierarchy, not cult) with various goals: Want to fly! ; Hope for recognition; Curious, interested in the problem ; Bring peace / make nation safe who share technical info with public Authors, evangelists, organizers have valuable role To welcome future tinkerers who could generate progress To avoid duplicate efforts, thru standards and specialization 7

8 Relevant clubs and societies new data coming Key early societies in Paris (1864,1872), London (1866), Berlin (1881) then smaller/local Key Exhibitions and Conferences: 1868, 1893, 1904, others Focused on ballooning aerial navigation builds on that infrastructure Aeronautics-related clubs and societies

9 Publications Brockett / Smithsonian Institution (1910) is a Bibliography of Aeronautics 13,800 bibliography entries large sample of data

10 Periodicals listed in Brockett (1910) L'Aérophile, Paris, Zeitschrift für Luftschiffahrt, Berlin/Vienna Illustrierte Aëronautische Mitteilungen, Strasbourg 1065 L'Aéronaute (Paris) 822 Wiener Luftschiffer Zeitung (Vienna) 623 Bollettino della Societa Aeronautica Italiana (Rome) 535 Aeronautics (London, 1907-) 441 Aëronautical Journal, (London, 1897-) 415 Scientific American, (New York) 383 La Conquête de l'air (Brussels) 351 There are many duplicates and reprints in the data; haven t standardized this. Many of these articles are online What did they talk about? Balloon, aerostat, dirigible, Zeppelin Voyage (ascent) Bird (animal, fish, insect) Scientific (research, theory, meteorology, upper atmosphere) Experiment Measurement (duration, altitude, temperature, weight) Motor (engine, propulsion) Propellers Machine Navigation (control, steerable) Wings Kite/glider (gliding, soaring)

11 Successful examples were copies Pratt truss Chanute-Herring glider Wright brothers 1900 kite, glider Wilbur Wright s very first letter to Chanute in 1900 says the apparatus I intend to employ... is very similar to [your] "double-deck" machine [of] (... with these changes) Chanute s replies: I believe like yourself that no financial profit is to be expected from such investigations for a long while to come. Ferber, 1902, copies Wrights based on report from Chanute 11

12 Was it an information commons? Yes Designs were copied Publications copied Tinkerers in contact Standards did arise Rivalry was secondary No No sharp boundary (of common resource) Usual commons issues are minor congestion, free riding, conflict, overuse, pollution (Hess and Ostrom intro, 2006) No global formal rules Many clubs or journals had rules No strong collective action; little governance, sanctions, monitoring. Soft law / context Note relevance of: uncertainty; opportunism; support

13 Transition conflict, and paradigm shift Octave Chanute: A commons person Wright brothers It s industry time Letters and telegrams between Octave Chanute and the Wright brothers Wrights to Chanute Chanute to Wrights

14 Startup industry In Publications skyrocket Patent counts probably do too, 1907 Big public demonstrations, Even bigger prizes than before, tens of thousands of viewers Legitimate to start firm (Hannan, Carroll et al 1995) Flow of new firms appears: 1908 Aeronautically-relevant patents by country Number of entrants Britain France Germany US Italy Russia Austria-Hungary All others Number of entrant firms by year of first investment (Sources: Gunston 1993 and 2005; Smithsonian Directory) Count of Publications Britain Germany France US Year

15 Microeconomics issue We have useful micro models of agents: Firms, investors, employees, R&D, households, consumers, governments, bureaucrats, principal-agent, managers, employees, families, etc. But these characters didn t bring us the airplane. Need models of self-motivated non-profit tinkerers (scientists) who sometimes generate these behaviors: Offering information to commons Sometimes avoiding intellectual property institutions Standardizing technology, modularizing, specializing Evangelizing the field and technology Relevant models/phrasings: user innovation, distributed innovation, collective invention, peer production, open source innovation If goal is to change the world, open-source behavior can be rational (Meyer 2007)

16 Conclusions so far Overhang of technological uncertainty is extreme No firms do this research (hopeless, useless, dangerous) Independent tinkerers link up network/commons progress Clubs, publications, visits, letters Lead to standard info/platform in mid 1890s They copy previous work relevant to open source software and other cases Their motivation is mostly intrinsic or altruistic To fly! To change the world so others can fly; or, the challenge Entrepreneurial people and era was very different The experts of 1899 did not become industrialists ten years later

17 Motivations of experimenters Why do this? Would like to fly Curiosity, interest in the problem Prestige, recognition Belief in making world a better place Make one nation safer Nobody refers to expected profits... A desire takes possession of man. He longs to soar upward and to glide, free as the bird Otto Lilienthal 1889 The glory of a great discovery or an invention which is destined to benefit humanity [seemed] dazzling.... Enthusiasm seized [us] at an early age. - Gustav Lilienthal 17

18 Future work: More evidence Can measure participation of people and institutions Publications in bibliography Patents References in combined index from historical books (ex post) References in Chanute s book References in letters (Wrights and Chanute) Participation in startup firms Can see what is happening in a commons And infer what experiences, motivations, and institutions set up an airplane industry

19 Communication institutions referred to in histories These rough counts come from 12 combined historical book indexes about the invention of the airplane, and exclude references to events after These institutions serve technical communication. There was much free revealing of tech. page references distinct instances Clubs, society, or association Journals, periodicals, newspapers, or magazines, Company Exhibition, prize, trophy, award, contest, medal, or meet book (fact or fiction) university or school lab, museum, institute, observatory, zoo, or fund military institution 45 7 conference

20 Development of the airplane (heavier than air, with fixed wings) 1800 Fixed-wing airplane concept/designs of George Cayley 1860s and on French and British clubs and journals start up It s a niche activity maybe hopeless, useless, and/or dangerous Publications on this topic do not refer much to prior work 1890s Public glider flights of Otto Lilienthal 1894 Book by Octave Chanute surveys issues and experiments Publications then refer more often to prior work. Many designs were shared and copied. open source innovation Many firsts Wright brothers key powered-glider flight, 1906 patent Public demonstrations of modern airplanes; an industry arises 20

21 Chanute s 1894 overview Progress in Flying Machines refers to or quotes more than 190 persons Experimenter location (background) Pages referring to, Chanute (1894) Publications listed, Brockett (1910) Maxim Britain (US) Lilienthal Germany Pénaud France Mouillard Algeria, Egypt (Fr) 21 6 Hargrave Australia (Br) Moy Britain Le Bris France 17 0 Langley US Wenham Britain Phillips Britain 14 3 Chanute US (France) * 50+ These are counts of pages referring to the individual. The people are diverse and international. Later technological histories treat these people as central. Their findings were mostly public. 21

22 Communication by letters and visits between experimenters Chanute visited with Mouillard, Langley, Santos-Dumont, Ferber, Huffaker, Herring, Maxim He hosted an international conference on aerial navigation in He corresponded with Hargrave, Mouillard, Montgomery, Cabot, Zahm, Kress, Wenham, Moy, Pilcher, Means, the Lilienthals, the Wrights, and others. Chanute exchanged at least 29 letters with Lawrence Hargrave and 26 with Francis Wenham. (Short, forthcoming) The Lilienthal brothers exchanged at least 12 letters with Chanute and dozens with other experimenters up to (Schwipps book) Had visits from many. Letters and telegrams between Octave Chanute and the Wright brothers Source: McFarland (1953) Wrights to Chanute Chanute to Wrights

23 Wright brothers as open-sourcers First letter to Chanute, May 13, 1900: Assuming then that Lilienthal was correct... [Wilbur explains what he will do differently.].... my object is to learn to what extent similar plans have been tested and found to be failures, and also to obtain such suggestions as your great knowledge and experience might enable you to give me. I make no secret of my plans for the reason that I believe no financial profit will accrue to the inventor of the first flying machine, and that only those who are willing to give as well as to receive suggestions can hope to link their names with the honor of its discovery. The problem is too great for one man alone and unaided to solve in secret. the apparatus I intend to employ... is very similar to the "double-deck" machine with which the experiments of yourself and Mr. Herring were conducted in Chanute s reply May 17, 1900: I believe like yourself that no financial profit is to be expected from such investigations for a long while to come. Wrights 1900 glider 23

24 1910 Bibliography of Aeronautics Brockett/Smithsonian Institution Smithsonian expanded director Langley s collection Bibliography has over 13,400 items, listed on 940 pages. It was scanned, digitized and made public online Archive.org ; also credits to Cornell Univ library, U of Michigan library, and Carnegie-Mellon (posner.cmu.edu) with many scanning/ocr errors. I m fixing those and making a database. For most publications we have authors, date, language of the title, location of publication. Work continues Chanute s 1894 book and this 1910 book are my major sources here. 24

25 Did experimenters copy earlier designs? This is key to the open source process idea. Yes, they copied. A tail on an aircraft was sometimes called the Penaud tail for Alphonse Penaud s models of the early 1870s. A tail can help with stability and control. Long thin fixed wings were found to give more lift than square or round wings. These are imitated, e.g. from Wenham s 1871 wind tunnel experiments Stacked wings draw from particular designs: Wenham, 1866 ; Stringfellow, 1868 ; and box kite experiments of Hargrave, 1890s. That leads to the biplane structure. Penaud model, circa 1872 Cayley, 1799 got much right but not wing shape Hargrave box kite, 1890s 25

26 Alternative models of invention (1) R&D: investments which expect financial payback on average (2) Race to be first (space race; genome project) (3) Collective invention (Allen, 1983) but those are (a) firms, (b) not paying costs to experiment (4) To earn income or wealth indirectly Start company, or license patented invention signal to employers; get hired as engineer (Lerner and Tirole, 2002) These do not apply well to airplane invention We need a model of tinkerers (5) Network: a population of agents with interest in a problem (a 0 ), worthwhile opportunities (p), information flows between them (f) experimentation and socially constructed progress No pool of information, or incentive structure, or technical measure of improvement. 26

27 Chuhachi Ninomiya Loved kites ; studied birds and flying insects Made model glider in and in Japan Tried to fund the building of a larger craft Not clear to me what he knew of the Western literature / progress Not mentioned in my other sources Beetle and Crow models, c.1893?

28 Richard Pearse Farmer near Timaru, New Zealand Flew a powered glider in 1903 Bamboo structure; ailerons Made internal combustion engines Alone! He d read some of the literature Is not mentioned in biblio

29 Jump in publications in early industry period Count of publications in Brockett (1910) Year Perhaps are in French in English in German Many refer to balloons, dirigeables, etc Can categorize by topic/title in future Location of publisher # publications Paris 4303 Berlin 1718 London 1342 New York 1154 Wien 866 Strasbourg 859 Roma 573 Bruxelles 391 Glenville, Ohio 295 Washington DC 228 Nova Scotia 248 St Louis 160 Milano 156 Philadelphia 117 St Petersbourg 101 Boston 100 Stuttgart 49 Hamburg 21 29

30 New firms: preliminary findings Few of the founders, investors, designers in the firms were experts/experimenters of the 1890s. Maybe this is how open-source technologies are usually commercialized by a new or different group Change from technological uncertainty to feasible/investable tech Are the authors of technical works different? Don t know yet. Many founders had experience in manufacturing Unlike the Wrights New firms spin off rapidly from earliest firms Klepper (2009): corporate-genealogies in Detroit and Silicon Valley show very high local rates of spinoff; that s how these places became central to cars and semiconductors

31 Microeconomic model (Meyer, 2007) Imagine self-motivated tinkerers making progress on some project They invest time, effort, money into experiments Let two tinkerers experiments add value to one another s projects Say they are not in competition because they cannot foresee a marketable product for now high technological uncertainty ) They d agree to share findings with one another They d specialize to avoid duplication They d standardize on modular designs and tools (Market processes are not necessary for these effects) They don t bother with intellectual property (there s no gain) There is a role for an author / organizer / evangelist to expand the network and reduce duplicative efforts. A tinkerer might change if the technological uncertainty lifts 31

32 Role for author / moderator / evangelist Chanute corresponded with, visited, introduced experimenters, and published book In model: A tinkerer s best opportunity for progress may be editing, writing, speeches, evangelism authors/evangelists are another kind of specialist tinkerer Octave Chanute, 1894: The writer s object in preparing these articles was threefold: 1. To satisfy himself whether... men might reasonably hope eventually to fly To save... effort on the part of experimenters trying again devices which have already failed. 3. To... render it less chimerical... to experiment with a flying machine.... Analogously: Lilienthal s public demonstrations; Felsenstein at Homebrew; open source programmers Stallman, Torvalds, etc. 32

33 Wright methods and inventions They are skilled, precision-minded toolsmiths, in a workshop every day. They flew craft as kites and gliders both, many times No landing gear, no engine. Their piloting invention had to be learned, like on bicycle Wind tunnel with smooth air flow Tested many wings systematically Propeller invention: shaped like wings, with lift going forward This produces ~40% more pulling power. This design idea lasts to the present. 33

34 Wrights exit open-source network : Wrights read everything they can, experiment with kites and gliders, visit, correspond, attend conferences, speak, publish. Late 1902: they become more secretive, apparently because of wing design success 1903: They filed for a patent on their control mechanism for the wings. Granted Then they started companies. Their secrecy and tight hold on patent rights lead to permanent conflicts with Chanute, Curtiss, and others. Wrights first powered, controlled fixed-wing flight Dec,

35 References in histories books These are coherent narratives with a variety of points of view. Sources: cross-national; in paper 15 books so far. Not enough yet. Combining them all one should get a list of everyone who is important in this invention. Frequency of mention is a very rough measure of importance, ex post. Have not adjusted for nationality/language of author and publication. Have not excluded very well events after Have not counted brothers well. Last name First name Page references Wright Wilbur and Orville * Chanute Octave 215 Lilienthal Otto 167 Blériot Louis 144 Langley Samuel 135 Curtiss Glenn 131 Stringfellow John 117 Cayley George 100 Voisin Gabriel 80 Smithsonian Institution 80 Herring Augustus 76 Patents 65 Manly Charles 62 Bell Alexander Graham 61 Zahm Albert 60 Penaud Alphonse 53 Ader Clément 50 Maxim Hiram 49 Means James 44 Brearey Frederick W. 44 Wenham Francis Herbert 41 Hargrave Lawrence 39 Mouillard Louis 36

36 Issues of interest What institutions support the activities that leads to the invention/industry? (taking its importance as known) Do the experimenters show open source behavior? What does the transition to industry look like? Methods question: How can we use a bibliography and historical narratives written after the fact to tell a unified quantitative story of innovation? I am developing databases of bibliographies of aeronautical publications and clubs patents from the 1860s to 1910 startup firms and their key people (founders, investors, designers) combined indexes from historical books about the airplane s invention

37 Imitation: Wright brothers copy Chanute s design, 1900 Wilbur and Orville Wright ran a bicycle shop. They read up on gliders and experiment with kites and gliders. Motivation: I am an enthusiast... I wish to... help on the future worker who will attain final success." -- Wilbur Wright, 1899, in letter to Smithsonian Wilbur writes Chanute, 1900: I make no secret of my plans [because] I believe no financial profit will accrue to the inventor of the first flying machine, and that only those who are willing to give as well as to receive suggestions can hope to link their names with the honor of its discovery. The problem is too great for one man alone and unaided to solve in secret... The apparatus I intend to employ... is very similar to [yours]. Chanute reports on Wrights design to others and it is copied in 1902 before they are famous! (Details Gibbs-Smith 1966) 37