Where Good Ideas Come from: The Seven Patterns of Innovation

Where do good ideas come from? And what do we need to know and do to have more of them? In "Where Good Ideas Come From", Steven Johnson, one of our most innovative popular thinkers, explores the secrets of inspiration. He identifies the seven key principles to the genesis of great ideas, from the cultivation of hunches to the importance of connectivity and how best to make use of new technologies. Most exhilarating is his conclusion: with today's tools and environment, radical innovation is extraordinarily accessible to those who know how to cultivate it. By recognizing where and how patterns of creativity occur - whether within a school, a software platform or a social movement - he shows how we can make more of our ideas good ones.

Steven Johnson is the author of the US bestsellers The Invention of Air, The Ghost Map, Everything Bad Is Good For You, and Mind Wide Open, as well as Emergence and Interface Culture. He is the founder of a variety of influential websites - currently, outside.in - and is a contributing editor to Wired.