The Creative Programmer

3 Communication

This chapter covers

• Cameratas, symmathesies, and what makes them tick
• Liquid networks and genius clusters
• The technology adoption curve
• Social debt and community smells

Mysterious voices echo from a colonnade just outside of Athen’s city wall. The Peripatetics—scholars and disciples interested in Aristotle’s teachings—are gathered in a series of open buildings called the Lyceum. The predominant voice that bounces off the peripatoi, or walkways, belongs to Aristotle himself, who is giving a lecture on how the squid reproduces. Among the regular listeners are Demetrius of Phalerum, one of the first Peripatetics; Alexander the Great, who would later build one of the largest empires in history; and Theophrastus, who initially studied ...