Lateral thinking with withered technology
In Range, Epstein recounts how Gunpei Yokoi (of Nintendo fame) approached innovation:
Yokoi embarked on an approach he called “Lateral thinking is range in action with withered technology.” Lateral thinking is a term coined in the 1960s for the reimagining of information in new contexts, including the drawing together of seemingly disparate concepts or domains that can give old ideas new uses. By “withered technology,” Yokoi meant tech that was old enough to be extremely well understood and easily available, so it didn’t require a specialist’s knowledge. The heart of his philosophy was putting cheap, simple technology to use in ways no one else considered. If he could not think more deeply about new technologies, he decided, he would think more broadly about old ones.
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