> Ideas are so cheap and easy.
I doubt this.
I doubt this.
Consider it was easy to bring an idea in this world, and the hard part was the initial first thought; writing a paper/article painstakingly rigorously would be unnecessary. Writing a book would be a breeze and no author would ever go through more than a single draft. The idea was born beforehand, was complete correct and perfect, so putting everything down with words is just a matter of transcribing. An organization would not usually hire engineers with multiple degrees, but simply writers or an automated system that would listen and transcribe the idea.
An idea is truly born and exists through a lot of effort and iteration and redefinement and refinement.
P.S. There is a hard and subjective issue of where the line is drawn between ideation and minor uninteresting and menial maintainance/get the money in the bank work.
We have to recall however that a parent brings their child to life and tags along through all the effort and work. A child is the result of years of high to low level of unpleasant work. Drawing an arbitrary line of when you shall stop giving as a parent is naive and egotistical.
I also think, I have another definition of 'idea' than most people here. It is common especially in software development, to see the way as the destination and incremental change as development caused by some magical good-ending evolutionary process. This includes a quite unsubstantiated belief in getting the right ideas automagically along the way.
You need both things. A good idea does not descent from heaven. Also, it has history in the person, creating it. This history is hard work in its own, inner fighting against the common and the environment. Jumping out of the box, all these pure implementers are unable to do.
I am working for 25 years in the industry. I have written real code from the beginning. But I am also a mathematician and can say I had a few good ideas along the way. I am proud of it.
If it's greater than zero, let me know. I have notebooks full of them. Business ideas. Project ideas. Political ideas. Social ideas. I generally can't give 'em away, much less sell them. Why? Everybody has their own ideas, and they like 'em better. And the ones in my notebooks don't have what really matters: validation.
To demonstrate: try to imagine a new color you've never seen before that's not in any way associated to any of the colors that you've seen. (it's impossible)
Or think of it this way: You could explain a car to someone who has never seen a car before, but only so long as the ideas used to explain the idea of a car (e.g. wheels, doors, windows), have already been familiarized to the other person. Otherwise if those ideas weren't familiar, such as a wheel, you'd need to also explain what a wheel is. And if the concepts used to explain the wheel wasn't familiar (and so on), you'd eventually hit a point where you must expose the idea(s) directly to their senses (eg show them), otherwise they will never understand what you're talking about.
So all ideas come from the senses, and your minds ability to combine these "pure" ideas that you've sensed. "Pure" ideas are cheap and easy because they're the simplest ideas - they're what you directly sensed. To have good ideas, you need to combine many "pure" ideas together, hence why those who have experience working closely and thoroughly with something, will often have the best ideas associated to that something...