A 1938 subway ride led to the invention of the video game console

Six years after Odyssey I bought a 'pong' game that was the size of maybe the size of two packs of cigarettes with two sets of paddles.

I was living in a singles apartment complex and one very pleasant side effect was that within days of getting the game I had every young woman in the building coming over to play it with me. Quite possibly the greatest investment I ever made ;<).

3 days earlier was this article on him

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/ralph-...

I see a pattern here with creative engineers:

1) Creative engineer comes up with an off-the-wall idea, it keeps bugging him, he makes a demo using spare resources

2) Shows demo to managers and superiors, they scoff and tell him to stop wasting his time

3) A couple of people he demoes it to, "get it"

4) Suddenly, thing catches on like wildfire

One thing he did differently is document and patent everything.