We Were Burning: Japanese Entrepreneurs And The Electronic Revolution

By Bob Johnstone

Book Overview

Are the Japanese faceless clones who march in lockstep to the drums beaten by big business and the bureaucrats of MITI, Japan's miracle-working ministry of international trade and industry? Can... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0465091172
• ISBN13: 9780465091171
• Release Date: November 1998
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 448 Pages
• Weight: 1.74 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.8" x 1.3" x 6.5"

Customer Reviews

A great book

Bookstores in the US are buldging with entertaining and informative "insider" books on Apple Computer, Microsoft, IBM, Xerox PARC etc. and a similar English-language writeup on Japanese companies such as Sharp, Sony, and Seiko is long overdue. Fortunately the Japanese stories and characters are every bit as entertaining and there are the bureaucratic villains as well. As a bonus, nice background information on the growth of the worldwide semiconductor industry is weaved into the narration. "Japan INC" seems a lot less monolithic after reading this book. The author is married to a Japanese national and apparently devoted much of his adult life to researching this story.

Amazinging researched. Extremely well written!

"We Were Burning" is an amazing book for those interested in the history behind today's technology. It is extremely well researched with many details previously unknown (or only hinted about) until now. Johnstone weaves this information into a well-written format that reminds one of a good novel. Also, the book is divided into logical chapters which allows those of us with particular technology interests to focus on the sections of most importance. (I have re-read "Doctor Rocket Goes to Disneyland" at least three times by itself.) Also, the extreme importance of this book is that it offers a comprehensive history of Japanese electronic developments for the English-language speaker. Too often we hear the of the successes of the North American and European industries, but the important Japanese contributions and accomplishments are rarely detailed. Well, no more! Buy this book! You will be glad you did!

Buy this book!

An excellent look at several decades worth of innovation. One bonus is the fascinating portrayal of leading edge developments at major US labs who then fumbled the transfer to products. I can't say enough about how well-written it is and how unique the historical perspective is. Superb!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

I found this book totally fascinating. Johnstone's journalistic background serves him well --- he's a great writer, and this is a fun read. Far more important than that, however, is that the book turns on its head the notion that Japan's post-war high-technology industries were built or directed by faceless government bureaucrats. Johnstone demonstrates (I think extremely compellingly) that passionate, stubborn, visionary, engineers and scientists drove much of Japan's post-war success in technology. This book is their story. I loved it.

Superb description about the reality of Japanese engineers

This is one of the best books in the topics of research and development in microelectronics. I was so fascinated by the actual human stories of how unknown researchers and engineers were heavily involved in the process of great innovations through each carrier. In particular, as myself a research engineer, I came across one great common truth throughout the reading : g The great motivations for work are not inspired by financial richness but by individual curiosities leading to a far-sighted vision.h . Probably It may be a quite common sense among researchers and engineers. This book also brought about the fair-minded and objective look for research and development implemented by particularly USA and Japan. This vivid and unique approach could get one out from the stereo-type of idea about the general policies and individual attitudes of science and engineering at both countries. For example, the myth of MITI is not actually representing the great success of Japanese microelectronics industry. Japan could not have developed such highly creative products without having such highly-motivated personalities. However, one thing which I wonder is the difference between English original version and the Japanese one. Compared to two books, the Japanese version did not duplicate the exact same content of English version. Individual photos and some descriptions for example about the dispute between MITI and professor Nishizawa were carefully eliminated from the original English version without any excuse from the translator. I am quite curious to be aware whether the translator got a sort of permission to do so from Mr. Bob Johnstone, who is an author of this book. Otherwise, this book is highly recommended to everybody who wishes to understand the actual story behind the remarkable development of IC chip.