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The airplane as an open source invention

Peter B. Meyer, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics*

*Findings and views are those of the author, not the BLS

Session K10: Innovation without patentsIEHA, UtrechtAug 7, 2009

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Development of the airplane

(heavier than air, with fixed wings)1860s Clubs and journals on “aerial navigation” appear

It’s a niche activity – maybe hopeless, useless, and dangerous

Publications do not refer much to prior work

1894 Survey book by Chanute refers to 190 people/experiments

Increasingly publications refer to prior work.

Many designs were shared openly.

I seek to quantify this activity.

1903 Powered-glider flights by Wright brothers and others

1909 An industry arises

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Chanute’s 1894 overview Progress in Flying Machines refers to or quotes more than

190 personsExperimenter

/ groupPage

s

location (background)

Maxim 33 Britain (US)

Lilienthal 31 Germany

Pénaud 22 France

Mouillard 21 Algeria, Egypt (Fr)

Hargrave 19 Australia (Br)

Moy 19 Britain

Le Bris 17 France

Langley 16 US

Wenham 15 Britain

Phillips 14 Britain

These are counts of pages referring to

the individual.

The people are diverse and international.

They are central to the history of the

invention.

Their findings were mostly public.

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Alphonse

Pénaud

Horatio Phillips

Engineer in France, 1870sShowed importance of tail on model aircraft for stability

Examined shapes for upper and lower surfaces of wings, 1880s and 1890s

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Lawrence Hargrave

Made box kite findings circa 1894Presented and published many papers Did not patent, on principle.

Samuel Langley Professor; Smithsonian Institution Director

Tested lift and drag of planes on “whirling table” with 30-foot arm

1891: Published Experiments in Aerodynamics

Wrote to and visited other experimenters Helps make aviation study legitimate 1896: flew powered model gliders 1903: full size powered gliders

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Founded company making steam engines in Berlin 1860s-80s studied bird wings and experiments 1889: published Birdflight as the Basis of Aviation 1891-6: Flew inspirational hang gliders

Otto Lilienthal

Why? “. . . to soar upward and to glide, free as the bird” -- Otto Lilienthal, 1889

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Motivations of experimenters

Would like to fly Curiosity, interest in the problem Prestige, recognition Belief in making world a better place Make one nation safer Nobody refers to expected profits

“. . . A desire takes possession of man. He longs to soar upward and to glide, free as the bird . . .” -- Otto Lilienthal 1889

“The glory of a great discovery or an invention which is destined to benefit humanity [seemed] dazzling. . . . Enthusiasm seized [us] at an early age.”

- Gustav Lilienthal

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Octave Chanute

Railroad / civil engineer, then writerHis 1894 book Progress in Flying Machines,

surveyed experiments, devices, theories Adopted “Pratt truss” 1896.Chanute preferred findings to be shared so as to speed progressWas in contact with many experimenters. Visited with Langley,

Santos-Dumont, Ferber, Huffaker, Herring, Maxim and others.Corresponded with Hargrave, Mouillard, Montgomery, Cabot, Zahm,

Kress, Wenham, Moy, Pilcher, Means, Lilienthals, and others.Letters back and

forth  1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905

W Wright to Chanute 7 28 29 22 24 24

Chanute to W Wright 5 30 34 25 29 37 and continuing to 1910

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Selected letters and contacts of Otto and Gustav Lilienthal (Schwipps, 1993)

are with a similar cast of characters

Person Letters

Means 12

Chanute 11

Dienstbach 5

Langley Met with, 1895

Pilcher Met with, 1895

Correspondence of Lilenthals

Last name Pages

Chanute 49

Means 35

Herring 29

Langley 24

G Lilienthal 16

Wood 15

Muellenhoff 11

Dienstbach 10

Cabot 9

Maxim 8

Corresponding with Referring to

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References in histories of aviation Counted references to persons or institutions in

the 11 books below, combined:

Crouch’s A Dream of Wings (1981/2002)Dale’s Early Flying Machines (1992)Garber’s Wright Brothers and the Birth of Aviation (2005)Gibbs-Smith’s The Invention of the Aeroplane. (1966)Hallion’s Taking Flight (2003)Hoffman.Wings of Madness (2003 biog of Santos-Dumont)Jakab’s Visions of a Flying Machine (1990)Penrose’s An Ancient Air (biography of John Stringfellow)Randolph’s Before the Wrights flew: the story of Gustave Whitehead. (1966)Runge and Lukasch Erfinder Leben (2005) (biography of Lilienthal brothers)Shulman’s Unlocking the Sky (bio of Glenn Curtiss)

Preliminary; almost all this is in English. Now up to 2000 persons referenced.Again the same names appear.

Last name Pages

Wright 443

Chanute 303

Langley 240

Curtiss 198

Lilienthal 177

Stringfellow 117

Cayley 103

Blériot 98

Herring 97

patents 81

Smithsonian Institution 75

Henson 66

Bell 65

Manly 60

Zahm 56

Maxim 49

Ader 47

Voisin 45

Brearey 44

Means 44

Wenham 44

Penaud 43

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Page references to institutions  Page references

distinct instances

club, society, or association 219 37

periodicals, newspapers, magazines, journals 131 39

patents 81  

company 75 35

prize, trophy, award, contest, medal, meet, or exhibition

67 18

book (fact or fiction) 47 21

university or school 46 19

lab, museum, institute, observatory, zoo, or fund 46 16

military institution 45 7

conference 14 2

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Hundreds of fixed-wing flying machine patents were filed before 1907. [Data for Germany and U.S.: Simine Short and Otto-Lilienthal Museum]

Patents

To my knowledge no patents were licensed until the Wrights 1903/06 patent.

Chanute, the Wrights, and aviation historians do not treat the patents and most of patent-filers as relevant to the main inventions.

Claim: Intellectual property ownership was mostly irrelevant.

Inference: the technology was too uncertain and immature for it to matter.The patent system exists in parallel to the network, but does not have traction.

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Wright brothers as open-sourcers 1900-1902

Wilbur and Orville Wright ran a bicycle shop.

They read up on gliders and try flight experiments. Motivations:

“I am an enthusiast . . . I wish to . . . add my mite to help on the future worker who will attain final success." -- Wilbur Wright, 1899

"At the beginning we had no thought of recovering what we were expending, which was not great . . ." -- Orville Wright, 1953

They published articles They spoke at conferences Chanute, others visited and stayed in contact

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Wilbur Wright, May 1900

First letter to Chanute: “Assuming then that Lilienthal was correct . . . ” “. . . my object is to learn to what extent similar plans have been tested and found to

be failures, and also to obtain such suggestions as your great knowledge and experience might enable you to give me. I make no secret of my plans [because] I believe no financial profit will accrue to the inventor of the first flying machine, and that only those who are willing to give as well as to receive suggestions can hope to link their names with the honor of its discovery. The problem is too great for one man alone and unaided to solve in secret.”

“I intend to employ [an apparatus] similar to the "double-deck" machine with which the experiments of yourself and Mr. Herring were conducted in 1896-7.”

Most cited in index of Published Writings of the Wright Brothers (Jakab & Young, 2000)

Person pages

Lilienthal 34

Langley 29

Chanute 24

Chanute’s reply: “I believe like yourself that no financial profit is to be expected from such investigations

for a long while to come.”

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Wright methods and inventions

Wind tunnel with smooth air flow Tested many wings systematically

Propeller invention: shaped like wings, with lift going forward This produces ~40% more pulling power . This design idea lasts to the present.

They are skilled, precision-minded toolsmiths, in a workshop every day.

They flew craft repeatedly as kites and gliders. No landing gear, no engine. Their piloting design had to be learned, like on bicycle

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Wrights withdraw some from open source network

Late 1902: they become more secretive, apparently because of wing design success

1903: They filed for a patent on their control mechanism for the wings.Late 1903: Powered glider flight.

They held their patent rights tightly and enforce them.

It has been suggested that this delayed overall growth by US producers.

Wrights’ first powered, controlled fixed-wing flight

Dec, 1903

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Count of firms which start making airplanes or related products

(Main source: Gunston, 1993)

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45UkraineSwitzerlandSwedenRussiaNetherlandsMexicoItalyDenmarkCzechoslovakiaCanadaAustria-HungaryUSGermanyFranceUK

• Most of these make airplanes. Can include others -- engine and propeller makers, pilot schools, exhibition companies -- given time.

• None of founding manufacturers were aero navigation experts of the 1800s!

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Parallels to open source software and user innovation

Autonomous innovators (not hierarchy, not cult) . . . with various goals

Want to fly! Hope for recognition, prestige, fame, maybe fortune Curious, interested in the problem Bring peace, or make own nation safer

. . . who share technical info with international public Intellectual property set aside

Authors, evangelists, organizers have valuable role

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More possible parallels Phase 1: Tinkerers worked in small groups (1800-1894)

Internal motivation. Not industrial motive. Experimenters not like economic models of employees, managers,

investors, consumers, social planners need model of “tinkerers” Phase 2: Tinkerers networked more (1894 to 1909)

High interaction -- correspondence, sharing networking, visits. Many open/shared designs. Measurement: who’s involved? What’s written? To whom do

inventors refer? To whom do historians refer? Who patented, how much, and were they cited?

Do these innovators evangelize, publish, and correspond? Do they specialize, modularize, and standardize the technology?

Phase 3: Commercialization (1909 and on) The open-type innovators are not the ones who industrialize it. Measurement of industry.

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An explicit reference to the person’s name or quote from the person• In a relevant book (11 so far; at least 15 to go)• Text in main content, preface, forward, introduction, appendices, pictures, tables, and figures• Table of Contents and indexes don’t count• References to something named for the person count. (Should they?)• Events after 1909 shouldn’t count (not done yet)• Only events related to aircraft work should count (not done yet)

• On this view, biographies “over-refer” to the subject person• sometimes they leave the subject person out of the index (!)

• Groups (brothers Wright, Lilienthal, Montgolfier , Tissandier, Voisin; likewise institutions or groups are referred to as groups and other times as individuals)

Counts are preliminary and can never be perfect

What’s counted as a reference