<p>Many technologies begin life as someone's vision of an ambitious, perhaps audacious, technology that is expected to have a revolutionary impact on consumers-whether families, companies, or societies. However, if this highly touted technology fails "prematurely" at some point in its life history, it becomes a spectacular flop. Employing a behavioral perspective, this book presents a sample of twelve spectacular flops encompassing the past three centuries-ranging from the world's first automobile to the nuclear-powered bomber. Because technologies may fail from many different causes, spectacular flops pose a special challenge to the author's long-term project of furnishing generalizations about technological change. Instead of constructing generalizations that apply to all spectacular flops, this book provides limited generalizations that pertain to particular groups of technologies bounded by parameters such as "long-term development projects" and "one-off projects." The reader need have no prior familiarity with the technologies because basic principles are introduced as needed.</p>

Spectacular Flops: Game-Changing Technologies That Failed

Science & Math

Michael Brian Schiffer

History & Philosophy

Eliot Werner Publishing

<p>Chiefs are political operatives who hold titles of leadership over groups larger than intimate kin\-based communities. Although they rule with the consent of their group, they are all about building personal power and respect. Many scholars have viewed chiefs as problem solvers\-\-defending groups against aggressors, resolving disputes, providing support under hardship, organizing labor for community projects, and redistributing goods among those in need. Chiefs do these things, but much of what chiefs do is accumulate benefits for themselves, staying in power and legitimizing control.\nAnthropological archaeology is well suited to pursue the study of chiefs, their leadership institutions (chiefdoms), and long\-term historical processes. The author argues that studying chiefdoms is essential to understanding the role of elemental powers in social evolution. As an illustration, he studies chiefs and their power strategies in historically independent prehistoric and traditional societies and discusses how they continue to exist as powerful actors within modern states.</p>

A Primer on Chiefs and Chiefdoms (Principles of Archaeology)

Business & Money

Timothy Earle

Economics

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Books by Eliot Werner Publishing