Kodak Invented the Digital Camera And Then Hid It in a Drawer
The Downfall Files
124 views
Why Kodak failed is the most famous cautionary tale in business, and almost everyone tells it wrong. Kodak didn't miss digital photography. A Kodak engineer INVENTED it, in a Kodak lab, in 1975 — and the company that owned the future decided not to have one. This animated business documentary performs the autopsy.
George Eastman's idea in 1888 was simple enough to put on a poster: you press the button, we do the rest. He sold the camera cheap and the film forever — razors and blades, decades before anyone called it that — and built a company that owned roughly nine out of every ten rolls of film sold in America. Then a 24-year-old engineer named Steve Sasson wired a lens to a cassette recorder and produced the first digital camera: 0.01 megapixels, 23 seconds per photo, an image on a television screen. Management's reaction wasn't laughter — it was a question that sounds reasonable and is fatal: why would anyone want to look at photographs on a TV? The prototype went in a drawer. Kodak went on to patent much of digital imaging, sell digital cameras, even lead the US market — while every sale cannibalised the film business that paid for everything. You cannot vote to shrink yourself. Fujifilm, facing the identical extinction, diversified into chemicals, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals and is alive today. Kodak filed for bankruptcy in January 2012.
THE CORONER examines a patient that predicted its own cause of death and filed the prediction. If you're over 40, you remember waiting a week to find out whether the photo came out. This is who took that week away.
⏱ CHAPTERS
0:00 — Cold Open: The Prototype in the Drawer
0:33 — Act 1: The Blades (You Press the Button)
1:56 — Act 2: The Drawer (1975)
3:58 — Act 3: The Arithmetic (You Can't Vote to Shrink)
6:54 — Act 4: The Autopsy
7:52 — Outro & Next Week's Patient
🪦 BRAND AUTOPSY is a documentary series performing post-mortems on the giant brands that ruled the 20th century — and the exact decisions that killed them. New autopsies weekly.
▶ Previous episode: JCPenney tried honesty. It cost $4 billion — JCPenney Tried Honesty. It Cost $4 Billion...
▶ Next episode: RadioShack built the PC era, then forgot why it existed.
▶ Subscribe so you don't miss an autopsy: @thedownfallfiles01
▶ Full series playlist: Why Sears Failed: The 40-Year Suicide of A...
#kodak #whykodakfailed #kodakmoment #digitalcamera #stevesasson #fujifilm #businessdocumentary #brandautopsy #businessbreakdown #animatedhistory
Kodak Invented the Digital Camera And Then Hid It in a Drawer
The Downfall Files
124 views
Why Kodak failed is the most famous cautionary tale in business, and almost everyone tells it wrong. Kodak didn't miss digital photography. A Kodak engineer INVENTED it, in a Kodak lab, in 1975 — and the company that owned the future decided not to have one. This animated business documentary performs the autopsy.
George Eastman's idea in 1888 was simple enough to put on a poster: you press the button, we do the rest. He sold the camera cheap and the film forever — razors and blades, decades before anyone called it that — and built a company that owned roughly nine out of every ten rolls of film sold in America. Then a 24-year-old engineer named Steve Sasson wired a lens to a cassette recorder and produced the first digital camera: 0.01 megapixels, 23 seconds per photo, an image on a television screen. Management's reaction wasn't laughter — it was a question that sounds reasonable and is fatal: why would anyone want to look at photographs on a TV? The prototype went in a drawer. Kodak went on to patent much of digital imaging, sell digital cameras, even lead the US market — while every sale cannibalised the film business that paid for everything. You cannot vote to shrink yourself. Fujifilm, facing the identical extinction, diversified into chemicals, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals and is alive today. Kodak filed for bankruptcy in January 2012.
THE CORONER examines a patient that predicted its own cause of death and filed the prediction. If you're over 40, you remember waiting a week to find out whether the photo came out. This is who took that week away.
⏱ CHAPTERS
0:00 — Cold Open: The Prototype in the Drawer
0:33 — Act 1: The Blades (You Press the Button)
1:56 — Act 2: The Drawer (1975)
3:58 — Act 3: The Arithmetic (You Can't Vote to Shrink)
6:54 — Act 4: The Autopsy
7:52 — Outro & Next Week's Patient
🪦 BRAND AUTOPSY is a documentary series performing post-mortems on the giant brands that ruled the 20th century — and the exact decisions that killed them. New autopsies weekly.
▶ Previous episode: JCPenney tried honesty. It cost $4 billion — JCPenney Tried Honesty. It Cost $4 Billion...
▶ Next episode: RadioShack built the PC era, then forgot why it existed.
▶ Subscribe so you don't miss an autopsy: @thedownfallfiles01
▶ Full series playlist: Why Sears Failed: The 40-Year Suicide of A...
#kodak #whykodakfailed #kodakmoment #digitalcamera #stevesasson #fujifilm #businessdocumentary #brandautopsy #businessbreakdown #animatedhistory