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Originally Posted by RichL
Edison was good at picking underlings, a good inventor, better innovator and superb business man.
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Actually Edison missed out on quite a few big movements because he insisted on sticking with his original inventions. AC vs DC. Records vs cylinders. Film projection vs peephole booths. He refused to develop film projection because he was convinced that his Kinetoscope would be more profitable. He could have been a much more successful businessman that he was, but he wouldn't accept other people's ideas.
The Edison museum is really worth a visit, if you are in the right part of the US. (Not sure I'd bother with the house though.)
He was also, it seems, a very unpleasant man, and a ruthless businessman.
Some examples:
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Another of Edison's assistants was Nikola Tesla. Tesla claimed that Edison promised him $50,000 if he succeeded in making improvements to his DC generation plants. Several months later, when Tesla had finished the work and asked to be paid, he said that Edison replied, "When you become a full-fledged American you will appreciate an American joke." Tesla immediately resigned.
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In 1902, agents of Thomas Edison bribed a theater owner in London for a copy of A Trip to the Moon by Georges Méliès. Edison then made hundreds of copies and showed them in New York City. Méliès received no compensation. He was counting on taking the film to the US and recapture its huge cost by showing it throughout the country when he realized it had already been shown there by Edison. This effectively bankrupted Méliès.
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