This article was taken from the May 2015 issue of WIRED magazine. Be the first to read WIRED's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
We're living, it has often been said, in a Gutenberg moment -- a time of rapid transformation unleashed by technological genius. But this statement is false on both counts. First, it took not one moment, but 50 years for Johannes Gutenberg's printing press to change the late medieval world. And just as importantly, Gutenberg -- the patron saint of Silicon Valley -- wasn't alone: he had two essential partners whose role in producing the Gutenberg Bible has never been sufficiently recognised.
For centuries we've clung to the romantic view of Gutenberg the lone genius, but a closer read of history reveals him as one in a long line of innovators who relied on collaborative teamwork. I call the German workshop where printing was invented the world's first tech startup for a reason: like the computer-age collaborations described by Walter Isaacson in The Innovators, this medieval technology firm is a testament to the importance of building a strong team.
In the first decades following their invention, the men were known as the Holy Trinity of printing: Gutenberg, the visionary entrepreneur; Johann Fust, the merchant who acted as his venture capitalist; and Peter Schöffer, the scribe and technician who executed his idea. Scholars accept that without Fust's capital and Schöffer's skill, Gutenberg's effort to complete and monetise his invention could not have succeeded. There are lessons for today's startups in the long, wearying process of turning printing with movable type into a flourishing concern.
Certainly, the inventor himself had two qualities essential to any entrepreneur: imagination and bloody-mindedness. Like Steve Jobs, Gutenberg was able to imagine a product consumers needed before they were aware of that need; the Bible was a great product that sold out on pre-orders. But it took a tough, almost messianic determination to survive the years of trial and error required to pull off the vision. Key to it all was a tight and loyal team that could keep out industrial spies and stay on the right side of regulatory authorities such as the guilds and the Catholic Church. Team buy-in, then as now, was achieved with a large piece of the pie for Gutenberg's VC, along with stock options for the rest: a copy of the finished Bible.
Yet for all that Gutenberg got right, he got one major thing wrong. He lost the trust of his principal financial backer. It is a little-known fact that this historic partnership imploded as soon as the product shipped. For centuries, Fust has been cast as the evil capitalist who drove a genius into bankruptcy. But he had reason to distrust the founder he had funded. Both parties, it seems, agreed to end the partnership when the Bible was completed, but Gutenberg baulked when Fust demanded full repayment of his initial loan. To settle the dispute, Fust sued. The court ordered each to provide proof, but for reasons known only to himself, Gutenberg elected not to pay, surrendering instead the printing equipment he had pledged as collateral.
What led to this mistrust? There is evidence that Gutenberg's "burn rate" was too high, that costs ran out of hand -- even that he'd spent Fust's money on unrelated projects. Fust and Schöffer continued without him, establishing the world's first major publishing house and racking up the spoils. Gutenberg kept on inventing and printing, finally retiring as an honoured member of the archbishop's court. He won the fame, but lost out on the wealth.
The moral of this story: limit the burn rate, keep the books clean and take care what term sheets you sign -- or someone else may capitalise on your brilliance.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
