<story><title>The Rise and Fall of 3M&apos;s Floppy Disk (2023)</title><url>https://spectrum.ieee.org/3m-floppy</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>0x0000000</author><text>&amp;gt; If you ask the average person what the company 3M does, odds are if they have a few gray hairs hanging out on their scalp, they might say that the company makes floppy disks.&lt;p&gt;That&amp;#x27;s crazy, I wouldn&amp;#x27;t think anyone would first and foremost associate 3M with floppies instead of adhesives, even those with a few grays like myself.&lt;p&gt;They make &lt;i&gt;post-its&lt;/i&gt; for chrissake, and we&amp;#x27;re gonna pretend they&amp;#x27;re most known for floppies?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jll29</author><text>&amp;gt; They make post-its for chrissake&lt;p&gt;Wikipedia to the rescue:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;3M Company (originally the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company) is an American multinational conglomerate operating in the fields of industry, worker safety, healthcare, and consumer goods. The company produces over 60,000 products under several brands, including adhesives, abrasives, laminates, passive fire protection, personal protective equipment, window films, paint protection films, dental and orthodontic products, electrical and electronic connecting and insulating materials, medical products, car-care products electronic circuits, healthcare software, and optical films. It is based in Maplewood, a suburb of Saint Paul, Minnesota.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Although recently not doing so well due to one lawsuit, they have a wonderful
rule that nudges management to add new products to its portfolio sooner and more aggresively than other companies, so I associate them with innovation.&lt;p&gt;The now-famous &amp;quot;Post-It notes&amp;quot; were such a disruptive new innovation, made from scrap paper that was left over when cutting larger pages: literally rubbish&amp;#x2F;garbage turned into a new revenue stream.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Rise and Fall of 3M&apos;s Floppy Disk (2023)</title><url>https://spectrum.ieee.org/3m-floppy</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>0x0000000</author><text>&amp;gt; If you ask the average person what the company 3M does, odds are if they have a few gray hairs hanging out on their scalp, they might say that the company makes floppy disks.&lt;p&gt;That&amp;#x27;s crazy, I wouldn&amp;#x27;t think anyone would first and foremost associate 3M with floppies instead of adhesives, even those with a few grays like myself.&lt;p&gt;They make &lt;i&gt;post-its&lt;/i&gt; for chrissake, and we&amp;#x27;re gonna pretend they&amp;#x27;re most known for floppies?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>esafak</author><text>I have no idea why they shoehorned 3M into the article. Floppies rose and fell independently of 3M.</text></comment>