I actually disagree with most of the comments here, and agree with the article. I recently had the same realisation that the article author did: that much more innovation seemed to have happened in the years 1870-2010 than the years 1972-2012. http://blog.i.saac.me/post/based-on-the-exhaustion-of-opport...

I also degree with the people saying that the current legal system is the problem; in fact I don't think there's any way to speed up innovation at all. I think we're started to reach the limit of wealth-generating opportunities. The train, the telegraph, electricity, cars, factories -- these revolutionised people's lives. I think we're now getting close to peak "innovation" -- it's getting harder and harder to find new ways to seriously improve people's lives. Smartphones and the internet have changed people's lives, too, but they're only major changes of the last few decades.

Now, a fair response might be -- we still don't have a cure for cancer! We still haven't colonised space! We still haven't built an AI! Nanorobots! 3D printing! And people are working on all those problems. And technologically, yes, they're much more complex and advanced than anything built in the industrial revolution.

But look at it from an economic point of view -- and I'm talking about the foundation of economics. Economics is based on value; human value. Stuff people want, as pg said.

I want a box on my desk that can print useful objects, but probably not as much as my great-great-grandfather wanted to be able to heat his home without having to burn things. We want a cure for cancer, but not as much as past generations wanted a cure for cholera, typhoid or the bubonic plague.

That's why processers keep getting faster but economic growth keeps slowing. Technology advances exponentially, but human wealth grows logistically. The natural limit is the limit of human happiness. Example: World economic growth is mostly driven by developing countries playing catch up to the West's living standards. Heck, even Adam Smith himself said that economic growth would only last a few centuries.

I guess each new iPhone app or Facebook game does make people marginally happier, the entertainment value does have economic value. But again, this is scraping the barrel of value creation. Are there still ways to majorly improve people's lives out there? Possibly, we're definitely not in utopia yet, but I think we'll need a new definition of wealth to get there.

I should really write up the above ideas into a proper blog post soon. Would be interested to hear people's opinions first.