You must be attentive to new discoveries while on the path to solutions even if they might be a deviation from said path. Top story here
An Australian scientist named John O'Sullivan was trying to detect exploding mini-black holes, each the size of an atomic particle.
he failed.
But the math he built to find them a way to pick out tiny, blurry signals buried in noise from across the universe turned out to be exactly what you need to send wireless data through a room full of walls and furniture.
The problem of finding a black hole and the problem of connecting your laptop to the internet are apparently the same problem.
He patented it in 1992. Then again, in the US in 1996.
Apple, Microsoft, Intel, AT&T, and basically every tech company on earth fought the patent for years. they lost. every single one.
CSIRO, an Australian government science agency, collected over $1 billion in royalties from Silicon Valley.
an Australian government lab. accidentally. while looking at space.
beat every major tech company in the world to the invention that runs the internet.
The WiFi you're using right now exists because someone pointed a radio telescope at a black hole that wasn't there.