A fairly quick read with a few core theses -- that Edison was just the tip of the iceberg of research done to invent electric light (with a role inflated by his status and perhaps Americans' desire to claim the invention as their own), that commercialization of the idea was more critical than the invention itself, and that it led to many other inventions or adaptations that changed life considerably. But it didn't feel like any of these points was developed as richly as it could have been, and it often felt like I was reading sort of random lists of what happened and how.

Some fun facts:
- Edison didn't actually invent the light bulb, but he invented the first design that would be stable and scalable enough to be widely adopted
- In 1885 some Yale students chopped down the first electric light pole on campus because they believed it ruined their privacy when going on dates in public
- Mass advertising and electric lighting came of age at the same time, leading to a massive number of gaudy lighted signs advertising stores or shows (and then a backlash against their ugliness)