Well, it's not much of a surprise at this point, but Eastman Kodak Co, the 131-year-old film company, officially filed for bankruptcy today.
The Wall Street Journal gives you the business side of things—the company managed to snag a credit line from Citigroup and will still pay employees while trying to sell off its digital patents—but CNN has a more interesting, personal account of what went wrong in "The Kodak Lie". Here's a clip, but the whole thing is worth a read.
"The demise of Kodak isn't merely the classic disruption story that everyone loves to tut tut over. Nor is the company's downfall merely a result of recent bad decisions or the mismanagement of senior executives. It is the more nuanced story of how easy it can be to get things wrong, even when trying with the best of intentions to do everything right. It's a cautionary tale of the need for deeper understanding of what innovation really means, and how it is infinitely more vital than most people think it is, even as it isn't about any single product or widget or technology."
And before you pledge allegiance to your DSLR forever, please do take a moment to peruse these colorful vintage Kodak ads from 1964-1969.
