"When the printing press was invented 93% of the population was illiterate."
Assuming Seth Godin meant Gutenberg: Printing press was invented at the time when demand for books was raising and old methods were not sufficient anymore. Gutenberg was in printing business at the time of his invention.
Also, Gutenberg was financially unsuccessful.
"The first guy to own a fax machine, what did he do with it?"
Just a guess: He probably brought multiple of them and used them to fax documents within his own company. That would be useful and I can see market for that.
They were trying to create functional fax machine for years before succeeding, so there must have been something apparently useful about it.
Assuming Seth Godin meant Gutenberg: Printing press was invented at the time when demand for books was raising and old methods were not sufficient anymore. Gutenberg was in printing business at the time of his invention.
Also, Gutenberg was financially unsuccessful.
"The first guy to own a fax machine, what did he do with it?"
Just a guess: He probably brought multiple of them and used them to fax documents within his own company. That would be useful and I can see market for that.
They were trying to create functional fax machine for years before succeeding, so there must have been something apparently useful about it.