Companies commissioning stories has gone on for a long time.
For example, the Isaac Asimov story "My Son, The Physicist" was commissioned by an electronics company to run in an ad in "Scientific American".
Another Asimov example. "Think", IBM's in-house magazine, commissioned Asimov to write a story based on this quote from J. B. Priestly:
> Between midnight and dawn, when sleep will not come and all the old wounds begin to ache, I often have a nightmare vision of a future world in which there are billions of people, all numbered and registered, with not a gleam of genius anywhere, not an original mind, a rich personality, on the whole packed globe
Asimov write the story "2430 A.D." about a world where Priestly's nightmare had come true. (The title comes from his estimate of when human population at its current growth rate would reach the point where the Earth had so many people that there were no resources left for non-human animals).
The funny thing about this story is that "Think" rejected it, because they wanted a story that refuted the quotation. So Asimov wrote another story, "The Greatest Asset", that refuted Priestly, and sent that to "Think".
"Think" then decided they liked the first story better and ran "2430 A.D."!
I'm pretty sure that there was at least one other similar case with Asimov.
I always remember my Grandfather suggesting that Michael Crichton (sp?) wrote a bunch of stuff to order by the government. I was never entirely sure I believed him, but then never entirely dismissed it (as evidenced by this comment).
I had "My Son, The Physicist" in my 9th grade. The mom comes and suggests the son about "continuous conversation" with some astronaut's stuck on Jupiter's moon - Ganymede (if I am not wrong and remember correctly)
Thanks for the link, buddy. This was the chapter we had. From beginning to end, very much the same. Even the title of the chapter was, "My son, the Physicist" (I remember, in my 9th grade, I was unsure how to pronounce "Physicist", and had asked my friend about it :D )
For example, the Isaac Asimov story "My Son, The Physicist" was commissioned by an electronics company to run in an ad in "Scientific American".
Another Asimov example. "Think", IBM's in-house magazine, commissioned Asimov to write a story based on this quote from J. B. Priestly:
> Between midnight and dawn, when sleep will not come and all the old wounds begin to ache, I often have a nightmare vision of a future world in which there are billions of people, all numbered and registered, with not a gleam of genius anywhere, not an original mind, a rich personality, on the whole packed globe
Asimov write the story "2430 A.D." about a world where Priestly's nightmare had come true. (The title comes from his estimate of when human population at its current growth rate would reach the point where the Earth had so many people that there were no resources left for non-human animals).
The funny thing about this story is that "Think" rejected it, because they wanted a story that refuted the quotation. So Asimov wrote another story, "The Greatest Asset", that refuted Priestly, and sent that to "Think".
"Think" then decided they liked the first story better and ran "2430 A.D."!
I'm pretty sure that there was at least one other similar case with Asimov.