I know of over 3,000 ways [that] a light bulb does not work.

I never once failed at making a light bulb. I just found out 99 ways not to make one.

Of the 200 light bulbs that didn't work, every failure told me something that I was able to incorporate into the next attempt.

I never once made a discovery ... I speak without exaggeration that I have constructed three thousand different theories in connection with the electric light ... Yet in only two cases did my experiments prove the truth of my theory.