Author, Investor, Speaker, Mentor
If nature abhors a vacuum, startup people abhor mistakes. Most of us got to where we are via a long chain of good grades and aggressive action, which means our instinctive reaction is to attack mistakes like a hungry piranha. And that itself is a mistake. It feels good to jump into action, to examine … Continue reading Before fixing a mistake, ask yourself if it matters:
Since I started advising Cube26, I’ve been paying a lot more attention to gesture-based controls. The most hyped company in the space has been Leap Motion, which raised over $44 million to bring its 3-D motion control technology to the market. Quite a number of investors to whom I introduced Cube26 begged off, citing the … Continue reading To Succeed In The Market, Be Specific
The always-insightful Mark Suster has another winning post up, “The Perils of Shiny Objects.” http://bit.ly/12qAmXm “In today’s uber-connected, social media, everything-is-public, people tell you there’s killing it with these new features, investor & mentor whiplash – it’s hard to avoid the latest thing. Pinterest is killing it with their new UI. 4 months later every … Continue reading The Real Problem With Shiny Objects
Most busy professionals view the working poor who struggle from paycheck to paycheck with barely veiled contempt. These holier-than-thou Whole Foods shoppers marvel at the poor decisions of the poor, whether in consumption of fast food, using payday loans, or worst of all, buying lottery tickets. What these yuppies don’t realize is that they’re doing … Continue reading What busy professionals and the working poor have in common
Most entrepreneurs focus on expanding the envelope of possibility. They love to tell me about potential applications of their technology and new markets that could use it. Their goal is to expand the envelope of possibility. Expanding the envelope is critical. Startups begin with nothing; only by expanding the envelope of possibility can they succeed. … Continue reading You need to shape the envelope of possibility
Continuing my Sunday afternoon Buffettology, I want to highlight one of Warren Buffett’s key principles, “The Circle of Competence”. http://bit.ly/19LxN7p What Buffett means is that the size of the circle and the area it encloses is less important to success than understanding the clear boundaries of that circle. As long as you know the area … Continue reading Warren Buffett and the Circle of Competence
Focus, focus, focus. Focus is the key to startup success. You have fewer resources than established companies. Your only path to success is to focus those limited resources in a tightly-defined problem space, so that your concentrated effort burns the hapless ant of success. Easier said than done, right? I have a very simple system … Continue reading Do something every day towards your three big priorities
The best coverage I’ve read about Yahoo’s massive acquisition of Tumblr comes from Tumblr co-founder Marco Arment (who went on to create Instapaper): “Intense focus requires neglecting almost everything else. David’s focus on pushing the product forward meant that he didn’t want to think about boring stuff: support, scaling, paperwork, and money. Every time we’d … Continue reading The Lesson of Tumblr: Product Uber Alles
Technology critics like Nicholas Carr often complain that the Internet is hampering our ability to think. Facebook, and even more so Twitter, exemplify this trend. Back during the ancient days of my youth, when dinosaurs roamed the planet, and shortly after fire was invented, I would communicate with my Stanford friends over the summer by … Continue reading Focus and Serendipity: You Need Both
There are only a few things in life that are important. These tropes and archetypes recur and recur. This presents the artist with a dilemma–focus on the important things, and risk seeming derivative, or focus on being original at the risk of spending one’s efforts on the trivial. To me, much of modern art smacks … Continue reading Original or Important?