More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
Read between
August 16 - October 7, 2021
But I know what’s behind that look: a rapid-fire evaluation of pros and cons, a high-speed cost-benefit analysis, a near-instantaneous predictive model about possible risks and scalability.
Lol
He’s analytical, rational, and doesn’t waste time with niceties. I don’t, either. Our voices are raised, but we’re not angry. It’s an argument, but it’s a productive one.
Each of us knows that the other is going to offer stiff, uncompromising resistance.
But I still find Reed’s mind fascinating and his demeanor refreshing.
Wow uy brotherly love
that my habit of constantly changing lanes is, in the end, counterproductive and inefficient.
epiphany
A moment of sudden great revelation
idea came to Reed after he’d rung up a $40 late fee on Apollo 13 at Blockbuster. He thought, What if there were no late fees? And BOOM! The idea for Netflix was born.
We like these tales because they align with a romantic idea about inspiration and genius.
The truth is that for every good idea, there are a thousand bad ones. And sometimes it can be hard to tell the difference.
unwittingly
Not aware of full facts
The best ideas rarely come on a mountaintop in a flash of lightning. They don’t even come to you on the side of a mountain, when you’re stuck in traffic behind a sand truck. They make themselves apparent more slowly, gradually, over weeks and months. And in fact, when you finally have one, you might not realize it for a long time.
“If you really want to change the world,” he said, “you don’t need millions of dollars. You need billions.”
What I needed was the feeling of being deeply engaged with a project. What I needed was purpose.
Along with a sharp eye for detail, she had a real genius for scheduling, and a ruthless ability to get things done on deadline – even if she had to kill someone to make it happen.
sharp, detail-oriented, and no-nonsense.
“Sure. But you want something that will scale,” he said. “You want to sell something where the effort it takes to sell a dozen is identical to the effort it takes to sell just one. And while you’re at it, try and find something that’s more than just a onetime sale, so that once you’ve found a customer, you’ll be able to sell to them over and over again.”
I loved her then for the same reasons that I love her now: her keen mind, her down-to-earth common sense.
reins
Ghe power to direct and control
but it was worth it because most people didn’t want to own a movie.
The truth is, I like headaches. I like a problem in front of me every day, something to chew on. Something to solve.
scone.”
Lightly sweetened cake
(One of the ideas they tested? Shampoo by mail. What can I say, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.)
HHaaah cute
You had to sell them on your idea.
We’d need an angel investor. Luckily, both of us knew one: Reed.
allow him to remain a part of the startup culture that he loved so much. Starting and running small companies had given his life order, meaning, and joy, and I think he may have been scared of losing that as he transitioned into the education field.
My risk was my time. His was his money.
Buy whiteboard markers. (I really like whiteboard markers).
Haha
we create new shares and sell him those.
I thought that putting significant amounts of my own money into the project would limit my capacity for other types of risk-taking. If I stood to lose a million dollars – and not just my job – I’m not sure I ever would have been able to take some of the imaginative leaps that were so crucial in the early going.
needed to come up with something approaching a business plan. Notice that I used the word “approaching.” I never intended to get there. Most business plans – with their exhaustive go-to-market strategies, detailed projections of revenue and expenses, and optimistic forecasts of market share – are a complete waste of time. They become obsolete the minute the business starts and you realize how wildly off the mark you were with all your expectations.
The truth is that no business plan survives a collision with a real customer. So the trick is to take your idea and set it on a collision course with reality as soon as possible.
By the mid-nineties, things had changed. Jeff Bezos’s success at Amazon had shown us that it wasn’t just more powerful hardware or more innovative software that would lead to future progress – it was the internet itself. You could leverage it to sell things. It was the future.
exuberant
Full of energy excitement
I’d realized by then that telling people about my idea was a good thing. The more people I told my idea to, the more I received good feedback, and the more I learned about previous failed efforts. Telling people helped me refine the idea – and it usually made people want to join the party.
festooned
A chain or garland of flowers
wandered from booth to booth, essentially trying to figure out how the video store business worked. Who were the major players? Who made money? And how? My strategy was to play the rube
He paid attention to what they liked, what they asked for, and what they wanted.
giving them not only what they thought they wanted, but what they didn’t even know they wanted.
was this deep internal database of movie knowledge and human insight that enabled him to predict exactly the right movie for a person’s mood, interests, and tastes.
sommelier.
A wine waiter
guileless,
Devoid of guile. Innocent and without deception
Buck’s is one of the temples of Silicon Valley. So many companies have been birthed there – conceived, funded, or otherwise organized
And in Buck’s, one of these ridiculous contraptions – it had lost at Sand Hill but had once held the downhill motorless speed record – was hanging from the ceiling over you as you ate, a constant reminder that anything was possible with enough effort, enough ingenuity, and enough money.
confound
Cause surprise or confusion especially wHen unexpected
Entrepreneurship is risky, and you want to ensure that the only skin you have in the game is…well, your actual skin. You’ll be dedicating your life to your idea. Let others dedicate the contents of their wallets.
flack
Publicize or.promote
Convincing someone to part with their money tends to separate those who are blindly supportive (“I love that idea!”) from those who are supporting you with their eyes wide open. I often counsel young entrepreneurs to start by asking people what they think, but then immediately follow up the inevitable “I love it” reply with the ask: “Can I count on you to invest a few thousand dollars?”
Makes sense. Separate the blind supporters
adjudicated
Pronounce or declarejudicially
What are you asking for, and what are you promising in return?
asking. I learned to keep it short. To make eye contact. To slump,
