Year One
A year ago, Dan, Jim, and I wrapped up finals and moved from Philly to a 3-bedroom apartment in the Financial District. We set up shop and got to work. Since then we’ve grown to 14 people, raised $6mm, rebranded, and built a product that’s used and loved at over 600 schools.
It’s just the beginning, though. Here’s to an even better next year.
The definitive photograph of Earth – unlike NASA’s iconic “Blue Marble,” a composite of many different images, this portrait by the European Space Agency consists of a single shot and is the highest-resolution image of our planet, at 121 megapixels, or 0.62 miles per pixel.
Available as a (giant) download here.
The story of Gertrude Stein’s little-known children’s book
Steve Jobs on Recruiting
When you put two great people together, the result is far great than 1+1=2.
Excerpts from the book In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations with the Visionaries of the Digital World, 1997, published in BusinessWeek in 1998.
What talent do you think you consistently brought to Apple and bring to NeXT and Pixar?
I think that I’ve consistently figured out who really smart people were to hang around with. No major work that I have been involved with has been work that can be done by a single person or two people, or even three or four people. Some people can do one thing magnificently, like Michelangelo, and others make things like semiconductors or build 747 airplanes — that type of work requires legions of people. In order to do things well, that can’t be done by one person, you must find extraordinary people.
The key observation is that, in most things in life, the dynamic range between average quality and the best quality is, at most, two-to-one. For example, if you were in New York and compared the best taxi to an average taxi, you might get there 20 percent faster. In terms of computers, the best PC is perhaps 30 percent better than the average PC. There is not that much difference in magnitude. Rarely you find a difference of two-to-one. Pick anything.
But, in the field that I was interested in — originally, hardware design — I noticed that the dynamic range between what an average person could accomplish and what the best person could accomplish was 50 or 100 to 1. Given that, you’re well advised to go after the cream of the cream. That’s what we’ve done. You can then build a team that pursues the A+ players. A small team of A+ players can run circles around a giant team of B and C players. That’s what I’ve tried to do.
So you think your talent is in recruiting?
It’s not just recruiting. After recruiting, it’s building an environment that makes people feel they are surrounded by equally talented people and their work is bigger than they are. The feeling that the work will have tremendous influence and is part of a strong, clear vision — all those things. Recruiting usually requires more than you alone can do, so I’ve found that collaborative recruiting and having a culture that recruits the A players is the best way. Any interviewee will speak with at least a dozen people in several areas of this company, not just those in the area that he would work in. That way a lot of your A employees get broad exposure to the company, and — by having a company culture that supports them if they feel strongly enough — the current employees can veto a candidate.That seems very time-consuming.
Yes, it is. We’ve interviewed people where nine out of ten employees thought the candidate was terrific, one employee really had a problem with the candidate, and therefore we didn’t hire him. The process is very hard, very time-consuming, and can lead to real problems if not managed right. But it’s a very good way, all in all.Yet, in a typical startup, a manager may not always have the time to spend recruiting other people.
I disagree totally. I think it’s the most important job. Assume you’re by yourself in a startup and you want a partner. You’d take a lot of time finding the partner, right? He would be half of your company. Why should you take any less time finding a third of your company or a fourth of your company or a fifth of your company? When you’re in a startup, the first ten people will determine whether the company succeeds or not. Each is 10 percent of the company. So why wouldn’t you take as much time as necessary to find all the A players? If three were not so great, why would you want a company where 30 percent of your people are not so great? A small company depends on great people much more than a big company does.
Harry Benson’s luminous black-and-white photos of the Beatles, 1964-1966, many never before seen
Thoughts on Entrepreneurship Education
I got an email in November from a student at Penn looking for some perspective on making entrepreneurship more of a priority at Wharton undergrad. I was a sophomore there last year, and I’ve since left to build Lore. I sent him some thoughts, and looking back I think they’re worth sharing. Edited for polish and anonymity.
Hey Joe,
I’m a sophomore in Wharton. I’m reaching out to you asking for some help with an initiative I’m working on. We’re currently trying to explore entrepreneurship at the undergraduate level at Wharton. To gain a greater perspective, we’re reaching out to students/grads that were entrepreneurs while in school.
What has your entrepreneurial experience added to your business education?
It is my business education. The efficacy of a scientific, academic business education is questionable. Business is so broad, it’s different to everyone. Sure, there are some who learn their trade before entering the job market, but that’s a small subset of people in business. I like to think that starting a company has bits and pieces of every aspect of business, and it’s the most comprehensive, engaged way of learning it.
Does the process of entrepreneurship add academic value (even for a student that doesn’t plan on pursuing entrepreneurship full-time)?
I don’t think one can “pursue entrepreneurship.” One doesn’t have short stints as an entrepreneur, like one would have a job. It’s a different career path entirely (if he/she is pursuing it in earnest). That said, you do see people try starting a company and then move on to other things.
It’s hard to make blanket statements about general entrepreneurship because deli-owners and high-tech CEOs alike are entrepreneurs. That said, the concepts in managing a shop, all aspects of it – its finances, product, marketing, hiring, firing, logistics – is incredibly valuable from a learning experience. I can’t say for sure that starting a company would add value to anyone, no matter what profession they pursue, but I’m fairly certain that someone who starts a company would be better at banking or whatever they end up pursuing.
What were some resources (ask for extracurricular AND academic) that were helpful?
I hadn’t taken an entrepreneurship course at Penn. My formal coursework, beyond some design and marketing courses, have had little relevance to my day-to-day job. That said, I couldn’t be doing what I’m doing if it weren’t for Penn. A few things:
- Professors as resources (even ones i didn’t have)
- WEP programs like VIP, WVA, and EIR
- Speaker series
- Meeting people from other schools at Penn
- Student-created meet ups
What are some resources (extracurricular and academic) that you wished you’d had?
I think there are a lot of mechanical things that are teachable and I wish there was a course taught by a part-time instructor, part-time entrepreneur to walk through the stages of launching a technology-based company. I think that we’re entering a new type of economy and that education in this area requires people who have played in it. I think that it’s not as relevant to hear it from someone who has been a successful founder, say, 20 years ago.
Regarding the last question, Peter Thiel’s recent course at Stanford is pretty much exactly what I had imagined. I would have killed to take that course. Luckily the notes are online, and they’re using Lore to facilitate it.
Salvador Dalí’s little-known but surreally beautiful 1969 Alice in Wonderland illustrations
The Mason Jar
Before a New Jersey-born son of a Scottish farmer named John Landis Mason patented his jar in 1858, home-food preservation was a tricky affair.
A simple invention that changed how people ate.
An early LEGO patent drawing circa 1958, the building block of a global cult.
The photo above is of Lower Manhattan’s skyline in February 1938. It’s part of a massive trove of 870,000 photos that the New York City Municipal Archives just released. I could spend days pouring through them.
(via Historic Photos From the NYC Municipal Archives - In Focus - The Atlantic)
