Zero to One - Thiel

 

I work in an industry monopolized by the 1 to n.  Most of us do.  We are always talking about 1 to n lists as in how do we get more of each thing on the list and if funding fails, which things on the list get divested first.   Enter Peter Thiel and his book of notes on  getting from “Zero to One, Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future”.  I’ll admit I didn’t know what zero to one meant when a friend of mine first recommended the book.  But I didn’t have to wait long, in fact by reading this review you've waited longer.  On the very first page Thiel explains, “Doing what we already know how to do takes the world from 1 to n, adding more of something familiar.  But every time we create something new, we go from 0 to 1.  The act of creation is singular, as in the moment of creation, and the result is something fresh and strange.”  If that doesn’t hook you, you don’t need to read any further.

With every turn of the page I harkened back to my days as an entrepreneur, and all the things I thought about, but could do nothing change.  It was scary enough starting a company and just staying alive in a competitive world. Just staying alive was success enough.  It was important to do the right things for the right reasons, but I dreamed, of more.   I dreamed of harnessing the secrets of huge success, that I knew existed, but couldn’t quite put my finger on.  Afterall, at the dot.com bubble was rising all around me.   I knew the secrets were out there, I could  find them in a number of important books, which didn’t change things for me, but had a huge impact on my thinking.  Books such as “The Battle for Investment Survival”, by Gerald Loeb, where I learned to put all your eggs, in one basket, then watch the basket.  The “Origin of Wealth”, by Eric D. Beinhocker where I learned about complexity economics, “Disturbing the Universe”, where Freeman Dyson tells us we can change the world with technology, and of course “The Black Swan”, by Nicholas Taleb, where I learned the world isn’t fair and run by the normal distribution.  I’ll throw in, “The Singularity is Near”, by Ray Kurzweil but that book isn’t in the same class as the others.

In each book I knew if I could only extract a simple formula for success, I could do something more, but in each case, the simple formula was just beyond my grasp...like the elusive green light of Gatsby fame...beckoning for us to reach out and catch it and then run faster....

“Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning ——”

Thiel has given us, in a series of simple lectures, all the secrets and the simple  formula that evaded me for so long.  Thiel has given us that fine morning...it’s now up to each of us to grab the green light and move onward as we build the future.  Five stars for Thiel’s recipe!