"Lucky things happen to entrepreneurs who start innovative, morally compelling companies." | Hacker News Reader

"Lucky things happen to entrepreneurs who start innovative, morally compelling companies."

inc.com

25 pointsvlad16 comments

Inspiring read...

The countless meetings with absolute assholes who had no interest in learning about the Internet, the single most significant business innovation of their lifetimes.

What do you think will be the next significant business innovation of our lifetimes? While we're on the topic of luck and timing...

We had Printing, then Manufacturing came, and now Networking. Frankly I do not see any other significant business innovation coming. If there were to be any, I would hope we would see new methods that speed the process of finding new drugs (not narcotics).

"Frankly I do not see any other significant business innovation coming."

You have a severe lack of imagination. Consider that while there will be N business innovations in all, there will only be one that will be the last. So I'd say it's more likely there will be many more than no more.

In the article the "business innovation" was the Internet (computer networking). Innovation in such a magnitude wont happen again anytime soon.

That is the same magnitude of change that was brought by Printing and Manufacturing. Every other innovation was/is a byproduct of those advances.

But if you may can you please give an idea of the next significant business innovation?

It's bad form to ask him to defend his point when you're defending your own by reiteration. Why won't innovation in such a magnitude 'happen again anytime soon'?

Because disruptive, game-changing, mind-flipping innovations take years to be accepted. Only a few individuals will understand the potential impact, the rest won't see it or understand it if they witnessed it.

So maybe that "next big thing" is already here. Maybe you saw it, read about it here or heard a couple of nerds talking about it, but chances are you would not care for it, or appreciate it because you would not know it.

The next big thing is the unknown unknown and it takes years for people to comprehend it.

Maybe that (generally) unknown unknown is gene therapy? Look at the recent discoveries of communities with strong genetic HIV resistance.

"But if you may can you please give an idea of the next significant business innovation?"

You're asking me to predict the next significant business innovation as big as the Internet?!

My guess is teleportation or colonization of space, within a hundred years.

I think it's fairly likely that in the next 50 years, strong anti-aging therapeutics will become available. This could reshape business practices significantly: long term strategies would directly reward their practitioners.

Open source hardware, ie: RepRap, most likely.

Yes it's an interesting story. And sometimes lucky things happen to innovative and morally compelling enterprises. But competence, attunement to developing markets, and a cautious nature that happens to cause you to divest from a dotcoms just before the bubble bursts... Well, it's only partly about "luck." ...or being morally compelling. ...and sometimes benefits scoundrels, too.

So there are no new morals in this story.

As for "the next significant business innovation(s) of our lifetimes." There are those that we are harnessing our vision and persistence to make happen right now.

"The second difference between business luck and everyday luck is that luck in business can be created, whereas everyday luck cannot. You can't will yourself to find $20 on the sidewalk. But you can create a company that gets lucky more often than the average company. Indeed, there is a pseudo-scientific formula for creating business luck. The key element is this: Lucky things happen to entrepreneurs who start fundamentally innovative, morally compelling, and philosophically positive companies.

Why? Because lots of smart people will gather around companies with these qualities. As it turns out, precious few such companies exist. And the vast majority of human beings, and certainly most of the smart ones, are constitutionally caring creatures who would, if given the chance, prefer to spend their valuable time in a positive setting contributing to the betterment of society rather than in a negative setting contributing to its detriment. Shocking, I know, but true."

In other words, karma exists and it's social!

> "Unbeknownst to me, and surely with some sort of anarchic motive, these lawless, long-haired, multi-pierced, tattooed, incredibly charming and smart hacker hooligans built a piece of software on Tripod that had nothing to do with offering practical advice to anyone. Instead, this software gave individuals the power to publish their own "personal homepages.""

this is why developers should seek to get paid for their work as well as receive shares.

Getting equity is pretty spiffy. It also implies you're taking on risk to receive it.

Would you be willing to forfeit your salary for a few months if things didn't work out and revenue dried up, or are you only interested in an arrangement that rewards you with ownership and a guaranteed salary regardless of performance?

"I have often dreamed of a study that somehow measures the impact of ego on workplace productivity. The results, I imagine, would be staggering, with as much as a 50 percent increase in productivity resulting from the eradication of egos."

I've wondered if the surge in productivity following WWII was, in part, due to something like this.

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