pizu

It's a form of lottery. Rewarding one in a million. Keeps the machine churning.

Wow, HN has finally broke Google! This is what Google Docs message says: "Wow, this file is really popular! Some tools might be unavailable until the crowd clears.Try again Dismiss "

Perhaps, this shows how people perceive the world:

Internet = browsing web pages on PC/Mac (using a web browser)

FB = apps/software on phones and tablets (or in a web browser, occasionally)

FB is then much more a standalone/native app than a website.

"Because his actions have had serious consequences for our national security.." Errr, really? What exactly are those consequences? Not a single person was hurt or injured as a result of the revelations. On the other hand, American people have learned a lot about their Government spying on their own citizens.

The article defines the overconfidence as a belief in an outcome despite what reasonable past statistics tell us. "the kind of optimism that leads governments to believe that wars are quickly winnable and capital projects will come in on budget despite statistics predicting exactly the opposite." On a second thought, project planning and making plans in general that involve duration, cost, etc, and "asking a girl out" or "asking for a pay rise" are very different things and I'd prefer not to conflate the two.

You might be able to generate some stats on what % of girls that are asked out (in some particular circumstantce e.g. at a bar in Kentucky, etc) agree or how many pay rises are approved. You can then talk about over- or under- confidence if expectations of the outcome deviate largely from these stats. How much is too little or much? Who knows.

I think you already disarm your own argument when you say: "things like actually being able to talk to that girl, ask for that raise, close that sale, take down that oppressor...these things benefit tremendously from irrational confidence". Exactly. You don't need to be overconfident to "talk down (sic!) to a girl" or ask for a raise, but about "just" confidence. Case closed.

SOFTWARE IS NEVER FINISHED. JUST LIKE FASHION IS NEVER FINISHED ;)

OMG everyone buy bitcoin!

also, "pre-birth" and "pre-kindergarten"

That picture is from the 1000 USD banknote...

"She found, however, that she could study them by following them around and observing their daily activities and interactions." Are you f$%"£ kidding me? This sounds like such a revelation but is so bleeding obvious. Of course you have to observe people in their natural habitat, WATCHING them, not just sending them a SurveyMonkey survey or asking a buncha questions. C'mon people. Get real!

Why nobody listens to these songs? Either crappy songs or failed marketing. Or both.

What a great reminder of a great book. And a science writer that rightly focused on the human side than the tech. Thanks for this.

To all you aspiring entrepreneurs, this is all you need to know: "Verify that there was an existing market opportunity in the form of real customers willing to pay you real money to solve a problem"

Now, go!

What impressed me the most is that his work evolved slowly, over many years, with incremental improvements. Stead and forward. Well done! Impressive.

How about delivering Tesla cars straight to customer's doors? Amazon-shipping style.

in movies cars catch fire and explode all the time. guess, the movie industry will face an inevitable change when 20-50 years into the future everyone drives electric.

Also - your arms and wrists should really be horizontal to your elbows or near horizontal. Looking at the picture...your wrists are way too high above your elbows...this is bad and will cause the blood to flow away from your fingers.

And here is a further proof that Google wants to become the one-stop shop for all your internet needs: https://www.google.co.uk/flights

And this is a further proof: https://www.google.co.uk/flights

Noooooooooooooooo? OMG!

IT departments will always exist in the Enterprise.

I work for a major ISP in the UK and they will never move to cloud for their core systems (Network, CMR, Billing, Provisioning). If you are trying to sell any software to them, they will ask you if you can provide a build that they can then deploy on their servers. Forget cloud computing. That may work for some teams and some functions within the business (e.g. marketing, online dev, UX) but the core functions, where you'll find customers' data, will never be moved to the cloud.

Here is a vital lesson about how to make arguments and win in a negotiation, but nobody here has picked up on it. You are instead focusing on the numbers...which is a small part of the win...

It's all about psychology and understanding the situation and the customer..let me explain:

Notice how Murdoch uses "I" and "we" (referring to NewCorp/HC) all the time, while Jobs almost entirely uses "you" or "we" (as in HC and Apple).

Take a look at Murdoch's language: " I thin[k] I have a handle on this now" - he's not sure "we we would like to be able to get something done with Apple" - done what exactly? very vague statement, no specific. blah. "The economics are simple enough" - are they really simple?

"we are worried about setting prices to high" - again, he doesn't sound confident or sure of himself

"Feel free to call or write anytime over the weekend to discuss if you like" - he is making himself available to Jobs over the weekend, giving Jobs the power to interrupt him "anytime", he takes a subservient/beta position in the negotiation, and gives the lead to Jobs.

Same sentiment here: "we would much rather be working with apple than not"

And this is quite painful:

"If we could offer to you that a certain percentage of releases (>50%) would be available within your pricing structure (< or = 14.99), does that GIVE YOU ENOUGH COMFORT?" - Murdoch is actually trying to "comfort" Jobs, really? it crossed my mind, that he is almost trying to "please" Jobs here. Psychologically (probably reading too much into his story), his need to please a (fatherly) authority figure (Rupert), impersonated by Jobs. Too bad for Murdoch.

More worries: "I think we are worried more about the absolute holdback of product elsewhere, and our ceding of pricing to Apple, than we are about the actual haggle over what the price will be." - This sentence sounds extremely vague, nothing is clearly qualified or quantified. Jobs just comes across as infinitely more knowledgeable on publishing and economics than Murdoch...

"I haven’t shared this with HC directly—so this is only hypothetical." - HYPOTHETICAL? He sounds like a time-waster, almost asks to be hardly negotiated with? Also, do we know who makes decisions here? Murdoch or HC?

"Please let me know."- again...PLEASE

"Is it worth considering in the round, over the next few months or weeks, whether or not some of these loose ends can be tidied up?" - Weeks or Months? Which one is it, James? More vague language...

Then contrast this with Jobs, "you" focused language and clear and simple arguments:

"The current business model of companies like Amazon distributing ebooks below cost or without making a reasonable profit isn’t sustainable for long. " - Jobs qualifies and frames Amazon's tactic in a sentence. Boom!

"All the major publishers tell us that Amazon’s $9.99 price for new releases is eroding the value perception of their products in customer’s minds, and they do not want this practice to continue for new releases." - ALL THE MAJOR publishers are on our side...i.e. NewsCorp/HC side too...

And some more clear, concise and action-oriented language: "All the major publishers tell us" "Apple is proposing" "Analysts estimate" "Customers will demand"

Person A does action B etc etc

Jobs sounds like a man who has done his research, both among other publishers, his competition (Amazon), and knows what customers want. Murdoch has done NONE and only "worries" about NewsCorp, coming across as weak and vague. Pathetic.

Jobs' language is "YOU" focused ("focus on your customer and their pains / benefits mantra" used in copywriting, advertising,etc).

"you will want this too"

"If you stick with just Amazon, Sony, etc., you will likely be sitting on the sidelines of the mainstream ebook revolution."

"You will make a bit more money in the short term, but in the medium term Amazon will tell you they will be paying you 70% of $9.99."

"Once we open things up for the second tier of publishers, we will have plenty of books to offer. We’d love to have HC among them." - here Jobs almost frames HC as a second tier publisher...urging HC to move to first tier or else they are going to miss out...

Jobs gives reasons behind his statements, e.g.

"Our proposal does set the upper limit for ebook retail pricing based on the hardcover price of each book."

Why?

"The reason we are doing this is that, with our experience selling a lot of content online, we simply don’t think the ebook market can be successful with pricing higher than $12.99 or $14.99. "

Jobs offers reasons, solutions, analysis. Murdoch brings nothing, but "worries" and woolly arguments to the table.

And finally, to win Murdcoch over to his side, Jobs does a fair amount of fear-mongering:

"the current situation is not sustainable and not a strong foundation upon which to build an ebook business."

"You will make a bit more money in the short term, but in the medium term Amazon will tell you they will be paying you 70% of $9.99"

"Hold back your books from Amazon. Without a way for customers to buy your ebooks, they will steal them."

Kudos to Jobs! What a great display of: - Framing - Focus on the customer (YOU language) - Appeal to other's needs - Understand and address their fears - Provide reasons and analysis in support of your arguments

And many more little gems, that I most likely have missed out!

Jobs had truly been one of the bests (if not THE BEST) marketer/negotiators/CEO of our era.

Did anyone tell Marissa that Tumblr is free?

Spending $1.1 billion just to post a single post, seems just like a huge waste of cash...