Loic Le Meur is one of my favorite people in Silicon Valley.
He is a successful serial entrepreneur — having sold companies to France Telecom and Six Apart — as well as a French presidential adviser, and an organizer of the world-famous LeWeb conference held in Paris. I will be speaking there December 9-10 of this year.
I recently stopped by the Seesmic offices, where Loic is pursuing his latest project, and we had a fun conversation on everything from practical philosophies and e-mail management, to product development and how to grow large communities at low cost. Please let me know what other topics you’d like to hear more on.
Enjoy and have a wonderful weekend!
On Lifestyle Design and Practical Philosophies – 11:30 Minutes
In this video, Kevin Rose — founder of Digg and others — and I talk about how we invest in other companies as “angels” and how we choose names for companies. Topics include:
-How to test company or product names using Google AdWords
-Kevin’s criteria for both good site names and good angel investments
-The role of start-up “advisors” and investors
-How I choose companies to work with: overlap, PR options, UI design… Read More
Napoleon, though mostly known as a little man with a funny hat, is regarded as one of history’s great commanders. He was also well-known for his unusual but effective methods of information management.
The Entertainment Group (The EG) is the most incredible weekend gathering you’ve never heard of.
I had no idea what it was 12 months ago, but two unrelated friends — also first-time attendees — raved to me about it in the same week. Once I did the digging, it quickly became the event I most wanted to be part of.
Where else can you sit next to Yo-Yo Ma, Jeff Bezos, and the guys from MythBusters with the breathing room lost at the mega-conferences? Share drinks with the winners of Nobels, MacArthurs, Oscars, and Tonys without the pretension of a white-tie ball? Hang with Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs while listening to the world’s top dueling pianists?
Now I’m in the mix: I’m speaking on December 12th, most likely on accelerated learning and the quest for elegant skill acquisition.
Founded by Richard Saul Wurman, the mastermind behind TED, to recreate the dream conference, it hosts the most unusual and creative cross-section of inventors, entertainers, artists, scientists, rising stars and living national treasures you could ever imagine… Read More
Interpolis – unconventional but damn effective. (photo: jsigharas)
Through simple redesign of workspaces, Interpolis of Holland increased productivity 20%, and sick leave has dropped from 9% to 2.5%. Last but not least, their new design also brings in 90,000 visitors a year.
Rolf Potts is one of my favorite writers, and his book — Vagabonding — was one of only four books I recommended as “fundamental” in The 4-Hour Workweek. It was also one of two books, the other being Walden; Or, Life in the Woods, that I took with me during my 15+-month mini-retirement that began in 2004.
Have you ever wondered what it really takes to pull the trigger and embark on long-term world travel?
Have you ever fantasized about getting paid to do it?
“Nothing bothers me more than sloth. The objective is to fix mistakes of ambition and not make mistakes of sloth. I work my ass off.”
-Tim Ferriss, from the new issue of Men’s Journal, Sept. 2008
Since I’m going nuts preparing for Burning Man, this post will be a short one.
The quote above is from the latest issue of Men’s Journal, where the main editorial cover story is a profile of me and the rise of The 4-Hour Workweek. There are also fascinating profiles of John McEnroe (awesome insight into his tennis strategies) and Gavin Newsom, as well as a cool snapshot of Tonny Sorensen, CEO of Von Dutch and former world champion in Tae Kwon Do.
The journalist, Larry Smith, spent almost three full days with me and covers a lot of details that haven’t been covered before, including background and education; core tenets of lifestyle design and common misinterpretations; interviews with family, professors, and friends; experiments involving critics; even how I organize my environment and home… Read More
Derek Sivers is a stud. I thought I’d share the conversation we had at SF MusicTech Summit. Dozens of topics covered include:
- Testing asssumptions vs. cheating
- PR and reaching out to unreachables
- Micro-testing ideas and products: from The 4-Hour Workweek to Trent Reznor
- Personal outsourcing for creatives
- Filling the void and creating meaning outside of the inbox and office
Derek is a programmer who lost his stage fright by doing more than 1,000 gigs as a circus ring leader. He is also the musician who started CD Baby, the world’s largest online music store for independent musicians. Here are some current numbers:
- 242,846 artists sell their music at CD Baby
- 4,574,622 CDs sold online to customers
- $83,590,381 paid directly to the artists
With more than 2 million digitized tracks under management, CD Baby is also the largest provider of independent music for iTunes… and it all started as a hobby.
How does it work now that it’s enormous? From Derek’s blog:
When I was the owner and president of CD Baby, it ran without me, and I hardly spent 4 hours on it in the last 6 months. It’s wonderful.
Here are a few snippets from our conversation… Read More
This is the final continuation of Part 1, where Torah Bontrager — who escaped the Old Order Amish culture to attend Columbia University — explained common misconceptions and myths about the Amish, as well as the pros and cons of being raised in this alternative American culture.
