Values ← A Little Ludwig Goes A Long Way

The Supreme Court DOMA ruling is going to roll through every state and organization

Jul

2013

In Ohio, a federal judge rules that Ohio has to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states. This is going to roll through every state, company, organization, municipality. If it is unconstitutional for the federal government to discriminate against legally married couples, then it is surely unconstitutional for any other entity to do the same. ...

Why I will vote for Obama in the presidential election.

Oct

2012

I am pretty apolitical. I view government as a necessary evil. The political process seems horribly compromised, most politicians seem hopelessly compromised. The campaign ads make me barf. I will be happy when election season is over. Usually I just keep my head down during the season and try to keep my views to myself. ...

Dan Barry — incredibly inspirational

May

2012

Heard “Dan Barry”:http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_T._Barry speak at USC grad this past week. What an amazing story. Was rejected by NASA for like 15 years running and refused to give up. Finally made it as an astronaut at age 37. An amazing tale of perseverance. If you ever have a chance to hear his story, it is worth ...

Best recruiting tool ever — Valve employee handbook

Apr

2012

Leaked today and linked to broadly — “Valve new employee handbook (pdf)”:http://cdn.flamehaus.com/Valve_Handbook_LowRes.pdf I’m ready to sign up and start next week. I don’t know that this model would work for every industry and for every scale company, but man is it compelling. Nice work, Valve.

Pixar story rules — relevant for us all

Apr

2012

At “Ritholtz”:http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2012/04/21-pixar-story-rules/, who lifted them from “Pixar TOuch”:http://www.pixartouchbook.com/blog/2011/5/15/pixar-story-rules-one-version.html who in turn lifted them from “Emma Coats”:https://twitter.com/#!/lawnrocket. Great stuff, relevant for so much more than movie making. We all have stories to tell every day, many of these tips are relevant in so many settings — * “Come up with your ending before you figure out ...

He was kind of a crummy dog, but he was our crummy dog

Apr

2012

He had a terrible attitude. He didn’t play well with other dogs. He’d bite you if you just looked at him wrong. He was fearful and was useless as a guard dog, retreating into his crate at any disturbance. He’d wander off and get lost if you didn’t constantly watch him. He had ugly “cherry ...

An obsession with failure

Mar

2012

What a great article at @farnamstreet — “An obsession with failure”:http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2012/03/an-obsession-with-failure/. People that worry about their failures, who take responsibility for them, who consider what else they might have done, tend to be the strongest performers over time. I’ve always felt like my best interview question for people has always been “What’s your greatest failure?”. ...

Not letting (just) anyone rent space in my head

Mar

2012

Twitter streams, RSS feeds, inbound email, facebook updates, linkedin, man it is easy to lose yourself in the constant chatter of the current age. I fight every day to rise above the wash of minutiae and think about the things that really matter in the longterm. So I’m being way more thoughtful about what I ...

Do you want to be right, or do you want to be effective?

Feb

2012

Relating to my post about effective business communication the other day, here’s a “great post on being right vs. being effective.”:http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2012/02/do-you-want-to-be-right-or-do-you-want-to-be-effective/. Of course it is best to be effective AND be right — being wrong and effective leads to epic disasters. Reminds me of the classic 4 quadrant chart of ambition vs competence. Being competent ...

You might want to develop a weapon besides the bazooka

Feb

2012

In my first job after grad school, I was giving a client presentation when a junior staffer at the client asked me a question that I felt was dumb. And so during the presentation, in front of his boss and his boss’s boss, I ripped his question apart. After the meeting, my mentor and manager ...

John Scalzi reminds me we are all short timers

Jan

2012

John Scalzi wrote an “excellent essay today on the impermanence of art”:http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/01/30/a-small-meditation-on-art-commerce-and-impermanence — none of us know the top 10 books of 100 years ago, or even the authors of the books. I’m betting the same dynamic holds true in popular music, or in almost every other area of human endeavor. Certainly holds true in ...

Getting US Citizens Out Of Trouble

Aug

2009

Journalists Rejoin Relieved Friends, Family in U.S. – washingtonpost.com — it is awesome that these folks have been freed, and it is generally a good thing that we have found a way to talk to North Korea and have a success at something, here’s hoping that this event will contribute to calmer relations with the ...

The big picture — VC Math, Life Threats, Rhythms

Apr

2009

Random posts that have caught my eye recently: * The VC Math Problem — excellent discussion of the “macroeconomics” of the VC asset class. * What to fear. The truth about what is going to kill you. The sensationalist news stories every night on random acts of violence and tragedy are scary, but they aren’t ...

Icebergs

Mar

2009

@chrisfhoward reminded me of my own post today — A Little Ludwig Goes A Long Way » Blog Archive » Icebergs. A good reminder for me. I also think a lot these days about the leaders in our financial industries taking home $10M+, $100M+ earnings for the year — how are they behaving when they ...

Racing the Beam: How Atari 2600's Crazy Hardware Changed Game Design | Game | Life from Wired.com

Mar

2009

Racing the Beam: How Atari 2600′s Crazy Hardware Changed Game Design | Game | Life from Wired.com. I remember also the goofy Apple ][ graphics. Yet both systems had tons of great games — these tight and arbitrary resource limits pushed programmers to become really inventive. A good lesson in many walks of life.

Blame and responsibility

Jan

2009

Nice quote here: “He who blames others has a long way to go on his journey. He who blames himself is halfway there. He who blames no one has arrived.” – Chinese proverb, via Millionaires Say They Were Failed by Advisers in Crisis | The Big Picture.

Madoff Story Smells Funny | The Big Picture

Dec

2008

Madoff Story Smells Funny | The Big Picture. The WSJ and NYTimes seem to be hinting at this today too, investigators seem to feel that the sheer amount of work required more than one person working on the fraud. Fascinating.

Election thoughts

Nov

2008

Rich, with his reflections on the recent election, has inspired me to share a few of my own personal thoughts. Like many commentators, I am inspired by the actions of the electorate, overcoming a history of bias and bigotry to overwhelmingly support a minority American. And I found McCain’s concession speech to also be very ...

A SWOT Analysis On America

Oct

2008

A SWOT Analysis On America. Don’t agree with many of the detailed points but the core idea of looking at our situation with a SWOT analysis is a good idea. Too often as I read the papers these days, I don’t really understand the goals and strategies of some of our government actions. A reasoned ...

Focus on Things Under Your Control

Oct

2008

Great advice from Brad Feld. Valuable in these troubled times.