How to start a movement | Derek Sivers

Sorry to hear of the loss of your friend. As a devote cyclist it always hits me hard to hear of another cyclist being injured - especially when it appears as though it was through no fault of their own. Maybe it's not as obvious to you but, I feel, your writing adds some much needed colourful philosophy to our community. As you say yourself, all too often we end up with our heads buried deep in virtual technical problems and forget to embrace the world that surrounds us. I can't count how many people I've shown your leadership talk to [0]. ▶ this video

in “OK, Milt Olin, I'll start writing again” · View on HN

I found your discussion of the sheet metal concept really interesting because as you found out the hard way, there's an awful lot of behavioural science in play. The line about Word having too many features is that everyone uses 10% of the features... the problem is that everyone uses a slightly different 10% of the features. One thing you should try hard not to do is look at the competition and write it off as crap. It's highly unlikely that your antecedents set out to make a shit product. It's likely that when they were starting out, they wanted to create something efficient and streamlined, but then years of paying customer feedback took things to where they are today. The folks at 37signals always used to remind us that it's much easier to add a feature than it is to remove one. I wonder how much of the shopkeepers reactions were fighting change vs just not trusting someone who didn't come from where they came from. There's real class anxiety around the blue collars vs the 20-something software millionaire set (which is likely how they saw you, as the other, even if you're actually their neighbour). I wonder what would happened differently if it was the owner of the first shop leading the pitch. I often advise founders that they shouldn't get into any business where one of the founders doesn't have deep industry experience and connections. If nobody on your team has ever managed a hotel, it's highly likely that you will fail to disrupt hotel management. Anyhow, it's uncle

in “Pursuing a Business I'll Love” · View on HN

hmm... I think many rationals problem is that they don't interact enough and then use their positive social interactions to social proof their bad ones. Consider his first scenario where the person puts up his hand and says that they don't have the budget to do that. The speaker might indeed be mad and likewise some others in the room. Invariably there would be someone there that likes your outspoken or directness[just by the share number of people in the room, probability dictates it]. Now, if our rational guy stands there by himself and refuses to interact with others, the speaker and his allies will brand him as rude. Every move he makes, no matter how trivial would only be seen in this light. If he had started interacting until he found someone who likes his disposition, he is then social proof by that person. Then he begins to climb a ladder of social proof. He would meet someone else who because that one person liked him they would like him too, and you can see how this spreads exponentially. Now, it would be just the speaker left hating him; well no actually, the speaker will now think his evaluation of the situation was previously wrong and that the guy is alright.[Appropriate reading: [link] ] And if our rationalist is lucky he can turn his new found social proof into Authority by running for some prestigious position such as president. At which point, people will like him cause he is in that given position. Being nice has it's only problems also. For instance, peopl

in “Defecting by Accident - A Flaw Common to Analytical People” · View on HN