The book was created based on a class Thiel taught at Stanford University and at some points it’s a bit prickly. The reason is simple, it’s easier to dominate a small market than a larger one.” Always err on the side of starting too small. Therefore, every startup should start with a very small market. Every monopoly dominates a large share of its market. It’s difficult to find these things, but you can help yourself at the start. Thiel writes: That would be something closer to 0 to 1. To find those zero to one ideas Thiel suggests we ask, “what important truth do very few people agree with you on?” and “What valuable company is nobody building?” However, we could show up and see a huge buffet on picnic tables (Martha Stewart or Mario Batali catering), and there’s a live band and a play about the local history of the area and what people did a hundred years ago this time of year.

In Thiel’s terminology these are iterations from 1 to 2. These are all incremental improvements on an Easter party. There may be some changes, more colored eggs, new candy, or someone in an Easter bunny costume. We went to one last year and the year before and I suspect that this year’s will be the same. It’s not creating a filtered photo app, an email inbox program, or another smartphone.Įaster is coming up and I’ll be taking my daughters to an Easter egg hunt. Going from “Zero to One” is to create something entirely new. To truly understand the book, you first must understand the title, which gives a lot of insight to Thiel’s thoughts. Zero to One: Notes on Startups or How to Build the Future encompasses Thiel’s beliefs about what might be coming next, what might be valuable then, and how you and I can put ourselves in the right position for both. Peter Thiel has written a book where he hopes to bridge the gap between specifics and generalities – a book that applies as much to a business owner in Iowa as a San Francisco startup. Or, it can be so general that it applies to everyone all the time (“Guests and fish both stink after three days”). It should either be so specific, it’s only relevant to a handful of people in a handful of situations (“Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. There are two qualities to good advice, but good advice rarely satisfies both.

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