How We Change The Stars

I’ve been rethinking how we make a great product.

I've reflected on things I've done well in my career as a founder/executive or as part of an investment team:

(insert brag)

But what’s given me pause is what I haven't experienced:

(insert definition of product changing the future)

Even though I've always had leading edge ideas, access to funds and world-class resources, I've never experienced a great product built by people I personally know. This includes people I know in other ventures if I were honest. 

All the great digital products I use passionately are built by people I don't know:

“Unknown Artists.”

* * *

The ideas we've had could always be proven. I see others proving it eventually.

It has led me to believe, most of us have had the wrong mindset to make a great product.

What's been missing is a culture for making something great. 

This equals making what our peers think “cannot be done.”

* * *

Listening to doubters has one fundamental flaw. Doubt is based on what “has been.”  

But we don’t want to be a “has been.” We want to create a new  future.

When I read Steve Job's bio, everything he set out to build was labelled "can't be done."

Glass staircase - "can't be done." 

Advisers, pros and experts are often shaped by what they know, but not by what they don't know to challenge a new frontier.

Even after we achieve unexpected success,  even  after doing  “the impossible,” the culture is still too frequently...not being able to go past where we are...to  protect what we have.

The conversation is regularly "you can do this (efficiently)"..."this platform will allow you to"…"given where we are now” ... "realistically for execution"…or my favorite “when we get funding… (as if it will guarantee a big difference).”

This keeps us regular. 

Right away, we are stuck inside the box, circling within norms, copying current trends or  knowledge like it was some easy way out. But it never was. Who among the millions found an easy way out?  

We do non-resistant things for the purpose of survival but it is a state that keeps one in only a state of survival.  

Even the term MVP (Minimum Viable Product) is all about the status quo. It's set up for people in the status quo.  The focus is on minimal effort with tools today available to get something “done.” 

Peer pressure skews towards what can be done in the current context. It focuses on what exists and  what is acceptable. Millions will do it.  So how does this stand out or change anything? 

* * * 

Great ventures don't think in terms of MVP (not that I've seen). They go for it.

Can you even imagine George Martin telling the Beatles to do the minimum for a viable product? Pioneers who break boundaries do far more than minimum from the get-go. 

Too often we do what "can be done." We are surrounded by people with a mindset influenced by clients/peers (who don't innovate). We are surrounded by a repetitive language of...status quo. 

We forget "innovation."

* * *

Innovation is how we change the stars.

Innovation IS what “can’t be done.”

Most talented people do what can be done. But the great ones who make history, who produce what changes the future, do what can’t be done.

Stars can only be seen by turning off the lights shining on everything else 

Writing As Is

Writing - not how things are written, but exactly how thoughts come out as is. No syntax, no sense at times, strange associations, vivid memories (visual and audio), ego-focused with random impulsive feelings, hints of fantasy and distracted at times..possibly while walking down a street.

What Is Sold

So many sell fears.

But who tells a solution?

I’m tired of buying fears

That make you a coward

The lawyer, the accountant, the consultant

The politician  who says watch out

"The uncertainty no one knows"

Their living is fear

Bittersweet

But neat

Acceptable

But reputable

No revelation

On any given day

No revelation

In the next year

The journalists speculate

Telling us about some kind of state

Piecemeal voices

Who are never there

Words could be a lie

But what lies ahead?

The friend who says beware

The mother or father who says

Don’t do this

Or that?

Well-meaning but scared

Well-spoken, they never dared

To any kind of gold

Or future that unfolds

To reflect on what if

Instead of what may

To make something small

Instead of tall

It circles the drain

Especially when it rains

A self-fulfilling prophecy

Makes nothing easy

Changing a narrative

To be afraid

Changing the restorative

To nothing said

What is this antic

Of borderline panic?

You're burned anyways

Too scared to know it

There’s no action in fear

No reaction but fear

No momentum created

No feeling belated

It can trip up every step

Press down instead of up

See ground instead of sky

Say empty instead of full

But who tells a solution?

This silence is deafening

When fear's what’s sold

Truth be told 

Anything else would be bold

One constitution

Against an intitution

Flip a coin

Uncertainty

Is either fear

Or possibility 

The Road Not Taken

Neutralizing what is feared is a beaten path. Nourishing what is inspiring is a road not taken.

The Art of Repetition

When someone repeats themselves, is it: 1) running out of things to say 2) forgetting what was said 3) thinking you didn’t hear it 4) a press release  5) a blues song 6) going senile or 7) talking to yourself. 

When repeating what others say, is it 1) no mind of your own 2) Stepford Wives 3) brainwashing  4) hypnosis 5)  a reflex 6) true belief  or 7) a form of slavery.

Or is it   9) religion  10) not seeing  a difference 11) social media sharing 12) a press release 13) Simon Says  14) quoting.

Politics can also be seen like Warhol Art.


Context changes everything. 

Art Clock 2

As a writer, one thing I never liked about writing for a daily: most stories are forgotten the very next day. Everything you've written becomes meaningless. With social networks, it's even faster - replaced by the next thing, next minute, sometimes, by the next second.


Who remembers the status report written one year ago or even yesterday? 

Art Clock

"Photo Blog"

Create new art = creating new media. 

There's a clock in every piece of art timing how long it will last. Some art lasts a second like fireworks or one day like a social network post. Others become heritage works standing the test of time for many years to come. And rarer still are masterpieces spanning centuries.