Saturday, 08 May, 2021
Q: If Hitler was alive today, what would be his favourite Indian startup?
A: Bye- Jews
Rothschilds, Clintons, Bush etc etc…. What do these names have in common??
They are all inherited names. You can found an institution or inherit it. A common way to inherit an institution is to pass it from parents to children along with the fortune. This is a model that has been followed by many banks, political parties, media agencies around the world. Most people have this belief that this is the only way to inherit an institution, however this is the not the case.
Another way can be to win an election. Someone who attains political office through this route inherits a seat they could never have built from scratch. In that case they are a political heir and not a familial heir. Their primary skill is getting elected, which is more like becoming popular on Twitter than creating Twitter. The banks they bail out are too big to fail, and the shoes they inherit are too big to fill.
When someone inherits an institution, they loose the ability to build it from scratch. During the normal times, everything appears to be in control, but during times of an aberration things get out of control because the ability to reinvent the space has been lost. For innovation to happen, one should focus on building something from the scratch. Bitcoin by Satoshi Nakamoto, Ethereum by Vitalik Buterin, SpaceX by Elon Musk - are all examples of what building from scratch looks like. In these unprecedented times of COVID-19, public health care systems failed, all levels of government failed, infact everything that is a product of inheritance failed in some way or the other. However the founders succeeded. The state couldn't deliver checks, but Amazon could deliver packages. The universities were closed but the MOOC platforms were open. The restaurants were shuttered but the delivery apps were shipping. The media corporations reported that the virus was at best a remote threat while the tech companies prepared for remote work.
The inheritance system is like a ladder, you have to collect a number of degrees before reaching the top, and the irony is that even after going through all the steps, success is not guaranteed. However, founders have a completely different space. For example, it's not a coincidence that both Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of Harvard and become tech founders. They are atypical in many other respects, but not this one. These people had the intellectual horsepower to compete with the best of the inherited tribe, instead they chose to a found something rather than inherit something.
With the advent of technology, founding has become relatively easier. It is now possible to found a community, a company, or even a currency from your laptop. The next step is to make it possible to found new cities and new countries, rather than simply inherit them. The coming decade brings ample opportunities for people to build something from scratch. We are diving into the block-com era. They say history repeats itself, it surely does. Opportunities are inundating just like they were in the dotcom era. Think from first principles, without any bias, and see yourself building something!
Until next time :)
Cheers!
Some things that you may find interesting-
Article I am reading: The Spectrum of Optimism and Pessimism by Morgen Housel.
Thought I am pondering upon: Read Only Culture: Suppose you were raised in a religious household, but didn't practice yourself. Growing up with these civilisational scripts means you can recognize them, perhaps repeat them, but cannot write them from scratch, let alone explain them.
Song I am listening to: Darkside by Alan Walker
Quote I am enjoying: “You learn several insane things about the world that only other entrepreneurs can understand when you build something from nothing.
Here are the last three posts if you were too occupied to read them:
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