Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World

by Peter H. Diamandis

From the coauthors of the New York Times bestseller Abundance comes their much anticipated follow-up: Bold—a radical, how-to guide for using exponential technologies, moonshot thinking, and crowd-powered tools to create extraordinary wealth while also positively impacting the lives of billions.

Bold unfolds in three parts. Part One focuses on the exponential technologies that are disrupting today’s Fortune 500 companies and enabling upstart entrepreneurs to go from "I’ve got an idea" to "I run a billion-dollar company" far faster than ever before. The authors provide exceptional insight into the power of 3D printing, artificial intelligence, robotics, networks and sensors, and synthetic biology. Part Two of the book focuses on the Psychology of Bold, drawing on insights from billionaire entrepreneurs Larry Page, Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Jeff Bezos. In addition, Diamandis reveals his entrepreneurial secrets garnered from building fifteen companies, including such audacious ventures as Singularity University, XPRIZE, Planetary Resources, and Human Longevity, Inc. Finally, Bold closes with a look at the best practices that allow anyone to leverage today’s hyper-connected crowd like never before. Here, the authors teach how to design and use incentive competitions, launch million-dollar crowdfunding campaigns to tap into ten’s of billions of dollars of capital, and finally how to build communities—armies of exponentially enabled individuals willing and able to help today’s entrepreneurs make their boldest dreams come true.

Bold is both a manifesto and a manual. It is today’s exponential entrepreneur’s go-to resource on the use of emerging technologies, thinking at scale, and the awesome power of crowd-powered tools.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction, Entrepreneurship, Self Help, Technology, Personal Development, Science

336 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 3, 2015

About the author

Dr. Peter H. Diamandis is an international pioneer in the fields of innovation, incentive competitions and commercial space. In 2014 he was named one of "The World’s 50 Greatest Leaders" – by Fortune Magazine.

In the field of Innovation, Diamandis is Founder and Executive Chairman of the XPRIZE Foundation, best known for its $10 million Ansari XPRIZE for private spaceflight.

Diamandis is also the Co-Founder and Vice-Chairman of Human Longevity Inc. (HLI), a genomics and cell therapy-based diagnostic and therapeutic company focused on extending the healthy human lifespan. He is also the Executive Founder of Singularity University, a graduate-level Silicon Valley institution that studies exponentially growing technologies, their ability to transform industries and solve humanity’s grand challenges.

In the field of commercial space, Diamandis is Co-Founder/Co-Chairman of Planetary Resources, a company designing spacecraft to enable the detection and prospecting of asteroid for precious materials. He is also the Co-Founder of Space Adventures and Zero-Gravity Corporation.

Diamandis is the New York Times Bestselling author of Abundance – The Future Is Better Than You Think and BOLD – How to go Big, Create Wealth & Impact the World.

He earned an undergraduate degree in Molecular Genetics and a graduate degree in Aerospace Engineering from MIT, and received his M.D. from Harvard Medical School.

Diamandis’ mission is to open the space frontier for humanity. His personal motto is: "The best way to predict the future is to create it yourself."

In 2016, the Greek Government honored him by issuing a 1.2 Euro stamp into circulation. Also in 2016, the book How To Make A Spaceship – A Band of Renegades, an Epic Race, and the Birth of Private Spaceflight, Peter’s biography and the story of the XPRIZE was written by Julian Guthrie with a Foreword by Richard Branson and an Afterword by Prof. Stephen Hawking.

Reviews

[Jay Dawkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter's laws:
1. If anything can go wrong, Fix It!!… to hell with Murphy!
2. When given a choice… take both!!
3. Multiple projects lead to multiple successes.
4. Start at the top, then work your way up.
5. Do it by the book… but be the author!
6. When forced to compromise, ask for more.
7. If you can’t win, change the rules.
8. If you can’t change the rules, then ignore them.
9. Perfection is not optional.
10. When faced without a challenge, make one.
11. “No” simply means begin again at one level higher.
12. Don’t walk when you can run.
13. When in doubt: THINK!
14. Patience is a virtue, but persistence to the point of success is a blessing.
15. The squeaky wheel gets replaced.
16. The faster you move, the slower time passes, the longer you live.
17. The best way to predict the future is to create it yourself!
18. The ratio of something to nothing is infinite.
19. You get what you incentivize.
20. If you think it is impossible, then it is… for you.
21. An expert is someone who can tell you exactly how it can’t be done.
22. The day before something is a breakthrough, it’s a crazy idea.
23. If it were easy it would have been done already.
24. Without a target you’ll miss it every time.
25. Fail early, fail often, fail forward!
26. If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.
27. The world’s most precious resource is the persistent and passionate human mind.
28. Bureaucracy is an obstacle to conquer with persistence, confidence and a bulldozer when necessary.

Awesome read. Inspiring. Now back to work!

[Tim · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book appeared on a couple of lists of best business books. I should have been warned off by the hype of the title, "Bold--How To Go Big, Create Wealth, and Impact the World." Don't expect anything new here, it's recycled. If you haven't read anything about crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, building communities, etc. and want to catch up, maybe. But you can get up to speed on these concepts with Wikipedia in less time without the breathless delivery.

[H (trying to keep up with GR friends) Balikov · Rating 2 out of 5]

Despite what it says in the title, this is not a "how to" book, it is an inspirational book. There are plenty of "case studies" to demonstrate that wealth can be created and you can have impact on those around you and, maybe even those you don't know. However, this is no more a road map than Columbus had when he departed on his trip to the Far East.

I was a bit more disappointed with the chapter on building communities. There are plenty of lists but, as was said about many a river in Texas, it may be a mile wide but only a few inches deep.

Enjoy the inspiration; there is plenty to be inspired about. But, before you start out, get more/better advice on how to go big.

[The · Rating 3 out of 5]

Google did this, Facebook did that, Richard Branson is ballsy....

[J.F. Penn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book which sparked tons of ideas for me. Should be required reading for all entrepreneurs or indeed anyone interested in where the world is heading in the next 10-20 years. Just wow!

[Cody Shorter · Rating 5 out of 5]

11 Things I learnt from Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World (Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler)
bold book

1) There is so much change happening in this world at an exponential rate. It amazes me how much technology is impacting us and will continue to do so.

From the book:
Consider that, twenty years ago, the idea that a computer algorithm could help companies with funny names (Uber, Airbnb, Quirky) dematerialize twentieth-century businesses would have seemed delusional. Fifteen years ago, if you wanted access to a supercomputer, you still had to buy one (not rent one by the minute on the cloud). Ten years ago, genetic engineering was big government, and big business and 3-D printing meant expensive plastic prototypes. Seven years ago, the only robot most entrepreneurs had access to was a Roomba, and AI meant a talking ATM machine, not a freeway-driving autonomous car. Two years ago, the idea of living past a hundred was a crazy idea. You get the picture.

2) The Six D’s of Exponentials.

From the book:
I have developed a framework called the Six Ds of Exponentials. These Six Ds are a chain reaction of technological progression, a road map of rapid development that always leads to enormous upheaval and opportunity.

Digitalisation. This idea starts with the fact that culture makes progress cumulative. Innovation occurs as humans share and exchange ideas. I build on your idea; you build on mine.
Deception. What follows digitalisation is deception, a period during which exponential growth goes mostly unnoticed. This happens because the doubling of small numbers often produces results so minuscule they are often mistaken for the plodder’s progress of linear growth.
Disruption. In simple terms, a disruptive technology is any innovation that creates a new market and disrupts an existing one.
Demonetisation. This means the removal of money from the equation.
Dematerialisation. While demonetisation describes the vanishing of the money once paid for goods and services, dematerialisation is about the vanishing of the goods and services themselves.
Democratisation is what happens when hard costs drop so low they becomes available and affordable to just about everyone.

3) Attitude is everything

From the book:
Climbing Mount Bold is not just technologically difficult, it’s also incredibly psychologically difficult. Every innovator interviewed for this book emphasized the importance of the mental game, arguing that without the right mindset, entrepreneurs have absolutely no chance of success. I couldn’t agree more. Attitude is the ball game. If you think you can or think you can’t—well, you’re right.

4) You have to get use to everyone thinking you and your ideas are crazy.

From the book
As Burt Rutan, winner of the Ansari XPRIZE, once taught me: “The day before something is truly a breakthrough, it’s a crazy idea.” Trying out crazy ideas means bucking expert opinion and taking big risks. It means not being afraid to fail. Because you will fail. The road to bold is paved with failure, and this means having a strategy in place to handle risk and learn from mistakes is critical.

5) Flow is an incredible way to hack productivity. Flow is something that really interests me and I will definitely be checking it out more.

From the book
As Virgin CEO Richard Branson says, “In two hours [in flow], I can accomplish tremendous things . . . It’s like there’s no challenge I can’t meet.”

6) You’ve got to start somewhere. If you don’t have a following or a source of credibility, create one.

From the book:
So if you’re lacking a track record, make one. Start your bold project with a much smaller effort aimed at letting others see you pull it off.

7) Create a set of principles/values you live by

From the book:
Start collecting mind hacks by examining your own life and seeing what strategies consistently worked along the way. Turn those strategies into your laws. Why is this so important? Because fear is hell on decision making. As threat levels begin to rise, the brain starts limiting our options. The fight-or-flight response is the extreme version of this story. When we are confronting mortal terror, our choices are literally limited to three: fight, flight, or freeze. But the same thing starts to happen with lesser fears. As Emory University neuroeconomist Gregory Berns wrote in an article for the New York Times: “Fear prompts retreat. It is the antipode of progress.” And that’s why it’s important to write down your own laws. You’re essentially creating an external hard drive for when your internal hard drive is guaranteed to crash.

8) Passion and purpose are key:

From the book:
So what’s his secret? Musk has a few, but none are more important to him than passion and purpose. “I didn’t go into the rocket business, the car business, or the solar business thinking this is a great opportunity. I just thought, in order to make a difference, something needed to be done. I wanted to have an impact. I wanted to create something substantially better than what came before.” Musk, like every entrepreneur in this chapter, is driven by passion and purpose. Why? Passion and purpose scale—always have, always will. Every movement, every revolution, is proof of this fact. Plus, doing anything big and bold is difficult, and at two in the morning for the fifth night in a row, when you need to keep going, you’re only going to fuel yourself from deep within. You’re not going to push ahead when it’s someone else’s mission. It needs to be yours.

9) The book delves into the traits of Richard Branson, Elon Musk, Larry Page and Jeff Bezos. What was interesting was that they all have different tolerances for risk. There are many paths to greatness. Below is Elon Musks’ take on risk:

From the book
“The lesson I would pass on to others,” he says, “the one rule I would have for entrepreneurs is, Don’t leave any dollars in reserve, you can always feed yourself, but don’t leave money on the table. I spent it all.”

10) Incentive prizes are now easier to accomplish through the HeroX platform. Incentive prizes, when used correctly (the book sets out an impressive step by step how-to) can leverage money and knowledge.

11) Ideas can turn into reality much easier with today’s technology, however we can’t just rely on technology

From the book:
Here’s the most important point: Abundance is not a techno-utopian vision. Technology alone will not bring us this better world. It is up to you and me. To bring on this better world is going to require what could easily be the largest cooperative effort in history. In other words, there is a bold and bright future out there. But, as with everything else, what happens next is up to us.

All in all, a brilliant inspiring book. One i’ll no doubt read again.

[Risto Kärkkäinen · Rating 4 out of 5]

If (you are interested in making a positive impact) {
read this.
}
else {
continue rereading fifty shades of grey.
}

[JJ Khodadadi · Rating 4 out of 5]

سوالی که خیلی شرکت‌های بزرگ روزانه با آن درگیر هستند این است که چگونه کسب‌وکار خود را به سریع‌ترین شکل ممکن گسترش بدهند؟ این شرکت ‌ها باید جسور باشند! ما امروزه در جهانی زندگی می‌کنیم که تکنولوژی فرصت های جدیدی را برای انسان‌ها رقم زده و این امکان را به آن‌ها می‌دهد که با دستان باز و ابعادی جهانی دست به نوآوری بزنند. شبکه جهانی وب امکاناتی را فراهم کرده که تا یکی دو دهه پیش تصور آن‌ها برای ما غیر ممکن بوده است. جلب سرمایه از طریق حمایت های مردمی شیوه جدیدی از برابری را برای صاحبان ایده و افراد جسور فراهم کرده تا بتوانند ایده خود را راحت تر از گذشته عملی کنند و کنار هم گرفتن این عوامل روزنه‌ای از امید را ایجاد کرده که می‌تواند هر فرد، شرکت و یا سازمانی را به بالاترین پله های نوآوری، تاثیرگذاری و اهمیت برساند.

[Kit Pang · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great read for entrepreneurs and anyone interested in today's technology and thinking BIG

[Ivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a ton of useful information about crowdsourcing and crowdfunding here, but the book is very focused on starting things and incentivizing people rather than the far more difficult and interesting slog of actually doing the work. For example, we're told we need more flow and get 17 flow triggers, but the authors don't tell us how they've re-arranged their lives to be in flow. Omissions like this make some of the concepts feel superficial. If you're interesting in crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, or how to be Diamandis, it's well worth reading. But this is far more narrow than the promised "go big, create wealth, and impact the world". Cast by the wayside is the technician/operator advantage of being insanely good at a few things. (Diamandis's rules include "When given a choice... take both!" and "Multiple projects lead to multiple successes.") There isn't a whole lot of practical advice here on what you need to find business partners, operate a company, monopolize the market, etc.

Entrepeneurs Organization has a rule: "Members don’t give advice; they speak from prior experience" - and the strongest parts of the book are where Diamandis is directly recounting his experience starting Space Adventures and Starfleet Academy, not giving generalized advice. Perhaps this would have been better if Diamandis just wrote a memoir with all of his businesses and left out the hype, advice, and Kotler's flow research (which is already available in another book.)

[Jose Papo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bold is a great book and it talks about the new technological trends and also on the power of platforms based on the six Ds: Digitalization, Deception, Destruction, Demonetization, Dematerialization Democratization. It also talks a lot about moonshot thinking and crowdsourcing strategies. I gave 4 stars because I believe that the book "Exponential Organizations" by Salim Ismail of Singularity University is more practical and already have many of the ideas found on "Bold".

[Christa Pusateri · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are in need of some serious inspirational kick start to Fuel Your Drive to yourself a favor and read (or listen) to this book now!

[Jian Hou · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Diamandis' book is all about how to make an impact on the world. He argues that it is easier to do so now in the present than ever before due to the abundance of resources and networking that has been made possible through the Internet.
He expounds on that by demonstrating what exponential technology is, and how it can disrupts industries. In order to capitalize on this force, you will need to have the correct mindset, a BOLD mindset that does not constrain itself to the traditional box. Finally, he shows how a task is no longer restricted to geography or organization, as the power of crowdsourcing and crowdfunding put the power of the world at your fingertips.
It is an inspiring read, and one I would recommend reading to open up your mind to some of the revolutionary stuff happening in the world now.

[Rafael Redondo · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must-read for would-be entrepreneurs, especially the first part, that covers the technologies that will drive progress in the next decades and the second one, that explores the motivation for going bold

[Dr. Tobias Christian Fischer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Großartige Ideen: einfach simpel und revolutionierend. Zum Beispiel „Crowdsourcing“ und andere.

[Bolek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspiring and resourceful book. The previous book - Abundance - was more of an explanation of exponential technologies and frameworks for growth mindset. Bold is a practical guide that teaches you and shows you examples of how to tap into the huge potential of exponential technologies while providing case studies and best practices for tools and techniques such as crowdfunding, community building, prize incentives and other. But it also touches on mindset and flow states, as well as the importance of 10x thinking., and also something called "supercredibility", which basically means that if you want to launch a project, make sure that the first reaction is "When is it gonna be on the market?" and not "That's not possible."

The book is built around a concept called "Massively transformative purpose" - and methods that help you get to work to pursue that purpose. Particularly "Skunkworks" method was interesting -
in short it's a method developed by Lockheed's Skunk Works during the World War II - it consists of several conditions that should be met in order to grant a group the freedom to explore a topic and innovate undistracted from daily life and bureaucratic hinderance.

Another great part of the book was a interview and analysis of mental frameworks and life attitude of four known innovators - Richard Branson, Elon Musk, Larry Page and Jeff Bezos.

Overall lots of interesting points and views that make you think about your fundamental motivations and drivers. Must read for anyone deeply interested in technological disruption.

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Most interesting parts of the book:

As AI and robotics guru Marvin Minsky writes in Scientific American, “In the past, we have tended to see ourselves as a final product of evolution, but our evolution has not ceased. Indeed, we are now evolving more rapidly, though not in the familiar, slow Darwinian way. It is time that we started to think about our new emerging.”

“We saw this with Gmail,” says Salim Ismail.10 “Instead of sending designers off to spend years coming up with the best twenty-five features anyone would ever want in an email program, Google released a version with around three features and asked their customers what else they wanted the program to do. It was very fast feedback and completely iterative. That’s why LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman famously said, ‘If you’re not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.’ ”

What’s more, this isn’t the only issue with money as a motivator. Money, it now appears, is only an effective motivator until our basic biological needs are met, with a little left over for discretionary spending. This is why, in America, as the Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman recently discovered, when you plot happiness and life satisfaction alongside income, they overlap until $70,000—i.e., the point at which money stops being a major issue—then wildly diverge.12 Once we pay people enough so that meeting basic needs is no longer a constant cause for concern, extrinsic rewards lose their effectiveness, while intrinsic rewards—meaning internal, emotional satisfactions—become far more critical.

While a 10x improvement is gargantuan, Teller has very specific reasons for aiming exactly that high. “You assume that going 10x bigger is going to be ten times harder,” he continues, “but often it’s literally easier to go bigger. Why should that be? It doesn’t feel intuitively right. But if you choose to make something 10 percent better, you are almost by definition signing up for the status quo—and trying to make it a little bit better. That means you start from the status quo, with all its existing assumptions, locked into the tools, technologies, and processes that you’re going to try to slightly improve. It means you’re putting yourself and your people into a smartness contest with everyone else in the world. Statistically, no matter the resources available, you’re not going to win. But if you sign up for moonshot thinking, if you sign up to make something 10x better, there is no chance of doing that with existing assumptions. You’re going to have to throw out the rule book. You’re going to have to perspective-shift and supplant all that smartness and resources with bravery and creativity.”

1. Focus on the User. We’ll see this again in chapter 6, when Larry Page and Richard Branson speak about the importance of building customer-centric businesses.
2. Share Everything. In a hyperconnected world with massive amounts of cognitive surplus, it’s critical to be open, allow the crowd to help you innovate, and build on each other’s ideas.
3. Look for Ideas Everywhere. The entire third part of this book is dedicated to the principle that crowdsourcing can provide you with incredible ideas, insights, products, and services.
4. Think Big but Start Small. This is the basis for Singularity University’s 109 thinking. You can start a company on day one that affects a small group, but aim to positively impact a billion people within a decade.
5. Never Fail to Fail. The importance of rapid iteration: Fail frequently, fail fast, and fail forward.
6. Spark with Imagination, Fuel with Data. Agility—that is, nimbleness—is a key discriminator against the large and linear. And agility requires lots of access to new and often wild ideas and lots of good data to separate the worthwhile from the wooly. For certain, the most successful start-ups today are data driven. They measure everything and use machine learning and algorithms to help them analyze that data to make decisions.
7. Be a Platform. Look at the most successful companies getting billion-dollar valuations . . . AirBnb, Uber, Instagram . . . they are all platform plays. Is yours?
8. Have a Mission That Matters. Perhaps most important, is the company you’re starting built upon a massively transformative purpose? When the going gets hard, will you push on or give up? Passion is fundamental to forward progress.

If creating more flow is the aim, then the emphasis falls on clear, not goals. Clarity gives us certainty. We know what to do and where to focus our attention while we are doing it. When goals are clear, metacognition is replaced by in-the-moment cognition, and the self stays out of the picture. Applying this idea in our daily life means breaking tasks into bite-size chunks and setting goals accordingly. A writer, for example, is better off trying to pen three great paragraphs at a time, rather than attempting one great chapter. Think challenging yet manageable—just enough stimulation to shortcut attention into the now, not enough stress to pull you back out again.

The challenge/skills ratio, the last of our psychological flow triggers, is arguably the most important. The idea behind this trigger is that attention is most engaged (i.e., in the now) when there’s a very specific relationship between the difficulty of a task and our ability to perform that task. If the challenge is too great, fear swamps the system. If the challenge is too easy, we stop paying attention. Flow appears near the emotional midpoint between boredom and anxiety, in what scientists call the flow channel—the spot where the task is hard enough to make us stretch; not hard enough to make us snap.

If you look under the hood of creativity, what you see is pattern recognition (the brain’s ability to link new ideas together) and risk taking (the courage to bring those new ideas into the world). Both of these experiences produce powerful neurochemical reactions and the brain rides these reactions deeper into flow.

To pull off such a massive moonshot, we’re going to need help, a lot of help. And thus our first challenge—convincing anyone our dream was doable. This meant, for certain, we were going to have to give birth to this dream above the line of super-credibility. Let me explain: In each of our minds we have a line of credibility. When you first hear a new idea, you place it above or below this line. If you place it below, you dismiss it immediately, often as ridiculous. If you place it above, you’re willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, follow it over time, and continue to make serial judgments. But we also have a line of super-credibility. When a new idea is born above this line, you accept it immediately and say, “Wow, that’s fantastic! How can I get involved?” The idea is so convincing that your mind accepts it as fact and your focus shifts from probabilities to implications.

What makes stone soup work is passion. People love passion. People love to contribute to passion. And you can’t fake it. The human bullshit detector is great at spotting the inauthentic article. The used car salesman, the carnival barker, and the disingenuous politician always rub us wrong. Sure, I’m probably not telling you something you don’t already know. But passion is a trickier subject than most assume. For starters, there are versions of passion that are extremely unhelpful to entrepreneurs, such as what John Hagel III, the cofounder of Deloitte’s Center for the Edge, calls the passion of the true believer. “In Silicon Valley we have many examples of the true believer,” says Hagel.17 “These are great entrepreneurs [who] are truly passionate about a very specific path and are notoriously not open to alternative views or approaches. Their passion is enduring and it does focus, but it can also be blind—leading the entrepreneur to reject critical input that does not match their preconceived views.”

The Creed of the Persistent and Passionate Mind
1. If anything can go wrong, fix it! (To hell with Murphy!)
2. When given a choice—take both!
3. Multiple projects lead to multiple successes.
4. Start at the top, then work your way up.
5. Do it by the book . . . but be the author!
6. When forced to compromise, ask for more.
7. If you can’t win, change the rules.
8. If you can’t change the rules, then ignore them.
9. Perfection is not optional.
10. When faced without a challenge—make one.
11. No simply means begin one level higher.
12. Don’t walk when you can run.
13. When in doubt: THINK!
14. Patience is a virtue, but persistence to the point of success is a blessing.
15. The squeaky wheel gets replaced.
16. The faster you move, the slower time passes, the longer you live.
17. The best way to predict the future is to create it yourself!
18. The ratio of something to nothing is infinite.
19. You get what you incentivize.
20. If you think it is impossible, then it is for you.
21. An expert is someone who can tell you exactly how something can’t be done.
22. The day before something is a breakthrough, it’s a crazy idea.
23. If it was easy, it would have been done already.
24. Without a target you’ll miss it every time.
25. Fail early, fail often, fail forward!
26. If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.
27. The world’s most precious resource is the persistent and passionate human mind.
28. Bureaucracy is an obstacle to be conquered with persistence, confidence, and a bulldozer when necessary.

In the end, we discovered that to think at scale, all four have leaned heavily on three of the psychological tools covered in earlier chapters—though, as we’ll see in a moment, each in different and insightful ways—and, equally crucial, each relies on five additional mental strategies. While we’ll get into greater detail in a moment, here’s a complete list:
1. Risk taking and risk mitigation
2. Rapid iteration and ceaseless experimentation
3. Passion and purpose
4. Long-term thinking
5. Customer-centric thinking
6. Probabilistic thinking
7. Rationally optimistic thinking
8. Reliance on first principles, aka fundamental truths

So what’s his secret? Musk has a few, but none are more important to him than passion and purpose. “I didn’t go into the rocket business, the car business, or the solar business thinking this is a great opportunity. I just thought, in order to make a difference, something needed to be done. I wanted to have an impact. I wanted to create something substantially better than what came before.”

But having passion and purpose is merely the first step. “The usual life cycle of starting a company begins with a lot of optimism and enthusiasm,” says Musk. “This lasts for about six months, and then reality sets in. That’s when you learn a lot of your assumptions were false, and that the finish line is much farther away than you thought. It’s during this period that most companies die rather than scale up.” This is also where Musk urges direct and blunt feedback from close friends. “It’s not going to be easy, but it’s really important to solicit negative feedback from friends. In particular, feedback that helps you recognize as fast as possible what you’re doing wrong and adjust course. That’s usually what people don’t do. They don’t adjust course fast enough and adapt to the reality of the situation.”

Musk, like all the billionaires in this section, fights back. He consistently strives to broaden his view by thinking in probabilities. “Outcomes are usually not deterministic,” he says, “they’re probabilistic. But we don’t think that way. The popular definition of insanity—doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result—that’s only true in a highly deterministic situation. If you have a probabilistic situation, which most situations are, then if you do the same thing twice, it can be quite reasonable to expect a different result.”

“The lesson I would pass on to others,” he says, “the one rule I would have for entrepreneurs is, Don’t leave any dollars in reserve, you can always feed yourself, but don’t leave money on the table. I spent it all.”

“It’s so hard to catch something that everybody already knows is hot,” says Bezos. “Instead, position yourself and wait for the wave to come to you. So then you ask, Position myself where? Position yourself with something that captures your curiosity, something that you’re missionary about. I tell people that when we acquire companies, I’m always trying to figure out: Is this person who leads this company a missionary or a mercenary? The missionary is building the product and building the service because they love the customer, because they love the product, because they love the service. The mercenary is building the product or service so that they can flip the company and make money. One of the great paradoxes is that the missionaries end up making more money than the mercenaries anyway. And so pick something that you are passionate about, that’s my number one piece of advice.”

Even better, in many cases, these structures are self-organizing. If the community has been set up in the right way, then growth happens organically, without need for too much direct intervention or intensive capital spends. For example, after Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg wrote Lean In, her bestselling book on empowering women to pursue their ambitions, she decided to capture the energy it was generating by building an online women’s community. As part of their growth strategy, one of their ideas was to create Lean In circles—local groups of eight to ten women coming together to share experiences and offer support. “These circles are almost entirely self-organizing,” says Gina Bianchini, CEO of Mightybell, the online community building tool that serves as the backbone for the Lean In community (more on such platforms in the how-to section). “All they did was suggest the idea to the community and issue a set of loose guidelines for how these circles should form and function. There is no one in the Lean In organization whose job it is to create new circles or manage existing ones. But in a little over a year, some 13,000 circles have been formed, with more starting up every week.”5

And that’s important. What Schawinski and his cohorts had accidentally stumbled upon is what I call the Law of Niches, the idea, quite simply, that you are not alone. This is one of the most telling features of the web—the somewhat humbling fact that no matter what oddball notion you’re deeply passionate about, well, there are plenty of folks who share the same passion. “The ability for entrepreneurs to nimbly find and serve niche interests—and to produce platforms that allow those groups to address their needs en masse—is better than ever before,” explains Joshua Klein. “It used to be that start-ups would have to compete with an established industry vertical—say, automotive parts. But I’ve got a friend who is building his entire business around Prius owners who want to hack their cars’ electrical system to make them even more fuel efficient. That’s a pretty small subculture, but today it’s more than enough to build a business upon.”

But the most memorable outcome came from one of the finalists who didn’t win. Vor-Tek was one of the teams that doubled the oil spill cleanup rate, but didn’t place in the top three. They were a team of complete novices from far outside the oil cleanup business. They had met at a Las Vegas tattoo parlor. The technology designer was a tattoo artist, his customer funded the work, and to test out their ideas, they built a scale model in a Jacuzzi. The first time their technology saw full-scale oil and water was at OHMSETT, and they still doubled the preexisting cleanup rate. When asked about their experience, Vor-Tek member and tattoo artist Fred Giovannitti said, “We get asked all the time, ‘How long have you been in the oil industry?’ and I ask back, ‘Counting today?’ ”

[Brendan Artley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting read for the bold-minded who look into the future.

[Darren · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has certainly got its pre-publicity quotes in order. Someone no less than former U.S. President Bill Clinton declares it to be a “…visionary roadmap for people who believe they can change the world” and the head of Deloitte Consulting describes it as “… an essential navigation tool for any proactive CEO who wants to remain relevant.” The list goes on!

Acting as a how-to guide for using exponential technologies, “moonshot thinking” and crowd-powered tools to create extraordinary wealth while also positively impacting the lives of billions, this book promises a lot. The book certainly packs a punch although it is not necessarily as accessible as it could be. The publicity material describes the book as a manifesto and a manual, being today’s exponential entrepreneur’s go-to resource on the use of emerging technologies. It is certainly capable of changing or refining your way of thinking. A lot of this book’s charm is hidden behind its futuristic label and packaging. Yet for a general business operator (or wannabe) there is so much great general advice and information too. You don’t have to be considering sending ultra-high-tech technology to the moon or finding a cure for a modern illness.

Of course current day business leaders and today’s exponential technologies are brought into focus, analysing how these technologies can be disruptive and market changing, whether they are 3D printing, AI, robotics or the ever-connected Internet. Do you reckon you can jump on-board and make your fortune with some futuristic thinking? The authors believe it is possible and give a whirlwind look at funding, community building, thought processes and much more besides.

A lot is crammed into ten chapters. It is hoped that a book of this relative complexity has a mass of further reading notes and citations plus a detailed index as it might be essential (these were missing in this pre-release copy). To many, this is one of those books you cannot pick up and put down - you will need to sit and focus on, locked away from all distractions.

Despite its great content, this reviewer found it hard to warm to – it could just be a matter of style or one of those strange individualistic things – but the quality of the writing and the subject matter cannot be denied. It will be worth its investment in time and effort. Sometimes you need a bit of a struggle to get to greatness.


Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World, written by Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kotler and published by Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9781476709567, 336 pages. YYYY

[Daniel Hipke · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book had its moments but overall there was too much filler/duplicate content. I didn't feel like I was getting an inside look into the mind of a successful innovator/entrepreneur, but rather a SparkNotes of the success of different companies/people.

I found myself skim reading near the end of the book. The second half focuses a lot of crowd funding and crowdsourcing which didn't really interest me.

Overall, I didn't really feel like I learned much about how to make an impact in the world although it was slightly motivational. If you enjoy reading company/entrepreneur case studies and want to learn about crowdfunding/crowdsourcing, you'll probably like this book.

[Abbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 STARS. MUST-READ IF YOU'RE AN ENTREPRENEUR!! This book is loaded not only with incredibly inspiring stories but practical tips and guides to execute your next bold idea. I love the quick, concise writing style and simplicity of big ideas. Peter Diamandis is a dreamer, and I can relate 1000%. He writes about seemingly insurmountable goals as if they are just as accessible as the grocery store. This book got me thinking and inspired me to expand my horizons and shoot for the moon.

"The day before something is truly a breakthrough, it’s a crazy idea. Trying out crazy ideas means bucking expert opinion and taking big risks. It means not being afraid to fail."

[Vince · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first part covered the landscape of innovation and the future in a terrific way. The second part felt more like a standard management tome but that said..I still learned a few things and enjoyed it.

[Sotiris Makrygiannis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will say a rather good book with lots of practical advice on how to manage a community, how to run a crowdfunding campaign and much more. As Greek, I admire Peter Diamandis, he has done so much. In fact, the star fleet academy would be the successor of his university, I believe and hope.

[Tony Aubé · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Diamandis is a fascinating individual and so is his book. The end section where he list tips and strategies on how to actually execute on your ideas was the more valuable to me.

[Thiago Lima · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terminei de ler o livro Bold - how to go big, create wealth, and impact the world, escrito por Peter Diamandis e Steven Kotler. Fui muito incentivado a ler esse livro pela Gabi. Gabi, <3 Obrigado por isso.

Os três livros, Abundance, Exponential organizations e Bold trazem a tona nessa sequência, o pensamento e ação exponencial, para que, com tecnologia, possamos impactar o mundo de forma rápida e promovendo abundância, com liderança responsável, para o bem.

O livro é dividido em três partes: Tecnologia, Mindset e Crowd. Em tecnologia ele apresenta a sequência 6Ds, que é uma reação em cadeia da progressão da tecnologia, que é um roadmap de autodesenvolvimento e sempre podem trazer oportunidades e mudanças profundas na tecnologia, que é composta por: Digitized > Deceptive > Disruptive > Demonetize > Dematerialize > Democratize. Enfatiza cinco tecnologias que estão permitindo que idéias exponenciais e empresas, governos e instituições possam mudar a sociedade rapidamente: Redes e Sensores, Computação infinita, inteligência artificial, robótica e biologia sintética. Ele também reserva uma seção especial pra falar apenas de impressão 3D.

Os autores trazem a filosofia de moonshot ideas, onde é estimulado a se pensar de forma muito ambiciosa, ponderando o risco e o fator "dá pra fazer?". Explica sobre o Flow e como conseguimos entrar no fluxo, nós e nossas equipes, e sermos muito mais produtivos e atenciosos em nossas tarefas. Mostra como os 8 princípios de inovação do Google podem fazer toda diferença, se aplicarmos a nossos projetos e empresas: Foque no usuário; compartilhe tudo; procure por ideias a todo momento; pense grande, mas comece pequeno; construa com imaginação, alimente com dados; seja uma plataforma; tenha uma missão que importa.

Os autores trazem no livro Bold uma lista de atividades e posturas (mindset) propostas por Peter, que traduzem muito a filosofia do vale do silício:

O Credo da Mente Persistente e Apaixonada
1. Se alguma coisa pode dar errado, corrija! (Para o inferno com Murphy!)
2. Quando for dada uma escolha - leve as duas!
3. Vários projetos levam a vários sucessos.
4. Comece no topo e depois suba.
5. Faça pelo livro. . . mas seja o autor!
6. Quando for forçado a se comprometer, peça mais.
7. Se você não pode ganhar, mude as regras.
8. Se você não puder alterar as regras, ignore-as.
9. Perfeição não é opcional.
10. Quando confrontado sem um desafio, invente um.
11. A palavra Não significa simplesmente começar um nível acima.
12. Não ande quando puder correr.
13. Em caso de dúvida: PENSE!
14. Paciência é uma virtude, mas a persistência ao ponto do sucesso é uma bênção.
15. A roda estridente é substituída.
16. Quanto mais rápido você se move, mais lento o tempo passa, mais você vive.
17. A melhor maneira de prever o futuro é criar você mesmo!
18. A proporção de algo para nada é infinita. Toda divisão por zero é infinita.
19. Você recebe o que você incentiva.
20. Se você acha que é impossível, então é para você.
21. Um especialista é alguém que pode dizer exatamente como algo não pode ser feito.
22. No dia anterior a "algo é um avanço", é apenas "uma ideia maluca".
23. Se fosse fácil, já teria sido feito.
24. Sem um alvo, você perderá todas as vezes.
25. Falhe cedo, falhe frequentemente, falhe para a frente!
26. Se você não puder medir, não poderá melhorá-lo.
27. O recurso mais precioso do mundo é a persistente e apaixonada mente humana.
28. A burocracia é um obstáculo a ser conquistado com persistência, confiança e um bulldozer quando necessário.

Eles trazem a história de Elon Musk, Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos e Larry Page. Cada um do seu jeito e com suas estratégias age da seguinte maneira:
1. Assumir riscos e mitigar riscos
2. Interação rápida e experimentação incessante
3. Paixão e propósito
4. Pensamento a longo prazo
5. Pensamento centrado no cliente
6. Pensamento probabilístico
7. Pensamento otimista racional
8. Confiança nos primeiros princípios, também conhecidos como verdades fundamentais

Na última seção, eles trazem insights e dicas de como montar uma comunidade bastante engajada, que luta por propósitos que unem as pessoas. Falam também sobre como estruturar concursos e engajar as pessoas a participarem de tais concursos, para criarem de forma colaborativa grandes projetos.

Eu recomendo esse livro pra meus amigos interessados em tecnologia e que trabalham em qualquer área relacionada a tecnologia. É, de fato muito inspirador.

Qual amigo já leu esse livro? Deixe comentário.

[Rey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This should have been a 5 but the fact I hit a real hard wall on the 3rd section of the book takes away from my personal experience.

Just based on its incredible topic, something was clueless about, this is an admirable book. It explains how a few people working from a garage now have the power to disrupt and literally reinvent longstanding industries. All via exponential technology.

Examples of such technologies in work include, Airbnb, a relatively recently formed organisation being valued higher than the well established worldwide Hyatt hotel chain despite not owning any property. Or Kodak going  bankrupt despite a century long monopoly on photography industry. While simultaneously, Instagram with its few employees was valued at a billion in little over 18 months and is clearly the platform for sharing photographs.

I liked the optimism, passion and excitement of the authors which filters through in the writing style. They are clearly the optimists/visionaries/dreamers that can inspire a spark in you to think big. I found it to broaden my vision and make me rethink my own impact on society.

The book is divided into 3 parts. The first explaining the new technologies set to grow exponentially such as AI, 3D printing and synthetic biology(gene editing) among others. I personally found this to be the most fascinating part of the book. 

The second is regarding the mindset required for it. Basically, the mindset not just to think and dream big but to persist. Gives examples of 4 billionaires and their mindsets. Pretty good section as well.

The third bit is regarding getting an idea into reality by harnessing the power of crowds. This 3rd part is pretty much a manual on crowdsourcing and I felt myself flagging and having to push through to really finish this. A lot of lists (who do you need to hire, what strategies to use) which is useful undoubtedly, but it felt like a different book. It was also here that I found the optimism going abit overboard, as in every fact is converted to a positive when it dosent have to be. 

Another thing I noticed, some stats which state "by 2020 we would have..." which even though written in 2015 make this feel dated already. Shows how quick technology is developing and changing the world I reckon. 

It does end on an empowering note though. Overall, its a book would recommend for an insight into the technologies, to influence you to think big, and for harnessing crowds to assist in these efforts. 

[Matthew White · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bold is a book about how any ordinary person, with a shoestring budget, can create a thriving business. The book shows the perspective and advice from a handful of extremely successful entrepreneurs, including Larry Page, Elon Musk, Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos.

The book carries a strong sense of empowerment, and inspiration, enough to make anyone want to make a difference in the world. The author also puts the reader into perspective, as there are multiple inputs towards the overall message.

The writing is easy to understand, and teaches new vocabulary related to key ideas and points, accumulating information as you go along.

Whilst the book is non-fiction, there is a range key ‘themes’ as you progress, including “Peter’s laws.” Some of my favourites are:
- “When given a choice… take both!”
- “The day before something is a breakthrough, it’s a crazy idea.”
- “If it were easy it would have been done already.”
And these are just a handful of examples to inspire the reader.

Whilst the book is great, there is one thing that could be done to make it even better. Quite often in the book, some key ideas are repeated too much, especially crowdsourcing and crowd funding.

Overall, I highly recommend this book to anyone who want to be inspired and make a revolutionary change in this world, as long as they can apply themselves and have a passion for the future.

[Rishabh Srivastava · Rating 5 out of 5]

I run a small startup, and read this book to understand what a framework for effective scaling would look like. I tend to devour startup books, and was pleasantly surprised to see that this covered very different material from what other startup books cover.

The first two sections of Bold present a 10,000 feet view of business, and discuss directional trends and meta-principles instead of concrete tactical advice. The third and last section gives great tactical advise on crowdsourcing and incentive prizes.

It a great kick up the butt for people (like myself) who already run a business, but might be thinking too small. The book contains a great deal of survivorship bias, but makes an excellent complement to other books. Would recommend reading this with Zero to One (strategy), Blitzscaling (tactics), and The Hard Thing About Hard Things (founder psychology).

[Sal · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can see why others are rating this book lower... some of the chapters focus too much on how they did their projects.

others may say, My project isn't like that, this isn't relevant. I can see that and almost gave the book 3 or 4 stars.

BUT, the dreams they are chasing are not dreams anymore... It's exactly this type of EXTRA LARGE thinking that put them in this situation. Think big, really, really big.

[Daniel M. Lozano · Rating 5 out of 5]

First half ot the book is inspiring. The second part is literally a playbook on how to use tools to create a successful project. Worth reading it.

[Edric Subur · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Thinking always ahead, thinking always of trying to do more, brings a state of mind in which nothing is impossible. The moment one gets into the ‘expert’ state of mind a great number of things become impossible.”

Key takeaways:
1. The path to bold is paved with failures so it's critical to know how to handle risks. Outstanding entrepreneurs are not only bold at risk taking but also risk mitigating

2. Going for 10x means throwing out the rule book. There’s no chance of achieving that with existing assumptions. It’d require both bravery and creativity

3. Doing 10x creates flow because flow follows focus and big risks catch our attention. We no longer have to put the effort to concentrate, flow does the job for us. Novelty, complexity and clear goals get us in the zone that breeds breakthroughs and a deep sense of fulfilment

P.S. Executing on exponential Ideas requires grit. They will go through period of deception where the growth goes mostly unnoticed. This happens because doubling of small numbers produce results so minuscule they are often mistaken for linear growth.