Derek Sivers, founder of CD Baby, discusses delegating company operations and stepping away from day-to-day management to move to California.
Insight
The 'Hell Yeah or No' rule doesn't apply when starving for opportunity
“There are other times in your career when really the most strategic thing to do is to say yes to everything because it can be like lottery tickets, you know, like if you got nothing going on and somebody's offering you an infinite amount of lottery tickets for…”
Opinion
Medium's 2.5MB payload to display text articles is 1,000x too big
“It was like, 2.5 megs of downloads, like, 33 CSS, JavaScript, and CSS files, just to display an article? No way. That's like a thousand times bigger than it needs to be.”
Insight
Simple and easy are not the same in software development
“You've now just installed thousands of complex files when yes, it would be a little harder for you to just make your own HTML page from scratch, but notice that by definition, that's simpler. So simple is not always easy.”
Insight
Business value is idea quality multiplied by execution quality
“What I wrote is that I think of ideas as a multiplier of execution, right? So let's pretend that we have two columns of numbers here. So an awful idea, let's say that's a negative one, but a weak idea is a one. An okay idea is a 10, and a great idea is a 20, o…”
Insight
Have no loyalty to locations, corporations, or past public statements
“Choose opportunity, not loyalty. Have no loyalty to location, corporation, or your past public statements. Be an absolute opportunist, doing whatever's best for the future in the current situation, unbound by the past. Have loyalty for only your most important…”
Insight
Delay decisions until the last possible moment to preserve maximum optionality
“For maximum options, don't plan at all. Since you have no idea how the situation or your mood may change in the future, wait until the last possible moment to make each decision.”