"Developers are like the honey badger. They don’t care. They go where the money is, and to create revenue-generating experiences they created apps. Millions of apps to encapsulate experiences in bite-sized, constantly updated little nuggets. We need the same kinds of building blocks for the IoE. Durable and useful building blocks that allow an ecosystem to bloom because developers and manufacturers can create experiences knowing that these building blocks are available for their use. And consumers must feel confident that their investments represent sustained value. So any such building blocks need to be openly available and interoperate on many dimensions: across OSes, across fields of use (car/home/office/mobile), across languages—and across all vendors. It can’t be the experience that each smart TV will require another app on every brand of smartphone in order to work. That won’t create an ecosystem. It can’t be that a washing machine can only interact with same-brand devices. That won’t create an ecosystem."

"The primary thing that any technology startup must do is build a product that’s at least 10 times better at doing something than the current prevailing way of doing that thing. Two or three times better will not be good enough to get people to switch to the new thing fast enough or in large enough volume to matter. The second thing that any technology startup must do is to take the market. If it’s possible to do something 10X better, it’s also possible that you won’t be the only company to figure that out. Therefore, you must take the market before somebody else does. Very few products are 10X better than the competition, so unseating the new incumbent is much more difficult than unseating the old one."

"We can’t realize our potential unless we plan for the long term."

"When making a point, humor should be the garnish, not the entrée."

"There’s no better way to force a conversation about what your team values than to write your four-word story. Pinterest: Organize everything you love. Facebook: Connect with loved ones. Google: Easily find useful information. Twitter: Instantly connect people everywhere."

"The smartest people are constantly revising their understanding, reconsidering a problem they thought they’d already solved. They’re open to new points of view, new information, new ideas, contradictions, and challenges to their own way of thinking. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a well formed point of view, but it means you should consider your point of view as temporary. What trait signified someone who was wrong a lot of the time? Someone obsessed with details that only support one point of view. If someone can’t climb out of the details, and see the bigger picture from multiple angles, they’re often wrong most of the time."

"What matters is: Are you profitable? Are you building something great? Are you taking care of your people? Are you treating your customers well? In the coverage of our industry as a whole, you’ll rarely see stories about treating customers well, about people building a sustainable business."

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You have to know more about more things.

Because we can’t beat the brain’s hardwiring, we’ve got to train it by routinely introducing new information, people, settings, sensations, and experiences in order to expand our databank of memories. In this way, we create more flexible and varied mental models that our brains can use to fill in the blanks of the future. With a richer store of memories, we are able to imagine a vast range of possibilities, appreciate the web of factors affecting a given issue, and make more of the associative links that prompt consideration of different scenarios. This is your best defense against—and preparation for—unforeseen events and opportunities that will likely impact your business.

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