Remarkable Reading #34: VALLEY OF THE GODS: A Silicon Valley Story by Alexandra Wolfe and Patrick Dixon's FUTUREWISE - SIX FACES OF GLOBAL CHANGE

The aim of this section Remarkable Reading is pay a tribute to the books that taught, share trends & insights into where our world in the 21st century is heading in a technology enabled world, and ask the right questions.

Bolded and italics quotes and references do not belong to myself  and belong directly to the author.  The focus is to share valuable insights and teachings from the book to win business for the authors.

Two Trends:

1) Further exploratory trends & trajectories in terms of what makes Silicon Valley unique

2) Implications & impact of the Internet of Things on the economy and commerce on a global scale (carrying on further from here and here)

Alexandra Wolfe’s  VALLEY OF THE GODS: A Silicon Valley Story has a influential and dominating impact for fans of start-up entrepreneurialism and innovation.

It stays refreshing because the teachings and trends are applicable to multiple markets.  What traditionally isn’t respected in common marketplaces, failure, is respected and applauded in Silicon Valley because it illustrates that you’ve tried, and are a risk-taker.

Wolfe’s writing style is memorable for her humorous honesty and revealing observations.

A few further take-out’s include:

Page 2 - “The old boys looked at the internet from the outside in and wondered what was the big deal. The digital age’s children didn’t have to look at it.  It was in their innards. They were visionary puppies who realized that the Internet would become the world’s first great new industry in a half century - created, developed, operated, and, more important, owned by children.  it had the potential to make television and nuclear power look like relics”

Page 9 - “He’s thirty-two and looks twenty.  Youth is a must for the new breed; they go to great lengths to appear young”

Page 14 - “In San Francisco, most children of the elite families go to one of a handful of private schools, but in Silicon Valley, most tech parents, including venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, send their kids to the alternative Nueva School (and so did the late Steve Jobs).

Page 32 - “That afternoon, Thiel was explaining enthusiastically that young people would do better to educate themselves as opposed to pay to enroll in a four-year institution.  “All great entrepreneurs have a passion about education and self-education,” he projected to the group of fifty or so professors, entrepreneurs, investors, and friend in the Hyatt conference room. “It’s never too early to begin”. Higher education, he said, was a distraction from thinking about what to actually do in life”

Page 34 - “We're not looking for the next Facebook - we’re looking for people who are thinking two to ten years beyond what the rest of the world thinks is possible today”

Page 64 - “In the start-up, making a wild, bold, bad decision -even if it resulted in catastrophic failure - was a resume builder”

Page 143 - “Many of those who were married didn’t talk about their husbands much,.  They didn't want to be the “wife of”. Successful women in Silicon Valley wanted to be known as such in their own right”

Page 162 - “There he works on enhancing human capability through technology.  He believes he will live forever”

Page 228 - “In some respects, belief in artificial intelligence capabilities was divided into evolutionary AI and humanistic AI.  Evolutionary artificial intelligence aficionados believes that machines would take over humans; that men and women were innately weak and full of imperfections, and that eventually a smarter, more intelligent machine would replace our meek human capabilities and guilt-ridden consciences (for such crimes as environmental degradation, violence, sexism) and make our species more effective and enlightened”

Page 227 - “There were those who believed humans would “evolve”into machines-like creatures - cyborgs - enhanced by technology and cognitive functions.  Then there were those who shared the humanistic view, in which humans used technology to make themselves better humans, even more human”

Page 231 - “Kurzweil believed that people would eventually stay young, ideally around age thirty, four hundreds of years.  He conceded that living around age thirty, four hundreds of years.  He conceded that living that way could get boring, so he explained away that phenomenon by saying that along with inevitable radical life extension would come radical life expansion, with new experiences, knowledge, music, and literature.  Her thought artificial intelligence would enable us to  make our lives into our own hands with endless choices that would go forever”

Page 237 - “If humans had built computers to be helpers of humanity, he thought, he never would have had to restart his old company to make them more intuitive”

Page 247 - “She also noticed that the conversation about human interaction, compatibility, and emotion had increased over the course of five years of the fellowship - and had come a greater concern throughout Silicon Valley in general”

Page 252 - “Just as the idea of romantic love changed marriage from a duty to something you were supposed to be passionate about, Silicon Valley changed work from something that was a routine part of life in order to make money and support a family, to something that was now expected to be exhilarating and fun”

Patrick Dixon's FUTUREWISE - SIX FACES OF GLOBAL CHANGE is an exemplary, future-focused business book that has real insight, perception, knowledge, wisdom and understanding about the top technical trends emerging in the 21st century.  The most exciting things about Patrick Dixon’s  FUTUREWISE - SIX FACES OF GLOBAL CHANGE is the author's ability to connect us to multiple fast-emerging themes in technology, explain what the change is, and what the impact is on us.  A truly superlative and spectacular read that is to be revisited despite being over a decade since it was written.  It’s particular focus on the economic trends on a global scale within the Indian, Chinese and emerging Southeast Asian markets proves yet again that Patrick Dixon is an author who is knowing and realized in terms of the strengths that create a strong world economy.

Top take-out’s include”:

Introduction: Xii “Many of the things that I expected are already history, such as: rapid growth of tribe and state sponsored terrorism, loss of civil liberties as a result, new viral threats, growing protests against globalisation, Internet replacing phones, the rapid rise of China, growth of London, rise of single issue activism, demand for stronger ethics, recycling as a way of life, growth of Islam as a political force, the online retail revolution, economic and commodity price instability, growth of reality TV shows, chips fused with brain tissues, advances in human cloning, designer babies, global agreement on carbon trading as a response to growing anxiety about climate change, rioting in France over pensions and strains in Europe following the euro, prior to enlargement”

Introduction: Xv - “Expect third millennial fashion, clothes, radio, television, culture, music, art & social codes.  The real winners will be those who tap into this huge shift - and help define it. What television producer wants to produce second millennial TV? What clothes designer dare risk his or her annual collection being labelled as a rehash of tired late twentieth century fashions? Every creative talent will be focused on trying to interpret what the third millennium means.  Expect to see radical shifts by 2020 in every aspect of art & culture with eccentricity pushed to the limits of every extreme, before settling into a third millennial rhythm of life”

Introduction Xv1 - “...not driven merely by culture clashes, the greatest forces will be unleashed by clashes of conscience influenced by strong religious conviction, or lack of it”

Introduction Xviii - “Economic growth is the centre of every government strategy, yet in the third millennium expect rapid economic growth as a universal goal will be increasingly questioned by activist groups in the wealthiest nations.  Growth means more things, greater wealth, but does it mean greater happiness?  If quality of life means being happy and fulfilled, what is the secret of it all? Since the very wealthy show little or no sign of being any happier than lesser mortals on modest incomes, this is a fundamental question”

Introduction Xviii - “Economic growth is clearly vital to the poorest nations, to provide food, clean water, education, clean water, better health care, and other things. However, the real human need for relentless growth in material wealth of those in the most affluent nations will be increasingly debated, especially in terms of costs to future generations from overconsumption and environmental damage”

Introduction Xviii - “ The future is uncertain and many possibilities are alarming, but I’m an optimist, convinced by the potential of science, medicine & technology, and the capacity of human beings to build a better kind of world.  But the way ahead will not be easy, being beset with moral challenges, economic and geopolitical instability, resource limitations and consequences of climate change”

Chapter 1 - Page 1 - “The first face of the future is FAST: speed will be everything.  Never before has the future so rapidly become the past for so many people.  History is changing faster than you can calculate a risk or exploit an opportunity, whether you look at trends in the economy, global events, industry, social factors, politics or share prices”

Chapter 1 - Page 6 - “Management theory is still an immature, inexact and unproven semi-science.  Expect that to gradually change over the next two decades as rigorous statistical and analytical tools are devised to try to provide or disprove the key elements of success in management methods”

Chapter 1- Page 7  - “Tomorrow’s technology is next week’s dinosaur.  The trouble is that most companies are obsessed with pushing accepted technology to the limits, when the greatest long-term threat or opportunity could come from a technology or innovation which is so different that very few take it seriously today”

Chapter 1 - Page 9- “Expect a continued boom in wireless technology in all the poorest nations”

Chapter 1 - Page 10 - “Location-sensitive technology will unleash new innovations to direct users to local services”

Chapter 1 - Page 11 - “Expect manufacturers to pack ever more digital gadgets in single devices in the race to the top on capability and to the bottom on price and distinctiveness. Expect big confusion as to what tomorrow’s consumers will actually want and about how younger and older people will behave.  The end result will be a loss of focus about strategy, design and innovation.  The real winners will be those who can beat competition on price with identical multi-function products, or those who innovate in creative ways to be different”

Chapter 1 - page 20 “The privileged will accelerate ahead leaving a digital underclass far behind.  But some in wealthy countries will totally reject the digital world - refusing mobile phones or e-mail”

Chapter 1, page 23 - “Next generation e-voting in every home will enable instant referenda on important issues and will be used in national elections”

Chapter 1, page 24 - “TV ads will work in the future only if they are entertaining or informative”

Chapter 1, page 24 - “Passive viewing is being replaced by much more inventive searching for what to watch.  That’s where Web TV will score highest of all: total choice.  Instant access to 500,000 programmes on TV in high definition will soon be a reality as the BBC digitises its entire archive.  Expect TV, movies, music, words and software to be pirated at an unprecedented scale despite every effort of copyright holders.  This will affect revenues and profits”

Chapter 1- page 27 - “The only way to adapt to a changing world is to keep learning”

Chapter 1 - page 24 - “Expect fresh thinking about what high school is for: preparation for a fulfilled life”

Patrick Dixon’s is a unique, gifted, precise, descriptive and patient writer who knows how to accurately cover multiple angles with potent detail. Do not forget to revisit FUTUREWISE - SIX FACES OF GLOBAL CHANGE.

You can follow Alexandra Wolfe on Twitter here and purchase a copy of VALLEY OF THE GODS: A Silicon Valley Story here.



You can follow Patrick Dixon - futurist on Twitter here, follow him on Google plus here, visit his website here, purchase a copy of FUTUREWISE - SIX FACES OF GLOBAL CHANGE here.

Thank you,

Prashant aka Praz
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