Author: LINUS FERNANDES
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Charlie Munger: Better managers
“I think the corporate types — the corporate managers — ought to study investing better because they’d be better managers. And I think that everyone who thinks through the investment process learns more about how the world really works. And I think that’s very worth having.” —Charlie Munger.
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John Neal: Kites
“A certain amount of opposition is a great help to a man. Kites rise against, not with, the wind.” —John Neal.
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Andy Hunt: Choose your technologies wisely
“Be careful to preserve the orthogonality of your system as you introduce third-party toolkits and libraries. Choose your technologies wisely.” —Andy Hunt.
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Brian Halligan: Consensus
‘For a long time, I looked for consensus. I think consensus is really the enemy of scale, and so I used to say, “Whenever we’re making an important decision, there should be winners in the room and losers. We shouldn’t find that negotiated settlement that everyone is happy with. Somebody should be unhappy, three or…
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George Matthew Adams: Made up of thousands of others
‘There is no such thing as a “self-made” man. We are made up of thousands of others. Everyone who has ever done a kind deed for us, or spoken one word of encouragement to us, has entered into the make-up of our character and of our thoughts.’ —George Matthew Adams.
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Steve Jobs: Storyteller
“The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller. The storyteller sets the vision, values and agenda of an entire generation that is to come.”— Steve Jobs.
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Ray Bradbury: Stories
“My stories run up and bite me in the leg — I respond by writing them down — everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.” —Ray Bradbury.
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Daniel Kahneman: They need a story
“No one ever made a decision because of a number. They need a story.”— Daniel Kahneman.
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Alicia Witt: Weird
‘I have no respect for people who deliberately try to be weird to attract attention, but if that’s who you honestly are, you shouldn’t try to “normalize” yourself.’ —Alicia Witt.
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Steve Jobs: Innovation
“Process makes you more efficient. But innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about a problem. It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks…
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George D Aiken: Prejudice by noon
“If we were to wake up some morning and find that everyone was the same race, creed, and color, we would find some other cause for prejudice by noon.” —George D. Aiken.
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Bertrand Russell: Rational animal
“It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this.” —Bertrand Russell.
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Mary Doria Russell: Read to children
“Read to children. Vote. And never buy anything from a man who’s selling fear.” —Mary Doria Russell.
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Dr. Who: Childish sometimes
“There’s no point in being grown up if you can’t be childish sometimes.” —Dr. Who.
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Seneca: Follow patterns
“You must go to the scene of action, first, because men put more faith in their eyes than in their ears, and second, because the way is long if one follows precepts, but short and helpful, if one follows patterns.” —Seneca.
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Warren Buffett: Inoculation
“With some, the idea of buying dollar bills for forty cents takes, and with some it doesn’t take. It’s like an inoculation. It’s extraordinary to me. If it doesn’t grab them right away, I find that you can talk to them for years and show them records—you can do everything—and it just doesn’t make any…
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Jean de la Bruyere: High birth
“It is fortunate to be of high birth, but it is no less so to be of such character that people do not care to know whether you are or are not.” —Jean de la Bruyere.
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Adrian Cockcroft: Get out of the way
“Get out of the way of your developers or lose them to someone who will.” —Adrian Cockcroft.
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John Galsworthy: Untidy
“The beginnings and endings of all human undertakings are untidy.” —John Galsworthy.
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Rakesh Jhunjhunwala: When opportunities come
“When opportunities come, they can come through technology, marketing, brands, value protections, capital, etc. You need to be able to spot those.” —Rakesh Jhunjhunwala.
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Linus Torvalds: Open source science
“I often compare open source to science. Science took this whole notion of developing ideas in the open and improving on other peoples’ ideas – making it into what science is today and the incredible advances that we have had. And I compare that to witchcraft and alchemy, where openness was something you didn’t do.”…
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Lillie Devereux Blake: Trained in gender roles
“People share a common nature but are trained in gender roles.” —Lillie Devereux Blake.
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Warren Buffett: Control your emotions
“Anything that causes people to get wildly enthusiastic or wildly depressed, actually, is what allows people to make lots of money in securities…. It doesn’t make sense to have that much volatility in the market, but humans behave the way humans behave, and they’re going to continue to behave that way in the next 50…
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Rainn Wilson: Hopeful, positive and proactive
“It’s way easier to be negative, sarcastic, and cynical. It’s much harder to be hopeful, positive, and proactive.” —Rainn Wilson.
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Charlie Munger: Search expenses
“The search expenses that brought us Ajit Jain, now there was an investment that really paid a dividend. I can think of no higher return investment that we’ve ever made that was better than that one. And I think that’s a good life lesson. In other words, getting the right people into your system can…
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Anthony Haden-Guest: Secrets
“Of course I can keep secrets. It’s the people I tell them to that can’t keep them.” —Anthony Haden-Guest.
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Howard Marks: Widespread belief
“There are few things as risky as the widespread belief that there’s no risk, because it’s only when investors are suitably risk-averse that prospective returns will incorporate appropriate risk premiums.” —Howard Marks.
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Adrian Tchaikovsky: No life at all
“A life lived entirely at the whim of another is no life at all.” —Adrian Tchaikovsky.
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Richard Hofstadter: Mood of a society
“One of the primary tests of the mood of a society at any given time is whether its comfortable people tend to identify, psychologically, with the power and achievements of the very successful or with the needs and sufferings of the underprivileged.” —Richard Hofstadter.
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Wendell Berry: Downstream upstream
“Do unto those downstream as you would have those upstream do unto you.” —Wendell Berry.
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Fred Miller: Worst speech
“The worst speech you will ever give, will be far better than the one you never give.” —Fred Miller.
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William James: Uncertified result
“It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all. And often enough our faith beforehand in an uncertified result is the only thing that makes the result come true.” —William James.
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Bertrand Meyer: Software quality or pointer arithmetic
“You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time.” —Bertrand Meyer.
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H L Mencken: Imagination over intelligence
“Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.” —H. L. Mencken.
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Mother Jones: United States Senator
“I asked a man in prison once how he happened to be there and he said he had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him if he had stolen a railroad he would be a United States Senator.” —Mother Jones (Mary Harris Jones).
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John Hall: Means of grace
“Kind words, kind looks, kind acts, and warm hand-shakes, — these are means of grace when men in trouble are fighting their unseen battles.” —John Hall.
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Howard Marks: Fifth psychological influence
“The fifth psychological influence is envy. However negative the force of greed might be, always spurring people to strive for more and more, the impact is even stronger when they compare themselves to others. This is one of the most harmful aspects of what we call human nature. People who might be perfectly happy with…
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Emily Bronte: Sufficient company in himself
“I am now quite cured of seeking pleasure in society, be it country or town. A sensible man ought to find sufficient company in himself.” —Emily Bronte.
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Guy Kawasaki: Polarize people
“Don’t be afraid to polarize people. Most companies want to create the holy grail of products that appeals to every demographic, social-economic background, and geographic location. To attempt to do so guarantees mediocrity. Instead, create great products that make segments of people very happy. And fear not if these products make other segments unhappy. The…
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Don Marquis: Human wandering through the zoo
“human wandering through the zoo / what do your cousins think of you.” —Don Marquis.
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Howard Marks: I just don’t know which one
“If there is a bunch of real estate funds formed this year, somebody who puts all of their money into office, and somebody who puts none of their money into office—one of them will be the best performer. I just don’t know which one.” —Howard Marks.
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Grady Booch: Function of good software
“The function of good software is to make the complex appear to be simple.”—Grady Booch.
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Georg Lichtenberg: In love with himself
“He who is in love with himself has at least this advantage — he won’t encounter many rivals.” —Georg Lichtenberg.
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Linus Torvalds: Data structures and their relationships
“Bad programmers worry about the code. Good programmers worry about data structures and their relationships.” —Linus Torvalds.
