What nerds miss is that it takes hard work to make sales look easy. Peter Thiel More Quotes by Peter Thiel More Quotes From Peter Thiel Most people are average. Founders are not. Founders' traits seem to have an inverse normal distribution to them. Peter Thiel normal average people Competition is overrated. In practice it is quite destructive and should be avoided wherever possible. Much better than fighting for scraps in existing markets is to create and own new ones. Peter Thiel competition fighting practice In a world where wealth is growing, you can get away with printing money. Doubling the debt over the next 20 years is not a problem. Peter Thiel printing-money debt years People don't want to believe that technology is broken. Pharmaceuticals, robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology - all these areas where the progress has been a lot more limited than people think. And the question is why. Peter Thiel technology believe thinking One of the reasons I think people are increasingly nervous about U.S. debt is because they think that we are not actually digging ourselves out of the hole, but instead are digging ourselves into a deeper and deeper hole and will not be able to pay it back because we're not actually creating the new technologies that will enable us to pay back and the money somehow is not really being invested in the future or in progress. Peter Thiel creating technology thinking No company has a culture; every company is a culture. Peter Thiel company culture There is perhaps no specific time that is necessarily right to start your company or start your life. But some times and some moments seem more auspicious than others. Now is such a moment. If we don’t take charge and usher in the future - if you don’t take charge of your life - there is the sense that no one else will. Peter Thiel company moments seems Thinking about how disturbingly herdlike people become in so many different contexts - mimetic theory forces you to think about that, which is knowledge that's generally suppressed and hidden. As an investor-entrepreneur, I've always tried to be contrarian, to go against the crowd, to identify opportunities in places where people are not looking. Peter Thiel opportunity people thinking If the slogan for Google is 'Don't be evil', then the slogan for Uber is 'Do a little bit of evil & don't get caught.' Peter Thiel google uber evil Big part of the challenge to innovation is that people too easily resign themselves to dying. Peter Thiel innovation challenges people All Rhodes Scholars had a great future in their past. Peter Thiel great-future scholar past If they don't go to law school, bright college graduates head to Wall Street precisely because they have no real plan for their careers. Peter Thiel wall real school We might describe our world as having retail sanity, but wholesale madness. Peter Thiel retail our-world might What important truth do very few people agree with you on? Peter Thiel agree important people Every tech story is different. Every moment in history happens only once. All successful companies are successful in their own unique way. It's your task to figure out what that future history will be. Peter Thiel unique successful way You'll attract the employees you need if you can explain why your mission is compelling: not why it's important in general, but why you're doing something important that no one else is going to get done. Peter Thiel important leadership needs The developing world can just do things that are extensive or horizontal, that basically copy. The developed world needs to do things that are intensive or vertical, where we take our civilization to the next level. Peter Thiel next-level civilization needs Technology and capitalism are very much linked. I think that capitalism probably works best in a technologically progressing society. Peter Thiel progress technology thinking We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters. Peter Thiel flying-cars wanted character I believe we are in a world where innovation in stuff was outlawed. It was basically outlawed in the last 40 years - part of it was environmentalism, part of it was risk aversion. Peter Thiel risk believe years
