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"Which was Woz, the perfectionist or the pragmatist?"

Over time, I've learned that it's not always an either-or thing. Many -- perhaps most -- people are both, depending on the activity. I'm a perfectionist about writing (code and natural language), but I'm certainly not a perfectionist about fashion or cooking, for example.

That's a false dilemma. It's like this argument:

"Why is the government spending money on scientific research? Its most important job is to ensure people's safety, and dollars are scarce! Therefore, the government should put all its efforts into preventing murders, drunk driving, etc., and there should be none left for luxuries like science."

That's a false dilemma because, depending on the situation, it's possible that money spent on scientific research will improve people's welfare more than if that same money was spent on law enforcement. For example, scientific research generates advances in forensics, criminal psychology, and sociology, which can make law enforcement more effective, and also in medicine, energy, and other areas that can improve human life in fundamental ways.

You're right that we're causing a lot of problems in the third world. For example, farm subsidies make it impossible for African farmers (who can produce some crops much more cheaply) to compete with American ones. So African farmers are locked out of the market and stay poor.

It seems that ending farm subsidies is much more important than giving computers to kids. But do you realize how expensive it would be to end farm subsidies? There's an entrenched industry that will fight you every step of the way. It might be a better use of our time and effort to get computers into the hands of poor children. It's far cheaper, and it'll help those kids learn about the outside world, communicate more widely, and learn technical skills that enable a few of them to create huge amounts of wealth in the future.

Good stuff:

"When you're young, you look at television and think, There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth."

"Who cares about laptops when you have problems like that?"

It's not an either-or thing. Technology democratizes.

Yes: as consumers, we're still captive to the wireless carriers. The difference is that now we're captive to the wireless carriers on Apple's terms. That change might seem insignificant for consumers. ("Le Roi est mort. Vive le Roi!")

But the article isn't (directly) about consumers; it's about the power relationship between wireless carriers and device manufacturers. The wireless industry is "blown up" in the sense that it lost a power struggle with the manufacturers.

Remember: five years of exclusivity is virtually the only thing Apple had to offer Cingular. (Plus a tiny slice of phone and music sales, but that's not huge.) Contrary to the old system, Apple retained full control over the development and marketing of the iPhone.

C++. That way, I'll look forward to my death.

Not really. The modifications that people get today, usually of the breasts and face, are intended to enhance the visual indicators of youth and health. I don't think they're meant to signal wealth, especially since the people who get these procedures are often loath to admit it.

But there are exceptions; some people are open about their cosmetic surgeries. Perhaps some of them are (consciously or not) displaying their wealth.

I don't think tattoos and piercings are signals of wealth, usually. Most people in rich countries can afford them. Really elaborate tattoos might be an exception.

I suspect that in a world where people can have their appearances overhauled, people will display their wealth by getting expensive body-modifications.

The Economist, BBC News, Al Jazeera.

link plz??????

Yes, Taleb and Spitznagel. I don't know if that fund is still around. I couldn't find much information on it.

From "Money, Money, Money" by Philip Greenspun (http://philip.greenspun.com/materialism/money):

It is 1986. You buy yourself an IBM PC. You are using MS/DOS and say "This sucks. It isn't even as good as operating systems from 1960." You're a computer expert so you know that the technology is pathetic. You do some business research and find that out that the company making this MS/DOS product didn't even have the in-house expertise to build it itself. They bought it from another company!" You call your broker and find out that this "Microsoft" company is publicly traded and selling for a very lofty price/earnings ratio. You smell blood and say "I want to short 100 shares of Microsoft."

Your broker is holding many shares of Microsoft in "street name" for other customers. So he can very easily find 100 shares of Microsoft to lend you. He lends you these 100 shares, and you sell them immediately. Suppose that the price/share is $10. You get $1000 that you can put into the bank. However, you owe your broker 100 shares of Microsoft Corporation. No problem, you figure. In another year, this company will be near bankruptcy and selling for $0.25/share. You'll buy 100 shares to cover the short for $25, thus making a profit of $975 less commissions.

Well, in another year, Microsoft is not selling for $0.25/share. In fact, it has gone up to $30/share. You still owe the broker 100 shares, but those 100 shares would cost $3000 to buy. You have a paper loss of $2000 right now. Your broker calls and wants you to put up some assets where he can get at them, either cash or stocks. He doesn't trust you to come up with the cash to cover your Microsoft short unless the cash is physically under his control. You consider cutting your losses by closing your position. Remember that it is 1987, though, and Microsoft hasn't gotten any better at writing software. In fact, they are flailing around trying to copy the Apple Macintosh interface, itself a copy of a Xerox system from the mid-1970s. What a bunch of losers. You put up the extra cash.

By 1996, Microsoft has split a bunch of times and you now owe your broker 1000 shares at $150/share. That's $150,000 to cover the short. You sell your house and say "You know, that potential return of $1000 was not worth ten years of agonized scanning of the stock pages, margin calls, and an ultimate loss of $150,000."

Empirica Capital does (or did) something similar. Their strategy is based on the belief that securities are overvalued because investors underestimate the effects of rare catastrophes. So Empirica slowly bleeds away their investment capital by buying way-out-of-the-money put options and then waits for a catastrophe.

What a cancer. On the plus side, this might put some pressure on developers to make the XO's OS really good. But, of course, OS choice is unlikely to be based on technological quality.

Yes, I think the book explained that the team mainly recruited Asians, half-Asians, and Greeks to take advantage of the pit bosses' racial prejudices. The protagonist, for example, is supposed to be of Anglo/Chinese descent.

This reminds me of the Starship Troopers movie, where the Filipino protagonist is played by Casper Van Dien.

The book read so much like an action movie that I thought they wouldn't have to change it much to make a movie out of it. I was wrong.

"People start companies because they want to have control and impact and work on interesting things and have more ownership."

That's true. If these are the founders' main goals, they'll be less averse to raising the acquisition price or working in bigger teams. They don't even need to be a startup -- they could also be happy as an autonomous research project under the wing of a big company.

I was talking about founders hoping to get rich by selling their companies after a few years. In this case, they want the company to be small, inexpensive, and have few strings attached, to attract as many acquirers as possible.

Occasionally, two startups might be a perfect match for each other -- their combined product is far greater than the sum of the parts. In these cases, it makes sense to merge. It sounds like this is what you mean.

It seems if several startups merged into one, it wouldn't be an attractive acquisition. An acquirer might only want one subcompany, but has to buy the whole thing at a greatly increased price. Acquirers like the a-la-carte aspect of startups.

Startups do too. The founders started their company precisely because they didn't want their product to be averaged together with a bunch of others.

A strong tea, like Irish breakfast or lapsang souchong.