the nerd

when the following job description comprises the most exciting 140 characters you read all day
"Be able to speak engineering, UX, design, analytics and finance. Sometimes, be ready to speak all of the above in the space of fifteen minutes."

first mover advantage

textbooks at management schools teach you that the market is a "first come, first served" kind of place for companies. that innovators and pioneers will rise to success above all others.

reality reads differently. steve jobs (/apple) announced the iPod to the market at a time when mp3 players had long tried to drive the discman (or its 1990's equivalent, the walkman) out of the market. a similar story could be told about the iPad and the myriad of tablets that preceded it.

oliver samwer, founder & ceo of rocket internet, has built an entire company on the premise that the textbooks are wrong, and backs his strategy with the fact that a number of the largest companies in the world did not invent their business models. by believing that if a business model has never been attempted before then it is unlikely to succeed, rocket has built a strength in optimizing risk to drive serial success. the modus operandi is hence to take good ideas and leverage on the company's execution capabilities and impressive access to capital.

the list is endless - which makes one wonder how library-based education stacks up to the cliché-d school of life. as we rethink the way that content is delivered to students, might be worthwhile allocating some headspace to the discussion around the content itself and how we can move that closer to real life.

obby

once in a blue moon, something you wish for comes true.

rewind to summer of 2015: while looking for a photography class in london, my excitement with the idea of learning something new quickly turned into frustration. of not finding the right class. in the closest location. at the best price. oh, yes, and it would have to be on a weekend. so, simple enough, i say.

the reason being i wanted to be able to take those pictures that make magazine covers - or, at the very least, a cool tube add (and i eventually did - case in point below).

fast forward to 2016, and last thursday in particular: my mission impossible just moved to the field of real life. three lovely gents (with a surprising love for emoticons) launched https://obby.co/. not only does it look awesome, but most importantly it is a seamless way to find and book the best live classes / courses / workshops in the great city of london. oh, and it's completely free! not to mention the sharing-is-caring discount codes when you spread the love.

(to book the best london classes, check out https://obby.co/)

video games know best?

"Here's the thing, kid: we don't get to choose how we start in this life. 
Real greatness is what you do with the hand you're dealt."

(Victor Sullivan in Uncharted)

so they said this job opened doors...?

literally

(taken from here)

on 2015

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

(Charles Dickens, in A Tale of Two Cities)