H O W T O T H I N K A B O U T
TheFuture
A G E N D A
Disruption•
Exponential Advancement•
How Unicorns Think•
Virtual Reality & Artificial Intelligence•
What Does All This Mean?•
What You Can Do Now
Education (like
media!) is ripe for disruption
• Information Technologies (of all kinds) double their power (price performance, capacity, bandwidth) every year
• We’re seeing this also translate over to communication technologies
• Progress over the next two decades will see greater gains than we’ve had in the previous two hundred years
Exponential Advancement
Peter Thiel’s Formula
- Make incremental advances- Stay lean and flexible- Improve on the competition- Focus on the product not sales
- Better to risk boldness than triviality
- A bad plan is better than no plan
- Competitive markets destroy profits
- Sales matter just as much as profits
How Unicorns think
Old New
zero to 1OLD 1 to n = horizontal
progress (copying things that work)
NEW 0 to 1. Make vertical progress (do new things)
Competition is overrated.Competition means no profits for anybody, no meaningful differentiation, and a struggle for survival.
NETWORK EFFECTS ECONOMIES OF SCALE
BRANDINGPROPRIETARY TECHNOLOGY
Build Monopolies
Don’t disrupt. Get the last mover
advantage.Make the last great development in a specific market and
enjoy years of monopoly profits.
To Become a Billionaire, Help a
Billion People. Technology is
democratizing the power to change the
world.- Peter Diamandis
A student learning about dinosaurs in the Jurassic period won’t have to just read about it in a textbook – they’ll be able to put on a VR headset and literally explore the VR equivalent of Jurassic Park.
Imagine This…
Students studying physics will be able to “step inside” a virtual environment where the build (and destroy) huge structures, fly through planets and stand next to Isaac Newton as he discovers the laws of motion.
Imagine This…
A virtual version of the world’s best history professor delivers a personalised lesson at a pace and language best suited to every student.
Imagine This…
What does this mean?Rapidly iterate and ceaselessly experiment until you get it rightThink about what you want to own and where you can partner
Emphasise a customer-centric approachRely on fundamental truths
Be a rational optimistThink in probabilities
Think long-term
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