The black swan is Nassim Taleb’s best-known idea, and the subject of his book of the same name. As Taleb points out, this simple little error of reasoning trips up experts every day, especially in the realm of finance. No-one can predict the inherently unpredictable. All the prior data might produce a lovely trendline that can be extrapolated out f

Where others assumed Friendster was yet another example of a social network fad, Thiel and Howery investigated more deeply why users were leaving and found a contrarian answer, in which they had confidence. Contrarian answers, with confidence, create very attractive investments.