on competition
I've been asked many times some variation of the question "how do you deal with the competition?" There are many answers to this question; in this essay, I want to give one: wait until they die .
Befriending the Goon Squad · Applied Cartography
Gause’s principle (evolution): Two species that coexist and compete for limited resources cannot continue at constant populations – one will eventually push the other into extinction or weakness. It’s the same in business: Without some sort of differentiating edge, companies that directly compete against one another often resemble a death match. I
... See moreMorgan Housel • One Big Web: A Few Ways the World Works
Play your own game where no one can compete with you
Tony Sheng • #07 - Erik Torenberg thinks we should build career moats
The ultimate competitive advantage is actually giving a shit about the problem you're working on. When Airbnb had just a few dozen employees, Rocket Internet raised $90 million and hired hundreds of people to clone and crush them.
Stew Fortier • Tweet
millions of dollars of funding can't compete with a company having a soul
I think the first point of treating competitors with an ordinary mind is to see competition as the norm. Don't try to escape the competition, it's a good thing. I don't even think that competition should be ended by doing M&A. We see a lot of companies that eliminate their rivals through M&A becoming complacent and end up slacking off.
Zhang Yiming • Zhang Yiming’s Last Speech: Part II
Of course, we should also keep in mind "do not compete for the sake of competition". Sometimes, after a prolonged period of competition, the only goal becomes simply beating the competitor. For example, in the Microsoft-Google competition, Microsoft for a long time saw defeating Google as its goal, and invested heavily in search. It wasn't until a
... See moreZhang Yiming • Zhang Yiming’s Last Speech: Part II
“Traditional competition forces us to take on an attitude of winning. A Worthy Rival inspires us to take on an attitude of improvement. The former focuses our attention on the outcome, the latter focuses our attention on process. That simple shift in perspective immediately changes how we see our own businesses. It is the focus on process and
... See moregreat advice on writing that applies to life as well:
“No one will ever write in just the way that you do, or in just the way that anyone else does. Because of this fact, there is no real competition between writers. What appears to be competition is actually nothing more than jealousy and gossip. Writing is a matter strictly of developing oneself.
... See moreBrian at Reforge says: One of my strong beliefs is that startups should rarely think about competitors and most should think about alternatives. Alternatives are the other ways your target audience are solving the problem today. If you focus on competitors, you are likely to make three critical mistakes: 1. You Will Lack Differentiation - When
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