Tom Schmidt

Why We Want Robots at Work but Humans in Art

We hate other people when latency becomes intolerable. As soon as a task is about speed, other humans feel like an irritating inconvenience. The Uber driver’s small talk annoys us. We wish we were in a Waymo. The cashier’s tip screen feels like a micro-ransom when all we want is a bottle of water.... See more

“The customer is the only one who lives the problem. Everyone else is just commentating from the sidelines.”

Energy without imagination is force. Energy with imagination is persistence.

People are frugal in guarding their personal property; but as soon as it comes to squandering time, they are most wasteful of the one thing in which it is right to be stingy.

— Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

"Once you've started, you're halfway there."

Mozi Money Minute : The 3-7-30 Method

Most businesses get leads. Then, follow up 1-2 times. Then, stop. But the majority of customers don’t buy that fast. Meaning, by only following up 1-2 times, you are losing probably half of your sales or more. People just need more information to make a purchase. But, most businesses don’t know how to follow up... See more

Practice until you get it right, and you'll need perfect conditions.

Practice until you can't get it wrong, and conditions no longer matter.

There comes a point where a person goes from "old enough to know better" to "too old to know better."

On change: We unconsciously adopt narratives about the shape of our lives from previous generations, movie plots, and our peers. These “scripts” are often useful but tend to outlive their purpose as we age. Much of life is about figuring out which stories to discard as you age.