commit 72605f9eb1282e84d09ad74fdab66bc23e10fbeb
parent 67c7af14a7ec93a93ace79fd6c9d46fd7c4509d2
Author: FIGBERT <figbert@figbert.com>
Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2024 18:10:27 -0800
Add "Marc Tarpenning on Innovation" post
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+title = "Marc Tarpenning on Innovation"
+date = 2024-12-01
+[extra]
+type = "post"
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+
+I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to hear Marc Tarpenning,
+cofounder of Tesla, speak at the beginning of this quarter. It was the
+most exciting and impactful talk I've attended at Stanford thus far.
+This is really saying something.
+
+<!-- more -->
+
+In his talk, Tarpenning elucidated a theory of innovation and disruption
+that feels to me to have been "lost to time." It is a measured,
+idea-first strategy that is totally foreign to the current generation of
+startups and to a world in which "founder" is itself a career.
+
+[Sara Singer] condensed his theory into a wonderful diagram that I have
+further developed into the following list (broad principles are bolded,
+with the specific examples from Tarpenning's time at Tesla in the normal
+weight):
+
+1. **Identify a real problem. Prove it exists with real-world data.
+ Narrow down your search area by taking the age-old wisdom seriously:
+ "if something can't go on forever, it won't." Create the solution
+ that will replace it.** At Tesla, Marc and his cofounder Martin
+ Eberhard wanted to help solve the issue of climate change. The DoE
+ projected in 2008 that over 70% of U.S. oil demand came from
+ the transportation sector, and others have calculated that
+ decarbonizing road transportation "could feasibly reduce global
+ emissions by 11.9%" ([The Carbon Almanac], pp. 67). Without any
+ action, climate change would end the world. The scenario they
+ identified thus fits the above model—a problem that exists and a
+ solution that must arrive eventually. So they set out to build a car
+ without emissions.
+2. **Evaluate your solutions. Prove that it will work, mathematically,
+ before you start building. Your product cannot be better along just a
+ single-axis if you want to change people's behavior; make a [Pareto
+ improvement]. Do the hardest thing first to learn if your solution is
+ possible.** Marc and Martin evaluated two things: the technology and
+ the market. First, they exhaustively investigated possible power
+ sources before deciding that batteries had reached the right
+ power density and mass-producibility to be—provably—the most
+ effective alternative to gasoline. Even powered by coal generators,
+ an electric car is less polluting per mile than an ICE vehicle due to
+ the efficiency of the electric motor (significantly less energy
+ wasted as heat, thus more energy toward movement). On the market
+ front, they found that upper-class Americans were seeking out
+ environmentally-friendly vehicles as a status symbol—with the Prius
+ eating into Lexus sales, and GM having to physically claw back their
+ [EV1] from leasers. Without scale, their first car would be
+ expensive, but it being the only vehicle to truly satisfy this niche
+ meant if the tech worked they would find buyers. Finally, their
+ solution wasn't just technically better for customers with its
+ radical efficiency: it was fun, sexy. The rise of electric cars has
+ made them feel normal, but Tarpenning described the "electric smile,"
+ a meme they threw around at Tesla in the early days to describe the
+ reaction that drivers had from the very first moment they pressed the
+ pedal and felt the instant torque.
+3. **Change the world. The shape of progress is not inevitable, we make
+ it. [Success is assured only in retrospect.][jobs]** Tarpenning
+ advocated for a goal of "sustainable abundance," forged from a fusion
+ of technological advancement, government buy-in, and behavioral
+ change.
+
+A lot of software businesses have none of these qualities.
+
+[Sara Singer]: https://profiles.stanford.edu/sara-singer
+[Pareto improvement]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_efficiency
+[The Carbon Almanac]: https://thecarbonalmanac.org
+[EV1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1
+[jobs]: https://youtu.be/UF8uR6Z6KLc?feature=shared&t=269
