
Bold: How to Go Big, Make Bank, and Better the World
Posted by jack_miller | Published 9 months ago

With 582 ratings
By: Peter H. Diamandis, Steven Kotler, et al.
Purchased At: $17.00
Bold is a radical, how-to guide for using exponential technologies, moonshot thinking, and crowd-powered tools to create extraordinary wealth while also positively impacting the lives of billions.
Exploring the exponential technologies that are disrupting today's Fortune 500 companies and enabling upstart entrepreneurs to go from "I've got an idea" to "I run a billion-dollar company" far faster than ever before, the authors provide exceptional insight into the power of 3-D printing, artificial intelligence, robotics, networks and sensors, and synthetic biology. Drawing on insights from billionaire entrepreneurs Larry Page, Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Jeff Bezos, the audiobook offers the best practices that allow anyone to leverage today's hyper connected crowd like never before. The authors teach how to design and use incentive competitions, launch million-dollar crowdfunding campaigns to tap into tens of billions of dollars of capital, and build communities - armies of exponentially enabled individuals willing and able to help today's entrepreneurs make their boldest dreams come true.
Bold is both a manifesto and a manual. It is today's exponential entrepreneur's go-to resource on the use of emerging technologies, thinking at scale, and the awesome impact of crowd-powered tools.
I would say that any entreprenuer who study this book thoroughly, and go deep into all examples that provided, also see how those companies are doing these days, can not go wrong in their business venture.
I salute the time and effort of the authors who dedicated such knowledge to the world.
There are three parts to the book. Part One covers exponential technology. If you're familiar with AirBnB, and have read an article on Artificial Intelligence, most of this will not be new information to you. Part Two covers the mindset of bold leaders. If you have never read an article about Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk or Richard Branson, you can find those here. Part Three is entirely related to crowdsourcing and crowdfunding. If you have working knowledge of 99Designs, Kiva, or Kickstarter, you're probably all set.
This book is trying very hard to do everything and does not succeed. In fact there are a few blatant errors along the way. On page 126 the authors highlight a glass bottom plane as an industry "first." How did an April Fool's joke make it into this book as fact? They also repeat the same quotation within a few pages of each other. "This isn't just plumbing and pest control. We've got PhDs on the site. I've seen both quantum physics and aerospace jobs handled perfectly." This snippet appears both on page 150 and 158. Who edited this book?
I am a firm believer that in this life I should aim to contribute, rather than criticize. I suppose my contribution is to you, a potential reader, to strongly consider if this book is what you are looking for before you add it to your cart.
Plain-English explanations of how technology giants like Lockheed Martin's Skunkworks and Google tap ideas and make them work are in this book. Understanding of how to slide into a state of flow and make it work for you is there. How to utilize platforms of social media to get instant feedback on ideas and therefore rapidly evolve and improve them is right there. Seriously. This is a how-to-take-over-the-world guide for entrepreneurs that can be read and understood by a 12 year old wearing headphones.
If you are thinking of starting a business that could shake up the status-quo and possibly change the world (never mind starting an Etsy page, I'm talking moonshots here), then this book needs to be in your collection. And I don't just mean taking up space in a bookshelf. No. This book should be dogeared and scuffed; sitting atop your coffee table right next to your dried out highlighter and your plans for the next big thing to benefit humanity. And if you read this book and it doesn't radically redirect and focus your ambition, then you are either already a millionaire reading what you already know, or your copy was accidentally shipped without ink. Which I'm sure Amazon would happily replace.
David Harder - President, Inspired Work & Workskunk
Reading this gave me ideas and inspired me to move forward with my own entrepreneurial endeavours whilst giving me an insight to the great minds of the most exciting and modern powerhouses such as Larry Page, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg. The book has a lot of useful advice for upcoming entrepreneurs and people interested in emerging technologies and the use of crowdfunding platforms to enable their visions.
Overall there is a lot useful advice, processes and learnings from two very influential and knowledgable individuals. The price of their insights is worth the money you will pay for the book
Good energy throughout with a fantastic narrative a must read.
Recommend it