Taste for Makers

I was talking recently to a friend who teaches at MIT. His field is hot now and every year he is inundated by applications from would-be graduate students. “A lot of them seem smart,” he said. “What I can’t tell is whether they have any kind of taste.” Taste. You don’t hear that word much now. And yet we still need the underlying concept, whatever we call it. What my friend meant was that he wanted students who were not just good technicians, but who could use their technical knowledge to design beautiful things.

Source: Paul Graham
Published: Feb 1, 2002
Length: 16 minutes (4,202 words)

How to Make Wealth

I think everyone who gets rich by their own efforts will be found to be in a situation with measurement and leverage. Everyone I can think of does: CEOs, movie stars, hedge fund managers, professional athletes. A good hint to the presence of leverage is the possibility of failure. Upside must be balanced by downside, so if there is big potential for gain there must also be a terrifying possibility of loss.

Source: Paul Graham
Published: May 1, 2004
Length: 35 minutes (8,871 words)

What Happened to Yahoo

Source: Paul Graham
Published: Aug 1, 2010
Length: 7 minutes (1,935 words)

The Acceleration of Addictiveness

Source: Paul Graham
Published: Jul 1, 2010
Length: 5 minutes (1,256 words)

How to Do What You Love

Source: Paul Graham
Published: Jan 1, 2006
Length: 18 minutes (4,665 words)