We’ve Got This Whole Unicorn Thing Wrong

Tim O’ReillyO’Reilly Media

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October 5, 2015

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“Senator, you have to understand…”

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Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, D-RI

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"I've seen no need for more than five computers in the whole world." -Thomas Watson, IBM, 1943.

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Moore’s Law has been responsible for a cascade of miracles.

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It has given us great powers.

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Are we using them wisely?

@timoreillyWe’ve Got This Whole Unicorn Thing Wrong

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“A unicorn is a startup with a valuation of at least a billion dollars”

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“A man breaking his journey between one place and another at a third place of no name, character, population or significance, sees a unicorn cross his path and disappear. That in itself is startling, but there are precedents for mystical encounters of various kinds, or to be less extreme, a choice of persuasions to put it down to fancy; until — “My God,” says a second man, “I must be dreaming, I thought I saw a unicorn.” At which point, a dimension is added that makes the experience as alarming as it will ever be. A third witness, you understand, adds no further dimension but only spreads it thinner, and a fourth thinner still, and the more witnesses there are the thinner it gets and the more reasonable it becomes until it is as thin as reality, the name we give to the common experience.”

- Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

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WTF!????

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Some Other Early Unicorns

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Real Unicorns Change the World

And like Tom Stoppard’s unicorn, are eventually taken for granted, becoming “as thin as reality.”

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When did this stop being magical to us?

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The infrastructure of unicornsNo one believed in it.

Built for military use, then opened up to the world.

Enabled everything from Google Maps to Uber, Lyft, Postmates, Instacart, and self-driving cars.

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So what makes a real unicorn?

1. It seems unbelievable at first.2. It changes the way the world works, and ultimately changes the

people who encounter it.3. It has enormous economic impact, far beyond that captured by

the entrepreneurs and venture capitalists who birthed it.

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“Successful innovators don’t ask their customers to do something different. They ask them to become someone different…. When Apple television advertisements show iPhone users asking Siri questions or telling ‘her’ what to do, the company is doing far more than showing off the versatility of its voice-recognition, artificial intelligence interface. Siri’s company asks its customers to become the sort of people who wouldn’t think twice about talking to their phone as a sentient servant.”

Michael Schrage, Who Do You Want Your Customers to Become

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Some 20th Century Unicorns

The automobileThe airplaneThe electric gridRadioTelevisionCell phones

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Think Entire Ecosystems, Not Just Inventions

Not just the Model T, but the assembly line.

Not just the assembly line, but higher wages, so workers could afford the product.

Not just higher wages, but weekends, and the Sunday drive as a form of entertainment.

Factories, roads, bridges….

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These unicorns were sources of wonder, but also became sources of horror.

Or banality.

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From “WTF?” To “WTF!!!”

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How do we put our unicorns to work making a better world?

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Our 21st Century Unicorns Still Have a Ways to Go

Imagine reinventing healthcare using Watson, Google Glass, and Uber style technologies.

On demand house calls by community health workers “upskilled” by AI and medical sensors, and able to call in expert consultation as needed via mobile devices.

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Yes, Glass will be back, when Google focuses on community health workers rather than fashion models.

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Imagine reinventing the energy grid

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Create more value than you capture

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Join us in San Francisco for the Next:Economy Summit to learn how to build a world-changing unicorn

http://oreil.ly/FUSCyl