Intersection of Categories

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Balaji Srinivasan has had about average success in many different domains, but he has never been the best at any of them. As a founder he had an exit but there were people who were better, like Brian Armstrong. There’s people much more focused on being a better investor than him like Naval Ravikant. He’s a good engineer, but Vitalik Buterin is still better. A scientist, but still behind Vijay Ponde. In his career, he’s been a good tech executive, but Ben Horowitz still does better. A best-selling author, but not close to Tim Ferriss. The point is that he’s proficient at a lot of skills. Balaji does not consider himself defined by one category. He is a that sits at the intersection of many categories.

Cultural Intersection

This idea relates to The Frontier Is Designed for Generalists

Steven Johnson explores the common thread among time travelers - those visionaries who saw far beyond their era. These innovators often worked at the fringes of their fields or at the intersection of disparate disciplines. Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville, for instance, conceived sound recording by blending ideas from stenography, printing, and ear anatomy. Ada Lovelace's unique position between advanced math and Romantic poetry allowed her to envision the Analytical Engine's potential for manipulating symbols and composing music. Johnson suggests that it's this ability to draw connections across diverse domains, coupled with a "Romantic instinct to see beyond the surface," that enables these geniuses to imagine and create technologies far ahead of their time. #genius #innovation/frontier #innovators

Most writers exist at one end of the spectrum: a poet or an academic. They're either too clever or too clear. Being a poet doesn’t get the message across. People get lost in the words or confused on their meaning. Academics are boring. The only people that read their writing are other people in their field. It's too clear and lacks empathy. William Maynard said, "Most good copywriters fall into two categories. Poets. And killers. Poets see an ad as the end. Killers as a means to an end." The writers that exists as the paradoxes, blurring the lines between black & white are the ones that get rich.

Steve Jobs was a poet and he was cold. He played guitar and was rude. He was enlightened but cruel. Parts of his personality make for a strange combination. A vegetarian and Zen Buddhist bought into the enlightenment-seeking culture of 1972. Yet Steve Jobs had a part of his soul that was an edginess, even if he didn’t express it during his time at Reed. Jobs found solace. Equally as much he found the peaceful, unavoidably subtle things science couldn't capture. Both were fascinating. His curiosities positioned himself at the intersection of the arts and technology. They combined in a strange way marrying great design, human touch, romance, and cutting-edge technology.