usc annenberg

Should You Drink the Kool-Aid?Venkatesh Rao

With contributions from:• Greg Rader• Kevin Simler• Jane Huang• BAR Group

11.27.2012 | USC Annenberg Innovation Lab

WARNING: VERY MUCH A WORK IN PROGRESS

04/12/2023 Venkatesh G. Rao 2

If the odds of making it as a [rockstar | movie star | entrepreneur | best-selling author | President] are so completely awful, why do people still try?


the usual answer: PASSION AND TRUE BELIEF

the common motif is KOOL-AID


PASSION+

TRUE BELIEF

IRONY

…very hard to study…

“Acting Dead” – Bruce Sterling

“Death wish” …


We’ll mostly be hyann

Numbers

Conservative

Speculative

anecdata, gossip, TV shows, movies, cartoons, narrative theories, personality theorieshistories, biographies,media stories, blog posts,

Fiction

StoriesScienceDuckworth Grit scaleinstitutional talent flow patternsmacroeconomic studiesKauffman type researchcorrelations, distributions

Thick Descriptioninterviews, longitudinal studies a la Vaillantembedded reportingfund-raising war storiesincubator lorehacks, metis of startuppery

Simulationgame theory modelsagent based modelslong-term historical simswhat-ifs


True Believers

Backstory: Gervais Principle (2009)


VCs

Founders

Option LotteryPlayers

Silicon Valley

Ecosystem

initial attempt to map model to startups…circa 2009


“Entrepreneurs are the New Labor”

long story short, 4 years later, this became…

…to polarized reactions

• “You nailed it!”• “That has not been my

experience”• “This whole thing is stupid, you

can’t analyze this way”


not insiders vs. outsidersnot investors vs. foundersnot winners vs. losers

only difference: different cognitive processes

viewed different types of argument as valid


The Clue at Quantico

“We use Myers-Briggs/Keirsey here in the Marine Corps…most of us are SJ types… Guardian/Protector… very passionate, very emotional…”


If an important decision is to be made [the Persians] discuss the question when they are drunk, and the following day the master of the house. . . submits their decision for reconsideration when they are sober. If they still approve it, it is adopted; if not, it is abandoned. Conversely, any decision they make when they are sober is reconsidered afterwards when they are drunk.

– Herodotus


http://tempobook.com

Character vs. Situation vs. Plot

Narrative Approach

http://tempobook.com/


I should be thankful for my

good, secure job, others have it

even worse. This startup idea is not

worth the risk.

What’s the point of this so-called life? I might as well die. I AM

QUITTING TOMORROW AND

DOING A STARTUP.

Probabilities don’t change when drunk….

But subjective utilities do…


So what happens when* you fail?

* rounded up from if


Courage Wolf Meme


Dutch Courage Wolf Meme


Alan: Wait a minute, that’s your big secret? Alcohol?Charlie: Shhh. Don’t tell anybody.Alan: But isn’t that just a temporary solution.Charlie: It’s only temporary if you stop drinking.Alan: I like it.

Something Salted and Twisted [3.10] - Two and a Half Menhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtituB9WRQU


If an important decision is to be made [the Persians] discuss the question when they are drunk, and the following day the master of the house. . . submits their decision for reconsideration when they are sober. If they still approve it, it is adopted; if not, it is abandoned. Conversely, any decision they make when they are sober is reconsidered afterwards when they are drunk.

– Herodotus

what happens if you never sober up?


The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

– Shaw

drunk

drunk


Dragline: Stay down. You're beat. Luke: You're gonna hafta kill me...

drunk = punch drunk?


“Learn to fetishize the pain of learning something new”

-- Andrea Kuszewski


more than a death-wish though…

What’s the point of this so-called

life? I might as well die. I AM

QUITTING TOMORROW AND

DOING A STARTUP.


unwavering Purpose

an UNFALSIFIABLE mission that cannot be invalidated by any amount of A/B testing or “customer development” or reframed away with “pivots”

Grit*

*Google “Duckworth grit scale…” for a more empiricist take…


Mattie Ross: Who's the best Marshal? Sheriff: Hmm, I'd have to think on that….


“Bill Waters is the best tracker. He's part Comanche; it is a pure joy to watch him cut for sign.”

This is the hacker-entrepreneur, see THE TURPENTINE EFFECT

/

http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/03/18/the-turpentine-effect


“…The meanest is Rooster Cogburn; a pitiless man, double tough. Fear don't enter into his thinking….”


“…I'd have to say the fairest is L.T. Quinn; he always brings in his prisoners alive. Now, he might let one slip by every now and then, but...” This is the PRAGMATIC actor who sees no

problem with ACQUI-HIRING and other REASONABLE ADAPTATION models


Mattie Ross: Where would I find this Rooster?


Venture

Capitalist

to achieve unreasonable things, find someone with a death-wish and

leash them to a Purpose


What happens when DOZENS of Matti Rosses need HUNDREDS of Rooster Cogburns?

BUT…


can true grit be scaled?


"They call him Shaykh-al-Hashishim.** He is their Elder, and upon his command all of the men of the mountain come out or go in... they are believers of the word of their elder and everyone everywhere fears them, because they even kill kings."

- Benjamin of Tudela

• Ancestor of Matti Ross• Founder of cult of assassins • Originator of fedayeen*

*from Wikipedia: “someone who redeems himself by risking or sacrificing his life”

** etymology/story of assassin == hashashin == hashish possibly apocryphal, but military-political-guerrilla tactics are not

Hassan-i Sabbah (1050 – 1124)


Cognitive capture by a nascent organization at the edge of existing institutions defined by us-versus-them discourses based on boundaries created out of trial-by-fire bonding experiences

Kool-Aid Characterized


The passion is sacred

patterns of argumentation that threaten it are systematically delegitimized

this is both a strength and a weakness

04/12/2023 35Venkatesh G. Rao

We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it.

-- Col. Jessup

Code RED: extra-judicial killings


In the 1960s and 1970s, classic social psychological studies were conducted that provided evidence that even normal, decent people can engage in acts of extreme cruelty when instructed to do so by others. However, in an essay published November 20 in the open access journal PLOS Biology, Professors Alex Haslam and Stephen Reicher revisit these studies' conclusions and explain how awful acts involve not just obedience, but enthusiasm too—challenging the long-held belief that human beings are 'programmed' for conformity.

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-human-obedience-myth-conformity.html#jCp

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-human-obedience-myth-conformity.html




The meanest is Rooster Cogburn; a pitiless man, double tough. Fear don't enter into his thinking….

…I'd have to say the fairest is L.T. Quinn; he always brings in his prisoners alive. Now, he might let one slip by every now and then, but...

Sociopath moral code(no institutions)

Rule of law (established institutions)

Kool-Aid law(emerging institutions)

04/12/2023 38Venkatesh G. Rao

We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it.

“passion”

“wealth/jobs”

“building”

“If you’re not actually doing a startup, you don’t get to talk…or at least, I don’t have to listen to

you.”

often “big company people”


“You can’t handle the truthiness”

04/12/2023 Venkatesh G. Rao

40

True wolves are rare Sheep+Kool-Aid creates scalability


Jung for “Startup Scene” (with help from Greg Rader)

ESFJPillar of

Community(Fe/Si)

ENFJSocial

Revolutionary(Fe/Ni)

ESTPPlayer

(Se/Ti)

ENTPInventor

(Ne/Ti)

ESTJ“New Labor”

(Te/Si)

ENTJHustler

(Te/Ni)

ESFPPromoter

(Se/Fi)

ENFPConference

Goer(Ne/Fi)

ISTJNew Org

Rank+File(Si/Te)

INTJHacker

(Ni/Te)

ISFPLoyalist

(Fi/Se)

INFP“Sharing Economy”

(Fi/Ne)

ISFJPillar of

Community(Si/Fe)

INFJIdealist

(Ni/Fe)

ISTPOrganization

Man(Ti/Se)

INTPArmchair Thinker

(Ti/Ne)


http://www.xeromag.com/fun/personality.html

ESFJControl Freak

(Fe/Si)

ENFJCult Leader

(Fe/Ni)

ESTPConman

(Se/Ti)

ENTPMad Scientist

(Ne/Ti)

ESTJBureaucrat

(Te/Si)

ENTJEvil Overlord

(Te/Ni)

ESFPNational Enquirer Headline

(Se/Fi)

ENFPScientologist

(Ne/Fi)

ISTJThought Police

(Si/Te)

INTJOutside

Contractor(Ni/Te)

ISFPCrackpot

(Fi/Se)

INFPIdealist

(Fi/Ne)

ISFJMartyr

(Si/Fe)

INFJConspiracy

Theorist (Ni/Fe)

ISTPPsycho

Vigilante(Ti/Se)

INTPEgghead

(Ti/Ne)


WARNING: neither prescriptive nor descriptive

Jung/Myers-Briggs measures preferences

You don’t always get what you want….


Belief TypesOUTSIDERSNon-Drinkers

OLD INSTITUTION STEWARDS

Champagne Kool-Aid

OUTSIDERSHome-brewers

VANGUARDHappy hour

TRUE BELIEVERSKoolaidaholics

VANGUARDParty drinkers

OUTSIDENon-Drinkers

OLD INSTITUTION STEWARDS

Social drinkers

OUTSIDERSNon-Drinkers


Tragedy(early part of an economic age)

Farce(late part…)


Col. Jessep: You want answers? Kaffee: I think I'm entitled to… Col. Jessep: *You want answers?* Kaffee: *I want the truth!* Col. Jessep: *You can't handle the truth!* ….

Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.


“In the work and its profits the Nation was an essential partner and equally entitled with the individual to share in the dividends.”

-- Andrew Carnegie, Gospel of Wealth II (1906)


Which side is right?

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. – H. L. Mencken


In the spirit of phillosophical bipartisanship, it would be pleasant to conclude that each of these traditions of political economy [Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian] has made its own valuable contribution to the success of the American economy… but that would not be true.

What is good about the American economy is largely the result of the Hamiltonian developmental tradition, and what is bad about it is largely the result of the Jeffersonian producerist school

-- Michael Lind, Land of Opportunity

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. – H. L. Mencken


RL

H

J

Big Welfare State

Big Military, Big Corps,Big Banks

Eisenhower

Teddy Roosevelt

FDR

Andrew Jackson

Thomas Jefferson

Reagan

J. P. MorganCarnegie

Hoover

Rockefeller

OSRD-DARPANSF, NIH

MorrillGI Bill

#Occupy

Tea Party

National Parks

Homestead ActManifest Destiny

HippieMovement

Transition/Permaculture

Locavorism

NASA

Startup Scene

Startups are weird because they start out Jeffersonian but nurse deep Hamiltonian ambitions


http://gameofpickaxes.com/

Planned201

4


Tentative Conclusions

• Kool-Aid is how you scale true grit• It works through cognitive capture• Takes unironic passion, not all can do

it• It drives institutional creative

destruction• Transient phase moral hazard

usc annenberg

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