The Pope’s Elephant—Silvio Bedini

This was my favorite book all year. It’s a historical account of a baby white elephant that the imperialistic king of Portugal sent to Pope Leo X–he also included a trained hunting leopard that could ride on the back of a horse. Leo fell in love with the elephant, who was trained to bow in his presence and trumpet as he walked into the pen which Leo had specially built behind the Vatican. Raphael sketched it and Da Vinci’s villa in Vatican City looked down on the papal menagerie. The book is hilarious and entertaining and at the same time a illustrative history of the Church. For instance, Leo sold indulgences partly to cover the expenses of Hanno, the cause which Luther later used to start the reformation. I also named my puppy after it.

Wikinomics—Don Tapscott

Great book. Probably should have read it earlier (when TheExec first recommended it). I haven’t decided if the premise of the book is undermined by the fact that the author’s came to it based on proprietary research that they refused to make public–the exact kind of thing they say companies should get away from doing–but whatever. It takes “Wisdom of Crowds” to a new level without being gushing or absurd or nerdy.

Gonzo Marketing—Christopher Locke

Old but awesome. It’s by one of the Cluetrain authors. The premise is strong–that marketing and creation online need to follow Hunter S Thompson’s style of actively being engaged with the story as it happens–but the book is overwritten. And I mean really overwritten–like 100x worse than I am. He makes a cool analogy with Kipling’s “White Man’s Burden” and the way corporations look at internet communities.

The Greco-Persian War—Peter Green

Robert recommended this one to me. It is an incredibly clear and analytical history of the war that preceded the Peloponnesian war in Greece. It gives Themistocles his due and frames Thermopylae as the relatively minor part of the conflict that it was. If you read this you can probably fool people into thinking that you read Herodotus. For me, it was the best contemporary telling of Greek history that I have read.

This is a really, really good idea. And Tim is the kind of guy that will meet all of them.

Like Tim asks, If you could choose only five people in the world to get to know in the 2008, who would they be? It can be anyone you want that is alive; people to help with business, people who interest you, etc. [His list: The Crystal Method band members, Rick Rubin, Jeff Corwin, Jamiroquai, Francis Ford-Coppola, Hayao Miyazaki]. Please provide a link to the person or an explanation who they are if its not very obvious.

My list of the five people I want to get to know this year:

1. Eminem

2. Mark Cuban

3. Marc Andreessen

4. Steven Pressfield

5. Umair Haque

–Tucker

I don’t want to publish my list because I think it would be a little creepy to let the people know that I’m coming for them but I did make one for myself. It’s a great idea for everyone to do the same. And Tim is 100% right, you wouldn’t believe the people I have talked to (or was contacted by) because I put myself out there.

One thing I learned from Robert was that you always attack the strategy of your enemy. This sounds simple, but it’s not. Most of the time, you’re attacking the tactics–or just trying to beat them in the game they chose. (We have to outrun them to that hill as opposed to, what if we made that hill a worthless target) In general, a of his stuff is difficult to apply as a real, regular human. I don’t dispute that absence increases fondness, but just getting up and leaving in the middle of relationship is complicated when you actually care about the person. But one thing you can always do in life is attack strategy. Figure out what it is, and then find a way to to interrupt it.

I found a perfect example when I was reading Wikinomics over the weekend. The writers talk about how in the 90’s there was a huge push to patent gene sequences and research in the race to develop blockbuster drugs. From what I gathered, the idea was to isolate the gene that caused the disease and then develop and monopolize the drug that treats it by keeping the data locked away.

Merck was just one player in this scramble. Inevitably, it would have been a war of attrition to see who could grab the most patents and keep them the most secret. The strategy of their competitors was to be better at this than Merck was–to cut costs, be more efficient at it, invest more and to slowly gather patents as possible.

Instead of playing this game, Merck shocked the world by releasing 15,000 of their proprietary human gene sequences to the public and announcing that they would release the rest of them as they came about. And then the dynamics utterly changed. Merck’s strength was never in researching genes, it was in developing and marketing drugs. So they attacked their competitor’s strategy by making it obsolete–making it no longer a commodity. They turned their weakness in research–a battle that if they won, would be Pyhrric–and took it off the table. And then competed where they were strong–marketing, distribution and other infrastructure. Most important, they got access to everyone else’s research when they were forced to follow their lead and make their patents public. And from what I gathered (although it’s still ongoing) that’s where they won.

Attacking strategy is a long-term plan. It’s getting inside and disrupting. It’s how you understand that even if you win otherwise, your victory is defined by the fact that you’re reacting against someone else. That means you’re focusing your energy in a lot of directions that you don’t necessary wish to; it’s full of waste and costs and friction. I am trying to to look at situations and go “what is their strategy?” and “can you I go around it?” instead of just accepting it as a given.

*More coming from Wikinomics, but you should read it if you haven’t yet.