The men are practitioners of Kyudo, Japanese Zen archery. Their outfits and the way they hold their second arrows (Ya) between their fourth and fifth fingers give this away. The target is most likely 28m away from the men, since they are shooting outdoors at what appears to be a makeshift range. Traditionally, 28m outdoor shooting is the final and most advanced stage of training in Kyudo. Beginners practice indoors (sometimes outdoors) on a target only 2m away. Practicing with such a close target ensures you cannot miss, so you can work on refining your shooting technique. Traditional Kyudo is not about marksmanship at all, but rather about the act of shooting itself. The Ya (arrows) are traditionally made with feathers from each wing of a single bird. One Ya has the right wing’s feathers, the other has the left wing’s. This causes one arrow to spiral to the right and the other to spiral to the left as they are shot from the Yumi (bow).
The men are wearing the traditional Kyudo outfit consisting of a Kimono (upper body) and Hakama (lower body). A small ritual is performed prior to practice in which one sleeve of the Kimono is taken off to minimize shot interference. Additionally, some schools of Kyudo use the knot of the Hakama to balance the second Ya while the first one is shot. It looks like these Ya are very short, which explains why they are holding them in their fingers.
Only one of the men is wearing the traditional deerskin hand covering on his right hand (Ya hand), suggesting that these men did not have much (if any) money to spend on their art. The hand covering is essentially a (usually) 3-4 fingered glove that allows the Kyudoka (practitioner) to comfortably hold the drawn Yumi and Ya in place. Typically, a Kyudoka will keep his Yumi drawn for 15-30 seconds. The Ya is released “when the time ripens”, or whenever it feels right to release it once you’ve become comfortable with the drawn Yumi.
Kyudo is an extremely slow martial art, designed to allow for meditation while practicing. Everything is done deliberately, and no energy is to be wasted in the movements leading up to a shot. People seeing Kyudo for the first time will often think it looks lazy or very easy for this reason. Kyudo is all about technique and minimizing effort to achieve the shot. The bows can have very high draw weights, but the actual drawing of the bow is done in single motion from above the head in a push-pull fashion. There is no one drawing arm. The arm holding the Yumi (bow) pushes it forward as the arm stabilizing the Ya (arrow) draws the string back. Since it is drawn from above the head, the body acts as a fulcrum for both arms to draw. For this reason, with perfect technique, even a seemingly frail practitioner of Kyudo can draw a Yumi of great draw strength with ease.
学习了 Denzel Washington 2011年在 University of Pennsylvania 的毕业演讲：
Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. (born December 28, 1954) is an American actor and filmmaker. He has received three Golden Globe awards, a Tony Award, and two Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actor for the historical war drama film Glory (1989) and Best Actor for his role as a corrupt cop in the crime thriller Training Day (2001).
Thank you. Thank you very much. I am obviously the most unorganized. Everyone else has nice boxes to bring their script up in; I just like kind of got it all messed up here put inside of a magazine so, in fact, I don’t even have it in the right order, let me get it in the right order here. So if it starts like flying around the stage just, you know, run around and grab it for me and bring it back up here for me. I’ll keep going as I can.
President Gutmann, Provost Price, Board Chair Cohen, fellow honorees beautiful, and today’s graduates, I’m honored and grateful for the invitation today. It’s always been great to be on the Penn campus. I’ve been to a lot of basketball games at the Palestra because my son played on the basketball team. Yeah that’s right; he played on the basketball team. Coach didn’t give him enough playing time but we’ll talk about that later. No, I’m really pleased with the progress Coach Allen has made and I wish them success in the future. I’d always get a warm welcome when I come to Pennsylvania, when I come to Philadelphia, except on the few occasions when I’d wear my Yankee cap. What’s wrong with that? I can’t just suddenly switch up and wear a Philly hat. It’s like taking your life in your hands. People would say, “We love you Denzel. But you walking around with that hat on, we don’t care who you are.” So you’ll be happy to see that I’m not wearing my Yankee cap today but I am wearing my Yankee socks, my Yankee t-shirt, my Yankee jock, my Yankee underwear, my Yankee toe warmers but not my Yankee cap. Still, I’ll be honest with you, I’m a little nervous. I’m not used to speaking at a graduation of this magnitude it is a little overwhelming. It’s out of my comfort zone. Dress me up in army fatigues, throw me on top of a moving train, someone said Unstoppable, ask me to play Malcolm X, Rubin Hurricane Carter, Alonzo from Training Day, I can do all that but a commencement speech? It’s a very serious affair, different ballgame. There’s literally thousands and thousands of people here. And for those who say, “You’re a movie star; millions of people watch you speak all the time.” Yes, that’s technically true but I’m not actually there in the theater, watching them watching me. I’m not there when they cough or fidget around or pull out their iPhone and text their boyfriend or scratch their behinds or whatever it is they’re doing in the movie theater. But from up here, I can see every single one of you. And that makes me uncomfortable.
So please, don’t pull out your iPhones and text your boyfriend until after I’m done, please. But if you need to scratch your behind, I understand, go ahead. Thinking about the speech, I figured the best way to keep your attention would be to talk about something really, like, juicy Hollywood stuff. I thought I could start with me and Russell Crowe getting into some arguments on the set of American Gangster, but no. You’re a group of high-minded intellectuals, you’re not interested in that or maybe not. I thought about a private moment I had backstage with Angelina Jolie half naked in her dressing room after the Oscars but I said, “No I don’t think so this is an Ivy League school. Angelina Jolie half naked in her dressing room, who wants to hear about that? No one, no one, no one, this is Penn. That stuff would never go over well here. Maybe at Drexel, but not here. I’m in trouble now.
I was back to square one and feeling the pressure. So now you’re probably thinking if it was going be this difficult, why’d I even accept today’s invitation in the first place? Well, you know my son goes here. That’s a good reason and I always like to check to see how my money’s being spent. And I’m sure there’s some parents out there who can relate to what I’m talking about! Yeah, everybody upstairs. And there were other good reasons for me to show up. Sure, I got an Academy Award but I never had something called a “Magic Meatball” after waiting in line for half an hour at a food truck. Yes, I’ve talked face-to-face with President Obama but I never met a guy named “Kweeder” who sings bad songs over at Smokes on a Tuesday night. I’ve never been to Breeze. I’ve never been to Emos. Yes, I’ve played a detective battling demons but I’ve never been to a school in my life where the squirrel population has gone bananas. I mean they’re breaking into the dorm rooms and taking over campus. I think I’ve even seen some carrying books on the way to class.
So I had to be here. I had to come, even though I was afraid I might make a fool of myself. In fact if you really want to know the truth I had to come exactly because I might make a fool of myself. What am I talking about? Well, here it is, I’ve found that nothing in life is worthwhile unless you take risks, nothing.
Nelson Mandela said, “There is no passion to be found playing small, in settling for a life that’s less than the one you’re capable of living.” I’m sure in your experiences in school, in applying to college, in picking your major, in deciding what you want to do with life, people have told you to make sure you have something to “fall back on.” But I’ve never understood that concept, having something to fall back on. If I’m going to fall, I don’t want to fall back on anything except my faith. I want to fall forward. At least I figure that way I’ll see what I’m about to hit.
Fall forward. This is what I mean; Reggie Jackson struck out twenty-six-hundred times in his career, the most in the history of baseball. But you don’t hear about the strikeouts. People remember the home runs. Fall forward. Thomas Edison conducted 1,000 failed experiments. Did you know that? I didn’t know that because the 1,001st was the light bulb. Fall forward. Every failed experiment is one step closer to success. You’ve got to take risks and I’m sure you’ve probably heard that before but I want to talk about why it’s so important. I’ve got three reasons—and then you can pick up your iPhones.
First, you will fail at some point in your life. Accept it. You will lose. You will embarrass yourself. You will suck at something. There is no doubt about it. That’s probably not a traditional message for a graduation ceremony but hey, I’m telling you, embrace it because it’s inevitable. And I should know, in the acting business, you fail all the time.
Early on in my career, I auditioned for a part in a Broadway musical. A perfect role for me, I thought, except for the fact that I can’t sing. So I’m in the wings; I’m about to go on stage but the guy in front of me is singing like Pavarotti and I am just shrinking getting smaller and smaller. So they say, “Thank you very much, thank you very much; you’ll be hearing from us.” So I come out with my little sheet music and it was “Just My Imagination” by the Temptations, that’s what I came up with.
So I hand it to the accompanist and she looks at it and looks at me and looks at the director, so I start to sing (Washington begins to sing very awkwardly) and they’re not saying anything so I’m thinking I must be getting better, so I start getting into it. But after the first verse, the director cuts me off: “Thank you. Thank you very much, you’ll be hearing from me.” So I assumed I didn’t get the job but the next part of the audition he called me back. The next part of the audition is the acting part of the audition. I figure, I can’t sing, but I know I can act. So the paired me with this guy and again I didn’t know about musical theater; musical theater is big so you can reach everyone all the way back in the stadium. And I’m more from a realistic naturalistic kind of acting where you actually talk to the person next to you. So I don’t know what my line was, my line was “Hand me the cup.” and his line was “Well, I will hand you the cup my dear, and it will be there to be handed to you.” I said, “Okay. Should I give you the cup back?” “Oh yes you should give it back to me because you know that is my cup and it should be given back to me!” I didn’t get the job. But here’s the thing, I didn’t quit. I didn’t fall back. I walked out of there to prepare for the next audition, and the next audition, and the next audition. I prayed and I prayed, but I continued to fail, and I failed, and failed but it didn’t matter because you know what? There’s an old saying, you hang around a barbershop long enough, sooner or later you will get a haircut. You will catch a break.
Last year I did a play called Fences on Broadway and I won a Tony Award. And I didn’t have to sing, by the way. And here’s the kicker, it was at the Court Theater; it was at the same theater where I failed that first audition thirty years prior. The point is, and I’ll pick up the pace, every graduate here today has the training and the talent to succeed but do you have guts to fail?
Here’s my second point about failure, if you don’t fail, you’re not even trying. My wife told me this great expression, “To get something you never had, you have to do something you never did.” Les Brown, a motivational speaker, made an analogy about this. Imagine you’re on your deathbed and standing around your death bed are the ghosts representing your unfilled potential. The ghosts of the ideas you never acted on. The ghosts of the talents you didn’t use. And they’re standing around your bed angry, disappointed and upset. They say, “We came to you because you could have brought us to life,” they say. “And now we go to the grave together.” So I ask you today, “How many ghosts are going to be around your bed when your time comes?” You’ve invested a lot in your education and people invested in you. And let me tell you, the world needs your talents, man, does it ever.
I just got back from Africa a couple of days ago so if I’m rambling on it’s because of jet lag. I just got back from South Africa. It’s a beautiful country, but there are places with terrible poverty that need help. And Africa is just the tip of the iceberg. The Middle East needs your help. Japan needs your help. Alabama and Tennessee need your help. Louisiana needs your help. Philadelphia needs your help. The world needs a lot and we need it from you, we really do, we need it from you the young people. So get out there. Give it everything you’ve got whether it’s your time, your talent, your prayers, or your treasures because remember this, you’ll never see a U-haul behind a hearse.
I’ll say it again. You will never see a U-haul behind a hearse. You can’t take it with you. The Ancient Egyptians tried it and all they got was robbed! So the question is, what are you going to do with what you have? And I’m not talking about how much you have. Some of you are business majors. Some of you are theologians, nurses, sociologists. Some of you have money. Some of you have patience. Some have kindness. Some of you have love. Some of you have the gift of long suffering. Whatever it is, what are you going to do with what you have?
Now here’s my last point about failure, sometimes it’s the best way to figure out where you’re going. Your life will never be a straight path. I began at Fordham University as a pre-med student. That lasted until I took a course called “Cardiac Morphogenesis.” I couldn’t read it; I couldn’t say it; I sure couldn’t pass it. Then I decided to go pre-law, then journalism. With no academic focus, my grades took off in their own direction down.
I was a, 1.8 GPA one semester, and the university very politely suggested it might be better to take some time off. I was 20 years old, at my lowest point. And then one day, and I remember the exact day, March 27th, 1975, I was helping out in the beauty shop my mother owned in Mount Vernon. An older woman who was considered one of the elders in town and I didn’t know her personally but every time I looked in the mirror she was staring at me and she just kept staring at me. Every time I looked at her she just kept giving me these strange looks. She finally took the drier off her head and said something to me I’ll never forget, first of all she said, “Someone give me a piece of paper.” She said, “Young boy, I have a spiritual prophecy. You are going to travel the world and speak to millions of people.” Keep in mind that I was 20 years old and flunked out of school and like a wise-ass, I’m thinking to myself: “Does she have anything in that crystal ball about me getting back into school?” But maybe she was on to something because later that summer, while working as a counselor at a YMCA camp in Connecticut; we put on a talent show for the campers. After that show, another counselor came up to me and asked, “Have you ever thought of acting? You should. You’re good at that.”
When I got back to Fordham that fall I changed my major once again, for the last time. And in the years that followed, just as that woman getting her hair done predicted, I have traveled the world and I have spoken to millions of people through my movies. Millions who, up ‘till this day, I couldn’t see while I was talking to them and they couldn’t see me; they could only see the movie. But I see you today and I’m encouraged by what I see. I’m strengthened by what I see and I love what I see.
One more page, then I’ll shut up. Let me conclude with one final point. And actually the President kind of brought it up; it has to do with the movie Philadelphia. She stole my material. Many years ago I did this movie called Philadelphia. We filmed some scenes right here on campus. Philadelphia came out in 1993, when most of you were probably still in diapers, some of the professors, too. but it’s a good movie; rent it on Netflix. I get 23 cents every time you rent it. Parents up there, rent it. Tell your friends too! It’s about a man, played by Tom Hanks, who’s fired from his law firm because he has AIDS. He wants to sue the firm, but no one’s willing to represent him until a homophobic, ambulance-chasing lawyer, played by yours truly, takes on the case. In a way, if you watch the movie, you’ll see everything I’m talking about today.
You’ll see what I mean about taking risks or being willing to fail. Because taking a risk is not just about going for a job. It’s also about knowing what you know and what you don’t know. It’s about being open to people and ideas. In the course of the film, the character I play begins to take small steps, to take risks. He is very, very slowly overcomes his fears, and I feel ultimately his heart becomes flooded with love. And I can’t think of a better message as we send you off today, to not only take risks, but to be open to life, to accept new views and to be open to new opinions, to be willing to speak at commencement at one of the country’s best universities even though you’re scared stiff. While it may be frightening, it will also be rewarding because the chances you take, the people you meet, the people you love, the faith that you have that’s what’s going to define you.
So members of the class of 2011, this is your mission. When you leave the friendly confines of Philly, never be discouraged. Never hold back. Give everything you’ve got. And when you fall throughout life and maybe even tonight after a few too many glasses of champagne, remember this, fall forward.
Congratulations, I love you, God bless you; I respect you.
学习的 TED 是 Simon Sinek 的《How great leaders inspire action》：
Simon O. Sinek (born October 9, 1973) is an author, speaker, and consultant who writes on leadership and management. He joined the RAND Corporation in 2010 as an adjunct staff member, where he advises on matters of military innovation and planning. He is known for popularizing the concepts of "the golden circle" and to "Start With Why", described by TED as "a simple but powerful model for inspirational leadership all starting with a golden circle and the question "Why?"'. Sinek's first TEDx Talk on "How Great Leaders Inspire Action" is the 3rd most viewed video on TED.com. His 2009 book on the same subject, Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action (2009) delves into what he says is a naturally occurring pattern, grounded in the biology of human decision-making, that explains why we are inspired by some people, leaders, messages and organizations over others.
How do you explain when things don't go as we assume? Or better, how do you explain when others are able to achieve things that seem to defy all of the assumptions? For example: Why is Apple so innovative? Year after year, after year, they're more innovative than all their competition. And yet, they're just a computer company. They're just like everyone else. They have the same access to the same talent,the same agencies, the same consultants, the same media. Then why is it that they seem to have something different? Why is it that Martin Luther King led the Civil Rights Movement? He wasn't the only man who suffered in pre-civil rights America, and he certainly wasn't the only great orator of the day. Why him? And why is it that the Wright brothers were able to figure out controlled, powered man flight when there were certainly other teams who were better qualified, better funded -- and they didn't achieve powered man flight, and the Wright brothers beat them to it. There's something else at play here.
About three and a half years ago, I made a discovery. And this discovery profoundly changed my view on how I thought the world worked, and it even profoundly changed the way in which I operate in it. As it turns out, there's a pattern. As it turns out, all the great inspiring leaders and organizations in the world,whether it's Apple or Martin Luther King or the Wright brothers, they all think, act and communicate the exact same way. And it's the complete opposite to everyone else. All I did was codify it, and it's probably the world's simplest idea. I call it the golden circle.
Why? How? What? This little idea explains why some organizations and some leaders are able to inspire where others aren't. Let me define the terms really quickly. Every single person, every single organization on the planet knows what they do, 100 percent. Some know how they do it, whether you call it your differentiated value proposition or your proprietary process or your USP. But very, very few people or organizations know why they do what they do. And by "why" I don't mean "to make a profit." That's a result. It's always a result. By "why," I mean: What's your purpose? What's your cause? What's your belief? Why does your organization exist? Why do you get out of bed in the morning? And why should anyone care? As a result, the way we think, we act, the way we communicate is from the outside in, it's obvious. We go from the clearest thing to the fuzziest thing. But the inspired leaders and the inspired organizations -- regardless of their size, regardless of their industry -- all think, act and communicate from the inside out.
Let me give you an example. I use Apple because they're easy to understand and everybody gets it. If Apple were like everyone else, a marketing message from them might sound like this: "We make great computers. They're beautifully designed, simple to use and user friendly. Want to buy one?" "Meh."That's how most of us communicate. That's how most marketing and sales are done, that's how we communicate interpersonally. We say what we do, we say how we're different or better and we expect some sort of a behavior, a purchase, a vote, something like that. Here's our new law firm: We have the best lawyers with the biggest clients, we always perform for our clients. Here's our new car: It gets great gas mileage, it has leather seats. Buy our car. But it's uninspiring.
Here's how Apple actually communicates. "Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in thinking differently. The way we challenge the status quo is by making our products beautifully designed, simple to use and user friendly. We just happen to make great computers. Want to buy one?" Totally different, right? You're ready to buy a computer from me. I just reversed the order of the information. What it proves to us is that people don't buy what you do; people buy why you do it.
This explains why every single person in this room is perfectly comfortable buying a computer from Apple. But we're also perfectly comfortable buying an MP3 player from Apple, or a phone from Apple, or a DVR from Apple. As I said before, Apple's just a computer company. Nothing distinguishes them structurally from any of their competitors. Their competitors are equally qualified to make all of these products. In fact, they tried. A few years ago, Gateway came out with flat-screen TVs. They're eminently qualified to make flat-screen TVs. They've been making flat-screen monitors for years. Nobody bought one. Dell came out with MP3 players and PDAs, and they make great quality products, and they can make perfectly well-designed products -- and nobody bought one. In fact, talking about it now, we can't even imagine buying an MP3 player from Dell. Why would you buy one from a computer company? But we do it every day. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it. The goal is not to do business with everybody who needs what you have. The goal is to do business with people who believe what you believe.
Here's the best part: None of what I'm telling you is my opinion. It's all grounded in the tenets of biology. Not psychology, biology. If you look at a cross-section of the human brain, from the top down, the human brain is actually broken into three major components that correlate perfectly with the golden circle. Our newest brain, our Homo sapien brain, our neocortex, corresponds with the "what" level. The neocortex is responsible for all of our rational and analytical thought and language. The middle two sections make up our limbic brains, and our limbic brains are responsible for all of our feelings, like trust and loyalty. It's also responsible for all human behavior, all decision-making, and it has no capacity for language.
In other words, when we communicate from the outside in, yes, people can understand vast amounts of complicated information like features and benefits and facts and figures. It just doesn't drive behavior. When we can communicate from the inside out, we're talking directly to the part of the brain that controls behavior, and then we allow people to rationalize it with the tangible things we say and do. This is where gut decisions come from. Sometimes you can give somebody all the facts and figures, and they say, "I know what all the facts and details say, but it just doesn't feel right." Why would we use that verb, it doesn't "feel" right? Because the part of the brain that controls decision-making doesn't control language. The best we can muster up is, "I don't know. It just doesn't feel right." Or sometimes you say you're leading with your heart or soul. I hate to break it to you, those aren't other body parts controlling your behavior. It's all happening here in your limbic brain, the part of the brain that controls decision-making and not language.
But if you don't know why you do what you do, and people respond to why you do what you do, then how will you ever get people to vote for you, or buy something from you, or, more importantly, be loyal and want to be a part of what it is that you do. The goal is not just to sell to people who need what you have; the goal is to sell to people who believe what you believe. The goal is not just to hire people who need a job; it's to hire people who believe what you believe. I always say that, you know, if you hire people just because they can do a job, they'll work for your money, but if they believe what you believe, they'll work for you with blood and sweat and tears. Nowhere else is there a better example than with the Wright brothers.
Most people don't know about Samuel Pierpont Langley. And back in the early 20th century, the pursuit of powered man flight was like the dot com of the day. Everybody was trying it. And Samuel Pierpont Langley had, what we assume, to be the recipe for success. Even now, you ask people, "Why did your product or why did your company fail?" and people always give you the same permutation of the same three things: under-capitalized, the wrong people, bad market conditions. It's always the same three things, so let's explore that. Samuel Pierpont Langley was given 50,000 dollars by the War Department to figure out this flying machine. Money was no problem. He held a seat at Harvard and worked at the Smithsonian and was extremely well-connected; he knew all the big minds of the day. He hired the best minds money could find and the market conditions were fantastic. The New York Times followed him around everywhere, and everyone was rooting for Langley. Then how come we've never heard of Samuel Pierpont Langley?
A few hundred miles away in Dayton Ohio, Orville and Wilbur Wright, they had none of what we consider to be the recipe for success. They had no money; they paid for their dream with the proceeds from their bicycle shop; not a single person on the Wright brothers' team had a college education, not even Orville or Wilbur; and The New York Times followed them around nowhere.
The difference was, Orville and Wilbur were driven by a cause, by a purpose, by a belief. They believed that if they could figure out this flying machine, it'll change the course of the world. Samuel Pierpont Langley was different. He wanted to be rich, and he wanted to be famous. He was in pursuit of the result. He was in pursuit of the riches. And lo and behold, look what happened. The people who believed in the Wright brothers' dream worked with them with blood and sweat and tears. The others just worked for the paycheck. They tell stories of how every time the Wright brothers went out, they would have to take five sets of parts, because that's how many times they would crash before supper.
And, eventually, on December 17th, 1903, the Wright brothers took flight, and no one was there to even experience it. We found out about it a few days later. And further proof that Langley was motivated by the wrong thing: The day the Wright brothers took flight, he quit. He could have said, "That's an amazing discovery, guys, and I will improve upon your technology," but he didn't. He wasn't first, he didn't get rich, he didn't get famous, so he quit.
People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it. If you talk about what you believe, you will attract those who believe what you believe.
But why is it important to attract those who believe what you believe? Something called the law of diffusion of innovation, if you don't know the law, you know the terminology. The first 2.5% of our population are our innovators. The next 13.5% of our population are our early adopters. The next 34% are your early majority, your late majority and your laggards. The only reason these people buy touch-tone phones is because you can't buy rotary phones anymore.
We all sit at various places at various times on this scale, but what the law of diffusion of innovation tells us is that if you want mass-market success or mass-market acceptance of an idea, you cannot have it until you achieve this tipping point between 15 and 18 percent market penetration, and then the system tips. I love asking businesses, "What's your conversion on new business?" They love to tell you, "It's about 10 percent," proudly. Well, you can trip over 10% of the customers. We all have about 10% who just "get it." That's how we describe them, right? That's like that gut feeling, "Oh, they just get it."
The problem is: How do you find the ones that get it before doing business versus the ones who don't get it? So it's this here, this little gap that you have to close, as Jeffrey Moore calls it, "Crossing the Chasm" -- because, you see, the early majority will not try something until someone else has tried it first. And these guys, the innovators and the early adopters, they're comfortable making those gut decisions.They're more comfortable making those intuitive decisions that are driven by what they believe about the world and not just what product is available. These are the people who stood in line for six hours to buy an iPhone when they first came out, when you could have bought one off the shelf the next week. These are the people who spent 40,000 dollars on flat-screen TVs when they first came out, even though the technology was substandard. And, by the way, they didn't do it because the technology was so great; they did it for themselves. It's because they wanted to be first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it and what you do simply proves what you believe. In fact, people will do the things that prove what they believe. The reason that person bought the iPhone in the first six hours, stood in line for six hours, was because of what they believed about the world, and how they wanted everybody to see them: They were first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it.
So let me give you a famous example, a famous failure and a famous success of the law of diffusion of innovation. First, the famous failure. It's a commercial example. As we said before, the recipe for success is money and the right people and the right market conditions. You should have success then. Look at TiVo. From the time TiVo came out about eight or nine years ago to this current day, they are the single highest-quality product on the market, hands down, there is no dispute. They were extremely well-funded. Market conditions were fantastic. I mean, we use TiVo as verb. I TiVo stuff on my piece-of-junk Time Warner DVR all the time.
But TiVo's a commercial failure. They've never made money. And when they went IPO, their stock was at about 30 or 40 dollars and then plummeted, and it's never traded above 10. In fact, I don't think it's even traded above six, except for a couple of little spikes.
Because you see, when TiVo launched their product, they told us all what they had. They said, "We have a product that pauses live TV, skips commercials, rewinds live TV and memorizes your viewing habits without you even asking." And the cynical majority said, "We don't believe you. We don't need it. We don't like it. You're scaring us."
What if they had said, "If you're the kind of person who likes to have total control over every aspect of your life, boy, do we have a product for you. It pauses live TV, skips commercials, memorizes your viewing habits, etc., etc." People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it, and what you do simply serves as the proof of what you believe.
Now let me give you a successful example of the law of diffusion of innovation. In the summer of 1963, 250,000 people showed up on the mall in Washington to hear Dr. King speak. They sent out no invitations, and there was no website to check the date. How do you do that? Well, Dr. King wasn't the only man in America who was a great orator. He wasn't the only man in America who suffered in a pre-civil rights America. In fact, some of his ideas were bad. But he had a gift. He didn't go around telling people what needed to change in America. He went around and told people what he believed. "I believe, I believe, I believe," he told people. And people who believed what he believed took his cause, and they made it their own, and they told people. And some of those people created structures to get the word out to even more people. And lo and behold, 250,000 people showed up on the right day at the right time to hear him speak.
How many of them showed up for him? Zero. They showed up for themselves. It's what they believed about America that got them to travel in a bus for eight hours to stand in the sun in Washington in the middle of August. It's what they believed, and it wasn't about black versus white: 25% of the audience was white.
Dr. King believed that there are two types of laws in this world: those that are made by a higher authority and those that are made by men. And not until all the laws that are made by men are consistent with the laws made by the higher authority will we live in a just world. It just so happened that the Civil Rights Movement was the perfect thing to help him bring his cause to life. We followed, not for him, but for ourselves. By the way, he gave the "I have a dream" speech, not the "I have a plan" speech.
Listen to politicians now, with their comprehensive 12-point plans. They're not inspiring anybody. Because there are leaders and there are those who lead. Leaders hold a position of power or authority, but those who lead inspire us. Whether they're individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to. We follow those who lead, not for them, but for ourselves. And it's those who start with "why" that have the ability to inspire those around them or find others who inspire them.
Thank you very much.