Once Microsoft lost its grip on developers, it became only a matter of time before it lost its monopoly on operating systems. - Ben Horowitz

During this time I learned the most important rule of raising money privately: Look for a market of one. You only need one investor to say yes, so it’s best to ignore the other thirty who say “no.” We eventually found investors for a series C round (meaning our third round of funding) at an amazing $700 million pre-money valuation and raised $120 million.

I move onward, the only direction Can’t be scared to fail in search of perfection.

Andy explained that humans, particularly those who build things, only listen to leading indicators of good news. For example, if a CEO hears that engagement for her application increased an incremental 25 percent beyond the normal growth rate one month, she will be off to the races hiring more engineers to keep up with the impending tidal wave of demand. On the other hand, if engagement decreases 25 percent, she will be equally intense and urgent in explaining it away: “The site was slow that month, there were four holidays, and we made a UI change that caused all the problems. For gosh sakes, let’s not panic!