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My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts

By | April 27, 2010 | Life | 2 Comments
dropout

Sometimes it’s easy to lose sight of what you need to do to be successful.  There’s a lot of people that oppose the idea of starting a business without a degree or some sort of formal higher education. I think that it’s only necessary if you truly believe it’s necessary – it’s entirely up to you and how you feel. I’ve noticed a pattern in entrepreneurial type people who dropped out of college and created a business in an underserved or even non-existing market and absolutely killed it.  I’m not saying that college is a good or bad thing – that’s for you to decide. There are certain jobs/lifestyles that absolutely DO need a degree with no questions asked (doctor, engineer, etc.) but any entrepreneur can do just fine without a degree.

To illustrate my point here’s a list of my favorite successful college dropouts:

Bill Gates, Founded Microsoft. Networth $59 billion

bill gates 300x300 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts

 

 

Michael Dell, founded Dell Computers. Networth: $17.3 billion

michael dell 218x300 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts


Steve Jobs, founded Apple. Networth: $5.4 billion

steve jobs 300x300 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts

 

Mark Zuckerberg, founded Facebook, Networth $700 million

facebook mark zuckerberg 300x176 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts

 

Jawed Karim, founded Youtube. Networth: $64 million

jawed karim 230x300 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts

 

Kevin Rose, founded Digg. Networth: $60 million

kevin rose 300x215 My 6 Favorite Successful College Dropouts


All of these people (literally ever single one) did the same thing. They found either a weak, underserved, or non-existent market and served it. If you have passion, know how, and drive that’s all you need to be as successful as anyone on this list.

Hearing “I’m Bored” Is The Most Frustrating Thing Ever…

By | April 16, 2010 | Life, Random & Rants | 2 Comments
Time wasting

I’m tired of seeing people complain about how bored they are on Facebook and Twitter. There is absolutely nothing to stop ANYONE with internet access to learn whatever they want.

The internet presents amazing opportunities to people that can change their lives and lead them on the path to be whatever they want to be in life. One of the most frustrating things I hear (often) is people complaining about wanting their life to change but it’s usually those SAME people that are constantly posting about how bored they are or spamming me with mafia wars requests. Please, if this is you – stop and and start making a better use of your time. There has never been a better time to learn absolutely any skill you want. So few people take advantage of this and use the internet to 1% of its capability at best.

Time is the single most sacred resource in life, and far too often wasted.

Enough ranting for now, GO LEARN SOMETHING!

Quote of the day:

“You can do anything, but not everything.”

-David Allen

How To Get ALL Important News In Under 5 Minutes a Day

By | April 8, 2010 | How To, Life | No comments
Keeping Up With The Current News

People spend way too much time reading newspapers, visiting news sites, and watching the news. Seriously, WAY too much time. I’d say at least 95% of what you read/hear/see on the news is garbage that you shouldn’t be plaguing your mind with. I use two resources every day and in under 5 minutes a day I know all of the important or “big” events that are going on in the world.

So what are these magical resources you ask?

Google Trends

Google Trends is a list of the “hottest” topics people are searching. This means that if I want to find out whats REALLY important and what people are looking for information on I can just go here and let everyone else do the work for me.

googletrends How To Get ALL Important News In Under 5 Minutes a Day

In this example we can see what people are commonly searching for. There’s some interesting topics here and if you want to find out more about something listed all you have to do is click on it. For example, if I click on “obama nuclear” I’m taken to the search engine results page for that keyword. From here I can find out in 20-30 seconds what the deal is and move on or keep reading if I really want to know more.

Twitter Search

Twitter Search is similar to Google Trends in terms of what it is and how it works, there are a few big differences though. First off, Google Trends will sometimes have a delay on new search trends. With Twitter, if something big or important happens you can find it right away because lots of people will tweet about it at and it becomes what’s called a “trending topic”. Second, Twitter trends are dictated by what people are tweeting as opposed to what they’re searching so the topics will generally be at least partially different. The trending topics are displayed below the search bar.

twittersearch How To Get ALL Important News In Under 5 Minutes a Day

It looks like a lot of people are talking about the new iPhone update, so let’s say you want more information on that. All you have to do is click on the blue link that says “iPhone OS 4″ and it will show you who has tweeted recently about it, the great thing is that people will usually include information and articles.

So there you have it, that’s exactly how I find out what’s going on in the world. When big things happen like elections, large scale natural disasters, deaths of famous people, etc. it will almost always be on either Google Trends of Twitter Search before you even have a chance to pick up a newspaper or go to a news website. Use these two resources to cut out all of the time you waste reading to stay caught up.

My Thoughts on Being Born a Genius

By | March 31, 2010 | Life, Random & Rants | No comments
Are people born geniuses?

I don’t think anyone has ever been born a genius, let me tell you why…

Anyone who has ever been considered a genius at their craft of skill worked extremely hard for it. It’s almost insulting to me to say that they were just born smart and it fell into their lap. Being a genius or even considered smart at something takes persistence and a lot of practice.

There’s only one reason why people don’t ever get to that level of intelligence and that reason is effort. Be honest, how many times have you TRIED to master something and gave up? How many sports have you tried? How many instruments have you played? How many of those do you still do daily? That’s exactly what I mean – do you think that any genius or master of a skill picked it up and tried a few times then never came back to it? Nope. They practice every day, as much as possible. It takes hundreds of hours to master a skill which people don’t realize and stop practicing/bettering themselves at it making them feel as if they weren’t born with this mysterious ability to be a genius.

There is one problem in the modern world that prevents people from achieving genius status in life – distractions. There are FAR more distractions today than there were even 50 years ago. People often choose to do something mindless and easy over difficult or thought provoking that will increase their intelligence. Think about it – how much work do you think Einstein would have finished if he had an Xbox 360 taunting him the whole time?

What I’m trying to say is I don’t think that you have to be born with some special gene to be a genius, you just have to try EVERYDAY to better yourself at whatever it is you want to master.

Quote of the day:

“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.”

—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Battle of the Books: The 4 Hour Work Week vs. CRUSH IT!

By | March 23, 2010 | Life, Make Money Online | 3 Comments
The Four Hour Work Week and Crush It

Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk are two widely known guys that both wrote great books. There is a problem though, they both are wildly successful but the views they hold are very very different when it comes to working. If you’re unfamiliar with these two as authors, I recommend you read the rest of this post then buy both of their books.

Tim Ferriss is the author of the best-selling book called The 4-Hour Workweek. If it’s not obvious – Tim’s book is about working as little as possible while still being a wealthy person, or being wealthy enough to do what you really want to do in life. In The 4-Hour Workweek Tim talks about his life and how he delegates 99% of his duties (both work related and personal) allowing him to work for 4 hours a week or less. The whole idea revolves around running your business so efficiently that it becomes a well oiled machine and doesn’t consume you so you can enjoy your life.  Not a bad mindset, right? Reading this book really proved to me how broken the idea of “retirement” is and makes me wonder why people are so willing to work their entire physically capable life away to just go and die on the beach.

Then we have Gary Vaynerchuk’s CRUSH IT!. When compared to The 4-Hour Workweek, there’s a very different idea of how hard you have to work to be successful. Gary preaches that you have to work your ass off, day in day out. There’s no time for video games, TV, or anything else but work work work. I think there is a very valid point that being successful won’t just fall into your lap but enjoying your success is just as important as HAVING success to me. Gary also gives some great insight about social media and how to leverage it with your business even if you don’t have any kind of budget. This book isn’t just about working super hard, there is a lot of great information that gives you a peak into how Gary’s mind works and how he got where he is.

I don’t think Tim would disagree that being successful does take work, but working like a mad man for your entire life is less than ideal for most people. There’s a lot of great insight and information to learn from both of these books that will get you going and motivated if you’re in a productivity rut.

With all that said, I really have to side with Tim Ferriss on this one, he’s living proof that you can outsource and delegate almost all of your responsibility and still run a very successful business.

Ok ok, I’m done playing book reviewer. Go buy and read The 4-Hour Workweek and CRUSH IT! right now!

Continuity Summit Update (Day 2)

By | March 5, 2010 | Life, Make Money Online, Marketing, Travel | No comments
Ryan Lee's Continuity Summit

So it’s day 2 at Continuity Summit and I must say I’ve been blown away so far. The event has exceeded all my expectations in every aspect. The people I’ve met here are great – from people just starting up to owners of multi-million dollar internet based companies. The networking opportunities are letting hundreds of people create mutually beneficial relationships giving everyone a shot at growing their business or creating new streams of income.

My company Beast Media gave a presentation on AdWords yesterday and my partner David Sinick did an amazing job. We received a lot of compliments and made some great new connections that I’m excited about. Continuity Summit has been a truly life changing experience for me this weekend. I’ve always 100% believed in what David and I are doing but the validation and appreciation I’ve been greeted with by the other attendees is extremely inspirational!

Consumer Responsibility: Where Does It End?

By | February 27, 2010 | Life, Marketing | No comments
Consumer Responsibility

After writing my post on the image of affiliate marketers becoming tainted to the general public I wanted to touch on consumer responsibility. A large majority of the “non-legitimate” affiliates chalk up the misleading rebills to consumer responsibility.

If you’ve ever seen the acai berry landing pages you know how they’re structured – something similar to “Just Pay Shipping”, “Free Trial”, “Get it For $1″, etc. In general, nowhere in plain sight does it tell you that you’re being enrolled in an $89.99 (give or take) per month program that is virtually impossible to terminate without canceling your credit card.

The typical retort from acai berry affiliates is that it’s the consumers responsibility. That means it’s your job to find the tiny link on the bottom of the site and read through the terms of service where it quickly glazes over the forced continuity you’re blindly signing up for. That is a beyond idiotic argument to make and not a realistic demand.

Just imagine if everything in life was structured that way where this scenario is entirely possible:

You buy a box of cereal and are secretly enrolled in an $80 a month program for that same box of cereal every month. After being billed $80 for a box of cereal the following month and trying not to murder someone you decide to call customer service to cancel. The phone rings for hours with no answer and you realize the situation quickly becomes hopeless. You then cancel your credit card because no box cereal is worth $80 (unless it’s Lucky Charms).

I don’t think any society can function in a world like this. Consumer responsibility only goes so far, there are things that consumers need to do to protect themselves and then there are things that are completely unreasonable to expect of people.

On My Way to Connecticut

By | February 23, 2010 | Life, Marketing, Travel | No comments
travel

I’m on my way to Connecticut for two weeks and I’m pumped to work my ass off and flesh as much new material as possible. My partner David Sinick and I have some huge plans for the next few weeks. We’ll be putting on a presentation at Continuity Summit in early March for a new product line we’re creating centered around creating and managing pay-per-click campaigns. We have loads of awesome content and lots of tips/tricks/secrets for staying super profitable that we’re excited to share. After Continuity Summit we’ll be launching the line of products to the rest of you so be sure to stay up to date here if you’re interested. I’ll update you guys throughout my trip about the products and other new and exciting big picture stuff.

Give Something a Second Chance

By | February 17, 2010 | Life | No comments
tryagain

Second chances are few and far between these days. How many times have you ever eaten at a restaurant, went to a store, or even got your hair cut and said “I will NEVER, EVER go back there again”? I said that once about a restaurant I went to about a year ago and had a pretty terrible experience. The food was bad and the service was worse, I can’t think of one thing they did right – I swore I’d never go back there. Recently I was looking for somewhere to eat and that restaurant was the only one open – I was faced with a tough dilemma here. I decided to go against my better judgment, suck it up, and eat there. My experience the second time around was so different it was unreal, the food was great and the service was top notch. Since then I’ve been to that very restaurant several times and have had nothing short of great experiences.

Give something a second chance. Just because it wasn’t up to your expectations the first time around doesn’t mean it won’t be the second. You never known – you could end up finding your favorite restaurant, store, or barber. When you think about it, ruling something out because of one bad experience in general can ruin a lot of opportunities and possibilities.

The Difference Between Being Money Driven and Greedy

By | February 12, 2010 | Life | No comments
Why People Are Greedy

I don’t know why so many people confuse money driven with greedy people. There is a huge difference between having money driven goals, dreams, and aspirations and being a greedy person. Money is the great equalizer in life and can improve anyone’s life almost guaranteed.

There is an old saying that I laugh at every time I hear it that goes “Money can’t buy you happiness.” The reason I find this amusing is because the people that I hear say it generally don’t have any. Some people ask me why I care so much about money and there is one simple reason: money = freedom and freedom = happiness, therefore money = happiness (transitive property!). If you can’t be happy with total freedom I don’t see how you can be happy period and I’m very sorry to hear that. It’s not that I want to conquer the Earth and be the wealthiest man alive, I just want to have freedom.

Just think about it for a few minutes, it’ll really start to sink in once you understand. I don’t think that a family living paycheck to paycheck would be upset if they became millionaires, cleared their debt and lived the life they’ve always dreamed of.