#TechGiants Art Series - Sam Lessin of Facebook (Timeline/Identity)
During TigerTrek 2011, Taylor Francis brought 20 of us to visit 30 companies in Silicon Valley, including Facebook. We met Sam Lessin at the then Palo Alto HQ dining hall (see photo below). That was the first time that I learned about Timeline, a new way to organize Facebook Identity that now everyone may have taken for granted.
Sam is the architect behind Timeline. Before Facebook, he ran a cloud-based file sharing service called Drop.io. The impression I got from the hour long group meeting was that Sam has so much wisdom.
This post shares a few pearls of wisdom that I learned on Ownership, Identity & Product Management .
I remember asking Sam about China market for Facebook - he responded that a country with such huge population and online users cannot be ignored.
After the TigerTrek trip - as an avid FB user and a believer in making the world more open & connected, I developed thoughts about certain Facebook feature, and decided to email Sam. Given how busy Sam’s schedule must be, I did not expect a response. But to my surprise, I received a (1) (2) (3) point-by-point response, succinct and easy to navigate through.
Since TigerTrek, I have exchanged a few emails with Sam and every time, I find myself learning new things and think beyond what I am used to.
As an Economics major, what Sam made me realize is how Economics theory can help analyze disruptive ideas empowered by technology - for example, costs & benefit analysis of sharing economy, i.e. how owning things will become an inferior good.
Here are two TEDx talks by Sam that I recommend if you are interested in the future of identity and sharing economy.
TEDx Constitutional Drive:here Bending Time
TEDx East here: The End of Ownership - really eye-opening
In his TEDx talk about the "end of ownership”, Sam mentioned the phenomenon in NYC that once it rains, there is umbrella salesman in every street corner. I experienced this in real life when I was walking down St. Marks Place in East Village in the pouring rain, and I couldn’t help but notice a myriad of sounds around me “umbrella, umbrella 1 dollar 1 dollar"
On Ownership: Below are some notes that I took
Pros: (1)on demand use (2)appreciation
Cons: (1) Maintainance (2) oppo cost
Ownership = buy use &future appreciation
sell liquidity &option value
"Ownership" is no longer a privilege, but inferior good
We gain more utility when moving away from owning
- Renting doesn’t change the rule of play , but only cost structure
- if one can afford /have credit, we should pay someone else to own thing for us
- Get rid of laws/regulation that encourage ownership , they are antiquated
- Encourage competition,because tendency towards consolidation
Our Generation = Hacker Generation à contribution in ‘social’ space; what will happen:
1. Info will tend to cluster and centralize
2. We will share a lot more about ourselves
3. We will be locals everywhere
4. Cost structures will variablize and ownership will become an inferior goods
5. Social Capital will get ever more fungible
On Product Management, the advice from Sam is that :
(1) spend a lot of time with our products and those of other related companies / develop opinions about what we are doing well and poorly, and strategically what we should focus on
(2) spend time thinking about how you would design and implement specific feature ideas in detail
(3) get a familiarity with ballpark math around our system…. e.g. How would you estimate how many photos are uploaded to Facebook every day, how much storage is that, etc.
Overall, Sam is one of the techgiants that I look up to and learning much, even from a distance. His name may not be as well known at the moment, but he is certainly a tech giant of our age.
Note: in this painting, I experimented not using any white paint, but leave white space during painting. I also did not have the original space to paint, so that I hang the panel on mirror and painted - putting surrounding material into good usage.
[Step 1] First draft - somehow the face should have been narrower.
[Step 2] Gathering feedback, revise the shape of face
[Step 3] Revised - note no white color was used in this painting. (my first experiment)
