The latest from TechCrunch
- NSFW: Sorry Deathhackers; Life Is Short, And So It Should Be
- Groupon CEO Andrew Mason On Google, Clones, And Other Things That Don't Worry Him
| NSFW: Sorry Deathhackers; Life Is Short, And So It Should Be | Top |
| You know what's getting old? The debate about aging. In today's Observer, molecular biologist Aubrey de Grey is interviewed about how he sees no reason why a human being alive today might live to 1000. If the prediction sounds familiar it's because de Grey – this time described as a gerontologist – was subject to a similar profile in Friday's New York Times, thanks to his being a key subject of Jonathan Weiner's book Long For This World: The Strange Science of Immortality . Right here on TechCrunch, Halcyon Molecular's William Andregg spoke to Cyan Banister about the need for humans to conquer death to allow us the time to reach the stars. And of course, Ray Kurzeil has been at this stuff for years: according to a 2005 Wired profile "Kurzweil ingests 250 supplements, eight to 10 glasses of alkaline water and 10 cups of green tea. He also periodically tracks 40 to 50 fitness indicators, down to his ‘tactile sensitivity.’” Christ. Oh yes, go to any Silicon Valley party right now and you’ll find a scrawny huddle in the corner discussing the science of living forever: a topic that's gone from fringe to hot to cliché in – ironically – less time that it takes a tsetse fly to start getting interested in girls. But then why wouldn't it when the science of aging touches on so many valley obsessions? For a start, gerontology is a science. But it's also hacking: human bodies aren't supposed to live much beyond 80, and these are people who would gladly spend a weekend hacking a Furby to make it curse, just because it's not supposed to. Bill Gates has described bio-hacking (deathhacking?) as the logical successor to computer hacking. More importantly though, Silicon Valley people are – by and large – massive overachievers. Company founders in their teens, rich by the time they're 30, angel investors by 31, charitable foundation at 40. No wonder these people want to go on forever: just imagine what they could achieve by the time they're 1030! And so the research goes on, millions more dollars are poured in to deathhacking startups by rich-mortal-and-terrified benefactors, dozens more books are published on the subject and every day countless startup founders jump into their Teslas and speed to their "doctors" to pick up the latest batch of pills that they hope will keep them around until someone figures this shit out. And why not? Here's why not. A few months ago I finished writing my book about living in hotels – a second memoir by the age of thirty, which is unwarranted by any measure. My deadline was January 1st, but I finally scraped past the finish line somewhere around the start of March. The truth is, I didn't need the extra time: I'd already had a year to write the thing, and much of that time was spent dicking around in the name of "additional research", most of which never made it into the final manuscript. But it's generally accepted that authors never make their deadlines, and my publisher gladly gave me the 90 days grace I claimed I needed to complete the task. By contrast, Lacy is about to hit ‘send’ on her second book – a book that required many thousands of miles of travel, hundreds of interviews and an immeasurable amount of actual reporting. And yet she's delivering right on deadline. Why? Well, mainly because she's more professional than I am, but also because her publisher (being a serious business publisher rather than a chilled-out literary one) is less generous with deadline extensions. They have a schedule to keep to. And, anyway, Sarah has other important projects to be getting on with and doesn’t want to waste time. The difference between my behavior and Sarah's is the classic "time taken to complete the task expanding to fit the deadline" curse. By knowing she’s working to a fixed deadline, Sarah is able to deliver a much more ambitious manuscript in less time than it took me to bash out a memoir for which the only research was getting up in the morning and waiting to see what happened next. And it's that same curse that takes us to the heart of the life extension myth: that if we can live longer, then we can achieve more. We blithely assume that it's the success of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs that makes them fear death so much: they can't take their wealth or success with them so they are desperate to stick around longer and longer to double and redouble it. But what if the truth is precisely the opposite? What if the real reason these entrepreneurs have achieved so much is precisely because – more so than other mortals – they were born with a keen understanding they are working to a fixed (if unknown) deadline? It's that fear of death that makes them succeed, not the other way around. Of course, by extending their lives – if there's any hard evidence it's possible, which of course there isn't – there's every chance that the current crop of entrepreneurs and scientists will continue achieving greater and greater things until they're hit by a bus on their 10,000th birthday. Every day will seem like a miracle and they won't want to waste it. But even so, that first gang of grateful near-immortals will be the only ones to feel that gratitude. Subsequent generations will never have known the idea of a strict biological deadline – the need to overachieve while there's still time – and so will be quite justified in taking things easy, diluting their work to fit the time available. Perhaps they'll start their first company in their hundred-and-teens, they'll be rich by the time they're 3000, angel investors by 3100, charitable foundation at 4000? 40,000? Whatever. But at least they’ll have more time to enjoy life, right? Not really. Apart from rabid over-achieving, there's another thing that unites all life-extension obsessives: they look like death. "Medievally thin and pale," is how the Times (quoting Weiner's book) describes de Grey. Kurzweil spends his days glugging green tea and popping pills, not eating to excess and avoiding recreational drugs. One can only imagine how much fun life would be if you had to live like that for 1,000 years. And by 'one', I mean Dante. So, please God, let's put an end to this deathhacking nonsense. Let's flush the pills, stock up on recreational drugs, drive fast cars, work long hours and stay inspired by natures crippling deadline to achieve greater and greater things in our fourscore years and ten. After all, to paraphrase Hippocrates – the original doctor – vita might be brevis but, done right, ars can be very, very longa indeed. | |
| Groupon CEO Andrew Mason On Google, Clones, And Other Things That Don't Worry Him | Top |
| On Friday at our Social Currency CrunchUp , Groupon CEO Andrew Mason sat down for an interview with our own Michael Arrington and Erick Schonfeld. Mason touched on Groupon’s history — including some dabbling with slippers with flashlights , and also gave some insight into the company’s growth as well as his view on the competition. During the interview, Michael revealed that he’d heard that Groupon was generating $1 million in revenue a day — Mason played coy and didn’t appear to confirm this. However, he did acknowledge that the company is getting a gross margin of 50% or higher, going on to say “it’s a cool business”. It’s safe to say that Mason, at least publicly, isn’t overly concerned about Groupon’s potential competition. Asked about the possible entry of Google into the market, Mason facetiously responded, “Google, Oh My God!”. And Mason said that Amazon (and Woot, which it recently acquired ) were primarily focused on consumer products, while Groupon caters more to local businesses. Asked about Tippr, which acquired a number of patents relevant to this space, Mason said that Groupon has “had people look at us to see if [the patents] applied and they don’t.” Mason also doesn’t worry much about clones — the company started seeing them pop up in March 2009, but Groupon doesn’t actively do anything about them because “the basic idea of Groupon is not something we can patent” (except when they infringe on things like Groupon’s logo). Other key stats Mason talked about: Launched in November 2008 A year ago today, we were active in 5-6 cities Now running in 170 cities in 22 countries Over 1000 employees now About 12 million people getting daily email. Adding 2 million a month 97% of businesses featured want to be featured again Breakage rate is probably around 10%, though Groupon doesn’t directly track it Asked about advertising on Facebook versus Google, Mason said that six months ago Facebook was often cheaper. However, that’s changing. Mason explained that in the past, when he wasn’t really focused on the Silicon Valley scene, he would look at Facebook’s valuations and not really see how it could warrant them — but now that he’s an advertiser on Facebook, he thinks “they’re going to be worth a lot of money”. Also see our recent interview with Mason on TechCrunch TV right here . CrunchBase Information Andrew Mason Groupon Information provided by CrunchBase | |
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