A Message to Every Entrepreneur

Author: David Perell URL: https://www.perell.com/blog/2015/5/16/2829n22bo2hpk34q8xr8y8th9bsfyk One-line: An early-Perell student manifesto: the American education system is obsolete in an age where information is a free commodity, and entrepreneurs — who learn by chasing ambitious goals and learning from their mistakes — are the model for how learning should actually work.

Key claims

• Classes are only as useful as the teachers who lead them. Rigid classroom settings and the lack of autonomy diminish Creativity and suppress the problem-solving skills students actually need.
• Students are taught to submit to arbitrary guidelines and think “inside the box,” graduating with near-identical skill sets and a base of information that could have been acquired on the internet — for free (cf. Wikipedia).
• The American educational system needs an extreme overhaul. The rise of AI and the ubiquity of the internet and smartphones make information and knowledge a commodity — which makes Creativity, Innovation, and thinking differently more valuable than ever.
• Startup incubators should be the model for universities. Y-Combinator, Betaworks, and Tech Stars don’t hand founders trivial knowledge — they provide support, wisdom, and connections.
• You are a business. Everyone can now build a personal brand and create their own success.
• The internet teaches more efficiently than the classroom. Professors should stop dispensing unpersonalized information and instead facilitate learning and serve as mentors. You can and should have both personal and impersonal mentors (cf. Live the Library, My Mentors).
• Life has no “final.” School builds toward a framed finish line; real life is a constant struggle from one milestone to the next with no timeline — only you can prioritize your time. Entrepreneurs learn by pursuing ambitious goals, fighting relentlessly, and learning from inevitable mistakes — they spend their lives chasing intangible finish lines.

Notable quotes

“Classes are only as useful as the teachers who lead them, while the lack of autonomy and rigid classroom settings diminish creativity and suppress necessary problem-solving skills.”

“Students graduate from college with similar skill sets and a base of information that could have been acquired on the internet… for free.”

“The internet and smartphones make information and knowledge a commodity. We’re entering an age of unprecedented human progress.”

“Instead of providing their founders with trivial knowledge, incubators provide support, wisdom and connections.”

“We live in a time where everybody can create a personal brand and create one’s own success. You are a business.”

“I’ve learned more from Ben Thompson, Fred Wilson, Mark Manson, Peter Thiel, Marc Andreesen and Benedict Evans this semester than any of my professors.”

“In school there is a ‘final’ event, something you build towards. In life it is just a constant struggle from one milestone to the next with no framed timeline to work towards. Only you can prioritize your time in the real world.”

“People who change the world spend their lives pursuing the intangible finish lines that contrast strict university curriculums.”

How it connects

• David Perell — an early-career piece (2015) prefiguring his later writing-on-the-internet and self-education themes.
• University disruption / Apprenticeship — the core argument that incubators and mentorship beat the classroom.
• Live the Library / My Mentors — Perell’s “your professors are the writers you read” framing; personal and impersonal mentors.
• Creativity / Innovation — what becomes scarce and valuable once information is a free commodity.
• Y-Combinator — the incubator-as-university model.