FRIDAY, 5 JULY 2013
The MP3 player was developed and has since proven to be a great success because people who were already in the privileged position to own Walkmans and Discmans complained – it could even be said that they moaned – about all the cassettes and discs they always had to carry around.
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I make chips of metal, the size of a large coin. At the end of the working day I push all the chips into a slot, and one fresh NT$100 note comes out at another slot for every chip I made. If I made a mistake with a chip or the quality is inferior, the chip will be rejected and dropped into a drawer at the bottom of the machine. I can then fix the error, or do some more work on the chip, and try again.
Because it takes me about twelve minutes to make each chip, I know I can produce five chips in one hour. I therefore know that I earn NT$500 for one hour’s labour. Although I can make as many chips as I want every day, I usually stop after four or five hours.
There is a clear and direct correlation between my labour and the rewards I receive.
I am thinking about hiring one or two people to make more chips than I can make on my own, which I will feed into the machine, after which I will share the rewards with my two workers.
THURSDAY, 11 JULY 2013
20:03
I am watching a documentary entitled, “Million Dollar Traders”. It is about a group of people, who have already been successful in other professions, who are learning to trade in London’s financial district. The story is the idea of a millionaire investor named Lex van Dam. He has appointed as the group’s manager a 29-year-old guy who has already retired – from trading on the stock exchange.
I look at the “City” people, and a profile develops:
– They like money.
– They are serious about money.
– They respect you if you are also serious about money.
– They get upset if someone is not serious about money, or if they are irresponsible with money, or stupid with money.
– They like to live well – good hotels, first-class airline tickets, exotic vacations, beautiful homes, nice cars, good clothes.
– They generally seem to be conservative in their outlook on life.
– They respect people who have mastered something, or someone who is good at something, or who knows more about something that many people are interested in.
21:47
If the place I want to reach can be called Point 100, I am now more or less at Point 14. Which is not to say that I haven’t made much progress. The “14” that I have achieved thus far is after all hard-won ground.
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