A Spark Lights a Big Fire

One of the things I love about Silicon Valley is that someone can go from a nobody to a superstar almost instantly. That's *not* possible at this sort of scale and consistency anywhere else in the world. For one of my personal anecdotes, check out the beginning of this email thread with Evan Reas (CEO of LikeALittle) from last fall:

Of course Evan was hustling and sending an email after we were replying to each other on Twitter but the point is that back then he was a complete "nobody" ;)

Now he's gone on to raise millions, LAL is a hot startup in the valley with great traction, and it seems like they have a pretty big opportunity in front of them with a top-notch team. As long as they just don't fuck it up.

Silicon Valley does a good job getting out of the way of "nobodies" because out here it's close to a pure meritocracy. Like a forest that's incredibly dry, all it takes is a small spark to light a tremendous fire. And of course in this analogy, a big fire is a very good thing. What's important is that this could probably only happen out in Silicon Valley.

In Silicon Valley it seems that the top talent, even if they're "nobody", more often than not finds a way to bubble up towards the top.