Hi there 還在十倍單字狂刷文法嗎?
讓英文變成你生活的一部分學起來才會自然有有效
所以同情懸疑推出全新的單元 Who is?
有我們老主持人 Gavin老師美洲帶你用全英文
這些人物的故事不只是新聞話題跟跟我們的日常習習相關
美洲鎖定 Who is?單元跟 Gavin老師一起探索那些改變世界的人
Today we are introducing a unique and powerful figure in Silicon Valley
who loves to go against the crowd
He is a famous contrarian which means he often does the opposite of what everyone else is doing
He is best known for being the first big investor in Facebook
but before that he changed the world by co-founding a company
that allowed people to email money to each other
He is also obsessed with the fantasy world of the Lord of the Rings
and is searching for technology that might help humans live forever
Can you guess who this billionaire thinker is?
The answer is Peter Till
Born in Germany in 1967
he moved to the United States with his family as a toddler
He was a brilliant student who studied philosophy and law at Stanford University
However, he realized that he did not want to be a lawyer
Instead, he turned to technology and finance
He became famous for co-founding PayPal in 1998
The team he built there was incredible
This group known as the PayPal Mafia includes Edon Musk and the founders of YouTube and LinkedIn
They helped each other build the modern internet economy we use today
Peter Till's career is defined by seeing value where others do not
In 2004, he made a historic decision
He invested $500,000 in a college student named Mark Zuckerberg and his small website Facebook
He was the first outside investor and this small stake eventually turned into billions of dollars
Later, he co-founded Palantir Technologies
A data analytics company that helps governments fight terrorism and crime
He also wrote the best selling book Zero to One
In this book, he teaches that competition is actually bad for business
He argues that true innovators should try to build a monopoly by creating something completely unique
that no one else can copy
Today, Till is one of the most influential venture capitalists in the world through his firm Founders Fund
He is critical of simple apps and wants to invest in hard tech
Difficult innovations like rockets, biotech and artificial intelligence
He famously said we wanted flying cars instead we got 140 characters
Criticizing how technology has focused too much on social media
He is also a major power player in American politics
Unlike most Silicon Valley leaders who are liberal, Till is a conservative libertarian
who uses his money and influence to support specific politicians and shape public policy
Here are two fascinating facts that show his unique personality
First, Peter Till is a huge nerd who loves the Lord of the Rings
He names almost all his companies after things in the book
Palantir is the all-seeing stone used by wizards
Mithro is a precious metal and Valar refers to God-like spurts
It is quite funny that serious global finance companies are named after fancy-sea magic items
Second, he is very skeptical of the traditional university system
He created the controversial Thiel Ferros Fellowship
This program pays young people $100,000 if they agree to drop out of college to start a company or do research
Critics thought it was a crazy idea but some of these dropouts have gone on to build billion dollar companies
Proving his theory that you do not need a degree to be successful
