
Business Lessons From a Former Gang Member - barredo
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-11-30/business-lessons-from-a-former-gang-member
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sayemm
Interesting guy, and that BW article is an okay read but doesn't do that great
of a job telling his story.

But then I looked him up and came across this HuffPo article on him and
absolutely loved reading it, it's a must-read for founders:
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/02/ryan-blair-
visalus-...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/02/ryan-blair-visalus-my-
first-million_n_1383430.html)

I love collecting stories like this. They're real-world case studies of PG's
"Anatomy of Determination" - <http://paulgraham.com/determination.html>

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rizzom5000
A cool two-paragraph back story, but otherwise generally worthless. Also, it
appears the protagonist of this story is the founder of a successful MLM
company - good for him but he'll never knowingly get a dime from me.

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Surio
Not related to the article, but if people are interested in the "economics"
and "sociological" aspect of gangs and other illegal activites, the book "Gang
Leader for a day" is a very compelling read. Check your library. (EDIT: I
ended up liking it enough to buy a copy.)

<http://www.sudhirvenkatesh.org/books/gang-leader-for-a-day>

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daniel-cussen
"Get My Name Right"

This is so important. If you just stop and focus on 1) pronouncing a person's
name correctly and 2) remembering it, people are going to give you a much
easier time.

