
Tim Ferriss Revisited - utnick
http://www.texasstartupblog.com/2008/05/19/tim-ferriss-revisited/
======
fallentimes
"We don’t mow our lawns, we don’t clean our homes, we don’t cook our meals, we
don’t drill for oil, we won’t build oil refineries, we simply don’t do much
anymore".

This is a sign of prosperity not a lack of hard work. We also don't cut our
own trees, build our own furniture, use printing presses or churn our own
butter. Instead, we've been able to reassign our time and talents to more
productive or fulfilling tasks while leaving or paying for tasks such as these
to machines or to a lesser amount of people.

One caveat, in TFHWW, Ferriss often comes off as sort of a douche, but that
doesn't mean there aren't great concrete ideas and references throughout the
book - the key is knowing which ones are applicable to your life. The book is
by no means perfect, but it's certainly better than the self-improvement fluff
and vapor proliferating itself all over the Amazon best seller lists.

The blog post author seems to confuse working hard and working smart.

~~~
mhartl
_One caveat, in TFHWW, Ferriss often comes off as sort of a douche, but that
doesn't mean there aren't great concrete ideas and references throughout the
book_

I agree. I do recommend TFHWW to people, but never without embarrassment.

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qaexl
The guy's older article is just as interesting for the confusion.
([http://www.texasstartupblog.com/2007/08/09/timothy-
ferriss-r...](http://www.texasstartupblog.com/2007/08/09/timothy-ferriss-
ruining-lives-four-hours-at-a-time/))

He takes the example of one person who has ruined his life. Ruined how? The
guy is no longer a customer. He hides from the people he is working with.
Therefore, he disvalues building lasting relationship.

Unfortunately, he assumes that a professional life necessarily encompasses a
personal life. He seems to be implying that if your professional life tanks,
then you no longer have a personal life ... whereas the main thing I get out
of Tim Ferris's book is giving priority to your personal life. Since the blog
post author only knows his example by through his professional life, he has no
way of knowing if his former client has ruined his _personal_ life.

I keep seeing so much hate in those comments. I saw the hate in the reviews on
Amazon. Particularly, people keep coming back to the idea that if everyone
follows Ferris's strategy, no one would be left to do the work. Why are people
waving that around as if they were waving a flag to make a last stand against
a charging horde of barbarians?

It seems to me that this blog author reacts violently to the idea that a
person can benefit from someone else's "hard honest work", to the point that
he may be taking it personally: reacting unconsciously to the idea of "Tim
Ferris is taking advantage of MY hard honest work." It is as if Ferris's ideas
threatens all those years of struggle with putting in long hours to put food
on the table. These are responsibilities as an adult, that one had to give up
personal things as a child to become an adult ... and here comes Ferris who
seems to advocate extending your childhood ... So he tells himself, "If
everyone follows Ferris's ideas, who is actually going to do the work" While
this is mathematically true, it serves more as an emotional security blanket
validating that all the "sacrifices" he had made was not for naught.

In his book, Ferris himself claimed to have worked extremely hard in his early
days, before dropping everything to go to Europe. There, with nothing to do,
and no "hard work" to validate himself as a person, he had to either fill it
up with something (usually hard work) or come to some sort of a realization
about himself. Ferris by no means the first person who has espoused this idea.
In my studies of Lao Tzu's ancient text, Tao Te Ching, these very same ideas
are already there. In fact, Ferris does not really escape the whole Protestant
Work Ethic -- he's turning his entire drive and passions towards doing the
things he _wants_ to do (whatever those "wants" are), whereas Taoists of Lao
Tzu's ilk tame those fires and retire into a contemplative life away from the
material world. Ferris still works hard, he just doesn't work hard in what the
mainstream American society considers "productive".

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jraines
"Envy never comes to the party dressed as envy, but as high moral standards."

That's a paraphrase, Wilde or Shaw I think, but this post is a perfect
example.

I think the idea that "hard work is an end unto itself" is pretty dumb.

I'd also like to address his comment about "who will do the work?" if everyone
implemented Ferriss methods. Well, obviously some people are going to lack the
initiative, brains, risk-tolerance, information, or opportunity to do so, and
will be stuck manning the refineries or stuffing the boxes. But you can't
really blame Ferriss for that, as he wrote a best-selling book trying to show
how and why to do it, even without having much money or "qualifications"!

~~~
kirubakaran
The author pretty much seems to say "What will happen if everyone starts
coding?" It is amazing how some people don't try to extract what is valuable
to them from Tim's book, PG's essays etc and simply try to reiterate why it
won't work for them.

This guy is a blubist.

(I am using <http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html> to my advantage ;) Search for
_defeatist_ )

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soundsop
_Our founders were the hardest working people of their time._

I think that distinction probably goes to their slaves.

~~~
dissenter
There is still debate over whether slaves worked harder even than other paid
farmhands. The last great volley (slaves do) could be said to have won its
author a Nobel Prize.

~~~
gojomo
Good, substantive point that anyone cheering on the glibness of the
grandparent post should consider.

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chaostheory
hmmm I didn't feel that Ferriss was espousing laziness. Instead here's what I
thought his major ideas were:

1) your time is very valuable; you only live once

2) it is stupid to spend all your time working so you collect and hoard
expensive toys that you won't have time to play with. instead use your money
to expand your free time and freedom to do cool stuff

3) you can delegate some of your work to expand your free time

4) there are unconventional solutions to conventional problems

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mpk
I've read the four-hour-work-week, and at its core the message is that if you
work hard and focused towards building a company that actually makes something
people want and structure it in such a way that that you can offload support,
etc to third-parties .. well _then_ you can go do something else and macro-
manage it in a few hours per week.

It takes a lot of effort and focus to get to that point, though.

Tim Ferriss is hardly a snake-oil vendor. The marketing of the book might
suggest otherwise, but to me he seems like a guy who found a novel way to
structure _his_ business and wrote the book as a "here's how I did it".

The book's worth picking up if you're reading this site, though comments along
the lines of programmers being a dime a dozen (or words to that effect) might
put you off.

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icey
Has anyone seen a blog post where someone applied the information from "Four
Hour Workweek" and it worked well for them? (Excluding Tim Ferriss, of course)

~~~
webwright
Ferriss suggests:

1) Reducing information/news intake (Peter Drucker said that) 2) Working ON
the business (automating it) rather than IN the business. 3) Pushing the
envelope on how much mundanity you can outsource.

You don't have to look far for people who've had success following these
ideas.

~~~
icey
I appreciate that he is using largely recycled ideas. What I am looking for,
though, is someone stating that Four Hour Workweek is the tool that they used
to get them from point A to point B.

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bkbleikamp
I've never read the book, but taking the title literally was the authors first
mistake.

From what I've seen in reviews and when I skimmed the book it's not about
working 4 hours a week, it's about working less on mundane tasks and doing
what you love in your free time (traveling, golfing, whatever)

~~~
wallflower
In the book, the author explains how he used Google Adwords to test the
marketability/flash of book titles. 4HWW won.

~~~
elai
The original title was drug dealing for fun and profit! The book isn't
necessarily about working 4 hours a week.

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amuse
You have to give Tim credit, he came up with an excellent controversy. Of
course, you all must realize that Tim doesn't follow his own advice. He admits
that it took a lot more than 4 hours a week to write the book. He spends more
than 40 hours a week promoting the book (even now). Get it? He doesn't believe
his own thesis. Sure, it is possible, but for how many people? for how long?
Not very many and not very long.

~~~
mechanical_fish
Ferriss never claimed to be writing his book for money. The book is his
_hobby_ : he _enjoys_ writing books. He _enjoys_ promoting his book. That's
one reason why he's so good at it!

I do agree, though, that the book's advice is not for everyone.

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bisi
Well .. I think the writer has a few things wrong ... Everybody is not going
to be successful . All fingers are not equal .

This is why if you have 50 students in a class who have been taught by the
same lecturer using the same books . They dont all get A's

If everyone one in America is given $1 Million most would be broke in less
than 3 years . Money will be pissed away on Alchohol, Drugs, Women, Gambling,
Bad Biz choices, etc

There is never a time when 100% of the people will get it right 100% of the
time .

So saying who will wash the dishes if everyone is a chef makes no sense
because life is designed there to be winners and losers . A lot of people that
bought the book wont even finish reading the book if they start at all .

Life is meant to be enjoyed . Your not meant to spend your life working hard
till you drop dead .

Your meant to utilize you talents to get ahead and finishe early .

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tdavis
Anytime I see someone try to use "ethics" to make an argument I instantly stop
reading. Ethics and morality are human constructs and inefficient ones at
that. The question isn't "Did I succeed at X by cheating/being unethical?" its
"Did I succeed at X?" Everything else is superfluous. There are countless
real-world "hacks" that require one to bend the rules or forgo being "nice" to
accomplish a goal.

~~~
Psyonic
Really? I agree that ethics doesn't really apply in this case, as what Tim
Ferriss suggests is just basic capitalism (companies always profit off the
backs of their workers... what has changed?) but you don't even consider it?
i.e. professional assassin is fine as long as pays the bills?

~~~
tdavis
Honestly? Yes, it is. That being said, were I planning to run for President, I
probably wouldn't pick a job like professional assassin because if the public
found out they likely wouldn't vote for me. I consider ethics only when my
perception as ethical/unethical factors into my probability for success at a
given task. In this case, Ferriss' success didn't hing on his ability to be
ethical and/or not be an ass so it's irrelevant.

Take Google for instance; their Do No Evil mantra. Maybe they really are super
ethical people and truly want to improve the world we live in. Or maybe its
just _really_ important to appear and be ethical when dealing with tons of
information from the public in order to gain the trust necessary for them to
use Google services. Either way, it's an important factor for their success.

I don't go out of my way to break social constructs or be a jerk, but my
business partner can attest that I don't go out of my way _not_ to, either.
Its why he does most of the talking ;)

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bisi
Yeah ..Our founders didnt do the work .. They outsourced it to slaves .

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k7lim
I tried to get through this, despite the piss poor writing ("Let's begin at
the beginning...") and the arrogant tone. I skimmed the beginnings of every
chapter, and realized that this book could be written in 5 pages. Then I read
the part about him cheating to win a kickboxing tournament. That's when I
chucked the book aside, and picked up Warren Buffett's biography instead. Talk
about contrast. Buffett is insanely talented, works hard AND smart and has
incredible depth. Ironically, Ferriss himself recommended the Buffett bio at a
talk he did. My prediction? Ferriss is going to do talks to plug his book at
smaller and smaller venues, whoring himself out to everything but the local
Elk's club, following in the crap footsteps of Andrew Keen's book tour. Then,
as he realizes the ship has lost all momentum, he'll admit that this book is
just another corner-cutting, outsourced, unoriginal, first-draft, lazy piece
of work in a long line of shams that he's pulled.

