So even if you can't buy the car lover in your life an actual car, you can certainly obtain something connected to the wonderful world of driving.
And it's worth noting: These gifts are a lot easier to wrap.
Famous, collectible Porsches cost a fortune, but scale models of famous, collectible Porsches are totally affordable
Take the 1973 Porsche Carerra, an iconic version of what many car nuts consider to be the greatest sports car every build by human hands. These can sell for half a million dollars at auction. But you don't need to have that kind of coin if you want to "collect" the car. A scale model exhibits all the detail of the full-size dream machine — and doesn't require a climate-controlled garage for storage!
These carbon fiber Ferrari sunglasses complete any look with style
Let's say you have a friend or relative who's fortunate enough to own a Ferrari. They probably like to spend time in their car. And while they're spending time there, they might want to bond with the glorious machine. What better way than to have a pair of sunglasses made out of the same material as the car — lightweight, super-strong carbon fiber?
Car lovers can also love motorcycles, and for them this Belstaff jacket exudes soul
For the car lover who also digs motorcycles, you can always go for high-tech, modern protective gear. But chances are the biker on your list already has that. If you want to provide them with an infusion of throwback British style, you can't do better than one of the most famous motorcycle jackets of all time — the waxed-cotton Belstaff Roadmaster. It looks as good on the road as it does on the town.
Babbo is run by Mario Batali of "Iron Chef America" fame. He's written nine cookbooks and owns 20 other restaurants, but this one is widely considered to be the best of the best.
The menu is staggering; it includes multiple tasting menus and more than 50 a la carte options, but the best way to go is the pasta tasting, according to The Infatuation's Andrew Steinthal.
Batali's pastas are the David to his Michelangelo.
Carbone pays homage to the classic Italian-American restaurants found in New York during the mid-20th century. It strives to provide an elegant, comfortable, and unpretentious atmosphere.
Favorite dishes include seafood salad, chicken scarpariello and veal parmesan.
A Sunday afternoon brunch attendee made a very expensive mix-up when she confused a rare, white Alba truffle for a complimentary offering.
The owners of Equinox — a Washington, DC based restaurant — had placed one of their Alba truffles they had purchased in a glass case in order to promote a new vegan brunch buffet they were offering, reports the Washington Post. The special promotion included shavings of the truffle for a $20 surcharge.
But one customer apparently thought the display was free and took a massive bite out of the truffle.
The single bite she took was "the size of a silver dollar" and cost an estimated $300, owners Ellen Kassoff Gray and Tod Gray told The Post.
But the customer was not impressed with the special delicacy, telling co-owner Gray that she didn’t like the taste, and “suggested the chef salvage the unbitten part,” according to the Washington Post.
Luckily for the customer, Gray decided to not charge the diner for the $300 mistake.
White Alba truffles are so expensive because they are difficult for restaurateurs to get their hands on. They are incredibly rare, hard to find, and only available for three months of the year. When these truffles are unearthed, they usually sell for astounding prices — a buyer in China recently offered $1 million for a 4.16 pound find.
Despite the heartbreak and gruesomeness that often accompanies war, there's no doubt that the subject is fascinating to read about.
Michael Inman, Curator of Rare Books at The New York Public Library, and curator of the current exhibition Over Here: WWI and the Fight for the American Mind, picked out the best nonfiction books about war.
These books are a selection of scholarly histories, journalism, first-hand accounts, and works on the tactics and theory of warfare from the crusades to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land" by Thomas Asbridge
The battle for the holy land launched in 1095, and pinned Catholics and Muslims against each other for the next almost 200 years. Asbridge puts the conflict in context, from Pope Urban II's call upon "Latin Europe" to take a stand against the Muslims to the Muslim reclamation of the holy land.
Asbridge lays out a clear timeline of events, and offers a compelling retelling of the crusades that reads nothing like a history textbook.
Taking place in part along the 38th parallel where American and North Korean troops faced off, "This Kind of War" is a profound portrayal of the Korean War which includes maps and photographs to illustrate a human perspective on war.
First published in 1963, "This Kind of War" has become a classic in military history books.
A MacArthur fellow and Washington Post journalist, Finkel takes an in-depth look at some of the psychological issues, including PTSD, that plagued many of his fellow battalion members after returning from service in the Iraq war.
A sequel, if you will, to his book "The Good Soldiers,""Thank You for Your Service," presents snapshots of Finkel's battalion mates post-war, and how their service has affected their lives and loved ones.
Forget 15 minutes of fame. Ever since its launch almost two years ago, Vine stars are using six-second videos to make a name for themselves.
We collected and ranked the most popular Vine stars in the world based on their number of followers. Most are comedians, while others are musicians or actors.
These Vine users have risen from relative obscurity, and are now followed by millions of people. Some have even landed record deals or TV show and movie deals because of Vine.
30. Amymarie Gaertner
Followers: 3.3 million
Amymarie is an amazing dancer, so you'll see six-second snippets of choreography, mixed in with cute videos of her pets.
Jessi Smiles, whose real name is Jessica Vasquez, is a singer and makeup artist. On any given day Jessi posts hilarious videos talking to the camera and hanging out with her friend Gabbie, another Vine star.
The relentless pace of technology requires companies to either find ways to keep up or face extinction.
We've collected thoughts on leadership from some of the most influential CEOs in the tech world to see how they approach business, develop elite teams, and push people to their full potential.
Elon Musk, Tesla/SpaceX, on why he mistrusts process
"When I interview a potential employee and he or she says that 'it's all about the process,' I see that as a bad sign.
"The problem is that at a lot of big companies, process becomes a substitute for thinking. You're encouraged to behave like a little gear in a complex machine. Frankly, it allows you to keep people who aren't that smart, who aren't that creative."
"I always did something I was a little not ready to do. I think that's how you grow. When there's that moment of 'Wow, I'm not really sure I can do this,' and you push through those moments, that's when you have a breakthrough. Sometimes that's a sign that something really good is about to happen. You're about to grow and learn a lot about yourself."
Food pairing is a science — there’s a right way and a wrong way to do it. Just ask a sommelier.
And some pairings are obvious. For example, a fish dish goes best with a light wine like Pinot Grigio while a grilled steak would pair well with a spicy Shiraz.
But herbs, spices, starches, and dairies are a little harder to pinpoint.
The experts at Wine Folly (the same people behind this helpful wine infographic) have created a pairing chart where you can select your ingredients and preparation method to find the perfect wine.
Confused? Here’s that same chart in action with fish tacos as an example:
So the next time you go get a bottle of wine, make sure you know what you’re having for dinner.
Essentially, they have less of a filter on their thoughts and actions, so they are more likely to do things outside the norms of behavior. We've rounded up some of the stranger habits that have led to inspired thinking.
Yoshiro Nakamatsu would starve his brain of oxygen to get big ideas.
At 85, Nakamatsu is one of Japan's greatest inventors. He patented the floppy disk back in 1952 and has racked up 3,300 patents. He's the father of the karaoke machine, the sauce pump, the taxicab meter, and the digital watch.
To feed his inventiveness, he likes to push his brain and body to the limit. He regularly goes swimming and holds his head underwater to the point of nearly drowning.
"To starve the brain of oxygen," he once explained,"you must dive deep and allow the water pressure to deprive the brain of blood. Zero-point-five seconds before death, I visualize an invention."
Then he jots down his inspiration on an underwater notepad and heads back to the surface.
Leonardo da Vinci would draw with his right hand while writing backwards script with his left.
Like his other notebooks, it was filled with sketches and a backwards, shorthand-filled handwriting.
"An ambidextrous, paranoid dyslexic,"writes Discover, "Leonardo could draw with one hand while writing backward with the other, producing a mirror-image script that others found difficult to read — which was exactly the point."
Drawing and writing at the same time allowed da Vinci to work even more quickly.
Also, like an early form of encryption, da Vinci's backwards-facing handwriting meant that his insights stayed his own — until he pitched them to an investor.
Jonathan Franzen works with a blindfold to keep his concentration.
In an era of 140-character messages, Franzen composes serious fiction. His books "The Corrections" and "Freedom" capture the endemic weirdness of American families.
But to write his 500-page novels, Franzen goes beyond just boycotting social media. He blocks out all sensory stimuli. As the New York Times reports, he writes with earplugs, earmuffs, and a blindfold when he really needs to concentrate.
''You can always find the 'home' keys on your computer,'' he said. ''They have little raised bumps.''
Even though Apple released its new iPhones in September, there is already speculation that the next iPhone redesign — the iPhone 7 — will be even better when it arrives in 2016.
These theoretical mark-ups of the iPhone 7 caught our attention. Nikola Cirkovic, an engineer at the CIRPIS Center of Kragujevac, Serbia, created some renderings and sent them to Business Insider.
Responding to critiques that the iPhone 6 Plus is too big for small hands, Cirkovic's iPhone 7 has a screen that would fall between the 4.7" iPhone 6 and the larger 5.5" 6 Plus, at 5.2".
Cirkovic has rendered the design the device in white and black, departing from the company's choices of space gray and silver because he says he misses the beautiful simplicity of the first iPhones.
Although Apple likely would never make the changes Cirkovic suggests, it's still fun to see his interpretations.
Here's a look at Cirkovic's concept:
The two thin lines at the top and bottom of the screen are not just there for looks. They have sensors in them.
The sensors will be able to tell whether the iPhone is in your pocket or on the table. If it is, the screen will stay locked. If the phone is held up and closer to the face, the screen will automatically activate:
The US Naval Academy and US Military Academy football teams faced off in their 115th meeting on Saturday.
The schools' rivalry is one of the most unique in college sports. Though fiercely competitive, Army Cadets and Navy Midshipmen understand they're playing for the same team: Team USA.
Midshipman Second Class Jeffrey Martino, a junior at the Naval Academy, took photos at last weekend's game. We've republished them with his permission.
The Army-Navy game is the hallmark of one of the longest, most heated rivalries in college football. The U.S. Naval Academy and U.S. Military Academy football teams have played each other since 1890.
2014 was Navy's year to host the game, and they threw down at M&T Bank Stadium. Both Academies make the transportation arrangements to get each of their more than 4,400 student bodies to the game.
A Naval Academy midshipman finds his bus and prepares to make the early morning ride to Baltimore, Maryland. Attendance is required of all students.
If you're not already using AirDrop on your iPhone, Mac, or iPad, you should start.
AirDrop lets you transfer any kind of file — photos, videos, phone contacts, and even Map locations — from one person or device to another.
AirDrop runs on WiFi and Bluetooth, and it's incredibly easy to use once you know how.
Before you get started, you need to know if you can use AirDrop with your Apple device.
AirDrop only works with devices running iOS 7 or later, or Mac computers running OS X Yosemite. You can use AirDrop on any of the following devices: an iPhone 5 or newer, a fourth-generation iPad or newer, an iPad mini, or a fifth-generation iPod touch.
Turn on WiFi and Bluetooth.
You'll need both connectivity options enabled to use AirDrop. You can do this easily by swiping up from the bottom of your screen on an iPad or an iPhone — that's your Control Center — and then selecting the WiFi and Bluetooth buttons. If you want to share your phone contacts, you'll also have to sign into your iCloud account.
On OS X, here's where you'd turn on AirDrop.
You need this folder open in your Finder to be able to use Airdrop. Otherwise, nearby devices won't show up on your computer.
To compile the list, Goodreads editors nominated titles frequently reviewed on the site, which were then voted on by readers.
The list spans genres from fantasy to crime to romance, pulling together some of the most compelling reads 2014 had to offer.
"Landline" by Rainbow Rowell
When Georgie's husband, Neal, and her two daughters leave for a family trip without her, Georgie wonders if this might signify the end of her marriage as well. So when she discovers a way to relive the early, pivotal moments of her relationship with Neal, Georgie sets out to decide if their marriage should ever have happened at all.
This novel follows the lives of three mothers in a quiet Australian suburb who all have children in the same kindergarten class. Snippets of a police investigation are interspersed with the narration, revealing that one of the characters will end up dead in the end. But between cheating spouses, abusive husbands, and school bullies, it's impossible to know who the victim will be.
"The Storied Life Of A.J. Firky" by Gabrielle Zevin
After losing his wife and watching sales steadily decline at his bookstore, A.J. Firky begins to unravel. But when a baby mysteriously appears on the front steps of his store, the infant captures his heart and things begin to turn around.
No matter what season it is, golfers always have the game on their mind.
Fuel your golfer's obsession this holiday season with the with great golf gadgets and gifts.
From personalized accessories to golf simulators, here are 13 great gifts any golfer would love.
A framed picture of a favorite golf hole is the perfect office decor.
Golfers will love looking at a picture of their favorite golf hole when they're away from the course, whether that's at the office or at home. The thoughtful gift can be tailored to any budget.
Richard Branson is the only entrepreneur to have built eight separate billion-dollar companies in eight different industries — and he did it all without a degree in business.
"Had I pursued my education long enough to learn all the conventional dos and don'ts of starting a business I often wonder how different my life and career might have been," he writes in his book, "Like a Virgin: Secrets They Won't Teach You at Business School."
Running a business takes blood, sweat, and tears (and caffeine). But at the end of the day, you should be building something you will be proud of.
Branson says, "When I started Virgin from a basement in West London, there was no great plan or strategy. I didn't set out to build a business empire ... For me, building a business is all about doing something to be proud of, bringing talented people together and creating something that's going to make a real difference to other people's lives."
Branson received some timeless advice when building Virgin Airlines from Sir Freddie Laker, a British airline tycoon: "Make sure you appear on the front page and not the back pages," said Laker. "You are going to have to get out there and sell yourself. Make a fool of yourself, whatever it takes. Otherwise you won't survive."
Branson always makes a point of traveling often and meeting as many people as he can. This, he says, is how he came by some of the best suggestions and ideas for his business.
The unique name and brand that Virgin employs is one of the things that has made the company a success. Branson makes sure that the name "Virgin" represents added value, improved service, and a fresh, sexy approach.
Branson says he's asked all the time about the origin of the Virgin name. "One night, I was chatting with a group of 16-year-old girls over a few drinks about a name for the record store," he says. "A bunch of ideas were bounced around, then, as we were all new to business, someone suggested Virgin. It smacked of new and fresh and at the time the word was still slightly risqué, so, thinking it would be an attention-grabber, we went with it."
Most people deciding between two sets of sheets would choose the higher thread count.
But it turns out we've all been duped.
“There’s a maximum number of threads that can fit into a square inch of fabric,” explained Scott Tannen, CEO of Boll & Branch, a luxury linen provider. “Depending on the type of cotton used, that number is generally not more than 400. So there is an awful lot of interesting math involved in the sheets you see in a department store that can be up to a 1200 thread count.”
In fact, Consumer Reports says that 50 years ago, the most luxurious thread count available was 180, but now 1,000 thread counts are the norm.
So what happened?
We spoke with Tannen about what thread count is, why the numbers are so confusing, and how to buy the best sheets for your bed.
Know The “Real” Thread Count
Thread count is the total number of threads per square inch in a fabric (counting both horizontal and vertical threads). In theory, the higher the thread count, the softer and higher-quality the sheets.
But brands nowadays are counting multi-ply threads, which can lead to higher, erroneous numbers.
“In reality, to achieve a higher thread count manufacturers are generally using a lower grade of cotton that becomes very thin when spun," Tannen explained to us. "They then twist this thread around itself to create a `multi-ply’ thread. When they use 2-ply thread and weave it to a theoretical 300-thread count (150 horizontal, 150 vertical) they call it a 600 thread count sheet and sell it that way.”
So imagine that a 4-ply thread is woven as a 200 thread count, but sold as an 800 thread count. A regular ply 300 thread count would feel better and last longer, but most consumers are convinced to always buy a higher thread count.
“Fortunately, brands are now required to list the thread ply on the package," Tannen said. "So when sheets are 'lustrously woven from 2-ply cotton thread' as I recently saw at a major department store, people should be highly skeptical.”
Always Buy Cotton
Experts say that organic cotton, Egyptian cotton, and Pima cotton are the best choices over synthetic materials that don't breathe as well and can make you hot (and sleep poorly as a result).
But Tannen warns that not all types of cotton are equal.
“The term 'Egyptian Cotton’ was given to a plant called Gossypium barbadense when it grows along the Nile River in Egypt," he told us. "This plant type is known for its extra-long staple length (the length of the strand of cotton the plant produces). Unfortunately, modern manufacturers realized that customers were looking for `Egyptian Cotton’ when purchasing bedding, so they stretched the definition.”
Now, most so-called Egyptian cotton is either a sub-par cotton grown in Egypt or Gossyplum barbadense that isn’t grown in Egypt but in Pakistan, China, or India (and due to soil compositions, is not quite as good as the original).
To be safe, Tannen recommends 100% organic cotton because it’s durable, soft, and breathable.
Don’t Rely On Touch
Common sense dictates you can tell how nice sheets are by touching them, but unfortunately it’s not that simple.
“Many manufacturers are applying polishes, waxes, and other substances that increase the luster or soft feel," Tannen said. "Unfortunately, they all wash off after a washing or two.”
Instead, Tannen advised that your sheets are a good quality if they feel better after every subsequent wash. Good quality sheets should also last for years and never pill.
If you're deciding in the store, look at the seams and manufacturing. This won’t always be an easy tell, but if there are threads hanging off or nonuniform stitches, that’s a giveaway that these sheets are not the best.
In conclusion, consumers should stop putting so much emphasis on thread count, and put far more emphasis on the quality, softness, and durability of the cotton.
One thing to know: Coach K is the highest-paid college coach in any sport, making nearly $4 million more than any other basketball coach and about $2.5 million more than Nick Saban makes ($7.2 million) as the highest-paid college football coach.
#2 Rick Pitino, Louisville — $5.8 million
2014-15 Salary: $5,758,338
Potential bonuses: $775,000
National championships: 2
Final Fours: 7
Conference championships: 10
One thing to know: Rick Pitino is one of three coaches on this list with more than one national championship on his resume and the only coach to do it at more than one school, having won in 1996 with Kentucky and in 2013 with Louisville.
#3 John Calipari, Kentucky — $5.5 million
2014-15 Salary: $5,511,381
Potential bonuses: $850,000
National championships: 1
Final Fours: 5
Conference championships: 14
One thing to know: John Calipari began his coaching career as an assistant at Kansas where he served under legendary coach Larry Brown. After a stint as the head coach of the New Jersey Nets in the NBA, he once again served as an assistant for Brown with the Philadelphia 76ers for one season (1999-2000).
Men aren't socially conditioned to care about their skin, but they really should if they'd like to keep it looking healthy and clear.
The world of skin maintenance isn't so hard, either. It will just require a few simple changes to your daily routine to keep your outermost layer in great condition for decades to come.
These are the three ways men can take better care of their skin.
Cleanse
Soap is bad for your skin. Really bad. The basicity of both liquid and bar soap dries your skin out and leaves it rough and raw.
Instead, when you wash your face daily you should use a non-soap cleanser like Cetaphil Daily Facial Cleanser. It will rinse all the excess oils off your face without drying your skin out.
It's also not as irritating to your skin since it doesn't have any fragrances or dyes.
If you outright insist on using soap, look for one with moisturizers in the formula.
Know How To Shave Correctly
Unless your father was a master barber, he probably didn't teach you the best way to shave your face (or worse, he advised you to use an electric shaver).
Here's the right way to do it:
First, make sure you shave after washing your face. This will stop any bacteria lying on your face from getting into any freshly opened pores, which can cause irritation or acne.
Apply your normal shaving cream. Then, shave with the grain of your beard. Use short strokes and don't go over any areas more than once. Apply only a little pressure as you shave, letting the razor do most of the work for you. This will minimize your chances of ingrown hairs and reduce irritation.
After each pass, rinse the razor's blade with hot water before you stroke again. After you're done, make sure you rinse your face with cold water to close your pores.
And when it comes to razors, skip those multi-bladed razor offerings. Any razor with more than one or two blades will only end up irritating your face.
After you're done shaving, apply a soothing aftershave balm, like Dove Men's Hydrate Post Shave Balm. It's important to note, however, that many things called "aftershave" are frequently alcohol-based, which will dry out skin. You want something that will moisturize or contains aloe vera if you commonly get razor burn.
Moisturize
Adding a moisturizing lotion, like Neutrogena For Men Facial Moisturizer, to your routine can help restore moisture to your skin, making it look healthier in the short term and protect you against wrinkles.
Many men forget that shaving dries out their skin. Apply your moisturizer after shaving for maximum effect.
One thing to know: The Packers are 3-4 on the road, with their only wins coming at Chicago, Minnesota, and Miami (where they needed a last-second miracle to win).
Jeff Bezos and I have a long history, dating from my days on Wall Street and the early years of Amazon.com. Today, he's an investor in Business Insider, and I remain an Amazon shareholder. I tried not to let any of that be a factor when I interviewed him recently at our annual conference in New York City. Jeff rarely gives in-depth interviews, so I didn't hold back on asking about issues both pressing and personal. (Even Amazon's biggest investors, I learned, get only six hours of his time per year!) What follows, in text and video, are edited excerpts from my discussion with the man the Harvard Business Review called "The Best-Performing CEO in the World."
Henry Blodget: Let’s jump right in. What the hell happened with the Fire phone?
Jeff Bezos: First of all, it’s really early. We’ve had a lot of things we’ve had to iterate on at Amazon. You may remember something called Auctions that didn’t work out very well. Z Shops morphed out of that. Then we launched Marketplace, which became our third-party seller business, which now represents 40% of units sold on Amazon. That’s a great business.
If you look at our device portfolio broadly, our hardware team is doing a great job. The Kindle is now on its seventh generation. The Kindle Voyage, the new premium product, is just completely killer. Fire TV, Fire TV Stick — we’re having trouble building enough. Amazon Echo, which we just launched. So there’s a lot of activity going on in our device business. With the phone, I just ask you to stay tuned.
HB: What was the mistake with the phone? Or are you saying there is no mistake?
Jeff: I think it takes more time to analyze something like that. Again, one of my jobs is to encourage people to be bold. It’s incredibly hard. Experiments are, by their very nature, prone to failure. A few big successes compensate for dozens and dozens of things that didn’t work. Bold bets — Amazon Web Services, Kindle, Amazon Prime, our third-party seller business — all of those things are examples of bold bets that did work, and they pay for a lot of experiments.
I’ve made billions of dollars of failures at Amazon.com. Literally billions of dollars of failures. You might remember Pets.com or Kosmo.com. It was like getting a root canal with no anesthesia. None of those things are fun. But they also don’t matter.
What really matters is, companies that don’t continue to experiment, companies that don’t embrace failure, they eventually get in a desperate position where the only thing they can do is a Hail Mary bet at the very end of their corporate existence. Whereas companies that are making bets all along, even big bets, but not bet-the-company bets, prevail. I don’t believe in bet-the-company bets. That’s when you’re desperate. That’s the last thing you can do.
HB: We should stay tuned for an evolution of the phone. For how long?
JB: Who knows? Ask me in some number of years.
Here's what happened next, when I asked Bezos, "Let's just establish this once and for all: Can Amazon make money?"
HB: You talked about what a lot of CEOs do in terms of trying to drive that stock price, selling the stock. You told me something when we we’re outside that is extraordinary, which is that you spend six hours a year on investor relations.
JB: Yes. We do a lot of unusual things there. We don’t meet with our biggest investors. We meet with investors who have low portfolio turnover. Many investment funds have very high portfolio turnover. They’re not really investors — they’re traders. There’s nothing wrong with that: It’s just a different thing. Where you are going to spend your time and your energy is one of the most important decisions you get to make in life. We all have a limited amount of time, and where you spend it and how you spend it is just an incredibly levered way to think about the world. If you’re going to spend time explaining the company, you should do it with people who are long-term investors, rather than traders. That’s our point of view.
HB: How dependent is Amazon on you these days? You famously had a terrifying experience in a helicopter. And last year you had a terrifying experience in the Galapagos.
JB: The kidney stone was just painful — I don’t recommend that. Stay hydrated ... Anyway, my opinion is that I can do some things at Amazon that would be hard for other people to do, only because of my history with the company. As the company has grown, of course my job has changed very much.
My main job today: I work hard at helping to maintain the culture. A culture of high standards of operational excellence, of inventiveness, of willingness to fail, willingness to make bold experiments. I’m the counterbalance to the institutional "no" who can say "yes." I’m not going to be here forever. Many of the traits that make Amazon unusual are now deeply ingrained in the culture. In fact, if I wanted to change them, I couldn’t. The cultures are self-reinforcing, and that’s a good thing. We sometimes have people come to the company and they find Amazon very boring, because we don’t have enough competitive zeal. With annual planning processes, some companies literally start with, "Who are our three biggest enemies? Here’s how we’re going to hold them at bay or defeat them." We don’t have such a list at Amazon. It’s not how our annual planning process works.
On the other hand, if you’re the person who gets up in the morning and says, in the shower, "What can we invent for customers? What can we do differently? How can we improve that experience?" And so on and so on. Then that is going to be a playground.
I still run into work, by the way. I took my family on a vacation to France. My wife’s whole family — there are about 20 of us. We had an unbelievably good time. Great food, everything. We were there for a week. I got back to Seattle, and I ran into the office. I'm having so much fun.
HB: Is there a succession plan?
JB: Yeah, there is a succession plan for me, and for all of our senior executives.
HB: There is somebody who would take over?
JB: Yes, absolutely.
HB: Who?
JB: Secret.
HB: Let's turn to Hachette. You just had a very famously public bitter fight with them over the price at which you were allowed to sell their books. First of all, were you surprised with the amount of animosity that was directed at Amazon?
WATCH: Bezos' critia for expanding into new businesses
JB: My view is that in this incident and actually in our entire history, I think we have been treated extraordinarily well by the press and the media — certainly by customers. I have no complaints. I think we have been treated way above average over time and and I’m grateful for that. Retailers negotiating and fighting with suppliers is not a new phenomenon. Rarely does it break through into a public fight and mostly it's not. It’s an essential job of any retailer to negotiate hard on behalf of customers. It's what we do.
HB: If there was no negotiation, and you could dictate to everybody exactly what the terms were going to be, what would the future be for authors?
JB: The most important thing to observe is that books don’t just compete against books. Books compete against people reading blogs and news articles and playing video games and watching TV and going to see movies. Books are the competitive set for leisure time. It takes many hours to read a book. It’s a big commitment. If you narrow your field of view and only think about books competing against books, you make really bad decisions. What we really have to do, if we want a healthy culture of long-form reading, is to make books more accessible.
It takes many hours to read a book. It’s a big commitment. If you only think about books competing against books, you make really bad decisions. You're competing against Candy Crush and everything else. If we want a healthy culture of long-form reading, you have to make books more accessible. Thirty dollars for a book is too expensive.
Part of that is making them less expensive. Books, in my view, are too expensive. Thirty dollars for a book is too expensive. If I'm only competing against other $30 books, then you don’t get there. If you realize that you’re really competing against Candy Crush and everything else, then you start to say, “Gosh, maybe we should really work on reducing friction on long-form reading." That’s what Kindle has been about from the very beginning.
In the internet era, almost all of the tools for reading have been reducing the friction of short-form reading. The internet is perfect for delivering three paragraphs to your smartphone. The Kindle is trying to reduce friction for reading a whole book. It’s working.
The vision for Kindle is every book, every imprint, in any language, all available in 60 seconds. That’s a multi-decade vision. We’ve been working on it for a decade now, and we’ve made huge progress. We’re making books easier to get, more affordable, more accessible. It’s a fantastic mission. The Kindle team is very dedicated to it, and they’re doing a great job. You are getting more reading.
HB: Which sounds great. Until it comes to the author who wants to write a book but can’t quit their job unless they have the nice advance from the big, rich publisher who you are quietly demolishing.
JB: No, but the facts are wrong. Publishers are having unparalleled profitability, and the book industry is in better shape than it ever has been, and it’s because of e-books. The Kindle team deserves a significant amount of credit for that, because they were early, they got ahead of it. There’s been very little piracy in e-books, unlike other digital media. This is a good-news story for publishers and for authors. It’s very difficult for incumbents who have a sweet thing to accept change. It’s just very difficult. It’s very easy, but almost always incorrect, to glamorize the past.
It’s easy to do. We all have these fake memories of how great things used to be. Right, before penicillin things were awesome. There are exceptions. But mostly things have gotten better, and we live in a world where I hope things continue to get better. Surely making reading more affordable is not going to make authors less money. Making reading more affordable is going to make authors more money.
HB: You turned 50 recently.
JB: Yes.
HB: Any changed outlook on life?
JB: No, not really. I’m still dancing into the office. I love my life. I have four kids. My wife still claims to still like me. I don’t question her aggressively on that. I do the dishes every night, and I can see that actually makes her like me. It’s a very odd thing.
HB: I do that, too.
JB: I’m pretty convinced. It’s like the sexiest thing I do. [Laughter]
HB: There was a book written about you recently, on Amazon. ["The Everything Store" by Brad Stone.] Have you read it?
JB: Yes, I read it.
HB: And?
Jeff: I’m not going to say many things, but I’ll say the first half of the book does an extraordinarily good job of capturing the culture of Amazon in the early days. Very, very good. I would also say that I get way too much credit in the book. There are a lot of people who have played huge roles in Amazon’s history, and they’re almost completely left out, or just barely mentioned. Maybe someday I’ll write that book and make sure that those people get their credit.
HB: Your wife reacted to the book with a long defense on Amazon as a comment — incredibly well written — and in it she said, “This is not my husband.” Who is right? It sucks to have stuff written about you.
JB: You don’t think I’m going to sit up here on stage and tell you my wife is wrong.
HB: Here we go.
JB: Henry, that’s … I don’t even know where you’re going.
HB: What was she objecting to?
JB: She was there in the early days. You’ve been a public figure, and you still are, but you had more public figureness in your earlier stock-analyst days. I’ve been a public figure. You get used to everything being wrong about you. Anytime you think you know a public figure from their media … You really don’t. I’ve gotten to know several public figures. You can’t tell that Bill Gates is an amazing dad. I know that. It’s very hard. Other people, like my wife, she doesn't have so much experience with this. I’m like, “It doesn’t matter.”
HB: Fair enough. What are you like as a dad?
JB: Me? Let’s see ...
HB: Boring? Work all the time?
JB: No. I have three boys and a girl. The oldest is 14. He was the last person in his class to get a smartphone. He reminded me of this frequently. When the second-to-last person got a smartphone, he sent an email message to all of his classmates that said, “Then there was one.”
All of my kids are very, very different. It’s pretty amazing. We spend a lot of time travelling, though I don’t travel very much for work. One of the reasons I do so little of what I’m doing here today, on stage, is that I like to be at home. I like to be in the office. I feel disconnected from the office if I’m traveling a lot. I travel less than 20% of the time, maybe less than 10% of the time.
I organize my life that way, because it’s a personal preference. I told our most senior executives at Amazon: "Because you’re a senior executive, you have more control over your environment, and you should have less stress." If senior executives are stressed out, I tell them, “Look, you shouldn’t be stressed out. Figure out what's causing it. Bring someone on your team who is good at that or who likes doing it, and have them shore you up in that regard.”
I am very, very lucky. I’m lucky in so many ways. I won a lot of lotteries in life. I’m not just talking about Amazon, a certain financial lottery, for sure. I have won so many lotteries. My parents are both amazing role models. My grandfather. My mom had me when she was 17, and she says, “Don’t do that.” It’s not her "reco."[Laughter]
Her dad had to fight to keep her in high school. Having a pregnant mother in high school in the 1960s in Albuquerque, New Mexico, that's a difficult situation. My dad was hardworking. He worked for Exxon for 33 years. In life, we get a lot of rolls of the dice. One of the big rolls of the dice is who are your early role models, so I try to do that for my kids.
HB: Drones. You had this amazing "commercial" on "60 Minutes" last year, about this fantastic future when drones are going to fly out and bring me my package, and it’s going to be right there. Immediately, everybody in the country, and probably around the world, was saying, “Great — when?”
JB: That’s a difficult question to answer. Technology is not going to be the long pole. The long pole is going to be regulatory. I just went and met with the primary team and saw the 10th- or 11th-generation drone flying around in the cage. It’s truly remarkable. It’s not just the physical airframe and electric motors and so on. The most interesting part of this is the autopilot and the guidance and control and the machine vision systems that make it all work. As for when, though, that is very difficult to predict. I'd bet you the ratio of lawyers to engineers on the primary team is probably the highest at Amazon.
HB: Is this a situation where everyone else in the world except Americans is going to get drone deliveries?
JB: I think it is sad but possible that the US could be late. It’s highly likely that other countries will do it first. I may be too skeptical. I hope I’m wrong.
HB: In addition to everything else we’ve talked about, you make rockets. You want to go into space. This is a proclivity that you share with fellow billionaires such as Elon Musk and Richard Branson. First of all, what is it about space that captivates you? Second, what are you doing that’s different? Third, just talk about how hard it is when you saw Richard have an accident that has set everybody back a long time. Talk about space. What’s the vision there?
JB: First of all, and most fundamentally, you don’t get to choose your passions. Your passions choose you. For whatever reason, when I was 5 years old, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon. I was imprinted with this passion for space and for exploration. I think it’s important. I could come up with lots of rational reasons why it’s important, and I really do believe them.
I think it’s probably a survival skill that we’re curious and like to explore. Our ancestors, who were incurious and failed to explore, probably didn’t live as long as the ones who were looking over the next mountain range to see if there were more sources of food and better climates and so on and so on.
We are really evolved to be pioneers. For good reason. New worlds have a way of — you can’t predict how or why or when — but new worlds have a way of saving old worlds. That’s how it should be. We need the frontier. We need the people moving out into space.
My vision is, I want to see millions of people living and working in space. I think it’s important. I also just love it. I love change. I love technology. I love the engineers we have. They’re brilliant. We have about 350 people there. We’re building a vertical takeoff, vertical landing vehicle. It takes off like a regular rocket, and it lands on its tail like a Buck Rogers rocket.
The initial mission is space tourism. We’re also designing an orbital vehicle. We just won a contract to provide the new engines for the new version of the Atlas 5, which is the most successful launch vehicle in history. That’s a Boeing-Lockheed joint venture. That vehicle uses Russian engines, and because of all the things that are happening in Ukraine and so on, that supply of engines has become less certain, so they want to switch away from a Russian-made engine and they chose [us] to provide that engine. It’s a very exciting endeavor. Great team. They’re just doing a wonderful job, and it’s fun.
HB: When are you going?
JB: I don’t know. When we’re ready. I like our architecture. The vehicle can fly autonomously. Throughout the entire test program, it flies all by itself and comes and lands all by itself, so we don’t need test pilots, which is good during the development phase. The crew capsule uses a full-envelope escape architecture. If you go back in time, all rockets had escape systems, Apollo and Soyuz.
The space shuttle was really the first human-rated vehicle not to have an escape system. That was a mistake. It needed an escape system. Our vehicle has a full-envelope escape system. I like the architecture we’re building. I’m excited about it, but this is not a business where you can rush things or cut corners. Our motto is, "Gradatim Ferociter." It stands for step-by-step ferociously. One step a time.
HB: Thanks, Jeff. It's a privilege and a pleasure to talk to you.
NOW WATCH THE FULL INTERVIEW: It includes additional discussion of the pay and perks of Amazon employees and why Jeff Bezos bought The Washington Post:
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Jeff Bezos and I have a long history, dating from my days on Wall Street and the early years of Amazon.com. Today, he's an investor in Business Insider, and I remain an Amazon shareholder. I tried not to let any of that be a factor when I interviewed him recently at our annual conference in New York City. Jeff rarely gives in-depth interviews, so I didn't hold back on asking about issues both pressing and personal. (Even Amazon's biggest investors, I learned, get only six hours of his time per year!) What follows, in text and video, are edited excerpts from my discussion with the man the Harvard Business Review called "The Best-Performing CEO in the World.".png)
HB:
On the other hand, if you’re the person who gets up in the morning and says, in the shower, "What can we invent for customers? What can we do differently? How can we improve that experience?" And so on and so on. Then that is going to be a playground.
HB: You turned 50 recently.
I am very, very lucky. I’m lucky in so many ways. I won a lot of lotteries in life. I’m not just talking about Amazon, a certain financial lottery, for sure. I have won so many lotteries. My parents are both amazing role models. My grandfather. My mom had me when she was 17, and she says, “Don’t do that.” It’s not her "reco."[Laughter]
JB: First of all, and most fundamentally, you don’t get to choose your passions. Your passions choose you. For whatever reason, when I was 5 years old, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon. I was imprinted with this passion for space and for exploration. I think it’s important. I could come up with lots of rational reasons why it’s important, and I really do believe them.
