Starting point: who is Jack Ma? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ma
In the seven years since Jack Ma co-founded Alibaba.com, the Alibaba websites have grown to include 30 million registered members from more than 200 countries and territories. In his Web 2.0 Summit conversation with John Heileman, Ma explains some of the reasons for the sites' success. He values what he doesn't know as much as what he does know. One thing that Alibaba CEO Ma knows is the Chinese market. He talks to Heileman about what does and does not work in China.
December 06, 2006
In the seven years since Jack Ma co-founded Alibaba.com, the Alibaba web sites have grown to include 30 million registered members from more than 200 countries and territories. In his Web 2.0 Summit conversation with John Heileman, Ma explains some of the reasons for the sites' success. He values what he doesn't know as much as what he does know. One thing that Alibaba CEO Ma knows is the Chinese market. He talks to Heileman about what does and does not work in China. This episode is sponsored by the Intel Software Network.
here is a partial transcript of the interview. Full transcript is available here: http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/network/2006/12/06/web-20-ma.html
Jack: Yeah, I think so. Because I'm not a... I want to tell people here, I'm 100% made-in-China, I learned my English from myself, and I know nothing about technology. One of the reasons why Alibaba survives is because Jack Ma knows nothing about computers.[audience laughter]I think technology isn't for people like me, the dumb, we know nothing about technology. So I'm quality control for my company. Any products that we design, I will use it. I don't want to read the manual; I don't want people to tell me how to use it. If I can't use it, sweep to the rubbish, because 80% of people like me won't use it. So search engines, I do the same thing, because I represent those 80% or 90% of people that know nothing about technology, we hate technology, we are scared of technology. We just want to go on it and find it. I think we got some chance there, making those "non-technologed" people happy.
John: One of the first things you told me when we talked, you mention an important book written about Google, called, "The Search" by John Battelle. I think one of the first tings you said to me when we met is that you had not read that book and you would not read that book.
Jack: No.
John: I'm curious why.[audience laughter]I'm just idly curious.
Jack: When we competed with Ebay, people gave me three books. "The Perfect Marketplace," there's a book. I said I don't want to read it, if I read it I will follow them. If I read, "The Search" of Google, I will follow the Google way. I will be influenced by them. "Oh, that's the way to do it!" I don't think so. You got to change the game. Do it your own way, do it like our own people. I believe this is the way and just follow it. So I'm scared if I read the book I will be influenced. I want to influence the others, not let the others influence me.