Poke the Box - Hardcover

Seth Godin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1936719002 ISBN 13: 9781936719006

Publisher: The Domino Project, 2011

Synopsis

Presents a call to action about taking initiative, embracing change, and risking failure.

About this title

About the Author

Seth Godin has written 12 books – all bestsellers – that have been translated into more than 30 languages. He has long been a provocative proponent of changing the way books are created and marketed. Godin writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything. American Way Magazine calls him, “America's Greatest Marketer,” and his blog is among the most popular in the world written by a single individual. An entrepreneur since the age of 16, he founded Yoyodyne, his first internet company, which was acquired by Yahoo! in 1998. It pioneered the use of ethical direct mail online, something Seth calls Permission Marketing. He was VP of Direct Marketing at Yahoo! for a year. His latest company, Squidoo.com, is ranked among the top 90 sites in the U.S. (by traffic) by Quantcast. It allows anyone to build a page about any topic you’re passionate about. The site raises money for charity and pays royalties to its million plus members.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

When my cousin was born, my MIT educated uncle built a buzzer box with two switches, some lights and a few other controls on it. It looked like something from a nuclear power plant, not a kid’s toy, but he tossed it into the crib anyway. Terrifying or mysterious, it depends on your perspective. It presented two options: poke to see what happens or do nothing. How do computer programmers learn their art? Is there a step-by-step process that guarantees you'll get good? All great programmers learn the same way. They poke the box. They code something and see what the computer does. They change it and see what happens. They repeat the process until they figure out what works. That's what happens when you poke -whether it's the market or your customer or what you think about yourself - you solve the puzzle by poking.

This is manifesto is about starting to poke. Starting a project, making a ruckus, taking what feels like a risk.

Poke the Box reminds us that life is a buzzer box. If we want to make things happen, we need to remember to poke.

Edition details

• Publisher: The Domino Project
• Publication date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1936719002
• ISBN 13: 9781936719006
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 96