"What's more impressive to you: someone who went to Stanford, or someone who is followed by Patrick Collison, Elon Musk, and Marc Andreessen?"
Erik Torenberg on the peer-to-peer credential, and why attention from the right people can open more doors than a degree:
"My friend David Perell said, 'My Twitter account is more valuable to me than my college education. My Twitter has given me more value to my career and also personally.'"
"College is a bundle of education, network, and credential. You learn from having conversations. You meet people and discover people. It's proof of work: Are they interesting? Are they funny? Did they build something cool?"
"What's more impressive to you: someone who went to Stanford, or someone who is followed by Patrick Collison, Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen, et cetera? I think most people would say the latter. It's this kind of peer-to-peer credential."
"Implicitly, although people often do this explicitly, that is a cosign. It's an endorsement that this person is worth tracking. It's a public signal that this person is worth following."
"If you're followed by these people, now your doors are open. People want to read what you say. They want to work with you. They want to invest in you or have you as part of their team."
"There's benefit to the receiver but there's also benefit to the giver because if you're the first person to discover someone, that's how Silicon Valley operates."
@eriktorenberg