Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel

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Rolf Potts puts into contrast the tremendous difference between traveling as having vacation and traveling as a full discovery experience. Vagabonding is a fresh book that's digging into the philosophy of travel.

In case you were wondering, "vagabonding" doesn't relate to homeless people, instead:

Vagabonding is an attitude - a friendly interest in people, places and things that makes a person an explorer in the truest, most vivid sense of the world.

For most of people, going to vacation means rewarding pleasure for working hard a freaking number of hours per week all year long. Though vagabonding is not an escape from your real life but a discovery of your real life that justifies work. The purpose is -at its best- a rediscovery of reality itself so to allow your spirit to grow:

Travel compels you to discover your spiritual side by simple elimination: without all the rituals, routines and possessions that give your life meaning at home, you're forced to look for meaning within yourself.

The 4 key principles of the Vagabonding philosophy:
  • Keep things real and keep on learning.
  • Be creative and get into adventures.
  • Earn your freedom all over again and don't set limits.
  • Keep things simple and let your spirit grow.
As a frequent traveler, the content provided by this book has been very valuable to me. I highly recommend it to anyone willing to jump into the unknown of the road.
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Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

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Economic books have the true advantage of being backed up by numbers. And numbers don't lie. Freakonomics is about digging in unusual questions of daily life and society, using the power of numbers in order to unmask curious conclusions.

Conventional wisdom is definitely defied. Questions such as: Why experts are in the perfect position to exploit you? Which is most dangerous: a gun or a swimming pool? How the legalization of abortion impacted so much criminality? How the invention of crack cocaine mirrored the invention of nylon stocking? And so on.
My favorite: How much do parents really matter?

The incentive behind this book is the fact that morality represents the way that people would like the world to work. Whereas economics represents how it actually does work. And people crave for that information. A very entertaining reading.
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8 Facts Why Silicon Valley Kicks Europe's Butt

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I have been wondering lately whether Europe can be such a place as great as Silicon Valley to foster startup creation.
Loic Le Meur puts a couple of reasons why Silicon Valley is well ahead of Europe in the tech business. Here are the 8 key facts:

  • All you need is in one place. The best Internet companies and the best people in tech industry are all in one place.
  • Campus life. Everything you do with entrepreneur friends during free time is related with business. It's non stop.
  • Social environment is very flexible. You can hire fast but also fire fast which is very unpopular in Europe and impossible to do. Being able to fire fast allows startups to hire fast.
  • The "how can I help" attitude. People trust you more by default. Very easy to meet anyone in Silicon Valley.
  • Diversity. Silicon Valley is much more diverse. Half of the people we interact with daily are not Americans.
  • Visibility. The press and the key tech blogers care more about you if you are based there.
  • Global state of mind. You're surrounded by people who want to create the leader in the world on something. The thing is you're allowed to think big.
  • Multinational team. It forces you to think and execute globally. Especially enhances creativy.

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