Anything you want
by Derek Sivers · first published 2011
76% recommend19% neutral5% critical
Why HN recommends it
Short, quick read drawn from the founding, growth and sale of CD Baby, with a grounded, do-it-your-way take on business. Suits first-time entrepreneurs who want a day-long, practical read.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Best known for creating CD Baby, the most popular music site for independent artists, founder Derek Sivers chronicles his "accidental" success and failures into this concise and inspiring book on how to create a multimillion-dollar company by following your passion. Sivers details his journey and the lessons learned along the way of creating and building a business close to his heart. In 1997, Sivers was a musician who taught himself to code a Buy Now button onto his band's website. Shortly thereafter he began selling his friends' CDs on his website. As CD Baby grew, Sivers faced numerous obst
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…do, most won't implement it. On the off chance that one out of 50 of you let this change your life, however, I'm sending it. Derek Sivers, who posted "There's no speed limit," also wrote a book called Anything You Want, [1] and reading it is probably one of the best ways you can spend an hour. [1] http://www.amazon.com/dp/1936719118?ie=UTF8&tag=thstsst-...
on “Ask HN: What are the most inspirational blog posts you've ever read?” ↗Two (fiction) Books, I really read in one piece: Deamon & Freedom from Daniel Suarez Non Fiction: Black Swan - N.N. Taleb Anything you want - Derek Sivers
on “Ask HN: Best book you read in 2011” ↗…amounts of money, hire employees, own a market segment, rather than work slowly, cautiously, incrementally, and happily towards a better future. I'm sixteen pages in, and it has yet to disappoint. I read Anything You Want by Derek Sivers, it's my current favorite business book in this space. I hope this book manages to supplant it with an actual followable and iterable plan for action.
on “The Single Founder Handbook” ↗There is some truth to this but doing things like paperwork quickly can lead to a lot of trouble. Read Anything You Want by CD Baby founder Derek Sivers. He recommends not worrying about having Terms and Conditions on your website, and all kinds of other "formalities". Then he says breezing through some paperwork on a…
on “Don't. Waste. Time.” ↗"The snowball: Warren Buffett and the business of life" "The autobiography of Benjamin Franklin" "The toilet paper entrepreneur" "The lean startup" "Anything you want"
on “Ask HN: Best book you read in 2011” ↗'The Joy of X: A Guided Tour of Mathematics, from One to Infinity' by Steven Strogatz. http://www.flipkart.com/joy-x-1848878443/p/itmdekzuwjwwngfz?... 'Anything You Want: 40 Lessons For A New Kind Of Entrepreneur' by Derek Sivers. http://www.flipkart.com/anything-you-want-1936719118/p/itmdy... 'Jugari Cross' by Poornachandra Tejaswi; an amazing thriller novel that takes…
on “Ask HN: Best books you read in 2012” ↗Everything you do needs to involve building a process to hand off to someone else Derek Sivers also discusses this issue in Anything You Want (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1936719118), which one of my favorite books, ever, and highly recommended.
on “Ask HN: How to move beyond “freelancer”?” ↗Anything You Want by Derek Sivers "In this book, I tell you everything I learned from starting, growing, and selling CD Baby, compressed into an entertaining and useful one-hour read." from https://sivers.org/a
on “Ask HN: Biographies for personal development and entrepreneurship?” ↗Anything You Want by Derek Sivers. It's still my favorite book on business, a short easy read filled with anecdotes from his time running CD Baby. The situations are ones I keep encountering myself running a small business,…
on “Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?” ↗I'd recommend his book. Very short to read and the tone is the same - https://www.amazon.com/Anything-You-Want-Derek-Sivers/dp/193... One of my favourite books about start-ups but here are a few more - https://medium.com/@KatAlexPas/an-hour-and-a-half-a-day-of-r...
on “Why are you doing?” ↗…Habits (Clear) - automate good decisions w/habits - Change Your Habits, Change your life (Corley) - data driven selection of which habits matter - Ultralearning (Young) - how to learn anything faster - Anything You Want (Sivers) How to talk to humans - Difficult Conversations (Stone) - how to talk to humans - Never Split the Difference (Voss) - every conversation is a negotiation - Death By Meeting (Lencioni) - short…
on “Ask HN: What makes a good technical leader – any recommended books?” ↗…wrote the following essay as a playful reminder to myself to stop taking my ideas so seriously: [1] https://taylor.town/brilliant-app-idea I highly recommend Derek Sivers's book on entrepreneurship, Anything You Want. As I'm on my own business journey, this tiny book keeps me grounded to a mission of truly helping people and enjoying the process. [2] https://sive.rs/a You might also need to change how you interact…
on “How do you deal with entrepreneurial obsession?” ↗I highly recommend Derek Sivers's book on entrepreneurship, Anything You Want. This tiny book keeps me grounded to a mission of truly helping people and enjoying the process: [1] https://sive.rs/a For mental frameworks, I personally maintain a few different lists. My bucket…
on “Ask HN: How do you think about life/career goals?” ↗I highly recommend reading Anything You Want by Derek Sivers. It's a 90-minute read about his strange journey of starting and selling his business. [1] https://sive.rs/a Shoot me an email hello@taylor.town and I'll purchase a copy for you. ---…
on “Ask HN: Founders, have you taken money from private equity? Tell me about it” ↗Anything You Want by Derek Sivers
on “Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?” ↗