General Magic's unlimited resources led to its collapse, founder of LinkedIn and Android emerged

What was said

"They have unlimited money. They have unlimited talent. And so they frequently do do anything. Any good idea, they're making this personal communicator, any good idea that somebody has, they basically do it. They define their customer as Joe Sixpack, which is as good as no definition at all because nobody has met that guy. And so they're doing this incredible innovation, precursors to USB, the precursors to emojis, all these things, but it just keeps growing and growing and growing until it starts to collapse under its own weight because they have no focus whatsoever."

David Epstein reveals the story of General Magic, a visionary 1990s tech company that went public in Silicon Valley's first concept IPO but imploded despite unlimited resources and talent. The company's failure to constrain itself and define priorities led to its collapse, but alumni went on to co-found LinkedIn, eBay, Nest, and create Android, iPod, iPhone, and Google Maps. The lessons about the necessity of constraints became foundational to Silicon Valley's next generation of successful products.