### What does this mean? Things that have lasted a long time tend to last longer still. The longer a non-perishable thing - like technology - lives, the longer it can be expected to live. Whatever has held its own throughout centuries of innovation will probably continue to do so in the future, too. > - _'You're sitting in a chair, an invention from ancient Egypt. You wear pants developed about 5000 years ago and adapted by Germanic tribes around 750 B.C. The idea behind your leather shoes comes from the last ice age. Your bookshelves are made of wood, one of the oldest building materials in the world. People have been using spoons and forks for eating since Roman times.' Rolf Dobelli_ > - _'Whatever has held its own throughout centuries of innovation will probably continue to do so in the future, too. Old technology has proven itself; it possesses an inherent logic even if we do not always understand it. If something has endured for epochs, it must be worth its salt.' Nassim Taleb_ > - _'The things you do learn and invest in should be knowledge that is cumulative, so that the knowledge builds on itself. So instead of learning something that might become obsolete tomorrow, like some particular type of software [that no one even uses two years later], choose things that will make you smarter in 10 or 20 years.' Warren Buffet_ ### Where could this be useful? - Software - Business - The longer a company has been around, the higher the _probability_ it will stay around for even longer. Why? By seeing through several business cycles and competitors they are the most robust and least likely to die. - Books > _'I follow the Lindy effect as a guide in selecting what to read: books that have been around for ten years will be around for ten more; books that have been around for two millennia should be around for quite a bit of time; books that are one year old are usually not worth reading (a very low probability of having the qualities for 'surviving').' Nassim Taleb_ ### Does it always hold true? It's a good rule of thumb - a _noisy estimator_ that should work on average - not an iron law. It talks about life expectancy which is a probabilistically derived average. Notable exceptions include: - The World Wide Web: it's ~20 years old but will last beyond another 20 years - Telephone lines and print newspapers are becoming inefficient and dying - Nokia and Kodak were left behind by rapidly improving tech. developments --- Tags: #publish #mental-model #history References: https://trello.com/c/PPi0JFDY [[Latticework of Mental Models: Lindy Effect]] [[Charlie Munger]] [[Circle of Competence]] https://trello.com/c/OOILYXOc/57-fooled-by-randomness-by-nassim-taleb [[The best ideas are timeless]] [[Process over outcome]] [[Any book not worth rereading isn't worth reading.]] [[Technology change happens more slowly than you might think, but hits you twice as hard when it does]] [[Nassim Taleb]]