[edanm]

You're making a mistake if you're thinking of Bezos as an example in the context of small business owners. Actually, you can probably just rule out Bezos and any of the other FAANG companies as crazy exceptions.

Outside of tech, the standard entrepreneurship story is "I want to be my own boss; hmm, maybe I'll franchise a McDonald's".

It's only in tech that we end up equating entrepreneurship with things like innovation, solving brand new problems, etc. That's because the most successful tech entrepreneurs are the ones that did innovation (for the most part).

But that's not at all required - even in tech.

[wpietri]

Well, the whole theory of a franchise is that it reduces all risk because the product has already been figured out. And franchising didn't really become popular until after WWII, so I'd have a hard time calling it "traditional".

And just to be clear, I'm not thinking of Bezos as an example of small business owners. He's just the only person I've ever heard of who successfully said, "I'm starting a business. I wonder what it should sell?" As you say, I think he's an enormous outlier.

[Blake_Emigro]

As far as I know, he had a business model involving an emerging technology, and wanted to select a product that would be most successful with it. He felt books was that product. He's said as much in interviews.