[larrys]

"Business is obviously not "random" in a true sense, but it's obviously not a pure-skill game because so many idiots get lucky and a lot of really talented people (like DMC) don't."

DMC had choices to make and his talent didn't extend to making the right choices.

Forgetting luck for a second which is obviously important, talent could be thought of as a collection of features that all come together to create success.

So simply saying that DMC has "talent" and that someone else who has made it has "inferior talent" ignores that you need varying degrees of talent and quality in many areas which also depends on what you are doing. Not a jack of all trades, master of none but a proper balance (just like you would want in a product). Stylish, good gas mileage and plenty of headroom say for a car.

In addition to luck then DMC was lacking talent in a few areas that would be required to be successful (to the degree he or anyone thinks is success).

As only one example consider the ability to have attention to detail and product quality. That might be super important when selling an expensive luxury product but an impediment if creating products for dollar stores.

Take any super successful person (by whatever definition) and put them in the wrong field. Do you think Bill Gates would be teacher of the year? Do you think pre-presidential Obama would be good running an incubator?