"Conference organizer Loic Le Meur
(a French entrepreneur who moved to Silicon Valley for his most recent startup Seesmic) says that Silicon Valley moves too fast, and that Europeans enjoy a good two hour lunch just to experience the joy of life. My response, at about 17:40: the joy of life is great, but all these two hour lunches over a bottle or two of great wine and general unwillingness to do whatever it takes to compete and win is the reason why all the big public Internet companies are U.S. based. And those European startups that do manage to break through cultural and tax hurdles and find success are quickly gobbled up by those U.S. companies. Skype (acquired by eBay) and MySQL (acquired by Sun) are recent examples."
As a response to Arrington's statement Le Meur put up a poll to conference participants on whether to invite Arrington to Le Web next year or not. Touchy, if you ask me.
But all this got me (again) thinking of how important it is to succeed in business (or sports or whatever it is you're doing) at almost any cost in comparison to having a good balanced life. I'm sure it is not good to be too obsessed by the success. On the other hand if it makes you happy then just work 14 hours a day and always think of what's the most effective way of doing things. Personally I think life's too short so you might as well stop and smell the roses while you're here.
