what is the myth of peter thiel and what is the reality?> the myth is that they are somehow singular and that they are somehow divine, omnipotent beings. these things that i am doing are not solo efforts. i have friends that i talked to a lot and people i talk to closely. >> i am curious about your background, and what shaped you along the way. i know that you were born in germany and moved around a lot, you went to south africa and namibia. >> i went to seven different elementary schools as a kid, and so i felt a little bit like an outsider instead of an insider. so there is kind of a combination of outsider-insider perspective that shaped me a lot. >> what were your parents like? >> my dad was an engineer. my mom was a homemaker. they were focused on education. >> you were raised an evangelical christian and did not believe in anything like evolution? >> i still consider myself a christian and i think it is important to have a very different perspective on things, because it pushes you to either defend your ideas really well or to have a

peter thiel with blake masters is the author. thank you. >> you were watching the tv television for serious readers. you can watch any program you see here online at booktv.org. >> here's a look at some books are being published this week.

what is the myth of peter thiel and what is the reality?> the myth of all these founders is that they are somehow singular and that they are somehow divine, omnipotent beings. any of these things that i'm doing are not solo efforts. i have friends who i talk to a lot and people i work with closely. >> i am curious about your background and what has shaped your views along the way. i know that you were born in germany and moved around a lot, south africa and namibia. tell me about your upbringing. >> i lived a lot of places. i went to seven different elementary schools as a kid, and i think of myself as always having been an outsider and a little bit of an insider. so there is kind of a combination of outsider-insider perspective that shaped me a lot. >> what did your parents do? what were they like? >> my dad was an engineer. my mom ended up being a homemaker after i was born. they were very focused on education. >> you are also raised on evangelical christian. an evangelical christian. you questioned things like evolution. >> i still consi

. >> peter thiel said that hp is a bet against innovation. >> it is certainly a provocative statementerms of relevance, you have leaders of these companies that are recognizing that their previous strategy would have led to irrelevance, and they have to change that. we have the view that everything is zero-sum. ibm doesn't have to lose for apple to win or for salesforce to win. >> what about microsoft, a company you grew up with? >> there are specific product areas that could potentially be harmed by this transition, but them as an entire company at the macro level doesn't necessarily have to lose. >> so companies like microsoft, google, amazon are dropping the price of cloud storage. how much of a threat is that the box? >> we love that. the same unit of storage is a 40th of the price it was 10 years ago on the supply side of our business. the cheaper storage gets, the more we can deliver unique experiences. >> you recently took on $150 million of funding. why did you take that money? >> as you may have seen, we filed to go public at the end of march this year. a week after we filed,

peter thiel talks about this. the point peter makes, and i agree with that, is there never is one.re will never be another microsoft. there will never be another google. there was just the one. it is the same thing -- people look to whatsapp. we have founders come in all the time -- there will not be another whatsapp. there will be new things. what do we know about the new things? they will be viewed as completely crazy. the one thing we know is that nobody will think it's the next best thing. it will be out on the fringe. it will be considered bizarre. it will be software as a service in 1999. everybody is going to be like, there is no way. like, it could never possibly work. 10-years later that is the thing. >> marc andreessen, everybody. ♪ . . >> it clearly had an impact on the way people begin to think about economic policy. >> i was totally aware that a revolution was starting. >> if we did nothing else, we changed the world. >> this is how i tasted my first cup of coffee. >> boy, this is the first time in years. >> oh! [laughter] >> ooh. >> stand by, take three. >> knowing fo

. >> peter thiel, for example, said to me hp is not a technology company anymore.t is a bet against innovation. >> i think that is a -- certainly that is a provocative statement. but i think in terms of relevance, you have leaders of these companies that are recognizing that their previous strategy would have lead to irrelevance and that they have to change that. we have this view that sort of everything is sort of zero sum. ibm does not have to lose for apple to win. or for salesforce to win. >> what about a company like microsoft? a company that you grew up with. >> i think there are specific product areas that could potentially lose or be harmed by some of this transition, but then there is an entire company at the macro level that does not necessarily have to lose. >> so companies like microsoft, google, amazon are dropping the price of cloud storage. how much of a threat is that to box? >> we love that. the same unit of storage is now a 40th the price as it was 10 years ago. on the supply side of our business. so the cheaper that storage gets, the more data th

peter thiel is one of silicon valley's most audacious and contrarian investors.de his name founding paypal and funding facebook. he is now is backing rocket ships, dna manipulation, meat grown in labs, and a start-up island off the coast. he has paid kids to skip college and start companies instead, in hopes of building a better future, faster. and building flying cars along the way. joining me is the bold and controversial venture capitalist and now the author of a new book, "zero to one," peter thiel.

. >> peter thiel said that hp is a bet against innovation. >> it is certainly a provocative statement of relevance, you have leaders of these companies that are recognizing that their previous strategy would have led to irrelevance, and they have to change that. we have the view that everything is zero-sum. ibm doesn't have to lose for apple to win or for salesforce to win. >> what about microsoft, a company you grew up with? >> there are specific product areas that could potentially be harmed by this transition, but them as an entire company at the macro level doesn't necessarily have to lose. >> so companies like microsoft google, amazon are dropping the price of cloud storage. how much of a threat is that the box? >> we love that. the same unit of storage is a 40th of the price it was 10 years ago on the supply side of our business. the cheaper storage gets, the more we can deliver unique experiences. >> you recently took on $150 million of funding. why did you take that money? >> as you may have seen, we filed to go public at the end of march this year. a week after we filed, ther

not 100 tweets a day. >> i am between peter thiel and mark andreessen regarding my tweet volume. one outlet that my pr team does not control for me to be able to just share my thoughts on the technology industry. >> i guess i just wonder, why aren't you more scared? >> that might be generational. i grew up in chat rooms. i'm sure i will say some things that i wake up to in the morning and pull a donald trump or something, regret tweeting for the rest of my life. >> how much of it is strategy? >> it is less strategic than you might think. because my brain is all over the place. it is actually very representative of the random notions that i have. >> i've had the benefit of seeing you do magic. >> i am less active now is a magician. >> that is a very hard thing to learn. what have you learned from that? how has it affected your career? >> magic is weird. have you been to magic conference? >> no. that sounds like an interesting experience. >> you think the tech industry has a diversity program? there is something called the international brotherhood of magicians. i do not think abou

peter thiel. the atlantic and as the institute cohosted this event.applause] >> we are in an unusual technical situation. craig venter was supposed to be here. he is ill with something. let's see -- can you hear me? he is ill with something akin to mutinous. he is looking pretty good. can you hear me at all? you think he is scary looking? he is not scary looking. he is just an ill man. we have a number of backup systems which i suppose we should employ. [laughter] if worse comes to worse, i will tell you what i think he would've done if i could control him like a puppet. maybe he is hearing me. can you hear me? >> i can. >> we lost you for a bit. what's wrong with you? [laughter] >> i didn't want to believe the la jolla sunshine for washington d.c. a number of things going on. it would have made montezuma proud. [laughter] >> let me ask you -- you have a lot of things you are doing. one that intrigued me the most is this notion of a minimal cell. can you explain what a minimal cell is? >> within trying to work on this since 1995 when we singled the tw

we will show some of those interviews including paypal cofounder peter thiel and aol founder steve caseatlantic magazine and the aspen institute co-hosted the event. [applause] >> we are in kind of an unusual technical situation. craig venter, in san diego, is ill with something. craig, can you hear me? he is ill with something akin to muteness. he's looking pretty good. [laughter] can you hear me at all? do you think he is scary-looking? he's just an ill man. let's see -- we have a number of backup systems which i suppose we should employ. if worst comes to worst, i will just tell you what he would have done if i could control him like a puppet. [laughter] now maybe he's hearing me. craig, can you hear me? >> i can robert. >> [laughter] >> i didn't want to leave for washington, d.c.. numeral things going on -- you are a number of things going on through it would have made montezuma proud of. [laughter] let me quickly ask you because we don't have a lot of time, but i guess that you have a whole list of things that you are doing. but the one that intrigues me the most is this notion of

. >> so while you are at stanford, you met peter thiel. >> yes. >> tell me how you met. >> peter and had both been told about each other by people we knew. i was told there was this really right-wing person. he was told there was this really left-wing person. we both went, wait a minute, i've heard about you. we grabbed coffee, i think we argued for eight hours. , you can't believe that. we said that was fun, let's do that again. >> you went to oxford and studied philosophy, why? >> i think i'll be an academic. if i'm an academic, i can write about both of these interesting questions. i'm fascinated about how people think and reason. how we communicate. what i realized was that the course of becoming an academic professor was to be a very narrow scholar. you wanted to be an expert on the thing that only 10 to 20 people in the world knew about. what i wanted to do was how to -- how do you help millions of people? within six months at oxford, i knew that i wasn't going to be an academic. i was going to come back here. >> that is when you decided to be an entrepreneur. >> that is when i

. >> peter thiel, a venture capitalist criticized twitter, calling it horribly mismanaged, probably "lot of pot smoking going on over there." how do you respond to that? >> i think he is on a book tour, correct? >> i believe so. >> i would leave it at that. once you make a statement like that about a management team that has created a $30 billion company, taken in public, grown revenues to $1 billion, i think you lose all credibility yourself. >> what else can uber do? we have seen them delivering christmas trees. but really, what is next? >> what is the myth of bill gurley and what is the reality? >> i don't know if i can separate the two. i love being an investor. i think, over the past five years, people have made a big deal out of, do you have operating experience as a vc? i think over the next next five years, if the markets play out like i think, they will be asking do they have investor experience, because that is what the job is after all. >> some will only hire partners who were former ceos. >> 90% of the time when a venture capitalist opens their mouth, they are speaking to

. >> so while you are at stanford, you met peter thiel. >> yes. >> tell me how you met. >> peter andad both been told about each other by people we knew. i was told he was this really right wing person, he was told i was this really left-wing person. we both went, 'wait a minute, i've heard about you.' and so we grabbed coffee, and i think we argued for eight hours. right, because we were like, 'oh, you can't believe that.' and then we were like, 'that was fun, let's do that again.' >> you went on to oxford, you studied philosophy, why? >> i said, 'well, i think i'll be an academic. because if i'm an academic, i can write about both of these interesting questions. i'm always fascinated about people -- how we think, how we reason. how we communicate. and in fact, actually, what i realized was that the course of becoming an academic professor was to be a very, very narrow scholar. so you essentially wanted to be an expert on this thing that, for example, only 10 to 20 people in the world probably knew about. and actually, what i really want to do was how do you help millions of people?

thank you peter thiel for your time. [applause] >> morneau -- more now from the ideas forum. an interview with the aol founder. the atlantic and the aspen institute cohosted and it is just over 20 minutes. >> steve blocker. when i was writing about the birth of the internet, we did have al gore so we can get rid of that joke real fast. there were two people that made it happen. i worked for steve and i did not know the importance when aol open and let people in and certainly they didn't know the importance of steve crocker. i'm going to start with steve because the darpanet which is woven into the internet and it starts with a graduate student at the university of california santa barbara ucla. and they were the first to get these notes, these routers or message processors that were going to be part of the internet. and they thought that the u.s. government and the pentagon and all these people were creating -- who were creating it with ward tell them -- it would tell them how to do it. the research universities just updated it to the graduate students and you became the lead

and peter thiel. >> on the next "washington journal" steven latourette discusses the role modern republicansill play in the new congress. human rights campaign talks about recent court decisions and same-sex marriage and whether the supreme court should hear oral argument on it. and an american university president, author of the black history of the white house looks at the 1965 selma to montgomery march and learn -- and martin luther king jr.. you could join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal'" live at 7 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> this sunday on "q&a" the film "the birth of a nation." defending national -- >> part two of the movie is the heart of the protests in the sense that this is where the blacks are appalled by the betrayal of the freed slaves. this is a scene showing what happens and you give former slaves the right to vote

entrepreneurs from the washington ideas forum including biochemist craig venter and paypal cofounder peter thiel. on the next "washington journal," former ohio congressman stephen latourette discusses the role moderate republicans will play in the new congress. a guest from the human rights campaign talks about recent court decisions on same-sex marriage, and whether the supreme court should hear oral arguments on it. and an american university professor looks back at the 1965 selma to montgomery march and dr. martin luther king junior. as always, we will take your calls, and we will continue the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" live on c-span. >> this sunday on "q&a," the ground breaking film "the birth of a nation" and the efforts by an african-american news there publisher to prevent the film' is release. >> part two of the movie, reconstruction, is the heart of the protest. this is where the blacks are appalled by the portrayal of freed slaves. this is a scene showing what happens when you get former slaves the right to vote, the right to be elected, the right to go

now peter thiele is making a bet on marijuana hoping investments grow like a weed.peaks exclusively to us. and it's being called a game changer in the race to find new antibiotics. that whole whole world has been stalled for decades. this could be the tip of the iceberg. a lot of those drugs come from dirt, not kidding. back to scott. >> thanks so much. as oil kpaeps take a hit. hedge fund heavyweight mark hasry is buying up net. here is what he had to say this morning. >> when you talk about energy everybody is saying crude soil is going to be 70 to 90 two years from now. if that is correct everything we're buying at 60 krebts today is going to be worth par. if you do the math you will make somewhere around 30% returns. >> kate kelly joining us from 30 rock. >> i think a hedge fund community agrees with hasry on beast a couple points. . i think his view is a bit of an outlier in other ways. some market watchers note for every ten dollars crude falls spreads widen another 30 to 40 basis points and the cost of funding for energy companies has effectively doubled sinc

peter thiel is one of silicon valley's most audacious and contrarian investors.made his name founding paypal then funding facebook. he is now is backing rocket ships, dna manipulation, meat grown in labs, and a start-up island off the coast. he has paid kids to skip college and start companies instead, in hopes of reaching a better future, faster. and building flying cars along the way. joining me is the bold and controversial venture capitalist and now the author of a new

. >> for american whose don't understand that relationship, i remember peter thiel talking to us aboutt it's all of that politics. >> they knew they're taking the risk. they don't own assets they have a contract. >> and it all comes down to trust. got to trust us. >> so far, investors are for the most part. >> today, investors are not happy because the growth again, growth while it is extraordinary, it was not quite as much as people had been hoping. >> high expectations. coming up -- speaking of high expectations mcdonald's stock trading up 4.5. more on the big story of the morning. should you be buy on the news they're replacing the ceo? back in a moment. opportunities aren't always obvious. sometimes they just drop in. cme group can help you navigate risks and capture opportunities. we enable you to reach global markets and drive forward with broader possibilities. cme group: how the world advances. >>> the stage is set for difficult decisions from the fed, when to raise interest rates after describing the economy as growing at a solid pace at yesterday's meeting. our senior economi

. >> big names on this list peter thiel, jerry yang, gg we have all the times. >> jeff richards. >> ie, one, incredible experience in retail but more importantly, incredible believers in mobile commerce. that's what we're going after. the key of what we're doing and why the younger shoppers are shopping with us we're strong in where they go live in social media, that's on their mobile devices what we're going after. >> are you making money? >> we are. we are or else we would have raised more capital than kind of what we have. we're -- it's still the early days for us. we're invested into growth. >> how do you make money? you hold your inventories. >> we do. >> unusual for an on-line retailer. >> it's the only way we can guarantee delivery times to you and only way we give you a good experience. so on that kind of subject we're constantly lowering prices when we get a better price from the manufacturer or from whom ever we pass that on to the customers. >> interesting story. keep an eye on you. thanks for sharing the news chieh huang the co-founder and ceo at boxed. >> almost time to c

peter thiel with a pot company. investing in a pot company. company's called privateer.ompany does an app, but actually sells medical marijuana. so of course the question is who do you think he's going to sell it to and i think -- somebody who he thinks likes it. >> twitter's hard to evaluate. they have a lot of potential. it's a horribly mismanaged company. the people you know probably a lot of pot smoking going on there. >> so there he's -- he has a market already. >> he may visit headquarters as a first stop. >> there you have it. >> all right guys. let me tell you a little bit. you know about my howard hughes-like fear of germs and everything else. there was a story out this morning that nine people who visited disneyland in california between december 15th and december 20th contracted the measles. measles is a disease that was originally eradicated in the united states back in 2000. but because people are not getting vaccines as often as they used to. we're now getting something like 60 to 70 cases a year. these people were at disneyland. the cough can linger in the

you'll meet a 19-year-old tech whiz kid who's gotten the attention of apple and peter thiel.a host of media companies think his site could be a game changer for the news business. but up next the best and worst analysts. that's the same guy. here to name names. "squawk box" will be right back. as we head to break, look at u.s. equity futures. yes! so no set up fees! wooh! yeah! so i get help from rollover consultants? wooh! yes! no rollover hassle. great. woah oh, we're spiking things, robbie. for all the confidence you need. that's better! td ameritrade. you got this. e financial noise financial noise financial noise financial noise out of 42 vehicles... based on 6 different criteria... why did a panel of 11 automotive experts... ... name the volkswagen golf motor trend's 2015 car of the year? we'll give you four good reasons the all-new volkswagen golf starting at $17,995. there's an award winning golf for everyone. ♪ >>> welcome back to "squawk box." in our headlines this morning, johnson and johnson buying a license option from isis pharma. shares of cempra are getting a

peter thiel, ty pennington and others. matt is here with us.ulations on the usa today honor. pretty cool. so a new round of funding. when a company like yours is growing so fast gets 65 million bucks or whatever it is what happens to it? >> we innovate. we're really focused on the porch app that's available nationwide. so people can push a button and speak to one of our conciergekonsconcierge. you can push a button for any small thing. >> so i suppose a competitor would be an angie's list? would that be fair? you say they're the best professionals. how do you know that? >> it's built off a massive data. 130 million projects that they've done. and with that we know who your neighbors have used or which professionals work on homes just like yours. and so for any project whether it's a massive roof you need to put in or whether it's building a fence or just getting a cleaner, we know who your neighbors have used and loved. >> how predictable is it? you get one quote up front from a contractor. then it ends up being double what you were quoted at t