Tim Ferriss

Timothy Ferriss (born July 20, 1977) is an American entrepreneur, investor, author, and podcaster.[1][2]

Not to be confused with the science writer Timothy Ferris or the musician Tim Farriss.
Tim Ferriss
BornTimothy Ferriss
(1977-07-20) July 20, 1977
East Hampton, New York, U.S.
OccupationAuthor, Podcaster, Investor
Alma materPrinceton University (A.B.)
GenreSelf-help, Physical fitness
Notable works

Early life

Ferriss, who was born premature, grew up in East Hampton, New York, and graduated from St. Paul's School, Concord, New Hampshire.[3] He graduated with an A.B. in East Asian studies from Princeton University in 2000 after completing an 128-page-long senior thesis, titled "Acquisition of Japanese Kanji: Conventional Practice and Mnemonic Supplementation", under the supervision of Seiichi Makino.[4][5][6] After graduation, Ferriss worked in sales at a data storage company.[7]

Career

In 2001, Ferriss founded BrainQUICKEN, an internet-based nutritional supplements business, while still employed at his prior job.[8] He successfully sold the company, then known as BodyQUICK, to a London-based private equity firm in 2010.[9][10][11][12][13] He has stated that The 4-Hour Workweek was based on this period.[11]

Current Projects

Podcast

The Tim Ferriss Show covers topics ranging from personal and character development, to morning routines and meditation habits of celebrities, CEOs and sportspeople like LeBron James,[14] also covering occasional posts about writing, venture capital, metaphysics and even acting/movies.[15]

Investing

Ferriss is an angel investor and advisor to startups.[16]

He has invested or advised in startups such as StumbleUpon, Posterous, Evernote, DailyBurn, Shopify, Reputation.com, Trippy, and TaskRabbit.[17] He is a pre-seed money advisor to Uber, co-founded by Garrett Camp, the founder of StumbleUpon, which Ferriss also advises.[18][19]

In 2013, Ferriss raised $250,000 in under an hour to invest in Shyp by forming a syndicate on AngelList.[20] Ferriss ended up raising over $500,000 through his backers, and Shyp raised a total of $2.1 million. In 2018, Shyp shut down[21][22][23] and laid off all its employees.[24]

The New York Times listed Ferriss among their "Notable Angel Investors" while CNN said he was "one of the planet's leading angel investors in technology."[25][26]

In November 2013, Ferriss began an audiobook publishing venture, Tim Ferriss Publishing.[27] The first book published was Vagabonding by Rolf Potts.[27] Other books include The Obstacle Is The Way by Ryan Holiday, Daily Rituals by Mason Currey, and What I Learned Losing A Million Dollars by Jim Paul and Brendan Moynihan.[28]

In 2015, Ferriss declared a long vacation from new investing. He cited the stress of the work and a feeling his impact was "minimal in the long run", and said he planned to spend time on his writing and media projects.[29] In 2017 he stated one of the reasons he moved from Silicon Valley was that, "After effectively 'retiring' from angel investing 2 years ago," he had no professional need to be in the Bay Area.[30]

Books
A picture showing cover of one of the most notable works of Ferriss.

Ferriss has written five books, The 4-Hour Workweek (2007, expanded edition 2009), The 4-Hour Body (2010), The 4-Hour Chef (2012), Tools of Titans (2016), and Tribe of Mentors (2017).

Television

The Tim Ferriss Experiment

In December 2008, Ferriss had a pilot on the History Channel called Trial by Fire, in which he had one week to attempt to learn a skill normally learned over the course of many years. In the pilot episode he practiced yabusame, the Japanese art of horseback archery.[31]

In December 2013, his television series The Tim Ferriss Experiment debuted on HLN. In the show, Ferriss attempts to learn notoriously punishing skills in record time, such as surfing, professional poker, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, parkour, and foreign languages.[32]

Ferriss also hosted the 2017 TV show Fear{Less} with Tim Ferriss, in which he interviews people from different industries about success and innovation.[33]

Psychedelic research

Ferriss has raised funds for the Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and for the Center for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London. Since 2016, Ferriss donated at least $2,000,000 for clinical research into psychedelic drugs.[34][35]

Criticism

In a Forbes article, media and marketing strategist Michael Schein suggested Ferriss's success is due in large part to his skills as a self-promoter and self-marketer, and his methods have been criticized as exploiting technicalities, sometimes in unethical or dishonorable ways, and then attractively packaging those shortcuts and fake-outs.[36] Jacobin magazine said Ferriss capitalizes on dissatisfaction of middle-income deskbound workers by recycling self-help and time-management cliches and combining them with the advice to become a "fake expert".[37] In his book, The 4-Hour Workweek, Ferriss states "Expert status can be created in less than four weeks if you understand basic credibility indicators."

"Something else Tim Ferriss understands far better than most of us is how little the real usefulness of advice someone gives corresponds with how well the person giving that advice is received. Ferriss’s isn’t actually the efficiency revolutionary most of his supporters see him as. His main talent is his ability to pinpoint a sensation of mass emptiness and to give the impression that he has the secret to filling that emptiness."[36]

Published works
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2007). The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich. New York: Crown Publishers. ISBN 978-0-307-35313-9.
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2009). The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich (Expanded and Updated). New York: Crown Publishers. ISBN 978-0-307-46535-1.
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2010). The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman. New York: Crown Archetype. ISBN 978-0307463630.
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2012). The 4-Hour Chef: The Simple Path to Cooking Like a Pro, Learning Anything, and Living the Good Life. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 978-0-547-88459-2.
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2016). Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 978-1-328-68378-6.
  • Ferriss, Timothy (2017). Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 978-1-328-99496-7.

References
  1. "Tim Ferriss is raising an Army of fitness enthusiasts..."
  2. "Angel List".
  3. Richards, Daniel. "'The 4-Hour Workweek' author Tim Ferriss reveals what he's learned after a difficult year of introspection, and how he built a passionate fanbase of millions". Business Insider.
  4. Ferris, Timothy Cooke (2000). "Acquisition of Japanese Kanji: Conventional Practice and Mnemonic Supplementation". Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  5. Timothy Ferriss ’00, Princeton Alumni Weekly; accessed September 4, 2017.
  6. Hall, Cornelia (May 9, 2007). "Ferriss '00 takes the day off". The Daily Princetonian.
  7. Rosenbloom, Stephanie (March 25, 2011). "The World According to Tim Ferriss". The New York Times.
  8. Grech, Dan (November 22, 2006). "From Workaholic to Tango King". 100 Years of Princeton Alumni Weekly.
  9. Bowers, Brent (June 13, 2007). "In the Hunt; The Hectic Chronicles". New York Times.
  10. Ferriss, Tim (September 5, 2007). "How I Work". CNN Money. Retrieved April 5, 2008.
  11. Tim Ferriss Wants You to Get a Life, ABC News, October 11, 2007.
  12. Warrillow, John (October 6, 2010). "Why Tim Ferriss Sold His Muse". The Globe and Mail. Toronto.
  13. Warrillow, John (November 11, 2010). "Why Tim Ferriss Sold His Muse". Inc. Magazine.
  14. "'How Sleep is an important factor for his performance', LeBron James on an interview with The Tim Ferriss Show - Business Insider".
  15. "Give Yourself That Extra Kick With These Podcasts From the Likes of Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk". Entrepreneur Magazine. Retrieved May 13, 2016.
  18. Byrnes, Brendan. "An Interview With Tim Ferriss, Author of "The 4-Hour Workweek"". Motley Fool.
  19. Mangalindan, JP. "Tim Ferriss: Tech has too much 'dumb capital'". Fortune.
  20. Constine, Josh. "Betaworks And Tim Ferriss Among First Using General Solicitation To Ask Crowds For Investment". TechCrunch.
  21. Kumparak, Greg. "Shyp Raises $2.1M To Pick Up And Ship Your Stuff". TechCrunch.
  22. "AngelList Unveils Maiden Lane, A $25 Million Fund For AngelList Deals". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2019-03-16.
  23. "Ranking the Top Angel and Venture Capital Fund Managers (Part 1)". Financial Poise. 2016-08-12. Retrieved 2019-03-16.
  24. Gibbon, Kevin (March 27, 2018). "I Can't Wait for You to See What We Do Next". LinkedIn.com.
  25. "Notable Angel Investors". New York Times.
  26. "Tim Ferriss: How travel helped me learn to kick ass". CNN.
  27. Ha, Anthony. "'4 Hour Workweek' Author Tim Ferriss Is Becoming An Audiobook Publisher". TechCrunch.
  28. "Tim Ferriss book club".
  29. "How to Say "No" When It Matters Most".
  30. "Reddit AMA". Retrieved November 22, 2017.
  31. Marketing Ideas #17 Tim Ferriss Trial by Fire on the History Channel Archived July 25, 2009, at the Wayback Machine Unconventional Marketing, December 3, 2008.
  32. "Bestselling author breaks boundaries..."
  33. "Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss". Show Experience.
  34. LEBOWITZ, SHANA. "'4-hour Workweek' author Tim Ferriss plans to donate $100,000 toward studying how to treat depression with psychedelics like magic mushrooms". Business Insider.
  35. Carey, Benedict (2019-09-06). "Tim Ferriss, the Man Who Put His Money Behind Psychedelic Medicine". The New York Times. Retrieved 2019-08-09.
  36. https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelschein/2019/01/17/tim-ferriss-is-everything-thats-wrong-with-the-modern-world-and-why-you-should-follow-his-lead/#1304cfee3f3d
  37. https://jacobinmag.com/2018/03/four-hour-workweek-tim-ferriss-work
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