It's cheaper and faster to steal

...business ideas, don't steal in real life

I first heard this from a former exec at Amex as he spoke about ideas Amex “stole” and executed better upon.

A positive way of framing which I read in Felix Dennis’s book is to not fall for the fallacy of an idea only being a good idea because you came up with it. In fact, often other people come up with good ideas.

There are many examples of this but I think it’s really obvious with insular states that don’t let much foreign tech in - Russia, China has their own “Google”, “Facebook”, etc. Same idea, successfully copied by different companies.

More examples: disappearing images work as well on Instagram as Snapchat. Short form video is a medium that just works, and hence is a good opportunity for lots of companies to steal if they can execute on it (Youtube, Instagram, etc.)