There's one last aspect to working like a slave. If revolutionaries develop no other skills, they must learn to "kick butt" -- to stop saying things like "You have an interesting product, but..." Defeating "butt-headed thinking" means adhering to the fundamental principles of revolutionaries both past and present: Focus on customers, not on experts. Focus on promise and possibility, not on problems and perils. Always question authority. Never consider the battle to be lost. And finally, Kawasaki urges, remember that "the greatest role that life can bestow upon you is to be a revolutionary."

Sidebar: Cheat Sheet

Too busy planning the revolution to read this book? Here's a manifesto sampler to take to your next cell meeting.

Enemy of the revolution: "Status quo-perpetuating scumbags." According to Kawasaki, you're in danger of becoming one after you go from introducing a revolutionary product or service to developing an installed base that allows you to dominate your market.

Highbrow revolutionary influence: The sculptor Constantin Brancusi supplies the book's epigram -- and its organizing principles: "Create Like a God. Command Like a King. Work Like a Slave."

Best Apple one-liner : "Mea culpa, we were arrogant and French (that is, led by Jean-Louis Gassee)," writes Kawasaki, referring to Apple's fateful decision, made in 1987, against licensing the Macintosh operating system to other companies.

Best Microsoft one-liner: "Our nemesis, Microsoft (where quality is job 1.1) is excellent at churning. Windows started out far behind, but it moved faster. As a friend once told me, 'He who hesitates is DOS.' "

Best coinage: "Evangineer": "a combination of evangelist and engineer: someone who wants to change the world and has the technical knowledge to do it"; the ideal revolutionary.

Sidebar: FC Recommends

We asked Guy Kawasaki to recommend some additional reading for revolutionaries.

Big Picture: "If You Want to Write: A Book About Art, Independence and Spirit," by Brenda Ueland (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1938). Forget the word "write." This book shows you how to do whatever it is that you do -- free from feelings of mediocrity and from oppression by what I call "bozosity" (an affliction that makes people think they know something when they don't -- and that causes them to stifle innovation).

Best Practice: "Uncommon Genius: How Great Ideas Are Born," by Denise G. Shekerjian (Penguin USA, 1991). Learn from winners of the MacArthur Award. No squirt guns. No beanbag chairs. No off-sites. Just do it. And then keep doing it.

Sleeper: "Mastering the Dynamics of Innovation," by James M. Utterback (Harvard Business School Press, 1994). The best explanation of innovation and product development that I've ever read. The ice-harvesting story alone makes it worth reading.

Keeper: "The Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker (Harper & Row, 1966). The title doesn't have to be an oxymoron. This book was written more than three decades ago -- but it's even more relevant today. Read it and reap.