If we can keep our competitors focused on us while we stay focused on the customer, ultimately we'll turn out all right.

My worry about the New York Times is that it's got the only position as a national elitist general-interest paper. So the network news picks up its cues from the Times. And local papers do too. It has a huge influence. And we'd love to challenge it.

Most big technology companies are competitor focused. They see what others are doing, and then work to fast follow. In contrast, 90 to 95 percent of what we build in AWS is driven by what customers tell us they want.

For a lot of companies, it's useful for them to feel like they have an obvious competitor and to rally around that. I personally believe it's better to shoot higher. You don't want to be looking at your competitors. You want to be looking at what's possible and how to make the world better.

If you're competitor-focused, you have to wait until there is a competitor doing something. Being customer-focused allows you to be more pioneering.

I found that competition was supposed to be a menace and that a good manager circumvented his competitors by getting a monopoly by artificial means.