I asked for $100 million for a television advertising campaign for Expedia, believing we could build the biggest brand in travel.

I pitched the spin-out of Expedia as an HR experiment to retain talent, as Microsoft was so large that many talented individuals could hide away and not contribute meaningfully.

Expedia started as a venture within Microsoft, and I left the operating system group to pursue it because of my wife's medical residency requirements.

We took 150 people from Microsoft to join Expedia, and almost all of them chose to take the adventure, which was a testament to the opportunity we presented.

On the day of Expedia's IPO, my son was born, and I jokingly promised the team I would name him Expedia if that happened.

Expedia was profitable and growing rapidly, which made it a successful business even during the dot-com crash, unlike Microsoft, which took years to recover.

The vision for my previous company was to use technology to make travel better, but it wasn't about improving the world.

The hardest part of recruiting for Expedia was convincing the spouses of potential hires, as they were often the most skeptical about the risks involved.

I ran Airbnb like a hardware startup, focusing on efficiency and discipline. This approach has proven beneficial for software development, as it encourages thoughtful decision-making and accountability.