The State of the Big Idea

It would be hard to make the case that Jared Polis is typical of the entrepreneurs who populate this year's Big Ideas list. For while others stand poised on the verge, he has already crossed over to the other side. Polis founded BlueMountain.com, an Internet offshoot of his parents' greeting card company, while he was in his early 20s. You can guess the rest of that story, though the magnitude of the numbers involved has likely regained its power to shock: He sold out for a cool $780 million, nearly half in cash. He was all of 24.

Well, that's how the world worked back in 1999. You remember; he does too, and many years from now when he's old and graying--say, 35--he might want to portray it as a golden era for business builders. But right now, like everyone else on this list, he doesn't have much use for what was. He has to focus on what is. And while that's hard for anyone who lived through the boom--never mind someone who profited so irrationally from all that exuberance--it may ...