I’ve heard many social product pitches where the founder excitedly explains “We’re going to connect (group x) with (group y) which will leads to awesome results”. But.. connection and matchmaking only happen when there are enough users on the platform. That’s why, ironically, social products can benefit from offering non-social, first-person utility features when they … Continue reading First Person Utility
Warren Buffett and Bill Gates were asked the same question in separate, unrelated interviews – what was the #1 reason for their success, in their own views? Coincidentally, they both had the same answer – Focus. There’s no startup founder who doesn’t know they need to bring ruthless focus to be able to succeed. But … Continue reading Focus
As they say “the public internet is broken” with toxic social networks etc, the so-called private internet – ie. closed private groups – has been on the rise. But I feel like the private internet is also on the verge of breaking – at least based on my personal experience. First is the volume problem. … Continue reading The Group Chat Problem
Someone in the community I’m part of recently mentioned: With the universe so vast and the human history so long, it’s likely 99.9999% of what we do will probably be meaningless in the grand scheme of things. This isn’t nihilism or pessimism. For me personally this was one of the most liberating quotes in a … Continue reading The Universe Doesn’t Care
Startups are literally between rock and a hard place in this AI world. Rock = the Googles and the Microsofts that develop powerful general AI models that work as a “thick protocol layer” leaving little room for the applications layer. There’s a reason why many of AI apps we’re seeing are wrapper apps with some … Continue reading Startup Moat In This AI World
Universities encourage faculties to help commercialize their scientific inventions through tech IP transfer. They hold events and provide education resources. But commercializing tech IP, such as starting a tech-based startup company, isn’t easy for the faculty to do, because they don’t have bandwidth and/or sufficient management knowledge/experience, and their career goals often don’t align with … Continue reading The Porsche Effect
Many times in life, we need That One Person. Someone said that the #1 success factor for hiring by far is having a strong internal champion who goes above and beyond to vouch for the hire. (Imagine someone yelling, “We must hire that person, otherwise I’ll quit!”) Same goes for company acquisitions. In many cases, … Continue reading That One Person
Part of founders’ job is to empower investors with sufficient knowledge about their business, so the investors don’t ask dumb questions. In most cases, VCs won’t invest in companies where they find themselves asking dumb questions. Because it means they’re not familiar with the industry; also, no one wants to look stupid, especially VCs with … Continue reading Empower Your Investors
Why do you build a new service when XYZ is already well established in the same space? Because a big market is already proven to be there and you can make a difference when you build a better solution for customers. Just a few quick examples: Pulley (vs Carta) and Beehiiv (vs Substack). Pulley is … Continue reading New Player In A Proven Market
It might be just a pure coincidence that Warren Buffett (93 years old) and Charlie Munger (99 years old) have been working together in the same partnership for a long time and living a very long life, on what often doesn’t seem like particularly healthy diet. Or, there might be at least some correlation between … Continue reading Do What You Enjoy