radical candour from a deep generalist
This is so good. Every founder should stop and watch this.
The focus on the consumer above everything else is such a good lesson.
It is also just great listing to his view on criticism, making mistakes and long term planning.
And the slight work/life balance speech at the end is spot on.
Jeff is pretty amazing.
I have always held the view that a powerful digital currency is a threat to the central banking system of all governments. Which in theory means the governments could embrace it as a way of having more control over it. I think this is what Sam is suggesting since at the moment the governments are trying to squeeze it which to me is forcing crypto to figure out how to survive away from central banking control. If this happens than central banks will have a big issue on their hands and probably the only way to prevent this would be to embrace it.
Not sure it will be the USA that will pull this off but if they did would be pretty amazing. Given the Trump administration being more focused on crap like building a wall – my guess is that somewhere in Asia would be a more obvious choice.
US Digital Currency – Sam Altman:
Although I don’t think the US government can stop cryptocurrency, I do think it could create the winner–let’s call it “USDC” for US Digital Currency–and fix some challenges that governments currently face with cryptocurrency.
I think the first superpower government to do something like this will have an enviable position in the future of the world, and some power over a worldwide currency.
The US government could decide to treat USDC as a second legal currency, which would be hugely powerful. (I think the US doing this would be significantly more impactful than the smaller governments thinking about it now.)
Ideally the initial coins would be evenly distributed to US citizens and taxpayers—something like everyone with a social security number gets two coins, one that is immediately sellable and one that you have to keep for 10 years.
Been on a few phone calls and a couple f2f sessions with Prashanth – always gold in those moments.
Good podcast to get to know him more and glean some insights.
INSIGHTS Podcast Series — #5: Markets Opportunities — Evaluate Wise & Execute Nice
It’s kind of pathetic that Apple takes a hard line to dealing with something when they clearly have made a mistake.
The evidence is fairly overwhelming at this point and if Apple were to own the issue – it wouldn’t have to turn into a class action.
Apple hit with class action suit over MacBook, MacBook Pro butterfly switch keyboard failures
I wil admit I thought Amazon would try harder to buy Flipkart but I guess they feel they don’t need to.
I am still thinking Amazon wins in the end – Walmart isn’t winning in the USA so not sure they are setup to win in India.
Will be interesting to see if Flipkart goes regional at all or just hunkers down in India.
All in all this is great news for India and puts the Asian start scene front snd center as this is the biggest ecommerce deal ever.
Also waiting to see how big this tax bill is and how that is all dealt with.
Walmart Beats Amazon in the Battle to Buy India’s Flipkart | Fortune
Add this from Axios:
Walmart made it official this morning, announcing that it will pay $16 billion for a 77% stake in Indian e-commerce leader Flipkart. Or, put another way, Amazon just suffered the sort of defeat that is usually reserved for physical retailers.
I really dig UpFront Ventures – my dream is to attend their conference.
This is a good read into one of their partners.
Why This Venture Capitalist Has a Gen Z Mentor | Fortune:
What’s the best business advice you’ve ever received?
NORTMAN: When you stop learning, you perish. It’s a cliche thing to say, but I really think it’s an advantage. For me, I was in this crazy article in The New York Times about how I have a Gen Z mentor. It’s actually true, but it started just because I wanted to be helpful to a young woman who I knew was talented. At some point, I realized I was learning more from her than she was from me. It constantly reminds me not to be ageist or industry-ist.
This should be good 😉
Had an amaze balls event with John yesterday. I have so many notes – hopefully we can share the video online soon.
One of my coolest takeaways was his view of taking your company and forcing yourself to write a job description for what your company is suppose to be doing or what you want it to be doing.
Then wrap your head around making sure that your customers would “hire” your company for that role.
Cool stuff.
I am trying to further grok how to treat a fund like this.
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