May 2012
2 posts
3 tags
What makes a good engineering culture? →
2 tags
10 Lessons for Young Designers →
The ones I like (which are most of them)
1. Be Authentic. The most powerful asset you have is your individuality, what makes you unique. It’s time to stop listening to others on what you should do.
2. Work harder than anyone else and you will always benefit from the effort.
4. …Make things with your hands. Innovation in thinking is not enough.
6. Being original is still king,...
April 2012
5 posts
4 tags
Peter Thiel’s CS183: Startup - Class 7 Notes Essay →
Choice quotes:
Understanding exponents and power law distributions isn’t just about understanding VC. There are important personal applications too. Many things, such as key life decisions or starting businesses, also result in similar distributions. We tend to think about these things too moderately. There is a perception that some things are sort of better than other things, sometimes. But the...
2 tags
“If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re...”
– Jeff Bezos, Interview with Wired
1 tag
The Law of Shitty Clickthroughs →
“There are a few drivers for the Law of Shitty Clickthroughs, and here’s a summary of the top ones:
Customers respond to novelty, which inevitably fades
First-to-market never lasts
More scale means less qualified customers”
3 tags
Instagram's First Investor Explains What He Looks... →
He wants founders who are thoughtful, but then make forceful decisions.
Founders must be able to code, but he doesn’t have strong opinions about languages.
Don’t raise more money until you’re sure you have product market fit.
“most of the time entrepreneurs are realistic near the end and say this isn’t working. Those decisions aren’t that difficult. It gets...
2 tags
Startups: How to communicate traction to investors →
How to:
Compress your y-axis
Choose your x-axis
Lower expectations
Choose your y-axis
Use absolute and growth numbers
Tell a story of a customer
Benchmark against a known competitor
Annotate a graph
Using testimonials as traction (don’t)
Using press as traction (don’t)
March 2012
6 posts
4 tags
How To Get Media Coverage For Your Startup: A... →
A very thorough guide and extremely relevant to tech startups.
3 tags
Hiring Talent: 4 Traits Your Start-up Needs →
1. Adaptability
“ask where they want to be in five years. While most job recruiters look for candidates who know exactly where they want to be, we’re the opposite.”
2. Honesty
“we ask them if they’re nervous. If we ask someone whether they’re nervous and they say no, but they’re sweating, shaking, and breaking out in rashes, it’s pretty much a red...
5 tags
Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann’s Lesson for... →
My favorite parts:
Don’t take too much advice:
But here’s Pinterest co-founder and CEO Ben Silbermann’s advice: “Don’t take too much advice.”
“Most people generalize whatever they did, and say that was the strategy that made it work,” Silbermann said. In reality, there’s very little way of knowing how various factors contributed to success or failure.
Being comfortable as a...
3 tags
Sir Jonathan Ive: The iMan Cometh →
3 tags
Developing Product Ideas
Mark Prigg: When you are coming up with product ideas such as the iPod, do you try to solve a problem?
Sir Jonathan Ive: There are different approaches - sometimes things can irritate you so you become aware of a problem, which is a very pragmatic approach and the least challenging. What is more difficult is when you are intrigued by an opportunity. That, I think, really exercises the skills of a designer. It’s not a problem you’re aware of, nobody has articulated a need. But you start asking questions, what if we do this, combine it with that, would that be useful? This creates opportunities that could replace entire categories of device, rather than tactically responding to an individual problem. That’s the real challenge, and that’s what is exciting. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/sir-jonathan-ive-the-iman-cometh-7562170.html
3 tags
“One of my tricks for generating startup ideas is to imagine the ways in which...”
– Paul Graham
February 2012
10 posts
4 tags
Airbnb: A $1.3 Billion-Dollar Startup's First-Ever... →
Another good example of a quality, simple pitch deck, this time from AirBnB.
4 tags
The First Pitch Deck Foursquare Ever Showed... →
3 tags
Almost Three: A Brief History Of Foursquare Time... →
“With so many approaches to product management, I found but a single common philosophy that bound all successful products together:
Identify product opportunities.
Create products to seize them.”
2 tags
Talk to Us About Your Problems →
“And Mr. Cho kind of looked at me. I could see he was puzzled. He said, ‘Jim-san. We all know you are a good manager, otherwise we would not have hired you. But please talk to us about your problems so we can all work on them together.’”
3 tags
"It is the human friction that makes the sparks." →
“I was part of a number of failed remote R&D attempts. The one time it worked was when we decided to abandon meetings, project documents, tracking tools, etc. Instead, we got a high quality speakerphone so everyone could overhear everyone else’s conversations, and we left it on all day, every day. It wasn’t the same as being together in person, but we did manage to get some of the human...
2 tags
In Startups And Life, You Need Plan A, B, And Z →
“How can you be flexibly persistent in your startup or in your career? Here’s a framework I use: ABZ Planning. In business and in life, you should have three plans: Plan A, Plan B, and Plan Z.” -Reid Hoffman
1 tag
How Companies Learn Your Secrets →
“Deciphering cues is hard, however. Our lives often contain too much information to figure out what is triggering a particular behavior. Do you eat breakfast at a certain time because you’re hungry? Or because the morning news is on? Or because your kids have started eating? Experiments have shown that most cues fit into one of five categories: location, time, emotional state, other people...
5 tags
An Overview of Online DIY Education →
3 tags
Employee Equity: How Much? →
“The first thing you do is you figure out how valuable your company is (we call this “best value”). This is NOT your 409a valuation (we call that “fair value”)…
The second thing you do is break up your org chart into brackets. There is no bracket for the CEO and COO…
When you have the brackets set up, you put a multiplier next to them. There are no hard...
1 tag
Complete List of Behavioral Interview Questions →
Even though I hate behavioral interview questions and think they’re abused, I think there are some gems in this list that could be useful to interviewers if used properly.
January 2012
4 posts
3 tags
5 Steps To Bootstrapping Your PR Efforts →
I really like his sample journalist outreach letter.
3 tags
Twelve Things You Were Not Taught in School About... →
A few that jumped out at me:
3. You must go through the motions of being creative…The more times you try to get ideas, the more active your brain becomes and the more creative you become.
6. Never stop with your first good idea.
10. You do not see things as they are; you see them as you are.
11. Always approach a problem on its own terms. Do not trust your first perspective of a problem...
3 tags
Advice for Early Management →
1 tag
“The biggest barrier to an artist is self-confidence. The artist always battles...”
– Francis Ford Coppola (via brycedotvc)
December 2011
4 posts
1 tag
This Post is Censored
I’ve censored the following, in protest of a bill that gives any corporation and the US government the power to censor the internet—a bill that could pass THIS WEEK. To see the uncensored text, and to stop internet censorship, go here.
I don’t █████ ████████ ████ up █████████ ██████. I may ████ █████ ██████ ████ ███████, but I ██████ ████ my ██████████ on an █████ to my ████,...
How to Pick a Great Designer →
1 tag
How Entrepreneurs Can Increase Productivity by... →
9 filters for getting rid of negative thoughts from a post by James Altucher:
Pessimistic thoughts
Vice
Perfectionism/shame
Jealousy
Painful
Fear
Obsessive
Sadness
Unimprovement
4 Characteristics to Look for When Trying to Hire →
November 2011
3 posts
4 tags
A guide to Jack Dorsey's 80-hour workweek →
“Here’s a rundown on the weekly calendar Dorsey keeps as CEO of payments platform Square and chairman of Twitter.
Monday: Management meetings and “running the company” work Tuesday: Product development Wednesday: Marketing, communications and growth Thursday: Developers and partnerships Friday: The company and its culture
Weekends are a bit slower: Saturdays are for...
2 tags
What good interview questions are actually trying... →
A good outline for how to structure your interview questions. When you know this is the information you’re trying to learn, it’s easier to know what to ask to learn it.
1 tag
“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us...”
– Ira Glass
October 2011
5 posts
3 tags
'You Are Not So Smart': Why We Can't Tell Good... →
“Expectation, as it turns out, is just as important as raw sensation. The build up to an experience can completely change how you interpret the information reaching your brain from your otherwise objective senses.”
2 tags
In The Ring: Problems, Problems Everywhere →
“And it’s not the easy problems that make it your way. Those already got solved. Rather, they’re the hardest problems that people bring to your attention. Day after day. That, my friends, can be tiring.”
“…it led to two pretty interesting discoveries: a) people often don’t realize they’re facing a problem. Rather, they just feel frustration. b) problem solving, and...
3 tags
BRYCE DOT VC: You're Doing It All Wrong →
brycedotvc:
Close your eyes.
Imagine, if you will, a startup that meets the following criteria:
Their recruiting process is fundamentally flawed
Their operations are a mess
They make engineers pretty much do everything, which leaves almost no time for coding
They don’t (care) about charity or…
3 tags
Make a 60 Sec Video Pitch in 500 Photos, $2 and 1... →
A fantastic post by my friend Avand Amiri from Sqoot, an API for daily deals
4 tags
Watch“How to Measure the Metrics that Determine Real Progress” By Trevor Owens on Oct 3, 2011
September 2011
9 posts
3 tags
Affordably Priced Brandable Domain Names for... →
The best list I’ve seen of prepackaged company names with the domain. At $250 the price is also great too.
3 tags
How to Sell Like Steve Jobs →
2 tags
“Self motivation is and always will be the most important form of motivation....”
– I quote Seth Godin a lot, but this one is just to relevant to pass up. I especially love the last line about it being easier than ever to measure your performance against others.
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YC NYC Meetup Twitter Feed →
A couple quotes from Paul Graham about startups that get him excited:
“…Introduce market pricing in worlds that don’t have it…”
“…startups destroying things that everyone thinks works but are artifacts…”
4 tags
How to Keep Your Employees Happy While Pushing... →
My takeaways:
Pick a day of the week where you focus on vocalizing the positive contributions team members are making to the company. Make it a habit.
Feed them. It’s a fancy perk that doesn’t have to cost a lot.
Know your team’s 5 top personal goals
3 tags
“Leaders are people who go their own way without caring, or even looking to see...”
– John Holt as quoted on the blog of Caterina Fake
4 tags
“You don’t need logos. Logos are for insecure people. Just like they were in high...”
– Mark Suster talking about investment rounds with a laundry list of “rock star” investors. I also related to this comment with regards to deciding whether or not to accept my admissions offer to NYU ITP.
3 tags
What's the Most Difficult CEO Skill? Managing Your... →
Some choice quotes:
“It’s like the fight club of management: The first rule of the CEO psychological meltdown is don’t talk about the psychological meltdown.”
“Which interpretation was closer to the truth? In the absence of someone to talk to, that’s a question that I asked myself about 3,000 times. As an aside, asking oneself anything 3,000 times turns out to be a bad...
2 tags
“The most dangerous way to lose time is not to spend it having fun, but to spend...”
– Paul Graham
August 2011
5 posts
4 tags
Is Verge SXSW Interactive or Ted?
The new Verge questionnaire and screening process for attending meetups prompted what I think was a good discussion yesterday about how to best manage a burgeoning startup and innovation community.
I think I have a good understanding of and appreciation for the motivations of people on both sides of the aisle. It’s actually a somewhat old debate that has been going on for about the past 18...
4 tags
Useful Hiring Tip: Write Your Job Specs as a Pie... →