gmays

> incumbents don’t have Innovators Dilemma here

I would argue that they do in some ways. For example, with AI it's not about adopting vs. not adopting AI, but rather degree of adoption.

It's easy to superficially integrate AI, but creating a competitive product predicated on post-AI assumptions requires rebuilding it from the ground up, which is not in the rational self-interest of incumbents.

In fact, this is even harder than the decision whether or not to adopt new technologies because with AI you can fool yourself into thinking you've gone far enough.

AI is such a game-changer that we have no idea what 'far enough' means yet. So the best we can do is run in that direction as fast as possible, which is hard to do with the baggage of an existing business. Startups are uniquely suited to this because they arebets on a different future.

That said, it is a fantastic article -- Jason always puts out insightful, high quality writing.

Another angle is that it is highly unlikely to be worth doing since we're so early in the AI cycle.

It's so challenging, capital intensive, and takes so long to bring these things online (especially if it's not your core competency), that but by the time you got something working in this paradigm, it's possible that a better paradigm/approach will have emerged.

Partly because analysts are learning their lesson in underestimating the AI demand and starting to correct for it.

The other complication is that we don't have intuitions for AI, so it's easy to underestimate how astronomically large the market will be.

And from an execution standpoint, Jensen (Nvidua CEO) has been preparing for a very long time (albeit unintentially, so nobody could predict AI to this extent). He also tends to go all-in on things, which has caused problems in the past (e.g. crypto crash), but just happened to be incredibly prescient in this moment.

Paper: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.01.20.576352v1

>> I'm curious to know what 'stuff' he's referring to. And what about it makes it such that kids need it but adults don't. And if that's true, are we SURE kids need it?

OP here. My understanding is that it's the stuff kids are tested on in school to pass (like standardized tests), but not necessarily needed for an adult to meet their learning goals.

Like, if your kid was using it they'd take take the grade level courses, but if you wanted to work up to Math for Machine Learning like I am you'd take the Foundation courses, which are streamlined.

One cool thing I like that I shared a screenshot of in the post is the knowledge graph that shows all the topics and how they are connected to make all of the lessons feel more purposeful. And if you get stuck somewhere there's an easy way to brush up on past lessons (dependencies).

Thanks for this. What I included was just one of the ones I came across while researching. But given my lack of proficiency I couldn't tell up from down. I will bookmark this and dig in after I get a better handle on the fundamentals.

...and for some adults. As a gamer particularly when I was young, this is catnip for me :D

Similarly, I've been enjoying "The Joy of X" as additional context around the fields and how they connect in an entertaining wyay.

FYI this is the guy that wrote the comment you replied to: https://www.justinmath.com

He's true math nerd, and definitely not a marketer. In fact, I don't think a single marketer works at the company. It's a bootstrapped labor of love and I've been following their journey for almost a decade.

I get the skepticism, but some things are legit.

Not likely yet, I'm still working through the Mathematical Foundations courses before I earn my way up to the Mathematics for Machine Learning course.

I would love to do a follow-up post at some point.

I agree, but the art (e.g. what a good author does) comes from the structure, of which thousands of combinations could be created. Gen AI would then be able to endlessly fill in details for unique variations (different characters, locations, allegiances, time periods, decision trees, etc.).

Think about any good story. A million details could be different, and it would still work well.

They'll also benefit from the boom on the graphics side as well.

Once gen AI gets good enough to generate high quality video games, virtual worlds, etc. in real time, that will redefine gaming and entertainment.

Why wait for the next Mission Impossible movie to come out when you can experience it...as Tom Cruise...with your own storyline with all of your friends. And get a new one every day.

9 year old me finally gets to cross this off the bucket list.

There isn't just one way, so there isn't just one source. Depending on where you're at in your knowledge, YC has some good content to start with.

A newsletter I started checking out recently is Last Money In, which is for those interested in joining syndicates. So far, the newsletter I've found most useful is this one on how VCs evaluate pre/seed stage investments: https://lastmoneyin.beehiiv.com/p/vcs-evaluate-startups-part... But you have to subscribe to read that.

There's also this deck I've had bookmarked (not sure when it was made) by Jyri Engeström explaining early-stage VC for founders: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/117ezrVxa9pwzBD7rbCv4...

One thing I'd caution is while it's good to read a bit to get some familiarity, don't paralyze yourself with consuming endless content. Just put in the work to make a deck and start pitching. That way, you at least have some experience to hang your learning on.

In terms of targeting VCs, think of it as who you could have great conversations with about your core competency/opportunity. That'll help you target the right ones who are most likely to get it, and the conversations will help you get a better idea of who you'd like to work with.

OP here. Good feedback, thank you. I tried to combine too mich into this one and it came out muddled.

I reworked it, hopefully it's clearer now. I removed the bit about aligning to leverage marketing cycles, so I'll have to think more about that one and if it's meaningful enough to add back elsewhere.

They have their own, it's just to unlock shared products/purchases.

Slides: https://github.com/ladamalina/coursera-startup/tree/master

Nothing beats mathacademy.com

Interesting time for writers to strike given the emerging capabilities of AI writing.

Babywise is a good overview book, but the most useful thing for us was the companion PDF since there's no fluff. They have it freely available here: http://babywise.life/audiobook

Congrats Matt, this is awesome news!

For those looking to build habits, something that helped me immensely is https://habitsgarden.com

I started using it earlier this year and my current streak as of this morning is 226 days.

Before using this to track consistency I actually automated commits to a GitHub repo for certain actions :D

Yes, it explicitly mentions that FTX US is included:

> FTX Trading Ltd. (d.b.a. FTX.com), announced today that it, West Realm Shires Services Inc. (d.b.a. FTX US), Alameda Research Ltd. and approximately 130 additional affiliated companies (together, the "FTX Group"'), have commenced voluntary proceedings under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in the District of Delaware in order to begin an orderly process to review and monetize assets for the benefit of all global stakeholders.

Excluded are:

> The following subsidiaries are not included in the Chapter 11 proceedings: LedgerX LIC, FTX Digital Markets Ltd., FTX Australia Pty Ltd. and FTX Express Pay Ltd.

Not a traditional paper workbook, but a better web-based alternative is Math Academy: https://mathacademy.com/#courses

A fellow hacker with a strong math education background spent most of the last decade building this and it's quite impressive (more exhaustive than anything I've seen). I don't know of a better way to learn math than this.

Not exactly. They are all tech stocks, but NASDAQ has large cap tech stocks, which 'only' saw a ~30% drop YTD in the index.

The ones I invested in were growth stocks that saw particularly steep corrections of around 70-90% when I invested.

My bet was that though they were overvalued, it was an overreaction that would on average get me a ~3X return in 3 years.

So yes, they are similar, but IMO the similarity was an overreaction that was not based on fundamentals. As mentioned earlier, I'd make the same bet again now for all but Peloton.

Keep in mind these are longer-term (3+ year) investments. If you watch the market, the wild swings (especially in these stocks) still tell us the market doesn't know how to value them.

Back to the OP's question, to get any significant outsized return you often have to be contrarian AND right. I felt I knew enough about the fundamentals of these companies and the market that I had enough confidence to make the bet. Only time will tell.

- Affirm

- Coinbase

- Cloudflare

- Netflix

- Peloton

- Roblox

- Shopify

- Snapchat

- Snowflake

- Unity

Peloton is the only one I regret so far — seems to be a falling knife I tried to catch, but still have some hope they can offload the inventory, grow distribution through Amazon/retail and drive up subscription revenue. But seems increasingly unlikely.

Last recession I made millions off real estate. Every $100k invested has grown 3-4X, but more importantly continues to return ~1.5% to 2% monthly in rent, plus offers significant depreciation expense at tax time. I doubt those conditions will ever happen again — I was lucky with timing.

This recession I bought a significant portion of select ‘pandemic stocks’ I thought have good fundamentals after they dropped 70-90% earlier this year (I was already all in cash anticipating a recession). My hope is in ~3 years that investment will 3X when the market recovers.

I wish I had better ideas on the next opportunity this recession, but by definition they will always be contrarian. My next big bet will likely be on myself with a startup, which I haven’t done in a decade.

Yes, exactly. Large organizations are full of anti-patterns that middle managers must navigate. The gist of my comment was that middle managers have to wrestle with inefficiencies that founders don't. Said another way, founders define structure and middle managers inherit it.

Founders are also incentivized to invest much more time energy into their businesses than a middle manager.

Founders also shape their org structure to something that suits them, while a middle manager has to work within the constraints of their organization, which are often stifling with significant overhead.

Even basic things take inordinate amounts of time for middle managers. You could ignore them, but that often has secondary impacts like not taking care of your team (promotions, good reviews, training, etc.) or not getting your team the visibility it needs.