alt orgs

The cost of this was that the company often felt like there was no clear strategy or direction, more like a Petri dish of smart people building little fiefdoms and going off in random directions. But it was incredibly generative.

if you create titles, people start coveting them, and this ends up creating competitive politics inside the company that undermines internal unity. Better to just give everyone the same title and make them go focus on the goal instead.

I’ve always believed the best early-stage founders are artists – they're obsessive about new and unusual things, they feel compelled to bring creation into the world, and they are often misunderstood for long periods of time–even lifetimes. Building businesses is their art.

On FIRE: I realized that I actually don’t want to retire early. What I’m more interested in is to retire often.

We discussed that what we deem as our “legacy” can, in fact, be hyper-local and intimate. Maybe no one will ever know the details of what you’ve said and done to others, but its subtle or not so subtle effects on another person’s life is rewarding in itself. I sometimes feel that way about writing: it’s less of a mirror or loudspeaker, and more so ... See more

know a guy in France that will take 2 months off and delete his whole inbox when he gets back

"if it's urgent, someone's already handled it

if it's important, they'll just send it again

if it's neither, then I don't care"