Musings

lI enjoyed this Foreign Policy Magazine piece offering a contrarian perspective on Africa’s growth over the last 10 decades. It describes TIME magazine and The Economist’s cover story articles about Africa’s precipitous rise. As author Rick Rowden says of these magazines, They looked to Africa’s recent high GDP growth rates, rising per capita incomes, and the explosive growth of mobile phones and mobile phone banking as evidence that Africa is “developing.” Rich countries figured out […]

Within 10 minutes of stepping onto the streets of SOMA, a young bearded man who couldn’t have been older than 35 started trailing me, screaming “you black fuck! Turn around. I’m talking to you, dirty nigger.” I turned to face him, and said, “I’d prefer you say that to my face, like a man,” at which point he did say it to my face like a man. If there wasn’t a security guard at the […]

I loved this New York Times article about the “busy” problem. If you live in America in the 21st century you’ve probably had to listen to a lot of people tell you how busy they are. It’s become the default response when you ask anyone how they’re doing: “Busy!” “So busy.” “Crazy busy.” It is, pretty obviously, a boast disguised as a complaint. And the stock response is a kind of congratulation: “That’s a good […]

As the year draws to a close, it’s time for resolutions and reflections. Mine has to do with service. These questions about service have been hanging over me a lot this year, and I would like to share some of my explorations on this forum.** What does it mean to serve?“To help those in need.” That sounds good, right? It seems to encompass volunteering and economic development and political activism, all usually associated with service. […]

I used to hear people talk about consumer software and social media interchangeably. I always used to think of these people as luddites or not in the loop somehow. I believed that this mistake was largely because social media is viral, is where people communicate, and is noisy. After all, consumer software is surely far more than new media. But lately I’ve been trying to understand what it is, with the intention of better understanding our […]

What defines a consumer company, anyway? My working definition was a company which had you and me, individuals, as their customers. Samsung is a consumer company. I buy phones, washing machines, flat screens. Unilever is a consumer company. I buy ice cream, shampoo, and tea. Microsoft is a consumer company. I buy word processing, operating systems, and video game consoles. These companies are made or broken by how many products they can sell me.  What […]

The cheapest possible investment a company can get: customers paying more for the product than it cost to build the product. This throws off the cash to grow, keeps equity intact, and avoids accrual of interest. Happiness is positive cash flow. How do we apply that to equity crowdfunding, the new wave of private financing marketplaces. Today, people who are concerned about equity crowdfunding point to two major problems: – If your equity crowdfunding platform […]

The airline industry is a useful case study on product / market fit. There are infinite features airlines can provide, and there are as wide a range of plane travelers as one could imagine. Virgin America, Spirit Airlines, and Southwest are three good examples. Virgin America has consistent WiFi, plays nightclub music and has sexy mood lighting. Anecdotally, the tech community reports on experiences flying Virgin America far more than other airlines. Customers love it. In fact, Virgin America […]

I met two companies this week who are working on solutions in a space that I had only considered in passing until I spoke to them. Per U.S. household, there is currently more student loan debt than credit card debt. We’re talking, ballpark, one trillion dollars. And that number doesn’t seem to be going down any time soon. The cost of college has risen 1,000% since they started keeping a record of the figure in 1978. […]