On being nimble
Entrepreneurship in the face of AI
Get smarter in 5 minutes with Morning Brew (it's free) There's a reason over 4 million people start their day with Morning Brew - the daily email that delivers the latest news from Wall Street to Silicon Valley. Business news doesn't have to be boring...make your mornings more enjoyable, for free. Sign up!
Friends,
It’s clear that AI forms a path for the future - and many companies are starting to face up to what to do. In reality many companies won’t do anything immediately. On the flip side, you’ll see the knee jerk reaction of doing everything AI which is also a mistake. Entrepreneurs at earlier stage businesses in technology face a fine balance in in navigating emerging technologies and new markets. Where companies have seed or series A investment or later, the direction is governed by both founders and investors.
That’s easy when there is agreement or if AI is part of the tech stack already, but in many cases when dealing with rapidly evolving technologies like AI, the investment upside lies in doing something in AI, no matter the consequence of direction of the business. The unpredictable nature of entrepreneurship and the need to identify key risks to invest in while remaining responsive to changing circumstances is a the game that every founder has to play.
For founders, the balance is to have sensible financial runway while selectively taking advantage of opportunities to accelerate growth and seize talent, acknowledging the unpredictability of market conditions. But sometimes it's just impossible to get the right talent at the right price. The further the core business is away from the latest hot tech, the more difficult it is to pivot.
The way that I see this is that you need to look at the core consumer of the product. Do they want AI or do they want a product that works? Aligning directly to the consumer gives the best product. Aliging to investor demands give great returns. The trick is to find balance.
Reid Hoffman emphasizes the need for entrepreneurs to adapt and embrace change, convert challenges into opportunities, focus on the value proposition, and communicate their vision effectively. The common advice for all startups is to be nimble, take calculated risks, and staying responsive in an ever-changing business landscape. That’s advice that we could all use in our daily lives.
Progress is often underestimated because it occurs through the compounding of ideas, inventions, and education. Innovation often arises when different ideas combine to create something greater than the sum of its parts. Compound growth is not intuitive, leading to pessimism and the underestimation of technological progress. However, when viewed as a series of incremental advancements and the merging of small ideas, the potential for significant improvements becomes more conceivable. The reason why we need to look at AI in this context is because it will affect everything. But we don’t need to put all our eggs in one basket.
Stay Curious - and don’t forget to be amazing,
1440 is the daily newsletter helping 2M+ Americans stay informed—it’s news without motives, edited to be unbiased as humanly possible. The team at 1440 scours over 100+ sources so you don't have to. Culture, science, sports, politics, business, and everything in between - in a five-minute read each morning, 100% free. Sign up now!
Here are my recommendations for this week:
Now
Check out Refind! Every day Refind picks the most relevant links from around the web for you. Loved by 200k curious minds. Sign up
50 Ideas That Changed My Life - From Dave Perrell - these are his guiding principles and the light of his intellectual life. All of them will help you think better, and inspire curiosity.
Your Phone Is a Mindfulness Trap - Relying on apps for meditation is a recipe for distrac—hold on, I just got a text. Also, Does Dream Inception Work? and How to Overcome Anxiety-Driven Thoughts
Suddenly, It Looks Like We’re in a Golden Age for Medicine
We may be on the cusp of an era of astonishing innovation — the limits of which aren’t even clear yet.
The Man Who Turned the World on to the Genius of Fungi -A vast fungal web braids together life on Earth. Merlin Sheldrake wants to help us see it.
Everyone Has a Side Hustle Now. Is That a Good Thing? Also see The hottest new perk in tech is freedom
Next
1440 is the daily newsletter helping 2M people stay informed—it’s news without motives, edited to be unbiased as humanly possible. The team at 1440 scours over 100+ sources so you don't have to. Culture, science, sports, politics, business, and everything in between - in a five-minute read each morning, 100% free. Sign up now!
It’s Not a Computer, It’s a Companion! A167 dives into the emerging behaviour of AI companionship: why people are creating companions, how they’re doing it, and what features or use cases might be coming next. (must read!) Also see AI Is a Lot of Work
A storefront for robots - The SEO arms race has left Google and the web drowning in garbage text, with customers and businesses flailing to find each other. Also see: GPT-4 Can Use Tools - Now—That’s a Big Deal and How do humans spend their day
The power of defaults - Are network effects overrated? Also see The New New Moats
Read TIME's Interview With OpenAI CEO Sam Altman - Find out what Altman uses ChatGPT for. Also see: AI has poisoned its own well
How scientists are hacking the genetic code to give proteins new powers - By modifying the blueprint of life, researchers are endowing proteins with chemistries they’ve never had before.
Get smarter in 5 minutes with Morning Brew (it's free) There's a reason over 4 million people start their day with Morning Brew - the daily email that delivers the latest news from Wall Street to Silicon Valley. Business news doesn't have to be boring...make your mornings more enjoyable, for free. Sign up!
If you enjoyed this edition of Box of Amazing, please share and help me grow this group. If you share it on Twitter or LinkedIn, please tag me so that I can thank you.