Notes towards becoming a better investor
kaiton and
Notes towards becoming a better investor
Learning to lean into my weirdness has taken many shapes. Mostly it’s looked like embracing what comes to me naturally: I’ve always been much more interested in understanding people than ideas, get immense gratification from building lasting relationships, and consider it a lifelong goal to improve my discernment and refine my taste. This often shows up in how I spend my time: I rarely take pitch meetings (if a founder is fundraising already I probably didn’t get there early enough), always have a creative project I’m actively working on, and spend a significant amount of time striving to understand and translate myself to the page. Cultivating a view of the world that no one else has is an edge I consider critically important to Moth’s success, as well as something that requires continual cultivation and critical refinement.
The idea of research as leisure activity has stayed with me because it seems to describe a kind of intellectual inquiry that comes from idiosyncratic passion and interest. It’s not about the formal credentials. It’s fundamentally about play . It seems to describe a life where it’s just fun to be reading, learning, writing, and collaborating on... See more
Celine Nguyen • research as leisure activity
If your solution to some problem relies on “If everyone would just...” then you do not have a solution. Everyone is not going to just. At not time in the history of the universe has everyone just, and they’re not going to start now.
Everyone will not just
A Look Back at Q1 '24 Public Cloud Software Earnings
cloudedjudgement.substack.com
I was young, naive, and plagued by impostor syndrome. I held back instead of exploring more, engaging more deeply, and seeking out more challenges. I allowed myself to be carried along by the current, rather than actively charting my own course. Youth is wasted on the young.
Why pretend to be smart and play it safe? True understanding is rare and... See more
Why pretend to be smart and play it safe? True understanding is rare and... See more
Murat Demirbas • My Time at MIT
I want to end this with a quote by Ivan Illich, who I'm sure many of you have heard of.
He wrote a wonderful book called "Tools for Conviviality" where he talked about the importance of people being able to make tools for themselves.
He says, "People need not only to obtain things; they need above all the freedom to make things among which they can... See more
He wrote a wonderful book called "Tools for Conviviality" where he talked about the importance of people being able to make tools for themselves.
He says, "People need not only to obtain things; they need above all the freedom to make things among which they can... See more
I want to end this with a quote by Ivan Illich, who I'm sure many of you have heard of.
He wrote a wonderful book called "Tools for Conviviality" where he talked about the importance of people being able to make tools for themselves.
He says, "People need not only to obtain things; they need above all the freedom to make things among which they can live, to give shape to them according to their own tastes, and to put them to use in caring for and about others."
Software is no exception to this.
In some sense, Albini’s contrition was the act of a premier hater realizing that the final frontier of hating is one’s own past. But it was also a welcome way for Albini to show that people can continue to grow at any age—and it set the stage for him to continue to grow as a producer as well.
Steve Albini Was a Hater to His Core. And We’re All Better for It.
