Max Beauroyre

We’re in a confusing period where AI capabilities have vastly outperformed even optimistic projections, but have undershot when it comes to economic impact. It’s not clear why that’s the case.

Here are eight imperatives—all of them drawing strength and sustenance from the humanities:

1. We need a way of defining and pursuing progress that doesn’t reduce that concept to something that only comes from a digital device.


2. We desperately need access to values and wisdom that aren’t corrupted by the relentless financial metrics and imposed flavor-of

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The most innovative products emerged without explicit customer requests. Nobody asked for the first iPhone, Airbnb, or Figma. These products came from vision and intuition.

Around 20 to 25 percent of the readers, the heavy readers, account for 80 percent of the revenue pool of the industry of what consumers spend on books. It’s the really dedicated readers. If they got all-access, the revenue pool of the industry is going to be very small.

We are formed by the structures of modern society to be insatiable consumers of an increasing range of commodified things and experiences and services. There is no art in this, because the tacit assumption that we must buy into along the way is that there is no limit to what we can consume.

For the same reason these systems will be helpful with anything, we should expect that these systems will be able to help with the problems that they create. If we believe there are solutions to unhappiness or a feeling of a loss of purpose, and that these solutions can be found with intelligence, then we should expect these systems to be able to h... See more

First time founders think about product. Second time founders think about distribution. Exceptional founders think about both, and how they work together.