Sam Blumenthal

There are large indicators that there is major demand for more sophisticated social commerce in the US marketplace already. An obvious example of this is Instagram, which has over one billion users and is now, arguably, one of the world’s largest social shopping platforms. Similarly to Pinduoduo, Instagram has fostered a browsing-based feed from... See more

Inflation, Interest Rates, The War in Ukraine & Commodity Prices, Labor Markets and The Great Repricing

In a time when shoppers are wary of being in physical shopping centers due to the pandemic, retailers, brands and social media apps have all jumped on the shoppable live content playing field in some way. In recent months, Nordstrom announced over 50 interactive livestream events, Facebook partnered with Anne Klein to debut its live in-app shopping... See more

Livestream shopping is an emerging trend that combines livestreaming, a feature that can be found on a majority of social media platforms, with the ability to purchase products directly from the livestream. In this way, it provides consumers with a more engaging experience than just clicking and filling a virtual shopping cart. Livestream shopping... See more

One question I had is whether you can build giant fictional worlds this way. Right now the NFT market is full of speculators hoping to flip their acquisitions for a quick profit. There is more than a little of the mania that fueled this winter’s meme stock enthusiasm to be found on the crypto Discords. (More than a little cynicism among the... See more