Facebook has a long history of attempts to move into payments and commerce, and this latest iteration is happening amid an accelerated transition from offline sales to e-commerce and a softening ad market.
Just as Instagram’s rise amplified the world’s obsession with physical aesthetics, avatars that abstract our physical selves can decrease it. A focus on our physical appearances is arbitrary: does it matter that I am attractive? That you are? Why? How is the conversation we have different if I mask my gender, age, ethnicity, shape?
A belated professional update: I’m delighted to share that I recently joined @Uniswap to lead research!
https://t.co/IDu2aee0yw
Here’s why I left the @federalreserve to dive into #DeFi
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In the language of Ben Thompson, Substack has two choices. It can become a full fledged aggregator, build network effects and community, personalized content and so forth, but risk the moral purity of being one of the last ad-free algorithm-free corners of the internet, or it can become a platform, provide valuable infrastructure and flexible... See more
Americans have come to define liberty “negatively, as lack of dependence, the right not to be obligated to others. Independence came to mean immunity from social claims on one’s wealth or time.” If this is how you conceive of liberty—as freedom from obligation—then the transition to parenthood is a dizzying shock. Most Americans are free to choose... See more
the scaled ad play on social is kind of over. Even Meta is working on paid products now for its apps for Instagram and Facebook. I don’t really see any of the more upstart social companies focusing on a scaled ad play. I think we’re past that era.