The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 13 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Regional tech hubs cannot beat Silicon Valley by simply copying it
“As any startup, in order to win the incumbents needs to be 10 X better than that incumbent. It's impossible to be another Silicon Valley and be 10 X better than the Silicon Valley that already exists.”
No more than 5% of the world's top tech talent is in Silicon Valley
“That's, yeah. That's a recent pointer was Paul Graham wrote a great essay on this topic, is that reminding the American public and the tech scene that if you look at the statistics, if you look at the probability or the distribution of the top tech talent in t…”
Moving to Silicon Valley without connections wastes unfunded founders' resources
“If you are a unfunded founder with no valid ties and you just land in SFO with an intent to build a successful business, this is probably one of the most extensive places where you can spend your resources just to network a bit and get to know people because n…”
Moving to Silicon Valley is no longer a binary decision for startups
“Or what my thesis is that it's not a binary answer anymore. It's not like, should you move to the Valley or not? It's like, okay, you're in software business. When and how and how often should you spend time in the Valley? And what are the other places where y…”
Mountain View is poorly suited for heavily regulated frontier tech startups
“Like if you wanted to build a company that operates drones and trades in Bitcoin while doing that and maybe layer something, I don't know, stem cells into that mixer or something, it's very unlikely that you should create that company in Mountain View.”
Remote engineering salary savings easily cover travel costs for team retreats
“But in, in my experience, the Competition on tech talent and the top engineers in the world in Silicon Valley has grown to a point where that if you hire a person outside here, like you go to even Portland or Seattle or Vancouver, or even London or Tokyo, whic…”
Startups in doubt about location should establish themselves closest to their users
“This is, I think, a universal advice is that If startup has doubts about where to locate themselves is probably closest to the users is not the worst bet.”
Housing and taxes consume 70% of an average person's lifetime income
“For a normal person who is just doing what they do every day and not doing a spectacular one-time financial event about 70% of their money that they see in their lifetime goes to just two things. It's primary residence and taxes.”
VR telepresence will eventually render physical co-location unnecessary
“Before Oculus kicks in with proper telepresence, like it will take some time, but we'll get there.”
Remote team relationships must be built face-to-face before going virtual
“That's, I think that's a learning that we got from Skype, is that you can build human relationships face-to-face, and then you can maintain them over video calls. And when you're booting up a new team, you have to ensure that there is enough of that face-to-fa…”
Rational people actively optimize where they live based on opportunity
“Changing your place and picking the optimal location and considering location is, is, is just the thing that rational people should do when living in that world.”