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 8 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
Founders should build for themselves unless exceptionally skilled at user research
“One of my fundamental rules, I can believe, is if, unless you are really good at user research, Build, build products for yourself.”
Williams recommends founders work at an established company before starting one
“Thinking, maybe you should work at a company before you start a company. Yeah. Which is a tip that I would recommend to most people.”
Williams: Intuitive product feeling matters significantly more than early usage metrics
“It felt like a thing, which has, I've come to realize, is the most important thing, and like, it's, feeling is much more important than metrics early on.”
Williams: Tech founders frequently over-index on data over intuition early on
“It's so easy to get Overwhelmed by data, especially in tech. And as soon as you have anybody using your product, the attention turns to numbers, and testing, and people try to be very scientific about it.”
Williams warns founders against accepting executive coaches hired by venture capitalists
“It was my coach at the time, hired by a VC, which is a bad idea Bill Campbell, who told me”
Williams: September 11 attacks forced mainstream journalists to take blogs seriously
“Nine 11 was actually a big moment for blogs, and it's when, the way I would describe it, it's when journalists started taking them seriously.”
Founders should only sell for burnout, imminent failure, or undeniable money
“I thought about it very deeply, and I came up with this, like, okay, why would you sell a company? I think there are three reasons, and none of these meet that criteria. Three reasons being, you don't want to do it anymore, and so you need someone to do it for…”
Social networks derive value from distribution and connectivity, not content hosting
“What we had learned from social networks was that
The value was in the connectivity. Like, if Twitter just did what Blogger did and posted your tweet to a webpage and didn't fan it out, if there wasn't this follow mechanism, it wouldn't be very interesting. I…”