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 11 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
Mark Zuckerberg once argued having multiple online identities was intellectually dishonest
“Mark Zuckerberg was very adamant for a while that in the future there would be one profile online. There was a point where he thought it was almost intellectually dishonest to represent yourself in different ways online.”
Reid Hoffman stayed directly involved in LinkedIn's product as chairman
“Even as a fact, even when he stepped out of the CEO role and was chairman, he kept his hand pretty directly in product.
He might even argue too much at some times.”
LinkedIn had no mobile product strategy in 2009 beyond an intern's project
“So in 2009, I was handed LinkedIn mobile.
It had been literally a fun, innovative thing that one of the engineers had built.
We had an intern over the summer work on actually keeping it up, but we did not have a heavy focus on mobile.
And it was because when I…”
Wealthfront pioneered automated ETF tax-loss harvesting and launched direct indexing in 2013
“Wealthfront was the first to do ETF tax loss harvesting automated. And then we did direct indexing. Direct indexing is so hot right now in the industry. It's 20, 24. Direct indexing is so hot. We launched it the end of 2013, my first year there, because it was…”
Early eBay evaluated every proposed product feature using three-year NPV financial spreadsheets
“EBay worked very much. They had an incredibly detailed financial spreadsheet that literally every feature we built went into a spreadsheet with a three year kind of NPV based that even built in eBay's cost of capital.”
Adding donation presets in multiples of 18 increased median Jewish donations 80%
“The reason I got written up in the New York Times is it turned out that one little feature actually moved our median donation to Jewish charities by 80%. It increased it. That median donation went from a hundred dollars to one 80.”
Over 80% of the S&P 500 has turned over in 30 years
“How much of the S&P 500 has turned over in the last 30 years? I think it's over 80%.”
Sun Microsystems almost acquired Apple for roughly $2 billion in the 1990s
“Apple was almost bought by Sun and Sun balked at the price. I think it was like two billion, two point something too much.”
eBay, Yahoo, and Amazon dominated Silicon Valley hiring from 2001 to 2005
“EBay, Yahoo, Amazon were some of the few companies that survived that forest fire. And so what it meant was from 2001 to 2005, they kind of had their pick of talent.”
Amazon spent nine years experimenting before successfully adopting a marketplace model
“How long did Amazon spend trying to graft a marketplace onto Amazon? Nine years, I think, given their first efforts before it finally worked, but that wasn't an accident.”
Reid Hoffman stepped back to ensure Jeff Weiner had full CEO authority
“The best transitions, founder transitions, I think, with leadership, Reid imbued Jeff with a lot of moral authority. I mean, even when Jeff came on board, for example, Reid actually spent time away from LinkedIn. He wasn't really that away. Could have been rea…”