The Wayfarer by Gun.io. March 3rd, 2023.
If I had a dollar for every time I implored someone to listen to an episode of Lenny's Podcast, I'd at least be able to afford a few dozen eggs from Whole Foods.*
But! This one was really, really good: Patrick Campbell (if you've ever used ProfitWell, you've seen his name in your inbox) talking about bootstrapping a $200M business. So many golden nuggets in there, but the one that has lived rent-free in my head for the last week or so is:
Real professionals ship. Strategy and meticulous planning can only get you so far. At some point, you need to press play before you talk yourself out of it. And ideally, you have a cadence for this that is just a hair faster than what feels comfortable.
So this week, my shipping cadence has been the focus of most of my reflections and step changes. And the lowest-risk place to start practicing is in my personal life. It started with clearing out all the personal tasks on my triage list. If it's not important enough to do now, it was evicted. If it was, it got done.
Through this process, I caught myself very nearly deleting one task that's been on my list since last year—"bite the bullet and learn how to use TikTok because you're a marketer and you simply must"—because, honestly, it felt to complex too "ship" (I'm annoyed with my use of this word already, I'm sorry). But instead, I (nobly! fearlessly!) uploaded my first TikTok and promptly forgot about it.
A week later, I logged in on a whim to find that, whoops, I had become an internet sensation. Ok, maybe not a sensation, but over 300,000 people had watched this weird little video. And just like that, damn, I think I learned how to use TikTok.
Listen, I've said "whatever, let's just do it" more times in my career than I can count (including starting this newsletter!), and this accidental virality has happened precisely zero times. Well, now one time. So I suppose all this is to say: if lukewarm results have made you cautious to take big bets (and take them quickly), this is just a reminder that more at-bats = more chances to hit a home run. You probably don't need to tinker, perfect, or iterate more; you probably just need to take another swing.
- Faith
*...which, of course, I no longer need to purchase as my flock of free-loading hens have decided to start laying again after a long winter drought and much discussion about "retirement plans." Never underestimate the power of instilling juuuuuust a little existential fear.
1. For all the weird tech history I get to read (and podcast about) every week, why doesn't Xerox come up more often? 50 years later, we're still living in the Xerox Alto's world.
2. Giving major Mos Eisley vibes: 5,000-Year-Old Tavern With Food Still Inside Discovered in Iraq.
3. You know I'm a sucker for a spring clean, especially a digital one. Thanks Kate for sharing this guide to clearing out digital clutter. Spending this weekend organizing my photos into albums, yikes.
4. See below.
The web of digital advertising is wide-spread and many-threaded; when companies use ad tech to promote their products, they don't always know what their ads are supporting. This week I talk to Claire Atkin, co-founder of CheckMyAds, about how ad tech makes money, ways to tackle big advertising, and how we can all help fight the funding of hatred and misinformation. Audio and transcript here.
When the Homebrew Computer Club met up for the first time in Menlo Park, they had no idea they'd be so instrumental in spreading awareness and enthusiasm for personal computers. This week, Chris and I dive into the history of the club, the inventions that came out of it, and why, as New Yorkers, we think NYC would have been the OG tech hub if Silicon Valley hadn't come into play. Audio and transcript here.
We have 747 folks ready to interview and get to work this week. Here are three folks I'd hire if I could:
⚡️ Eugenio G, a senior React and React Native engineer with nearly a decade of experience as a fractional bandwidth-multiplier on engineering teams.
⚡️ Tome D, a Ruby and Python engineer with 15+ years of experience as a hands-on leader and contributor.
⚡️ Joel S, a full-stack developer who focuses on Node.js, Go, React, and Vue.js.