Ryan Nisbet

Maker & Mountaineer. Doing ops at @withdelphi + @LibraryMinds podcast

[The Library of Minds @LibraryMinds]

Be sure to watch the full episode with @rabois
• Lessons learned building PayPal, LinkedIn, Square
• Joining a great team is > starting your own company
• The new physics of AI startups
• Why stretching & Slack are actually bad for you

Watch here: https://t.co/zkMfDDZyeK

[Delphi @withdelphi]

Exciting piece this weekend from The New York Times covering the Delphis of @lennysan, @AlisaCohn, and @bussgang.

A product leader, an executive coach, and a Harvard professor, each with a Delphi that answers questions, coaches, and teaches in their own voice, at scale.

Learning from the best used to require a steep fee, a long waitlist, or an invitation into the right room. Now anyone can learn directly from the top experts in any field.

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@hi_kaank @lyft @johnzimmer Best part of the episode

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@daraladje @johnzimmer Thanks for coming on @johnzimmer!

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

I post on X one time and get harvested for LinkedIn thought leadership

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@FarzaTV If I could make bread just by speaking english I would make all my bread.

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@braveben Thanks for coming on Ben!

[Dara @daraladje]

If AI companies don’t start winning the narrative war the public is going to burn it all down says @braveben, ex-CRO of Flexport & partner at Saga Ventures

Not a product war. A narrative war.

AI labs are discovering cancer treatments, new molecules, and materials breakthroughs in real time.

Nobody's celebrating. People are fighting the construction of data centers that would create local tax revenue.

Ben's conclusion: The labs that are effectively becoming nation states in terms of their level of power and influence. They're going to have to make massive shows to the public or the public will burn it all down.

In this week's episode of The Library of Minds, Ben breaks down the AI narrative war, why great companies should be going public, why list construction is still the most underrated GTM skill, and why outbound as we know it might be dead.

01:15 — The story of Ryan Peterson and Flexport
05:09 — We are losing AI narrative war
10:55 — All Americans need ownership in the future
13:23 — His secret for B2B hyper growth
20:38 — The real definition of an AI company
24:28 — What it takes to change the world
27:08 — Opportunities: What Ben is looking for

[Dara @daraladje]

How unicorn founder @thisisgrantlee took Gamma from “the worst idea ever” to a $2.1B company.

VCs hung up on him, friends lied to his face, and signups plateaued. Most founders would have pivoted.

Grant doubled down and went all in on the users first 30 seconds:
• The entire team focused on it for 4 month
• "Time to Value" was their key metric to drive growth

That bet took @GammaApp to 70M users who can't stop sharing it.

In this week’s episode of The Library of Minds, Grant breaks down the playbook for building a breakout AI success: staying ruthless on what matters, mastering creator-driven distribution, and hiring painfully slow.

5:10 VC: “worst idea I’ve ever heard” (then rage quit)

10:54 Betting the company on the first 30-seconds

13:05 How to run a micro-influencer program

16:14 The secret benefit to hiring painfully slow

18:12 The pains of scaling

23:29 Grant’s most challenging moment

26:45 How to launch your product

28:12 What Grant is looking for - opportunities

[Ben Blumenrose @benblumenrose]

I joined @daraladje on @LibraryMinds to talk about early Facebook + design (including some fun Zuck stories), our current Silicon Valley design gap and founding Designer Fund. Hope you enjoy :)

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

Ask my Delphi who will win the Super Bowl

https://t.co/v0yo0ZRI1F

[Dara @daraladje]

Most founders accidentally train their customers never to pay them.

@MadhavanSF (the "pricing guru" of Silicon Valley - having worked with LinkedIn, Uber, and 30+ unicorns) calls it the 20/80 Pricing Trap

• 20% of your features drive 80% of the willingness to pay
• Founders give that 20% away for free to gain distribution
• You are left trying to monetize the remaining 80% of features - the ones users don't actually value.

The result? You build a charity, not a business.

In this week's episode of The Library of Minds, we discuss the science of monetization and deconstruct how to architect ‘Profitable Growth’ - the core framework from his new book, Scaling Innovation.

03:33 - Netflix vs Blockbuster: The Pricing Decision That Changed Tech
08:06 - Why Most Startups Get Pricing Wrong
11:39 - Freemium vs Paid: When Free Destroys Value
15:38 - Pricing Models Matter More Than Price
16:28 - The AI Pricing Framework: Autonomy vs Attribution
21:49 - The Biggest Pricing Mistake Ever
25:05 - Why Steve Jobs Was a Pricing Genius
26:44 - Behavioral Pricing: How Founders 10× Deals Without Changing Product
31:02 - Data vs Conviction: How Great Founders Make Pricing Decisions

[Dara @daraladje]

Our engineers promised this would “feel magical.”

Not sure if magical was the right word...

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@stanleytang @daraladje @withdelphi @DoorDash My chat with your Delphi was amazing!

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@evilrabbit_ ❤️

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@jordwalke @Replit @expo Yes

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@theallinpod Just ask Roelof yourself: https://t.co/WORNs7TRvX

[Soleio @soleio]

Back in May, I paid @withdelphi a visit to be the first person to speak to the team about my career, both as a way for them to learn from my experience but also to train my delphi firsthand.

It was a candid, far-ranging conversation. Enjoy.

[Ryan Nisbet @Ryanbyde]

@daraladje @soleio Doing a call with him is a must: https://t.co/DtbtSKCZsk

[Dara @daraladje]

THE LIBRARY OF MINDS: EPISODE 3 - Soleio Cuervo (@soleio)

Early designer at Facebook & Dropbox, co-inventor of the Like button, and design-driven investor behind Figma, Perplexity, and Delphi.

We discuss:
• The untold story of the Facebook Like button
• Defining the role of “Product Designer” at Facebook
• Building world-class design cultures at scale
• Balancing speed vs. excellence in product teams
• When intuition fails - and data saves you

Plus: Lessons in hybrid designer-engineers, hackathon culture, trust & safety, and how AI is redefining great UX.

Bonus: Soleio on utility vs. beauty, system-centric design, and why digital minds might be the next design frontier.

(00:00) - Intro
(01:00) - Who is Soleio Cuervo
(02:00) - Early web days: The origins of product design
(04:37) - Inventing the ‘product designer’ role at Facebook
(07:43) - Culture of speed, ownership, and building at Facebook
(11:45) - Shipping fast: The story of Facebook’s Like button
(13:54) - When to persist and when to quit: Loonshots, ‘false fails’, and user onboarding at Facebook
(17:49) - Transitioning cultures: From Facebook’s speed to Dropbox’s trust
(20:54) - Balancing speed with excellence: Lessons for AI-era startups
(22:28) - Is speed or quality a stronger differentiator in today’s tech world?
(24:35) - Can design be a moat in the age of AI?
(27:35) - Rethinking UX in an AI-native world
(29:08) - Why Soleio invested in Delphi: The “Oprahbot” idea and digital minds