tennyo

interests include startups, product management, growth, creator economy and blockchain tech

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

Love and hatred, both are extremely irrational and dangerous emotions

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

Random musings thread

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

@blknoiz06 Guessing 12

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

@Osh_mahajan How did you figure that out for yourself?

Would love to hear your journey so far.

[Ankur Nagpal @ankurnagpal]

How Ali Abdaal built a $5M Business with 5M Subscribers on Youtube https://t.co/C62pefaCOF

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

The more organised you are, the easier it is to get things done.

[a16z @a16z]

CELEBRATING 10 YEARS OF “THE HARD THING ABOUT HARD THINGS” BY @bhorowitz!

“Hard Things” remains a go-to guide for entrepreneurs navigating startup life, with timeless wisdom that can only be learned on the battlefield of business.

Some of our favorite quotes from the book:

1. “It’s the moments where you feel most like hiding or dying that you can make the biggest difference as a CEO.”

2. “Life is struggle.” I believe that within that quote lies the most important lesson in entrepreneurship: Embrace the struggle.”

3. “Note to self: It’s a good idea to ask, “What am I not doing?”

4. “If you are going to eat sh*t, don’t nibble.”

5. "The hard thing is not dreaming big. The hard thing is waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat when the dream turns into a nightmare."

6. “People always ask me, ‘What’s the secret to being a successful CEO?’ Sadly, there is no secret, but if there is one skill that stands out, it’s the ability to focus and make the best move when there are no good moves.”

7. “Spend zero time on what you could have done, and devote all of your time on what you might do.”

8. “Some employees make products, some make sales; the CEO makes decisions. Therefore, a CEO can most accurately be measured by the speed and quality of those decisions.”

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

@Osh_mahajan *unless it’s scientifically proven otherwise

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

@Osh_mahajan After overthinking a lot, I just go ahead and get shit done by saying “F* it, life’s too short”

Also one shouldn’t call them bad decisions, cause you can’t really judge the outcome pre-decision.*

You just follow your gut and trust yourself enough to deal with the outcomes. ✌️

[Ryan Holiday @RyanHoliday]

23 pieces of career advice I wish I’d known earlier.

Whether you’re just starting out, looking to make a big change, or aiming to reach new heights in your current role, I hope you’ll find something here that helps you navigate your own unique path:

[Elad Gil @eladgil]

Things I don't know about AI markets - a list of questions about our ever changing world :)

[claire vo 🖤 @clairevo]

Ok so I rarely (never?) do product breakdowns but I’m really fascinated by the Slack “catch up” feature, both as a power user of slack and someone who thinks about weird dynamics in product optimization.

So let’s speculate: why was this built & how should it be measured? 🧶

[Anish Acharya @illscience]

Introducing the Abundance Agenda.

We believe AI will turn luxuries into commodities - making consumers happier, healthier, and more productive than ever before.

And a new generation of AI-native companies will lead the way.

More from @a16z consumer 👇

[Justine Moore @venturetwins]

🚨 New market map alert!

Our team @a16z consumer dove into the first killer use case of AI: making creative content.

A recap of the companies tackling generation and editing + what we're hoping to see next 👇

[Bryan Kim @kirbyman01]

In honor of Valentine's Day, @a16z consumer is dropping a market map on AI x social 💗

We don't think tech has to make us feel more alone.

In fact, it can help spark and foster new relationships, and help users build existing ones.

What we're excited about 👇

[ZC25 @zachcohen25]

Taylor Swift is old news, I am talking market maps over here!

Our team @a16z has spent the past year talking to founders, tracking usage, and envisioning the future of education.

This post is a culmination of what we've seen + the characteristics that get us excited 👇

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

Literally life changing perspective of everything can be a choice and if you choose to be something and do something you can make it happen for yourself in your own way🥰

[Visakan Veerasamy @visakanv]

People tend to assume that this Steve Jobs quote is about making products. He does say "everything around you that you call life" – it applies equally to ideas, perceptions, ways of seeing, ways of being. And so it is with time – we can reimagine our relationship with it

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

Interesting signals to build across sectors

Would dive deeper on the weekend

[GREG ISENBERG @gregisenberg]

This is the best time to start a company in 30 years.

I’ll summarize some of the best opportunities for you:

1. Buy distressed VC assets. Recap them. Offer team dividends going forward. Turn them into profit machines.

2. The media apocalypse is here. 20,000+ media employees have been LAID off in the last 12 months. From Condé Nast to Washington Post. How can you build a new media company that's profitable, AI-powered and community-first with that talent?

3. Apple Vision Pro App Store. 400,000 headsets will be sold in the next 12 months. it looks like a joke until it isnt. Create unique apps for that app store, be first.

4. The Figma-fication of everything. Turning software that was once single-player into multi-player is a generational opportunity. The future of software looks like Arc, Figma etc.

5. SaaS business model is dying. People are tired of Saas Subscriptions. One-time payments or pay-per-task SaaS is becoming normal.

6. Eldertech. Boomers are retiring. Probably one of the most underserved audiences. So much to be built for them.

7. Leverage creators, they are mispriced. Most creators can’t monetize beyond brand deals. They have distribution old media dreams of. Partner with them. Help them productize themselves and earn upside.

8. GPT Store. Fastest growing product of all time just launched an app store? Literally the next App Store.

9. Agents for everyone. You get an agent, and you get an agent and you get an agent. Who will be the Oprah of AI agents?

10. Productized services. How can you make a service like a product? Enable it by global workforce and AI. We built https://t.co/FPRIhIfWfn to build marketing assets for folks on a monthly basis. People pay us monthly fee to turn their market assets (landing pages, lead magnets, social assets) into revenue generating machines. Business does 7 figures overnight.

11. The unbundling of ChatGPT. ChatGPT won’t be everything to everyone. Just like how Craigslist, Reddit etc got unbundled, so will ChatGPT. ChatGPT for X.

12. Internet memberships are the new community. Digital communities that sell workshops, IRL events, software, deals etc. I created a limited membership with a monthly email with startup ideas, trends, private Q&A, free $99/month Skool sub, software deals and built $27k MRR in 3 months. https://t.co/NW2C96QOHD

13. The rise of the detox economy. People are overloaded with screens and seed oils. Build businesses for this new detox economy

14. High Interest rates at 5-6% make companies want to increase profits, reduce costs. There’s a bunch of businesses to create to help them do it.

15. Almost half of gen-z doesn’t believe in religion. The rise of community-based brands. This is your opportunity to build things they feel connected to.

16. Happiness, fulfillment, stability, and safety are at all-time lows for gen-z relative to other generations. How can we build products, services to help them?

17. Google is being completely rewritten thanks to AI. Billions of visits up for grabs. People are calling it "SEO 2.0". Learn how to do it yourself (https://t.co/GpDeHDkK5x or hire someone https://t.co/pIYc4oMEYf). These "boring" ways to get customers (like SEO) will only get more popular

18. Privacy-first startups. Yeah most people care more about convenience than anything, but there’s a growing privacy movement. The more people get hacked and phished, the more they care about their privacy and security.

19. TikTok stores. Today, I met an 18 year old guy who made $1m in the last 45 days from a TikTok store. He sourced the product, partnered with a creator, never raised $1 and was profitable on every purchase. I think you'll start seeing more of these stories with the rise of social selling, live (IG live/TikTok live) selling.

20. Multipreneurship. Portfolio of internet businesses instead of one internet business. Small mindset shift, big difference. Buy small profitable businesses to help scale it. Fund it via customers ideally.

21. The pop of the newsletter bubble. When the newsletter bubble pops (yes, when), it'll be an opportunity to scoop up interesting newsletters and aggregate and take them from a newsletter business to a business powered by a newsletter

AND MANY MORE OPPORTUNITIES. This is just a few to get your creative juices flowing.

After reading this, do you agree the opportunities right now are kinda mind blowing?

Every business is made out of thin air.

Just a good idea, the right timing and consistency.

The right timing is now.

It fires me up, does it fire you up?

Do you agree? What am I missing?

(in the next tweet ill give you some free resources for your journey)

[tennyo @tennyoboo]

Building a business from an idea is hard, you have to keep on iterating.

Also, there needs to a certain sense of delusion (self-belief) and original thinking to make it work.

If you stick long enough it’ll turn into something people will pay for.

Choose your markets wisely.

[Visakan Veerasamy @visakanv]

fascinating. i went to look up the original post because this is so interesting to me. particularly the second paragraph where they list out everything they've "tried", which seems like successful processes (audience, paying customers), before listing out the failed outcomes...

[Tara Viswanathan @TaraViswanathan]

I’ve never used a pitch deck to fundraise. 👀🌶️

Instead, I kicked off every raise with a Memo. (And brought in over $42M for Rupa with 15+ term sheets 🤯)

Here’s why I think founders should use memos more (and not always decks):