Did AI Kill the Lean Startup?
The most hated startup | The Pentagon pizza index | How to invest in Space-X | Lessons working at <> | The Panama Playlists + loads more…
🆕 Personal Updates
I write this as I diligently plan for a 9-hour flight with my 15-month-old son and partner in true military precision. Any tips would be most welcome. It’s our first time flying with him!
Earlier this month, I took a couple of days off and set out to get outside and attempt some renovation work on a small building on our property. After 3 solid days of planning, buying, cutting, building, tidying and decorating, I’m happy to say my mission is complete. We now have a great little garden workshop.
Right, let’s get to it - time for this month’s roundup 👇
🔥 Last edition’s top clicked link: Making software
🔗 Hyperlinks
Inside the AI startup that wants you to hate them
If, like me, you’ve noticed Cluely all over your timelines, here’s why.
Just earlier this year, 21-year-old Roy Lee and Neel Shanmugam launched a viral consumer AI app, which ended up getting them both kicked out of Columbia University. Their product was an undetectable AI-powered tool called “Interview Coder”, which was initially created to help engineers cheat on technical interviews. Shortly after being kicked out, they rebranded as Cluley and expanded the value proposition to a real-time whisperer for meetings, sales calls, and exams.
But what’s really interesting, aside from the product and its positioning, is their approach to viral marketing. Their rage-bait viral “comedy” marketing has been both loved and hated, and discussed at length by marketers. The very fact I’m even writing this suggests it’s working despite me cringing at the majority of their social posts.
Given Cluely is a consumer application-layer AI startup, distribution is their moat, and so far, it seems to be working for them based on the views of their social content.
Their CEO has said they “only hire for two roles — engineer or influencer. The rest is just noise”. There is a lot we could pick apart about that statement… however, in this short video, Hiten Shah breaks down Cluley and its postmodern marketing playbook and asks the question - Do you build a perfect product no one notices or a controversial product everyone talks about?
🎁 Bonus content: Another Columbia University student, Patrick Shen, announced on X that he had built Truely, a product designed to help catch “cheaters” who use Cluely. Game on!
The Pentagon Pizza Index
Any guesses what the Pentagon and your favourite pizza might have in common?
Well, it turns out that the amount of pizza (or takeaways in general) being bought in proximity to the Pentagon, CIA, or the White House can predict major international events or crises. In fact, this theory has been monitored dating back to the Cold War and developed by Soviet intelligence. But enough of the history lesson.
I’m sharing this because some genius has created a monitoring tool using the Google Maps API real-time ‘Popular Times’ data for a select number of takeaways in proximity to federal buildings in Washington DC. At the time of writing of we are at DEFCON 2!
I’m getting hungry just writing this.
Poolsuite
Poolside.FM launched back in 2014, courtesy of Marty Bell, who decided the world needed a Tumblr site dedicated to good vibes and even better 1990s tunes. Fast forward a few years, and with a little help from Grant MacLennan, Poolside Poolsuite FM evolved from humble blog to full-blown website, rocking a Classic Mac OS look, a killer playlist of ‘90s jams, and a treasure trove of nostalgia-soaked video clips.
If you’re looking for a frictionless digital escape that’s more retro pool party than algorithmic placement, this is your place. And if none of the above, at the very least, check out the website; it’s a work of art!
Invest in OpenAI, SpaceX and Stripe
Does that headline sound too good to be true? Perhaps it is, but one company is trying to democratise access.
But without being an accredited “institutional investor”, how are we mortals meant to get in on these deals? Well, Robinhood thinks stock tokenisation could be the solution.
Here’s how it works. Robinhood acquires the private stock (which they might typically acquire via secondary sale events), then tokenises the stock, which retail investors can purchase fractionally. It works very similarly to a stablecoin.
But why am I sharing this “non-financial advice”?
Firstly, it’s an interesting concept which certainly piqued my interest - but I’ll leave that there for the time being. Secondly, and way more importantly, it’s been a very controversial concept which the CEOs of these high-value private businesses aren’t particularly happy about.
So when I discovered the founder of Robinhood Vlad Tenev was invited onto John Collison’s (founder of Stripe) podcast and pitched this concept, I had to give it a listen. This felt like a rare opportunity to be a fly on the wall and listen to two multi-billion-dollar founders and CEOs discuss a deal. As you can imagine, John’s concern with the tokenised Stripe stock was based on legal and regulatory concerns, despite Vlad’s reassurance.
🎁 Bonus content: Robinhood aren’t the only kids in the block looking to allow retail investors a shot at investing in public companies like SpaceX - Recuplic have also just announced “Mirror Notes” (AKA tokenised trackers).
Giving Claude AI its own computer
A couple of weeks ago, an intrepid AI nerd known as Mckay Wrigley decided to give an AI model complete control of a new Mac Mini and called it Claudeputer.
Claudeputer runs 24/7 using Claude 3.5 Sonnet’s recent ‘computer use’ functionality and has been given free rein and uninterrupted access to do whatever it wants.
My first thought was, this is a fantastic way to burn an infinite amount of tokens. My second thought - why on earth hasn’t anyone else done this? This could be fantastic content to stream. Get this on a live Twitch stream 24/7 and show a timeline of all its actions, whilst also allowing viewers to vote on new system prompts to experiment with.
Perhaps my little brain is struggling to compute what it’s currently capable of with full autonomy, but from what little I’ve seen from this 2-minute clip, it's pretty fascinating. Show us more McKay!
It’s one step for man, one giant leap for singularity
📓 Articles
Did AI Kill the Lean Startup?
Yup, that clickbaity title got me too. As a devoted Lean Startup disciple, this shocking question begged me to find the answer. Surely AI couldn’t affect the backbone of product building as influential for tech founders as the Lean Startup?
Well, I’ll jump straight to it. The crux of the argument is that AI now allows you to build faster, much faster than just >2 years ago; therefore, why go through the principles of the Lean Startup when you could build multiple MVPs quickly and cheaply, and after countless attempts, as they say, the blind squirrel will eventually find a nut.
But as Ben Yoskovitz outlines in this post, AI is an accelerant, allowing you to build and learn faster, but the same principles remain true.
AI should supercharge core Lean Startup principles, which remain fundamental to building successful startups.
Ben mentions an interesting point, “The MVP Isn’t Dead - The Bar Has Risen”. AI tools allow us to build faster and perhaps cheaper, but also better quality software. Expectations have risen for MVPs, and AI can help reach parity with the quality bar without adding more time and money.
What do you think, dear reader - diligent customer validation or building and then validating?
Lesson from working at …
You can’t help but be curious, or at the very least nosy, about what it’s like to work at a prestigious, hyper-growth startup. You can read all the articles or social media posts from all the thread boi’s you like, but it’s not a first-hand account from someone who’s actually worked there. To that effect, I’ve gathered three first-hand accounts from employees sharing their experiences working for three smoking hot tech companies.
First up, we have OpenAI - arguably the most talked-about company on the planet right now. Calvin French-Owen, former co-founder of Segment, joined the OpenAI Codex team and shares his insight into the culture, launching Codex, Code and other interesting observations. But don’t get too excited, there isn’t any goss here. Check it out here.
Next up, we have Palantir. Perhaps the most secretive and controversial data analytics company. And if the name rings a bell, yes, it was inspired by The Lord of the Rings mystical crystal ball. Anyway, enough of the LARPing. In this post, Nabeel provides a fascinating retrospective of an eight-year stint, covering topics such as what drew her to the company, the interview process, team structure, culture, talent vortex and morality. Check it out here.
Lastly, we have Vercel - certainly not the most talked about compared to the previous two, but depending on who you speak to, most likely engineers and designers, this high desirable company who are on a tear right now with open-source acquisitions and their gen AI products such as v0. Lee Robinson delves into his experience working with Vercel for five years, covering their company principles, his learnings, and their unique culture. Check it out here.
🎁 Bonus content: The founder and CEO of Vercel - Guillermo Rauch discusses AI and the Future of Coding with Every’s Dan Shipper.
📱 Products
Tabl | A multi-player web browser
Something about a multiplayer experience in the browser intrigues me, and I’ve thought long and hard about why, and I still can’t put my finger on it. There have been a few attempts to bring the Figma-like experience to the browser, but from what I can see, none have got enough viable traction to continue. But despite that, here we are again with another attempt. I’ve personally yet to give this shot, mostly due to the fact that I have to download a new browser, which honestly seems like a lot of work. Secondly, I would need to convince my teammates to adopt this, which also seems like a lot of work, but hey, you might find it interesting and have a use case for such a capability. If you give it a shot, please let me know what you think.
Monotype | A Focused Writing Tool
Ready to break up with endless tabs, distracting notifications, and that blinking cursor judging your every word? This retro-inspired, offline-first typewriter app for your Mac is all about bringing focus, joy, and a little analogue romance back to your writing routine.
Monotype isn’t just a pretty interface; it’s loaded with purposeful limitations to keep you in the zone. Expect tactile key sounds for that satisfying click n clack, a distraction-free layout that ditches the plethora of formatting options. No auto-correct, no spellcheck, just you, your thoughts, and the digital equivalent of a sturdy old Smith-Corona.
The majority of writing I do is this newsletter outside of my day job, and I honestly can’t imagine using this tool given my frantic writing approach across multiple tabs. But this product perhaps isn’t for me - it’s for the bloggers, writers journalers.
🐽 Other links to consume
I found this recently and can’t stop thinking about it.
If you made it this far, hit reply or jump into the comments and tell me what you thought of this edition. Was this 🔥 or 🗑. I read every response 👀
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Until the next issue,
Sam | @thisdickie 👨💻
Great one! Will give it a go at the vintage typewriter!