Followups: Rorschach Media vs Andreessen’s Atoms, Bits, and Altruism
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The end of the GDP mismeasurement debate
by Annotote TLDR 2017.01.02
The end result of Trump trade policy: This approach to globalization and jobs will produce the very effects it’s trying to prevent
by Anthony Bardaro 2017.06.20
The future of free speech is social media regulation: A proposal for a special internet standard and its independent arbitration system
by Adventures in Consumer Technology 2019.04.15
The Roaring 20s: A future-proof economy and the business of adapting to automation in the age of AI/ML
by Adventures in Consumer Technology 2020.01.06
The Gig Economy’s turn on the Jump-to-Conclusions Mat: AB5’s war-of-attrition, supplemental income’s collateral damage, and the fading future of work
by Adventures in Consumer Technology 2020.01.28
Why America can make semiconductors but not swabs
by Dan Wang (The Japan Times) 2020.05.10
My column is in part a response to [Marc Andreessen], who argues that the US lacks the will to build. I think there’s more to it than that: The US has let its process knowledge decay, which means that it has forgotten and meaningfully lost the ability to build. — @danwwang
Conjuring Scenius: It’s Time to Build Together
by Packy McCormick (Not Boring Newsletter) 2020.05.17
[T]he term scenius [describes] “the intelligence and the intuition of a whole cultural scene. It is the communal form of the concept of the genius.” [There are] four ingredients for scenius…
1. Emergence from Catastrophe:
Until very recently, Americans at large had become complacent and disconnected. We did not share a common enemy or a common goal… we were heavy on innovation, and light on progress… the world had gone too long without a catastrophe. Without meaningful struggle… humans get fat and lazy while technology attends to all of our hedonic desires… This has been true throughout history. Either long periods of misery or catastrophic and world-altering events preceded nearly all of the examples of scenius…2. Competition:
We expect competition in international affairs, business, and sports. We do not expect competition within the liberal arts [like innovation and] the “marketplace of ideas”… Competition works on both the local level, as seen in Florence, and on the global level, as seen in World War II… More recently, the fight against a virus has united humans across rival companies and nations…3. Place-Based Ritual:
Gathering in a neutral, informal space allowed people at different points in their careers to exchange ideas on equal footing. A set of rituals ensured that the men stayed on task despite informal surroundings. The two — place and ritual — combined to contribute to [Ben Franklin’s] Junto’s progress…4. Diversity of Thought and Experience:
The best new ideas often aren’t new at all. Rather, they come from sampling and remixing pieces of existing ones [which requires] a diverse group of people who are willing to offer differing thoughts and experiences…The virus has exposed incumbent institutions’ shortcomings; we will need to reimagine and rebuild education, healthcare, work, supply chains, travel, retail, and so much more. We will build new virtual worlds and reimagine the physical one. Having glimpsed how the world can recover when humans stop emitting, we will work together globally to reverse the effects of climate change. Almost everything we do needs to be rethought, not just to prepare for the next outbreak, but because we have been given the closest thing to a tabula rasa we are likely to come by in our lifetimes.
Now that you know the secret, that human progress is the history of great scenia, you have no excuse. You cannot claim ignorance. You have a toolkit, and you have thirteen examples of scenius to mine for further lessons.
Andreessen Horowitz launches $2.2M fund to invest in underserved founders
by TechCrunch 2020.06.04
The Talent x Opportunity (TxO) fund, which a16z says was in the works for six months, starts with $2.2 million in donations from the firm’s partners. TxO will be invested in a small group of seed-stage startups the first year and expand in size going forward… all returns will be reinvested in the fund.
See also: SoftBank launches Opportunity Growth Fund to invest in companies led by founders and entrepreneurs of color, initially starting with $100M (TechCrunch)
Marc Andreessen on his “Time to Build” essay: His motivation; the public’s reception/reaction; and where/how to start
by The Observer Effect (Sriram Krishnan) 2020.06.15
[NYC] put out a call for citizens to be able to volunteer their rain poncho so the hospital system can protect their healthcare workers. And… I decided I couldn’t take any more. I just snapped. I literally just sat down and pounded out that essay over the next four hours, fueled by rage…
The most surprising thing was it was a positive response for both sides of the political aisle. [Like Republican U.S. Representative Kevin McCarthy and Democrat Saikat Chakrabarti/Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez…] both sides of the political aisle found it equally compelling and that’s kind of what I was going for…
Well, I will pick three [things to prioritize]! It’s kind of the holy trinity of our modern dilemma. It’s health care, it’s education and it’s housing. It’s the big three… [T]he industries in which we build like crazy, they have crashing prices. And so we build TVs like crazy, we build cars like crazy, we make food like crazy. The price on all that stuff has really fallen dramatically over the last 20 years which is an incredibly good thing for ordinary people. Falling prices are really, really good for people because [your dollars gain purchasing power]… The stuff we *don’t* build, and very specifically, we don’t have housing, we’re not building schools, and we’re not building anything close to the health care system that we should have — for those things the prices just are skyrocketing. That’s where you get this zero sum politics… And those are the three things where the price levels are increasingly out of reach.
Technology Saves the World
by Marc Andreessen (Future by a16z) 2021.06.15
In his own sequel to “It’s Time to Build”:
The primary credit for this goes to the American worker, but almost as much credit is due to the technology that made this miracle possible… Technology helped save the world.
…and from a summary thereof:
Andreessen cites a number of ways that technology has excelled during the pandemic:
• Vaccines, particularly those developed using mRNA, were created, tested, and delivered at scale within a year.
• Telemedicine was enabled at scale.
• The majority of businesses continued to function thanks to technology platforms that enabled remote work.
• Huge numbers of small businesses moved online, thanks to platforms like Facebook, Instacart, Doordash, and more.
• Schools figured out online learnings, laying the groundwork for a huge expansion in educational opportunities.
• Online entertainment kept people entertained, and online networks kept people connected.
• The realization that people can work remotely separated the link between geography and economic opportunity.
Interview: Marc Andreessen on the pandemic catalyst and more work to be done
by Noah Smith (noahpinion) 2021.06.22
Housing, education, and health care are each ferociously complex, but what they have in common is skyrocketing prices in a world where technology is driving down prices of most other products and services. I think we should build in the next decade new technologies, businesses, and industries that break these price curves — and in fact reverse them, and make these three primary markers of the American dream easier and easier for regular people to attain…
[A] common criticism of software is that it’s not something that takes physical form in the real world… Software is a lever on the real world… Software is alchemy that turns bytes into actions by and on atoms. It’s the closest thing we have to magic. So instead of feeling like we are failing if we’re not building in atoms, we should lean as hard into software as we possibly can. Everywhere software touches the real world, the real world gets better, and less expensive, and more efficient, and more adaptable, and better for people. And this is especially true for the real world domains that have been least touched by software until now — such as housing, education, and health care.
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