What you should read this weekend + a great podcast

Video game stocks, a cheese billionaire, motivation to be great, bitcoin, and an interview with the Five Guys founder.

My dream was to set up my own e-commerce company. In 1999, I gathered 18 people in my apartment and spoke to them for two hours about my vision. Everyone put their money on the table, and that got us $60,000 to start Alibaba. I wanted to have a global company, so I chose a global name.

Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba. The company today is worth almost $400 billion dollars.

Off the Top

• Blackberry is back from the dead. BlackBerry has been in the process of trying to reinvent itself as a software and services company. It stopped making its own phones last year, although it still licenses others to sell Android phones under BlackBerry brand. [Axios]
  Their stock is up 59% YTD
• Video game stocks are killing it. Videogame stocks have relatively quietly been among the best-performing stocks this year, with Activision Blizzard the second-biggest gainer in the S&P 500 thanks to a 68% increase in share price. [WSJ blog]
• Got a startup idea? YC, the worlds most famous incubator, will look to accept up to 10,000 startups into its new online Startup School.[Quartz]
• Brick and mortar stores are dying, but not dead. I have been writing about this trend for a while. Here are 5 experts on the problems facing brick and mortar retailers. [Axios].

From the article-

For some product categories, retail settings are simply superior. For example, companies who struggle to express important features of their product online — such as sportswear, for which the texture and precise color of fabric is critical — will continue to rely on stores.

Some brands and associated products will always have an advantage over purely online channels.

Long Reads

• The mozzarella cheese Billionaire. Fascinating profile about the man who supplies cheese to Pizza Hut, Domino’s, and Papa Johns. [Forbes]
• The battle for the religious right.[paywall]. Insight into the battle inside the Southern Baptist Convention. A young leader, who appeals to younger Christians, vs the old guard who supported Donald Trump. [WSJ].
• The northwest is due for a devastating earthquake but nobody knows when. I read this story last year and read it again recently. Honestly, it freaked me out about traveling to the Northwest part of our country. [The New Yorker].

Motivation

• You want to be great at what you do? A quote from the movie Whiplash.

“I want to be great.” he explains
“And…you’re not?” his confused girlfriend replies.
Andrew corrects himself: “I want to be….one…of the greats.”

How much work are you willing to put in? How bad do you want to be great? Read this article if you need some motivation. [tylerhogge.com].

Bitcoin and the Blockchain

• How much would you have paid to own a piece of the internet in the mid 90's? This gets into the weeds a bit, but I think it is a good explanation of where the value might accrue and who the potential winners will be if blockchain technology really goes mainstream. [USV].
• Is Bitcoin a bubble? I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that the past two weeks. I don’t know where the price will be tomorrow, next week, or next year. However, being that sentiment is so positive, I would wait to buy when everyone thinks it is dead. Long-term, I think the reward/risk favors owning some part of that ecosystem, I am just not sure what part. Here is basic explanation of what Bitcoin is and how it works. They have other articles about Ethereum, and other cyrptocurrencies. Check them out if this space interest you. [Coinbase].

My favorite podcast I listened to this week

• Guy Raz interviews Five Guys founder Jerry Murrell. My biggest takeway-They did not go for scale immediately. They worked on perfecting their business for 10 years+ before deciding to sell franchises. [How I built this]

Hope you enjoyed these recommendations. If you have any suggestions on how to improve this, please let me know.

Caleb