Originally published on Mirror.

In the metaverse, when we look in the mirror, who do we see?

Last week, John Palmer wrote about new Internet logic. He argued that the next wave of companies built in web3 will need to build on a new “mental model” of the Internet.

John is right, and many aspects of web3 have already done so. The decentralized publishing platform Mirror (where this piece is hosted) puts power in the hands of writers. Royal, which recently launched, lets fans buy ownership in their favorite artists. The distributed hard drive Arweave offers a permanent repository for…

By Gaby Goldberg and Jesse Lee. Originally published on Mirror.

cūrāre: to attend to, to take care of.

Introduction

Last year, I published the piece Curators are the New Creators, arguing in favor of a business model centered around “good taste.” This piece expands upon that previous work by putting a magnifying glass on the relationship between curation and commerce. I’m grateful and excited to be writing it with Jesse Lee of Basic.Space, who’s helped to illuminate the unique relationship between goods and tastemakers.

In 1997, Malcolm Gladwell published his piece The Coolhunt, investigating the process of looking for new fashion trends at street level.

According to Gladwell, the coolhunter plays a major social role in spreading trends. Coolhunters were “the first…

Editor’s Note: This piece was written in partnership with the Stanford Tech History Project, which seeks to document how Stanford’s tech ecosystem has changed since 2010. The full report will be published on Monday, April 26th. To RSVP for the launch event, click here.

As an early-stage consumer investor, my #1 question to founders almost always regards defensibility. It’s easy to get distracted by the bells and whistles of consumer companies (related: The Value of a Velvet Rope), so I’ve found that returning to first principles keeps me grounded when making investment decisions and thinking about early-stage businesses.

As such, I wanted to share this four-part framework more broadly in case it is helpful to other consumer founders:

Why do people come? Why do people stay? Why do people share? Why do people pay?

1. Why do people come?

What gets users on the platform? Can this be distilled…

Last year, Ryan Dawidjan wrote a piece about modern friends, or the relationships that originate and develop through digital channels (like forums, email, Twitter, etc.). I’ve been thinking more and more about this concept of modern friends recently, particularly because I’ve made a lot of them this year.

Perhaps I am even writing about friendship in the first place because I realize now more than ever how rare it is, and more importantly, how immeasurable in value it is. …

By Gaby Goldberg & Talia Goldberg. Originally published in Bessemer’s Atlas.

Audio is experiencing a Cambrian moment, growing faster now than it ever has before. Apple is expected to sell over 100 million AirPods this year, up from 60 million in 2019. Roughly one in four adults owns a smart speaker, with a third of those owners having three or more devices in their homes. Sixty-two percent of Americans use a voice-operated personal assistant. …

You never get a second chance to make a first impression

Over the past few months, I’ve been lucky to meet and work with Matt, Miles, and Jason at OthersideAI. They’re building productivity and communication tools using GPT-3: in one summer, they’ve generated over 3,000 followers on Twitter, along with a waitlist of nearly 8,000 people who want to get their hands on Otherside’s early access alpha product.

But perhaps one of the most intriguing parts of OthersideAI’s story is their approach to onboarding: every single user who gains access to the coveted alpha is personally onboarded through a one-on-one…

In consumer technology, everything old is new again.

As products get flashier with more features and shinier buttons, we crave a return to our roots. In food delivery, Amazon Prime Now and Instacart bring back memories of Webvan, the poster child of the dot-com “excess” bubble that filed for bankruptcy in 2001. David’s Disposable, the disposable camera app from YouTube personality David Dobrik, is a nostalgic throwback to the Kodaks and Fujifilms of the ‘90s. Even iOS 14’s homescreen widget functionality is reminiscent of the days of jailbreaking iPhones to create custom themes.

Another growing trend among modern alternatives to legacy products is the comeback of the command…