[The only distinction Sublime makes between free and paid users is showing the ‘UNLICENSED’ toolbar text, which you may not even notice in daily usage but might make you look no so serious about your tools.]
[First priority is text entry, so that people feel they can type as fast as they want. Second priority is extensibility so that community can create optimizations for specific domains.]
[Everything inside Obsidian is a plugin. You can even turn off backlinks and the file menu bar to have a barebones editor and customize from there.]
One feature took off immediately, for power users and casual readers alike: a simple sharing system that let users subscribe to see someone else’s starred items or share their collection of subscriptions with other people. The Reader team eventually built comments, a Share With Note feature, and more. All this now seems trite and obvious, of course, but at the time, a built-in way to see what your friends liked was novel and powerful. Reader was prescient.
[Netflix can use their scale to charge $10 per month, but as a small business you need to charge more than that. Corner store doesn’t compete with megacorps, but instead offers something different.]
[Aggregate information and research in one place and present it in a useful way, then build a community of people interested in that info to present other products they might like.]
[Podcasts like are best friends, newsletters like acquaintances, blogs like random people you meet at conferences. You may never even know pay attention to who’s writing an article.]
[Smaller numbers but quality relationships with everyone learning and growing together]
[Podcasts are top of funnel and a big ask for people to listen for an hour. Strategically talk about the topic in other channels, and plug the podcast when it bites.]
[You wouldn’t hang out with a friend for an hour a week if they had no sense of humour and were purely informational, the experience needs to be fun.]
Was able to find an iPhone mini here not available anywhere else. ‘New’ here means brand new sealed in box. Claimed over the phone they resell returned items from Costco.
Is the solo model misaligned when capacity for non-projects feels chronically impossible, yet fundamental milestones seem lightyears away? How much is a celebration of what can be accomplished by one person and how much is a failure to involve others along the way?
[To become so centered that anyone coming to you with an opinion simply forgets. You can kill Jesus or Buddha but not push them.]
[Creativity comes easily to those who are loose and natural. Doing anything becomes a creative phenomenon. Touching something turns it into art, saying something into poetry. Even walking is creating a rhythm. Not because of obsession: simply being filled with energy makes you create.]
[A giver knows they have given and would like you to recognize it by giving them a receipt saying “Yes, you have given me”, thanking them, feeling grateful to them. This is not a gift but a bargain, where something is expected in return. They give to get.]
He is soft-spoken, even shy. As a boy, he once wrote, “I was timid and extravagant.” He can seem suspiciously modest for a world-famous musician. Many of his contemporaries are technically superior, he’ll say. “But there is this more mysterious aspect” to his talent, he told me: “The atmosphere that comes with my voice.” He described it as “my presence, my personality,” which echoed an old song of his, called “Minha Voz, Minha Vida,” or “My Voice, My Life.” His liquid tenor, melodic and trance-like, is one of the most distinctive voices in music. Away from the microphone, he listens intently, and goes into languorous digressions full of references to books and films.
[Make goals that are quantifiable, and achievable: big enough to matter and small enough to win. You want to overshoot your goal every single time. Set it up so that you win every single time.]
[In pre-advertising: announce what you’re going to do and how people can get involved.]
[Naming your benefactors might create a burden of association when you are perceived as divisive. Maybe don’t tell them or mention them until its done.]
[Remind people of the cause but don’t focus on the negative aspect so that people walk away feeling positive. If they feel bad, they won’t return.]
[Don’t guess what they need: ask them.]
[Delivering on the goal means not failing: if you’re short, cover out of pocket.]
[Document the delivery so that the people involved can see it after and feel good about making it happen.]
Making people feel they’re participation made the difference isn’t just for humility, it’s to help them feel their impact.
[When Michelin started, the car market was small, so they published guides as a way to encourage more driving. Ogilvy had under twenty clients before writing Confessions of an Advertising Man. Content is king.]