In Praise of Ponzis

But it didn't end there. The organizers set up a Distributed Autonomous Organization or DAO to handle the fundraising process. This sounds exotic, but it basically means this: They used a little piece of software to keep track of how much money each person promised to contribute. In exchange, every contributor was issued a bunch of tokens (in the same way an investor in a company received a bunch of shares). The token symbol (or ticker) was $PEOPLE. (View Highlight)

Note: parallels for us - bootstrap up a ponzi that actually has a chance to make money with a real business model

This logic seems circular: Let's buy something in order to ensure other people buy it as well. And the same logic can be seen in other blockchain-based projects. Games are paying people to play. Streaming services are giving people rewards for listening. Apps and protocols are giving people rewards for using their services. (View Highlight)

Psy, the artist, and his producers probably made around a million. (View Highlight)

Note: not that much considering the social reach not a great business model

Today, the main gatekeepers are the crowd and the algorithms that gauge and guide the crowd's attention. These algorithms create a world in which the biggest winners are bigger than ever. Success breeds success, creating path dependencies that make it hard for runners-up to catch up. In a growing number of industries, rewards are power-law distributed. This means the crowd is more important than ever and that launching a successful product is both harder and more lucrative than ever. (View Highlight)

Note: paradoxically winner win bigger but also everything is more fractured you have to cut through more noise, but reward is bigger if you do

The Message is the Message (View Highlight)

Note: love this the brand is the brand

This is, essentially, a pyramid scheme. A Ponzi. But it makes sense. It will be the dominant marketing method of the next decade and beyond. (View Highlight)