Co-founder and CEO of All Turtles and mmhmm. Co-founder and former CEO of Evernote. Generally enthusiastic.
Bentonville, AR
- Tweets 5,248
- Following 968
- Followers 35,367
- Likes 3,230
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When the economy is strong, it’s a good time to sell things. When the economy is weak, it’s a good time to build things.
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I was just on a Zoom call that ended automagically after 40 minutes because the organizer was on a free tier. This is the single greatest advance to meeting productivity that I’ve ever seen. Would pay extra for this feature.
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“Dear HOA,
I am surprised to learn that my Christmas lights are in violation of one of the rules. Being somewhat of a completionist, I am now compelled to modify my holiday display to try to violate ALL your rules at once. I look forward to your ongoing assessment of my progress.
- K”
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Watching Lars Ulrich on stage talking about how @Metallica uses @salesforce software for customer engagement and thinking that adult life hasn’t turned out exactly the way I thought it would. #Dreamforce2018
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Working from home, day 118. We finally did something about it! piped.video/watch?v=c8KhKBLo… @mmhmmapp
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Proof that emojis originated in Japan and not San Francisco: There are a dozen emoji for trains 🚃🚋🚞🚝🚄🚅🚈🚂🚆🚇🚊🚉, but only one for poop.
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I once had a Chrome plugin that replaced all instances of the word "literally" with "figuratively." It was majestic.
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Exploring a new language with @duolingo and am genuinely happy with how it’s going, though I worry that some of the phrases I’m learning might not be immediately useful.
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Achievement unlocked: first time since high school that I weigh less than 200 lbs. Five months of intermittent fasting experiments, -56lbs.
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Guys guys guys, my cousin Carl is an inveterate bullshitter who’s actually missing the part of his brain that processes facts, but he’s *really* good at combining things he’s previously heard into a slick pastiche word salad about any topic! Let’s rely on him for important stuff.
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App idea: Launch it and it generates random form questions that you have to fill out: name, date of birth, favorite sport, etc. As you scroll down, the questions become harder and more tedious. It never ends and there’s no ‘Done’ button. It’s called Enterprise Software Simulator.
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We raised an A-Round for @mmhmmapp led by @sequoia. A giant thank you to our beta testers, our investors, and our hard-working team! It’s been a whirlwind few months but now we have the resources to try to make the world a little bit better. mmhmm.app/blog/we-raised-som…
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Sometimes I wake up and feel there are an infinite number of things to do and it’s overwhelming and hard to get out of bed. So I think:
It’s not actually infinite, it’s like twenty.
And out of those twenty, I only really need to do four today.
I can do four things. I get up.
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Also, I can now truthfully and somewhat melancholically say that every live Metallica performance I’ve ever been to has started with a Disclaimer Regarding Forward Looking Statements.
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It’s astonishing that people have the time and energy to make asinine rules like this.
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AI has a UX problem. The symmetrical conversational interface, where you talk to the computer and it talks back to you, demos well and is deeply rooted in Hollywood. But it is grossly unsuited to most tasks; it’s inefficient, sets unreachable expectations, and magnifies mistakes.
@Apple’s AI demos at WWDC seemed sensible and coherent because they’ve mostly moved past symmetrical conversational UIs. There are narrow use cases where long-form natural language conversations with a machine make sense, but the real promise of AI is doing, not talking.
AI debates have primarily focused on technology and policy. Starting now, they’ll be just as much about design.
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I may have just carried out literally the least-efficient calculation in the history of computing. I’m impressed, amused, bewildered, and a little sad. I asked o1 to add two (non-random) 64-bit numbers. It got the correct answer after 82 seconds of anthropomorphic soul-searching.
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Selfie with @Schwarzenegger: cool. A picture: even cooler. A picture of a selfie: indescribably awesome. #AfterSchool
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Man, @mmhmmapp is like butter on the new 13" M1 MacBook Pro. No green screen, no lights, built-in camera. Two handed gestures launching soon.
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Every time a new AI image generator comes out, I like to run through the same set of sample prompts for fun and to see how much progress they’ve made on difficult requests. Here’s Grok vs. ChatGPT on “Make a sightseeing map of the US highlighting the most famous tourist attraction in each state.” Gotta give ChatGPT the win here. I mean, who amongst us can deny the majesty of The Colossal Stop Sign of Reno?
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Now seems like a good time to admit that @mmhmmapp’s last round was led by Sequoia Total Landscaping.
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Mmhmm turns your boring Zoom call into a Weekend Update-style TV show theverge.com/2020/7/7/213140… via @Verge
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Four possibilities: 1) I’m seeing this image wrong, 2) @CNN is using AI-generated illustrations for stories now, 3) justice Roberts really has six fingers on one hand, or 4) this is a subtle reference to The Princess Bride.
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This is what I learned over the past 20 years of running companies:
It’s not about the leader. It's about the leadership. It's not about the visionary. It's about the vision. It’s not about the designer. It's about the design.
Gonna spend the next 20 trying to remember it.
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How I learned to stop Video Fatigue and love Zoom meetings. Plus a preview of an up-to-now-secret feature coming soon to @mmhmmapp! piped.video/d3MaIevQkdE
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I have such mixed feelings about this unedited AI playground output from GPT-3. On the one hand: holy shit! On the other hand: holy shit!
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Elizabeth Holmes getting 11 years in prison feels unfair. Maybe not compared to others sentenced for fraud (Madoff, 150 years), but to people who’ve done worse and not been prosecuted. Let’s be more assertive with prosecutions and more merciful with sentencing.
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Large language models are good at generating things convincing to humans but are not grounded in facts and, therefore, inveterate liars. We need a new infrastructure for truth so that Generative AI can grow beyond niche or malignant uses.
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Testing an early version of one of the most frequently requested @mmhmmapp features: sound in video slides. Coming soon to the beta.
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There should be an app that catalogs your stuff, then markets it back to you through web ads, etc. Makes you want what you have. #StoicHappy
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Everyone with a Mac who signed up for the @mmhmmapp beta in July should have their invite by now. If you didn’t get it, check you spam folder or get in touch. Thanks for helping us test!
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Depending on how you count, @mmhmmapp is about the twentieth product I've helped launch. Emotions on day one are always the same mix of elation, disappointment, hope, vulnerability, excitement, loneliness, and gratitude. Tremendous respect for everyone who does this for a living.
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Startup timing: Wait until the world changes so that an important problem goes from impossible to just really hard, then execute.
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The real win for productivity and health isn’t the four-day workweek, it’s the zero-meeting workday.
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Just got my first drone delivery by @godroneup from @Walmart! Pretty cool.
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Though I’m pretty unimpressed with Metaverse / VR, I’m actually a big believer in the potential of AR. The difference is between escaping our shared reality vs. improving it. As soon as AR headsets are good enough, we’ll be building for them!
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Super happy to introduce @croneill as the next CEO of Evernote! Giant thanks to everyone who helped this to happen. blog.evernote.com/blog/2015/…
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My grandfather’s name was “Laser.” My great-grandfather’s name was “Wolf.” I could have been “Laser-Wolf, Libin” but my parents went with “Phil.” And they wonder why I don’t call more often.
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What pisses me off is that I always thought social media was the most boring part of “tech”. Assumed the real end-of-civilization threats would come from more legit sci-fi areas: nuclear, AI, gene editing, robotics, quantum physics. Now it’s death by marketing. Lame way to go.
For the last 6 mo, we led an investigation into Russian interference on behalf of the Senate Intelligence Committee (SSCI). That report examined the data sets provided by FB, Twitter, and Google. Our work is here: disinformationreport.com - slides, infographics, whitepaper.
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Make sure the problem you're trying to solve is real and that you didn't just make it up while trying to think of a startup. #VCPitchTips
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I’m having a hard time processing how crazy this is. finance.yahoo.com/news/games…
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Following a long-standing secret tradition, the @mmhmmapp logo is hereby officially named “Gordon” in honor of our first paying customer.
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Thanks for all the requests for @mmhmmapp beta access! We're sending out invites every day and, barring some unforeseen circumstances, are planning on getting everyone who signs up by the end of July (so this Friday) into the beta next week. mmhmm.app/invite
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We're doing our first big expansion test of @mmhmmapp next week. Anyone with a Mac who signs up by the end of today will get in by next week. Thanks to everyone who's been helping us test, and a giant thanks to everyone waiting! (And we're hard at work on a Windows version.)
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Here are some of the big new things we just rolled out in @mmhmmapp beta 2. Sending out tens of thousands of invites today to everyone still waiting from July. mmhmm.app/whats-new
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Looking ridiculous is such a small price to pay for having so many things wirelessly streaming data from my face.
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I'm going to start doing weekly AMAs with @mmhmmapp to answer questions and show off new features. Check it out and ask me anything! The engineering team is hoping that this keeps me occupied. Nothing is more dangerous than a CEO with time and ideas.
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I, for one, respect @Meta for their willingness to invite open mockery by choosing a ridiculous company name. Welcome.
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We need a new Turing Test for AIs. One that’s not about fooling someone (✅), but about being better than humans at discerning truths from falsehoods. Ideally much better. Who’s working on this?
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I never cease to be inspired by Bluetooth. Twenty-four years on the market, and they still can’t connect a headset to a phone reliably. Has one job! A quarter of a century, and it still does not work! How amazing every single startup looks in comparison! 🫡 🚽
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Finding it oddly comforting that my dog has not acknowledged either the daylight savings time change or the SVB collapse. He lives in an entirely more reasonable world.
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This is why I love Japan. Also, "please scream inside your heart" is a pretty good mantra for 2020.
Japan’s theme parks have banned screaming on roller coasters because it spreads coronavirus. “Please scream inside your heart.” wsj.com/articles/reopened-th…
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Ok, this video made by an @mmhmmapp beta tester has it all: comedy, suspense, spectacular visual (and audio!) effects, and... comeuppance! When Charlie, presently age nine, becomes world famous, you can say you saw him here first. piped.video/30hwC-Gvqbg
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Unpacking in my new apartment, found the prototype hardware that we used to design Evernote for iPad back in 2010.
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The augmentations are fairly limited for now, but I’m already liking Apple’s new AR headset!
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If I were near the start of my career now, I would do everything possible to make sure I never got stuck working for a company that didn’t trust me.
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Honestly, TV makers should just start building in @Snapchat filters. How did I ever watch the news without this?
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Good TC article about our new company @allturtlesco. It's my fourth startup, but I still get butterflies on day one! tcrn.ch/2qKiZoc
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We need to to set the record straight about many serious errors in the @Stranger_Things portrayal of Dungeons & Dragons! *SPOILERS* [1/20]
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My thoughts on Evernote quality and our priorities for 2014: blog.evernote.com/blog/2014/… Thanks to @jasonkincaid for the motivation.
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Serious question: why are credit cards legal? It seems like they’re explicitly designed to funnel value to people who don’t carry a balance (like me) from people who do and sometimes miss payments. With a good chunk diverted to the bank. Is there a non-exploitative credit card?
When times are toughest, large banks are crushing consumers:
We are tracking major changes to Chase’s terms of service today (credit cards):
- Interest rate increase from 24% to 29.9%.
- Late fee increase from $27 to $40.
DoNotPay will opt you out and “reject the changes.”
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“Metaverse” is a squishscammy word. If you include things like video games and, um, the Internet, it’s already a big success. AR has future potential. But I’m calling bullshit on a persistent, decentralized, skeuomorphic, interconnected 3D world, experienced primarily through VR.
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Within one month, the number of people dying daily in the US from COVID-19 went from zero to higher than the total average daily deaths from homicides, suicides, motor vehicle accidents, and all drug and alcohol overdoses combined.
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My epic podcast with @tferriss is up wp.me/p3PfoO-49P. He promised to teach me how to do a pullup!
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This is a calculation that a modern assembly language can do in maybe four operations, but my guess is that o1 used… hundreds of trillions. Not counting the training costs. I could be off by many orders of magnitude, but I’m still guessing it’s around a trillion-to-one. I wonder how that compares to using a modern iPhone calculator (already an extremely inefficient way of doing math). Is it a million times worse?
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Keep refining your idea until you can honestly see yourself happily working on it for the rest of your life. Pitch that. #VCPitchTips
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I want a browser plug-in that detects AI-generated text and removes it from web pages or at least flags it. If you didn’t have to bother writing it, I shouldn’t have to bother reading it.
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Anyone serious about blockchain (and I’m not) has one job: kill the disinformation, hype, and speculation. It’s possible that there are genuinely transformative use cases buried under a mountain of bullshit, but none of them will thrive in the current nonsense storm.
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I love Burning Man! Specifically, I love being in San Francisco during Burning Man because it’s the only week of the year when random slow moving people in line ahead of you aren’t talking about Burning Man.
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The new @sequoia web site is pretty great. Some really well-written biographies of founders including, and I hope this comes across with the complete lack of humility with which I say it, me! sequoiacap.com/article/phil-…
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Dear media: please stop reporting the number of daily new cases, without also reporting the number of daily new tests. Knowing the former without the latter is worse than useless.
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The main reason I can’t take the Bill Gates pandemic conspiracy theories seriously is that they couldn’t even be bothered to be called ‘Billgate.’ That’s just lazy thinking.
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My morning routine, thanks to @mmhmmapp. So. Much. Time. Saved. piped.video/watch?v=XMCinFrp…
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Moment of clarity after spending the weekend with the Apple Watch: Ads are dead within 5 years; payments are the one ring to rule them all.
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I absolutely love Figma. Biggest improvement to my overall productivity in years. Most fun thing about going to work. Big respect, @figmadesign!
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When you’re worried your company might be picked apart by governments who don’t really understand your business but think you’re flaunting laws and challenging their traditional power structures, it’s a good time to launch your own sovereign currency, right? Asking for a friend.
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I'm not sure what this says, but I love it! lifehacking.jp/2020/07/mmhmm… @mmhmmapp
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Just eyeballed my calendar for 2015 to 2019: I spent an average of 2.8 hours per day sitting in a car commuting to the office and meetings. Now I use that time to walk, exercise, and relax, often with friends, and have accomplished more than ever with my team. Return to office?
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Why I'm ridiculously excited about conversational UX, and my first VC investment! medium.com/@plibin/a-charge-…
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I think when a lot of people say that they’re eager to “go back to the office”, what they really mean is that they’re eager to “get out of the house.” Distributed working ≠ working from home. The world is reopening; there’s lots of opportunity to find the perfect places to work.
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This is not a breach. It’s significantly worse. money.cnn.com/2018/05/03/tec…
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Sad that the synagogue shooter was motivated by a conspiracy theory about @HIASrefugees; the world charity that resettles refugees of all backgrounds. HIAS welcomed and protected my parents and me 39 years ago when we fled from the USSR. I sometimes forget how much I owe them.
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The evolution of my personal reaction to ChatGPT:
1. Awe that AI can produce mediocre but plausible writing.
2. Disgust with mediocre but plausible writing from AI.
3. Disgust with mediocre but plausible writing from humans.
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If you sense that someone wants to ask a question, immediately stop talking and let them. Continuing to speak has no upside. #VCPitchTips
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Here’s o1 basically explaining that it considered whether or not to lie to me, and then decided, “fuck it, let’s go!”
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I just happen to have the perfect @mmhmmapp image to try out Twitter’s vertical photos today!
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