Six Big Bets

by personjerryon 12/14/2025, 6:51 PMwith 12 comments

by tptacekon 12/14/2025, 8:10 PM

There's an uncanny element to the writing here, but my bigger thing is that it's presenting a sort linear progression to stages of life and startup operating, and saying 36-42 are strong ages for doing startup work, but 42 is the last of those years and 51 is past it: no? An unsupported claim? There are ways in which it is much harder to do a startup at 36 than 51.

It seems clear why 20-somethings have advantages, but extrapolating that out is I think a mistake.

I also think subheds like "Naive Conviction" and "Capitalized Execution" and "Durable Craft" are going to set people off, and as a bit of writing advice I'd avoid them, along with constructions like "It's not X. It's Y." or "X isn't Z. Y is." It's also kind of not-great writing? It starts to sound like something written for Bill Shatner to read.

by wglbon 12/16/2025, 1:56 AM

I'm not convinced of the linearity of this. Consider that Ray Kroc started McDonalds when he was 50.