Napkin Math

Profit and power in technology.

Jan 24, 2025

Why Is Jensen Huang $120 Billion Richer Than You?

Hint: Nvidia’s success is based on much more than chips

Jul 30, 2024

Tinder Is Way More Important Than You Think

The success of a dating app has huge implications for the U.S. economy

Apr 5, 2022

Twitter’s Shot at Becoming a Meme Stock

It’s Musk's world and we’re just tweeting in it

Apr 14, 2022

The Race for New Payment Rails

Who is building the next Visa?

Sep 12, 2024

The Button Problem of AI

What’s the real reason AI hasn’t yet delivered on its hype?

Jul 8, 2020

The Future of Fitness: lululemon Buys Mirror

Why subscription hardware is better than hardware, the cross-selling opportunity, how Mirror could lead to a connected home, and why Mirror is a call option for Lululemon.

Jun 23, 2022

Facebook’s Capitulation

Abandoning a Trillion Dollar Advantage

Jun 21, 2024

You Can’t Math Your Way to Success

Whether in art, startups, or parenting, you can only control so much

Mar 24, 2022

Planet of the Billion Dollar Bored Apes

Is Bored Ape Yacht Club a Decentralized Disney?

Jan 11, 2024

The Books, Videos, Movies, and TV Shows That Changed Me Last Year

If you want to develop great taste, you must taste a lot of stuff

Jun 4, 2024

AI Is Transforming the Nature of the Firm

By reducing transaction costs, AI will reshape how companies operate and interact

Apr 21, 2022

Microsoft should buy Netflix

Netflix and Bill

Jan 31, 2022

Spotify’s Quest to Own Your Ear

A Napkin Math and Trapital Production

Aug 27, 2024

Benevolent Billionaire or Despot—Or Both?

A new book on Bill Gates asks: How do you measure a billionaire’s net impact on the world?

May 7, 2024

The Right Kind of Asshole

A founder’s personality can differentiate them—or destroy them

Jun 30, 2022

Look On My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair

I Have Some Thoughts To Share

Jul 30, 2020

GPT-3 Will Accelerate The Privatization of Internet Communities

What GPT-3 is, GPT-3's capabilities, if GPT-3 will replace jobs, and how it affects social media.

Aug 25, 2022

Finance is Narrative Not Numbers

The Subtle Art of Manipulating CFOs

Dec 8, 2020

How Live-streaming Ecommerce Works in China

In China, livestreaming has changed eCommerce. Learn about how it works, what the hosts do during the steam, and how it could impact American eCommerce.

Jul 16, 2024

What I Got Wrong About VR

Whoopsie, I may have gotten a little excited

Aug 18, 2022

What is an Asset?

Plus a new course from Napkin Math!

Apr 22, 2021

Am I getting ripped off writing at Every?

Screenshots of my contract and the financial model I used to decide

Feb 10, 2022

Is YC the Monopoly It Thinks It Is?

The Pricing Power Flex

Oct 7, 2021

The End of Software, Again

The impending doom of horizontal SaaS