Ports, toys, and transformations, the AI Act, the future of software dev and data for AI

A newsletter of practices.

Good morning

In today's edition, among other things:

• Ports, toys, and transformations

• The EU AI Act: impact on builders

• Remote Work Trends in 2024

• Unicorn founders = underdogs?

• Managing and Presenting to Your Board

• Thoughts on the Future of Software Development

• GitHub's Engineering Fundamentals

• How to Self-Manage Even if You Have Management

• Data Acquisition Strategies for AI

Onwards!

---

Ports, toys, and transformations

Via Greylock:

Each major tech shift brings new opportunities for startups to build products that can change our lives.

But how and when you develop your product during a platform transition can be the difference between it becoming an iconic product that defines a generation – or a relic of the hype cycle, disappearing as quickly as it came.

For startups in search of a wedge to build enduring consumer products during the current AI transition, it’s helpful to understand the phases of technological evolution. While the far-reaching impact of AI will be on par with the first internet revolution, the manner by which we actually incorporate the technology into our lives may look much more like the mobile transition. Drawing on parallels from the mobile age, we can see that products launched during shifts often end up falling into one of three categories: ports, toys, and transformations.

Here’s the Greylock mental model: in the early stages of any technological shift, the market is flooded with ports - marginal adaptations of existing solutions that simply repackage established products to fit the new paradigm. While some ports can achieve considerable success by significantly enhancing their offerings, most fail to change the value proposition fundamentally for users. Startups that focus solely on porting existing solutions face an uphill battle against incumbents, who hold the unfair advantages of scale, network effects, and brand loyalty.