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Gm. A meme a day keeps the doctor away.
FUTURE OF WORK
Shopify empties their calendar
"Meetings are a bug. Today, we shipped a fix to this bug at Shopify," tweeted Shopify VP of Product and COO Kaz Nejatian.
In a memo yesterday, Shopify cleared all scheduled recurring meetings with 3 or more people and impose a "two-week cooling off period" before any of those meetings could get added back on the calendar.
Nejatian also said they're reinstating meeting-free Wednesdays and limiting large meetings with over 50 people to a six-hour timeslot on Thursdays.
Shopify deleted nearly 10,000 events from employee calendars and cleared up over 76,500 hours.
"No one joined Shopify to sit in meetings," Nejatian wrote.
Did anyone join any company to sit in meetings... like ever?
While Shopify stock is down 70% the last year and had to cut 10% of its staff last year, this move is a strong signal to potential employees: we're here to work, not chat about the weather.
5 other unique company policies
In the words of Jack Butcher, Shopify's decision yesterday was "based".
I prefer "Lit af" but hey that's just me. Reading about Shopify's decision, I got curious what other companies have unique workplace policies? Here's 5!
Coinbase doesn't allow debate of political causes unrelated to the company's mission.
Amazon banned PowerPoints. Bezos liked his team to write memos.
The New York Yankees don't allow beards. Only mustaches!
"Leave a meeting if you're not contributing" is one of Elon's rules for his companies.
"Adequate performance gets a generous severance package" is the Netflix motto
— Jason Levin (@iamjasonlevin)
CRYPTO
Genesis vs Gemini
The collapse of FTX destroyed ungodly amounts of money, made many people look stupid, and is likely to put former CEO SBF in prison.
Now, we can add ruining friendships between billionaires to the list of casualties.
That is because alleged Facebook creator and crypto mogul Cameron Winklevoss has run out of patience with fellow crypto mogul Barry Silbert, and is now taking their beef to Twitter.
Genesis, Gemini, and DCG
The cause of the beef is a bit confusing, but bear with me:
Cameron Winklevoss and his twin brother Tyler own the crypto exchange Gemini.
Gemini offered its customers interest on their crypto, with the interest being earned from crypto lender Genesis.
Genesis is owned by Barry Silbert and his crypto VC firm DCG.
Genesis had to pause withdrawals after the FTX collapse, trapping $900 million of Gemini's money.
Winklevoss wants that money back.
Unfortunately for Winklevoss and Gemini customers, if what he says in his open letter is true, his odds of getting that money back don't look great.
Winklevoss alleges that DCG owes Genesis, its subsidiary, $1.675 billion, and that Silbert used the money to "fuel greedy share buybacks, illiquid venture investments, and kamikaze Greyscale NAV trades".
Again, it doesn't sound great, but Silbert denies owing Genesis any money.
Winklevoss gave Silbert a January 8th deadline to return the money. I have no idea if that means Silbert is going to wake up with a Horse's head in his bed on January 9th, but I'm sure we'll find out on Twitter one way or the other.
Possible Consequences
The outcome of this billionaire beef will have massive consequences on the crypto market.
If Winklevoss is right and DCG is badly in the hole, DCG may have to sell the underlying Bitcoin in their BTC trust. Considering they own 3% of the total Bitcoin supply, that would be an awful lot of sell pressure.
Let's hope it doesn't come to that.
— Stephen Flanders (@SteveFlanders22)
QUICK HITS
Seed Round
Stat: 1.31 million: The # of cars that Tesla delivered in 2022, a 40% increase from 2021.
Story we're watching: Crypto hater Molly White published her 2022 crypto recap, and its not pretty. 2023 is shaping up to be an important year for crypto. Can it bounce back?
Rabbit hole: Top 3 Twitter Content Creation Tools
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON
An Apple pencil that can sample colors and textures might be coming soon.
TikTok creators can now restrict their toks to adult audiences only.
SBF is planning to plead 'Not Guilty'.
GPT-4 is apparently able to pass the Bar Exam. Sheeesh.
THREE LIES AND A HEADLINE
News is so weird these days. Three of these headline are fake stories from The Onion while one is actually true. Can you spot the truth amongst the fakes?
A. France Offers Free Condoms To Young People
B. Biblical Archaeologists Uncover 2,000-Year-Old Poster-Board Photo Collage Displayed At Jesus' Funeral
C. Study Finds Abusing Waitstaff Secret To Longer, Happier Life
D. Man Peels Price Tag Off Gift For Dog
FOUNDERS CORNER
The best resources we came across that will help you become a better founder, builder, or investor.
👩🏻💼 Get more attention on your LinkedIn posts with a free LinkedIn font generator.
💼 tl;dr your legal docs with DetangleAI. #33 on ProductHunt rn!
X Check out Jack Butcher's Compound Content course to learn the secrets to SEO. I knew a bit about SEO, but still found it incredibly helpful.
FRESH POWDER
Looking at three startups that recently topped up their coffers. Congrats!
THREE HEADLINES ANSWER
A