Lattice

A growing lattice of mental models and frameworks I'm picking up — mostly from working with Mike Maples at Floodgate — distilled to what's mine to share. Six threads run through most of it:

Abundance creates the next scarcity.
Adaptive beats intelligent design — define objective functions, not algorithms.
In the agentic era, the moat is verification.
Powers are earned via paths, not declared.
Tempo control wins deals.
Knowledge is combinatory play.

18 entries

No. Term What it means Theme

01 Asymptotically-Free Inference The cost of running a model trends toward zero — so the edge moves to whatever stays scarce when inference is free. Tech 02 Objective Functions over Algorithms Increasingly you don't write the algorithm — you define the goal and let the system iterate toward it. Tech 03 The Bitter Lesson General methods that scale with compute beat hand-coded human knowledge — over the medium term. Tech 04 Abundance → Scarcity When technology makes X abundant, a complementary Y becomes scarce — and that's where the monopoly forms. Strategy 05 Credibly-Neutral Verification A 'Switzerland' third party that certifies agentic work with no vendor agenda — an Okta or Moody's for AI output. Strategy 06 IBM and the PC In a modular system, value concentrates in the layer that can't be swapped out — IBM ended up owning PC assembly (a commodity) while Intel (chip) and Microsoft (OS) owned the bottlenecks. Strategy 07 The Shifting Bottleneck There's always a bottleneck; when technology moves it, build where it's about to land. Strategy 08 Activation Energy The cultural leap from zero to one real deployed customer — the hardest, most catalytic step. GTM 09 Controlling the Tempo If delay is free, customers delay forever — so engineer a forcing function: a hard date and limited slots. GTM 10 Don't Ask, Tell Customers often can't spec their own needs — lead them with a framework instead of asking what they want. GTM 11 Ideal Customer Profile Narrow who you sell to first — a sharp ICP compounds; a broad one dilutes learning and proof. GTM 12 Lighthouse Customers Structured early-customer relationships with explicit phases and success criteria — not casual pilots. GTM 13 Ring the Bell Define exactly what pilot success is before it starts — then prove those precise criteria were hit. GTM 14 Combinatory Play Remix mental models across books and domains — with an LLM as cross-referencer — to find non-obvious connections. Epistemics 15 Conjectures and Refutations Knowledge grows by bold conjectures exposed to hard refutation — the engine under iterative 'loops.' Epistemics 16 The OODA Loop Observe–Orient–Decide–Act: don't decide and act before you've genuinely observed and oriented. Epistemics 17 Durability vs. Momentum Underwrite rounds on durability, not momentum — high durability paired with low momentum often means a cheaper entry. Investing 18 Super Thinking & Super Building Two founder qualities to underwrite: super thinking (seeing ten steps ahead) and super building (throwing an idea away and rebuilding). Investing