Finn Stäblein
← Lattice
Theme Strategy
Source Mike Maples
Added
Tags moats, monopoly, platforms

Abundance → Scarcity

When technology makes X abundant, a complementary Y becomes scarce — and that's where the monopoly forms.

Every platform wave makes something abundant and pushes value onto the newly-scarce complement. Cheap computers made hardware abundant and software the scarce, valuable layer. Cheap distribution over the internet made content abundant and attention scarce. The pattern repeats: find what the wave makes abundant, then look for the complement it makes rare.

Why it matters: to locate the next monopoly, don’t chase the abundant thing everyone can now do — build the scarce complement it creates. When inference becomes abundant, bet the scarcity is in trust and proof-of-work.