All 3 of them being for close friends and family, I have come to understand the expectation to be:

If it’s too much, or you don’t want to travel that far, or you’re busy— no worries! If you do, great, we invited you because we want to celebrate with you too, so why not make a big trip of it?

And then usually followed by a more casual reception closer to home for those family and friends who wanted to make it but couldn’t for whatever reason.

Regardless, given the fact they were close / within the same order of magnitude as Figma, it's interesting that the prospect of them IPOing is apparently considered a nuclear option.

https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2017/05/18/looking-behind-th...

An IPO allows every employee and shareholder to be as liquid as they like, and optimize to your individual tax and risk situation.

An exit is a one time thing. At most, you get to elect how much cash and how much converted stock you want. More likely, the company decides what that breakdown is.

Looking back, I think this ZIRP phenomenon of PE and VC was unhealthy (remember crypto??), unrealistic, and ultimately only benefitted a few founders, some employees, and mostly VC firms making paper gains by marking up SoftBank-esque valuations that no one actually believed.

We’re forgetting that all of FAANG IPOd when they too were much less than $20 billion. Maybe it’s time for the next generation of software companies to take control of their own destiny rather than wait for a golden parachute to buy them out.

Unfortunately I don’t think a majority of either party wants to reign in military spending, considering every admin including Obama and Biden has increased it since Carter, even though likely granting such a blank check is financially irresponsible (i.e. trillions unaccounted for in budget audits [3]). Both parties just want to please that bloc of votes, because it also has ripple effects on the rest of the nation’s votes to be seen as “good on military”.

I personally think our military could be just as effective if we tightened the wallet, but I don’t think either party actually wants to.

[1] https://www.economist.com/united-states/2021/10/14/military-... and https://www.nbcnews.com/think/amp/ncna1245542

[2] https://news.gallup.com/poll/118684/military-veterans-ages-t... (2009, but the trend has only gotten deeper)

[3] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pentagon-fails-audit-sixth-...

Is it a 10-max 20% fee to Apple, no matter the distributor, in the EU? Or are those rules only for the App Store, and anything else won't be touched by commissions to Apple?

Carta and Pulley, etc. do a solve a valuable concern here for non-executives who are compensated with stock options and want to keep track of stock vesting, exercises, and shares in a transparent way, I’d say.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhCcC2smGMI

https://discoverlexus.com/stories/journeys-beyond-the-road/

That's the marketplace of ideas – not platforming every single idiot who wants to speak. Is Harvard supposed to, hyperbolically, entertain the notion of a flat earth if enough people believe it? I'd argue absolutely not (that's what the internet is for). Maybe the reason that the makeup of Harvard and similar schools is so liberal is because the right hasn't offered much in the way of intellectual fodder other than "Harvard bad" ?

If you don't agree with Harvard's policies, don't go to Harvard.

I have not heard of a single Democrat politician advocate defunding religious organizations. I have often heard the GOP advocate for punishing college faculty/students/administrators and withholding accreditation/nonprofit-status.

Regardless, I actually think it’s a bad idea to go after either: both of those institutions, ultimately, are checks on the State — and historically, when a state turns to fascism, universities and religious organizations (save the “favored/officially sanctioned religion”) are the first thing to go.

The Mormon Church in Utah is essentially a government with real state power of its own, for example.

And the Westboro Baptist Church is still allowed to organize and shout God Hates [Gays] at funerals of private citizens by an 8-1 Supreme Court Ruling.

Go after the Churches and religious organizations first, in that case, as they’re also tax advantaged and their leaders and congregations have a profound pull upon politics and politicians.

I don’t think NYT, or any other industry, for that matter knows AI isn’t going away: in fact, they likely prefer it doesn’t, so long as they can get a slice of that pie.

That’s what the WGA and SAG struck over, and won protections ensuring AI enhanced scripts or shows will not interfere with their royalties, for example.

I guarantee you there is _no one_ who knows the exact ROI of a show in terms of dollars. In fact they don’t want to know (because it would be a liability). Often times studios set up entire shell companies for tv shows that they “loan” studio money to, and then set a variable interest rate slightly greater than the rate the shows bring in money, so they can declare a loss no matter how successful the show is even though they’re getting their own money back. That’s been going on for decades.

This is all a roundabout way to say, only in the highest profile disasters is something ever cancelled for “money”. Usually it’s something else, and much less rational: this exec doesn’t like this show for their personal resume, the show is successful and entering its fourth season but the showrunner wants a raise that an exec doesn’t want to sign off on lest other showrunners hear and demand a raise, an exec thinks starting a new show will demonstrate “leadership”, another exec hates another producer, the streaming service decided it doesn’t want to host one of the few-WGA animated shows (this is what happened to Bojack Horseman), etc.

https://www.languageunlimited.org/englishlessonhollywoodacco...

There’s finally enough people noticing Zaslav’s wrecking ball outside of Hollywood (which has been vocal in criticizing him as ruining everything since the WB-Discovery merger first was approved), including US government officials [1].

I think the markets will refuse to reward him this time, and more importantly, I think the DOJ/FTC will refuse to allow this merger to happen, having seen the fallout from last time. I don’t even think the studios’ cozy relationship with the Democratic Party will save him this time, as I’m certain smaller studios and likely even Disney absolutely do not want this to happen either.

From there I can only hope the board of directors will fire him. In an effective government, I would hope the whole WB-Discovery merger to be broken up, but I’m not holding my breath.

[1] https://x.com/joaquincastrotx/status/1737669717223964730?s=4...