I F E D I L I 👨🏽‍🍳

We are not afraid.

we're making @blocks smaller today. here's my note to the company. #### today we're making one of the hardest decisions in the history of our company: we're reducing our organization by nearly half, from over 10,000 people to just under 6,000. that means over 4,000 of you are being asked to leave or entering into consultation. i'll be straight about what's happening, why, and what it means for everyone. first off, if you're one of the people affected, you'll receive your salary for 20 weeks + 1 week per year of tenure, equity vested through the end of may, 6 months of health care, your corporate devices, and $5,000 to put toward whatever you need to help you in this transition (if you’re outside the U.S. you’ll receive similar support but exact details are going to vary based on local requirements). i want you to know that before anything else. everyone will be notified today, whether you're being asked to leave, entering consultation, or asked to stay. we're not making this decision because we're in trouble. our business is strong. gross profit continues to grow, we continue to serve more and more customers, and profitability is improving. but something has changed. we're already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working which fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company. and that's accelerating rapidly. i had two options: cut gradually over months or years as this shift plays out, or be honest about where we are and act on it now. i chose the latter. repeated rounds of cuts are destructive to morale, to focus, and to the trust that customers and shareholders place in our ability to lead. i'd rather take a hard, clear action now and build from a position we believe in than manage a slow reduction of people toward the same outcome. a smaller company also gives us the space to grow our business the right way, on our own terms, instead of constantly reacting to market pressures. a decision at this scale carries risk. but so does standing still. we've done a full review to determine the roles and people we require to reliably grow the business from here, and we've pressure-tested those decisions from multiple angles. i accept that we may have gotten some of them wrong, and we've built in flexibility to account for that, and do the right thing for our customers. we're not going to just disappear people from slack and email and pretend they were never here. communication channels will stay open through thursday evening (pacific) so everyone can say goodbye properly, and share whatever you wish. i'll also be hosting a live video session to thank everyone at 3:35pm pacific. i know doing it this way might feel awkward. i'd rather it feel awkward and human than efficient and cold. to those of you leaving…i’m grateful for you, and i’m sorry to put you through this. you built what this company is today. that's a fact that i'll honor forever. this decision is not a reflection of what you contributed. you will be a great contributor to any organization going forward. to those staying…i made this decision, and i'll own it. what i'm asking of you is to build with me. we're going to build this company with intelligence at the core of everything we do. how we work, how we create, how we serve our customers. our customers will feel this shift too, and we're going to help them navigate it: towards a future where they can build their own features directly, composed of our capabilities and served through our interfaces. that's what i'm focused on now. expect a note from me tomorrow. jack

We'll welcome the Arctic into a boiling San Siro 🔥🏟️

Unpopular opinion. Excessive use of AI will make you dumb. Very dumb.

Maturing is realizing that SPA > SSR

i use spotify, but no app touches youtube music in this area

I've been asked why I haven't decided to go out on my own, here are some thoughts (also for people in similar situations) Two main directions in my head (in that spirit) - create a product (be a founder), or start a consultancy 1. Founder route - I should either have an idea I feel so passionate about building I can't sleep (I don't have that idea) or I'm ready to embrace years of uncertainty, betting everything on my ability to that thing out along the way (not who I am right now) Also, the idea of taking money from an investor is something that I wouldn't do unless I was ready to also put my entire net worth behind it, which to me is also a good gauge of whether your idea or passion meets the bar. 2. Consulting - I did this before, and I was very successful on paper, revenue grew around 500% in one year, I made more than I ever had in my life by far, but I wasn't happy and didn't enjoy it towards the end. I don't like billing and admin stuff etc.., and as a consultant people usually hired me for "an expertise" which led me to honing that expertise more and more over time, which led me to less time experimenting with and getting better at other things, something I enjoy doing a lot. Also, I was working in a silo and not directly working alongside smart people with new ideas on a regular basis which IMO is an opportunity cost. This is not what I want to do right now. It comes down to balance, tradeoffs etc.., if I wanted to optimize for guaranteed cash I would probably do consulting because I know how much I can make and I could scale that, but I'd have limited upside as I don't think my consultancy would ever "20x in a year" etc.... and this doesn't excite me. If I wanted to be more risk on, I would maybe found my own product company and aim for some type of exit. Instead there are many companies / products that have traction and PMF that are relatively early vs TAM, and for me these are the most interesting places to be. Less risk, still a lot of upside, I get to experiment and build stuff and hack on things, I get to do what I love, I get to work with and learn from many new and smart people. One note, having worked with so many founders I have built an incredible amount of respect for them because I've seen what they go through on a day to day, the ups and downs, the stress and anxiety etc... def have to be built for that or at least mentally prepared for what is to come and still bought in Anyway, if you're in a similar boat, I hope my thought process makes your decision easier.