It's the humidity!

SBF Trial Coverage – Week 1!

There has been so much great coverage already, but far too little is known to really form a strong opinion.

While we wait for big revelations to come out, here are a few things we have to chew on so far…

First, for some reason: SBF got a prison haircut. Not sure why this was such huge news, but I saw this gem everywhere.

Next: SBF’s two college roommates testified against him and we got some great content from it, including the fact that one of them quit after getting a phone call saying that Alameda had used FTX customer funds to repay its loans. Oopsie.

This isn’t news, but a satirical classic.

Lastly: It was revealed that SBF thought he could pay Trump to not run for president again. You know, but he totally donated an equal amount to Republicans, just like…off the books or something.

Going Infinitely Horrible

Michael Lewis has undoubtedly brought us some classics.

From The Big Short to Moneyball – all the way to The Blind Side, Lewis has been responsible for creating highly entertaining works of sorta-kinda nonfiction, which even Hollywood ate up.

Heck, Flash Boys will forever be minted in my mind as the most interesting and exciting financial book that I’ve ever read. I literally could not wait to pick it up again every day until it was finished and it fueled my early work at Rainwell Financial Technologies.

Once the dust settled from the FTX collapse, the news of Sam Bankman-Fried’s arrest had me praying for a new tell-all book from Lewis, exposing more depth to what was already reported across the mainstream news.

Earlier this year, when Lewis announced that he was given an all-access backstage pass to SBF’s compound in the Bahamas in preparation for such a work, it was time for that dream to actually come true.

Well…on October 3 of this year, it sorta-kinda did.

Conveniently positioned right before the start of the trial, all early reviews of the book seem to point to the biggest twist I could imagine: Lewis became an SBF apologist.

Forget the weird commune lifestyle, nerd-orgies, and playing League of Legends during TV interviews. This guy allegedly used customer money to fund his own interests + pay for mommy & daddy’s house, leaked private diaries to sway public opinion, and much much more.

Maybe this is just a case of “guilty until proven innocent”, but I honestly can’t imagine at this point that this is possible. My man Coffeezilla’s 11-minute video is a great summary of my own personal disappointment – but with higher production value (and suspenders).

In summary – Lewis builds SBF up throughout the entire book, fawns over his quirkiness, and then says “oopsie” to the Fraud stuff.

This is clearly a book meant to capitalize on the popularity of the trial. It could have – and absolutely should have – waited for the evidence to surface so that it could marry anecdote and fact into a classic Lewis mélange that might actually have a chance to stand the test of time.

But hey, maybe this roll of the dice takes a bit of heat away from another sorta-kinda situation that recently popped up regarding another Lewis classic. I won’t stoop to a “blindside” pun, because you’d definitely see it coming.

That Drip

• The average car payment is now $725.
  

  

• Like so many other promises of technology improving our lives, completely and totally in-touch-with-society billionaire Jamie Dimon says that AI is going to allow our kids to work a lot less.

• People seemed to like that Toy Story football game, so I’m pretty much just a poor man’s Jamie Dimon at this point.

• A University in Ireland is actually creating a course on how to become an “Influencer”, with the intent of offering it as a full degree. (See above)

Sponsor

We have one slot available!

We have been able to open up (only) one slot for fractional CTO/CPTO services. They typically book up very quickly, so I encourage you to reach out before all time has been claimed.

When I speak with non-technical executives at software-driven startups, I often hear a lot of the same questions:

• Why are we moving slower than I’d expect?

• Is my engineering team actually effective?

• Is what we’re building going to scale to our next tier?

• How do I hire the best talent?

• What aren’t we doing that we should be?

If you’re feeling this way too – you’re not alone. Building is a lot more challenging than many expect when starting a company. I have met a lot of brilliant leaders with game-changing ideas who struggle with these same questions.

[email protected].

If you’d like to sponsor future issues: [email protected]