Andrew Park

One of my favorite things to do is break down complex tech topics into terms that are easy for regular people to understand. I've had a lot of great opportunities to do this at CNET, and I'm especially proud of this Managed vs Unmanaged Hosting breakdown. Like many aspects of web hosting, every person (and every web host) you ask seems to have a different definition of "managed hosting". I had several conversations with my editor about how WE defined it, and together we came up with something we were happy with. Check it out if you're curious about these types of web hosting, or if you want to see a sample of my writing before you hire me!

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About that WSJ story from last week on Amazon’s "Project Curiosity". When I read the headline, I was expecting a juicy tale of corporate espionage, but it turned out to feel more like just a dogfooding project to me. 🤷‍♂️ https://lnkd.in/gzWpP26A "Inside Amazon’s Secret Operation to Gather Intel on Rivals - Staff went undercover on Walmart, eBay ..." Here is the TLDR;  Amazon registered an entity called “Big River Services International”. And built a secret team whose sole job was to sell products through rival market places (Walmart, eBay, Flipkart), and to try out rival logistics services (FedEx) , and compare those to how Amazon’s own services work. Seems like they were just evaluating competitors using publicly available information. I didn’t see much corporate espionage in there. Yes, Amazon was very secretive about this project - they did not want an email trail, and so some information was presented purely in paper printouts etc. And the team attended an eBay users conference without disclosing the Amazon connection. Those parts trigger suspicion. But ultimately it just looks like a dogfooding project done at Amazon scale to me. Did you feel differently about it?

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CAREER ADVICE: BE A FUNCTIONAL SPECIALIST A friend messaged me: "At my startup, I’m technically a product manager but have taken on a much broader, generalist role. I’ve been juggling sales, product, engineering, ops, and more. I’m wondering if I should focus on something specific instead, like honing down into just the product role. Would love to hear your thoughts and advice!" My reply: "Be a functional specialist. As the startup grows, the top change they will make is to hire specialists. As a generalist, you'll almost certainly be sidelined and ultimately exited. You need to choose your functional path - I'd recommend product - and become excellent at it. This is the way to career success and growth." The only situation this advice wouldn't apply is if someone is transitioning from I-Banking or Consulting into an Operating role, where it will likely be into a Chief of Staff role.

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tl;dr: Not every ad channel is going to deliver results. Don’t be afraid to cut the cord on the underperformers before they drain your budget. Ever invested in a channel that just didn’t work out? If you’re a dev marketer, your answer’s most likely yes. At ScraperAPI, Google Ads was a total bust. We tried. We spent. We waited for results that never came. Outside of branded searches, it was a total disaster. It was a stark reminder that not every channel — no matter how popular — is always worth the spend. While I’m a big believer in the idea that growth doesn’t happen overnight, you need to know when it’s time to jump ship before you drain your whole ad budget. Our problem at ScraperAPI was that we were building a product that devs didn’t quite know to even search for yet. Hindsight's 20/20, but I wish we’d poured all that AdWords spend into channels that *actually* helped devs understand our product — like Quora, Reddit, and other dev communities — instead of holding out for a payoff that simply wasn’t coming. tl;dr: Not every ad channel is going to deliver results. Don’t be afraid to cut the cord on the underperformers before they drain your budget.

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If anyone is in North County San Diego, on Thursday May 2nd, we will be hosting a tech entrepreneur and investor meet up at 5:30pm. We’ll have a couple speakers, one of which is a fin-tech start-up raising a round, followed up by a presentation on the state of the stock & crypto market. We host these events quarterly and usually get a lot of founders and investors to attend. If anyone is interested, please message me and I can send you the details. LaunchPad San Diego #startups #startupincubator #entrepreneur #investing #crypto #meetup

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Looking for a great read that explains the interconnections between emerging technologies? Sick of lazy tech writers who ask which technologies will "win" without understanding that they're all connected? Want deep dives into the future of work and VR; how to think like an AI native; and the future of experiences and mobility, among many other topics? Check out the Fast Future Blur, a collection of collaborative essays written by the faculty of the The Fast Future Executive! Available now wherever books are sold. https://lnkd.in/e2YsEa2T

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What stood out to me in yesterday’s Apple announcement wasn’t the headline, but the subtitle. “Setting a new standard in privacy.” For privacy to become one of the leading selling points of software, competitive dynamics & user preferences have evolved. The mantra repeated over the last 20 years on the internet has been privacy is dead. Users simply don’t care. People are willing to trade their privacy for free & targeted experiences. Since 2020, Apple has marketed their products as the private alternativepoking fun at how public we all are about the minutia of our lives. Apple is competing using the challenger sale : Apple is telling the market, to use AI, you should want private AI, you should want to control your own data because it’s valuable. Apple’s massive distribution will affect consumer & enterprise preferences. It’s already happening. Enterprises push for their data to be under their control in virtual private clouds, in open data formats like Iceberg, to run AI models in their own environments - the cloud-prem architecture. These models are their intellectual property & a key competitive advantage. We’ve all learned Google’s core search business - arguably the best business model on the internet - is the commercialization of a machine learning algorithm from user & enterprise data. Fool me once… The broader market has realized how valuable data can be - both users who provide it & businesses who leverage it. These changing preferences will create demand for new architectures : software products that run in customer environments where the data remains in control of the user & buyer. This architectural shift creates a massive new opportunity for software startups to challenge the multi-tenant, centralized data incumbents with their own privacy-focused challenger sale. Many will debate whether the architecture is truly private. Is Apple using secure enclaves & SGXs, OpenAI promising not to log queries from Apple users, & users opting-in to sending their data to OpenAI private enough? Will Google rearchitect Gemini to do the same thing to power Apple products? https://lnkd.in/g-ukCuGt

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Michelle Kislak from Netflix is looking for a Product Manager! It’s Friday people, so you know what that means there will be a lot of product manager roles posted this afternoon, but you have to learn how to pitch yourself to get an interview beyond sending an “I’m interested” message to the hiring team. Do you want access to the rest of the product manager jobs instead of just getting them one by one, then sign up for our exclusive newsletter here.  https://lnkd.in/g7stR_Nj In addition to sending you a fresh batch of urgent product manager roles each day like hot bread out of the oven, I will also be sending you some LinkedIn templates on how to convert these LinkedIn postings into interviews.  https://lnkd.in/g7stR_Nj For whatever reason I have been getting a lot of hate comments about posting this many product manager jobs from real product managers. I have no clue how some people can be that angry considering I am trying to help the community out. You can sign up for the postings in my newsletter here.  https://lnkd.in/g7stR_Nj I am hosting 7 live trainings next week with the intention of helping as many people land a product manager job as possible for FREE. My team is still posting up the meetups on Eventbrite, but I will be sending an invitation to the following trainings over the weekend.  https://lnkd.in/g7stR_Nj Real Reason Nobody is Landing Product Manager Jobs in 2024 How to Interview Against Product Managers with More Experience Cold Product Manager LinkedIn Message Templates to Convert Interviews Product Manager Resume Templates for Startups and Big Tech Roles Big Tech Product Manager Case Studies of 2024 Secret Product Manager Job Boards and Referral Network How to Increase Product Manager Job Applications w/ Chat GPT + AI PS Please RESHARE this post for all your colleagues still looking for a job. #productmanagement #productmanagementcareers #productmanagementjobs #speedtolead

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Something that's popped up in a few conversations this week is what #GenerativeAI will mean for marketers (especially content creators). There's a lot of info out there and I see most falling into one of two opinion camps - either that GenAI will replace all marketers (poorly) and mean the downfall of marketing, or that it will revolutionize marketing in the very best way. The truth is...we don't know yet. We can speculate (and wild speculation is always fun), or we could focus on what we know right now. And what I know is this: ⌨ If you're a poor writer, GenAI can't help you because most stuff currently written using these tools reads like it is written by these tools. It uses awkward phrasing (GenAI tools like the word 'thrilling' more than any human) and might not have market or technical expertise. It can also hallucinate info or pull insight from common or competitive sources. ⌨ For good or great writers, GenAI can have a positive impact in many ways, acting as a sounding board to create an outline, creating a (very) rough first draft, and more. If you're resource-constrained, this is incredibly valuable and will save time because for many, it's faster to edit a document than to create something from scratch (and then edit it). THAT's the 🗝 - right now, any content created using GenAI requires editing, and in many cases, heavy-handed/extensive editing. Its maximum value is in its use by talented folks in a process it cannot replicate by itself. Will this change? Absolutely. How? I don't think we know yet. What I do know is that I've seen some great stuff and have grown some skills using GenAI for basic things like identifying sources for research or suggesting an itinerary for our next family vacation. But it has significant limits and it takes time and resources to find the right prompts and processes to extract value. ➡ I'm fascinated by this topic, so if you have great tips/tricks or fav tools you think make you more productive as a marketer, share away!

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I was recently asked what I thought about click-bait articles and if there would ever be a reason to embrace these as a communications tactic, or to celebrate as a win an article that has that sort of headline. The short answer is no. Attention is a valuable currency, but trust is more important. Something written for clicks instead of substance intrinsically is trying to trick the audience into reading more. Our role as communication is not just to capture attention but to earn it, sustain it, and build enduring relationships with our audiences.    And we know that regaining trust is a monumental task. We need to remember that our reputation as communicators hinges on the authenticity and reliability of our messages. Instead of relying on or combating sensational headlines and exaggerated claims, we should focus on delivering meaningful insights and fostering thoughtful dialogue.    As communicators, our aim should be to create content that challenges, inspires, and informs—content that people want to engage with not because it promises something outrageous but because it delivers something valuable. 

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Let's state the obvious in a way that almost seems original. In the California Gold Rush, it wasn't always the miners who struck it rich. Rather, it was the folks selling them the picks and pans! The AI boom feels a bit similar. Businesses scrambling to keep up in search of their nugget of AI success are turning to a new kind of gold prospector - consulting firms with a plan (and a hefty hourly rate!). Our Venn diagrams are better than yours. Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey, KPMG...these are names that have been around for ages. From snazzy studies and reports to grandiose business models and revenue ideas, consulting firms are often the first wizards that businesses turn to. AI is no different. In fact, the management consulting industry is experiencing a post-pandemic boom, with sales expected to reach $392.2 billion this year, a healthy 2% increase from last year due in large part to generative AI. Put a different way, many of the AI companies these consultants follow and track are in all likelihood barely generating enough revenue to cover their office lunches. Like Planters, the guidance and results can be a mixed bag. These consulting firms charge boatloads of money. Consulting firms are tackling the AI revolution on multiple fronts. Some are helping companies navigate the regulatory landscape as regions like the EU implement AI laws. Others are designing AI-powered customer support systems, while still others are building safeguards to prevent errors in AI applications. With that said, the track record of these firms can be pretty dicey especially if you use their calculators to gauge ROI. Irony is the universe's way of reminding you that you should have planned better. In choosing to work with a consulting firm, businesses should focus on doing their due diligence to prevent an expensive engagement into a costly one. While relevant expertise is a given, seasoned consultants are likely more able to provide the perspective and guidance than younger, inexperienced ones. The last thing you want to hear is a barely out-of-college consultant starting off a sentence with "Throughout my career..." Sorry, that's simply not credible regardless of how charming or creative their ideas are. Creative is good, sustainable is better. And be willing to push back. Consulting firms will always lead with their most expensive, yet not always the most useful programs, so do your research and get smart about AI before engaging. Yes, your business may be looking at them for guidance, but it doesn't mean you have to be like a deer in headlights https://lnkd.in/gaV5HGBr #managementconsulting #business #artificialintelligence #generativeai #technology #leadership #trends

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Welcome to predatory capital 101. As I often say - don't attempt to outscale China. The same is true for trying to outscale big tech. SV and notably Amazon played this game well against incumbents due to access to massive amounts of capital to burn for growth combined with more efficient online businesses, but even that game has played out. LLM firms are a good example where not even the largest VC ecosystems play beyond the seed rounds, then essentially hand it off to big tech and presumably cash out most of their equity in later rounds or secondary markets -- long before the burn stops. “I feel like there’s a race to the bottom in terms of commoditized commerce right now and almost everyone in e-commerce is playing that race,” Silverman said. “They’re selling the exact same product and they’re trying to sell it to you for 2 cents cheaper, or ship it two hours faster.” Unless a company has convincing evidence that they can survive this game, it's foolhardy to even play it.

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🚀 My favorite prompting trick that you probably haven't seen: Simulating Agentic Behavior With a Prompt 🤖 After spending now likely thousands of hours prompting #LLMs, one thing I've found that can vastly improve the quality of outputs is something I haven't seen talked about much. ✨ "Instantiate two agents competing to find the real answer to the given problem and poke holes in the other agent's answers until they agree, which they are loathe to do." ✨ This works especially well with #CLAUDE3 and #Opus. For a more advanced version that often works even better: ✨"Instantiate two agents competing to find the real answer and poke holes in the other's answer until they agree, which they are loathe to do. Each agent has unique skills and perspective and thinks about the problem from different vantage points. Agent 1: Top-down agent Agent 2: Bottom-up agent Both agents: Excellent at the ability to think counter factually, think step by step, think from first principles, think laterally, think about second order implications, are highly skilled at simulating in their mental model and thinking critically before answering, having looked at the problem from many directions." ✨ This often solves the following issues you will encounter with LLMs: 1️⃣ Models often will pick the most likely answer without giving it proper thought, and will not go back to reconsider. With these kinds of prompts, the second agent forces this, and the result is a better-considered answer. 2️⃣ Continuing down the wrong path. There's an inertia to an answer, and the models can often get stuck, biased toward a particular kind of wrong answer or previous mistake. This agentic prompting improves this issue significantly. 3️⃣ Overall creativity of output and solution suggestions. Having multiple agents considering solutions results in the model considering solutions that might otherwise be difficult to elicit from the model. If you haven't tried something like this and have a particularly tough problem, try it out and let me know if it helps!

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Anyone else have issues staying engaged when your trying to notate all the important stuff? 🖐️ I used to have a hard time keeping track of everything during video calls—trying to take notes, remember key points, and still stay engaged in the conversation. It's pretty overwhelming at times. I started using Zooms AI assistant and Fathom AI, and it’s made things so much easier. It automatically takes notes and highlights the important stuff, so I don’t have to worry about missing anything. Plus, it’s free, which is a nice bonus. If you’ve ever felt the same way, it’s worth checking out! Plus the link below will give you its premium features from free for 3 months. Enjoy. #AI #VideoCalls #FreeTool #WorkSmart

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I call them the anti-buyers. Though IT and Finance aren’t usually the folks picking new products for their companies, they are often the ones with the power to shut a deal down. If Finance has concerns about cost or IT raises flags about interoperability, they can pull the plug on even the most promising contracts. It's in a revenue organization’s best interest to: Factor these critical stakeholders into the equation from day one so they get answers to questions that your primary contact may not know to ask. Make sure that representatives from these important groups are on the buying committee, and Marketing teams need to consider their needs just as early in the process. Ensure these two groups operate in lockstep as they communicate their products’ benefits to these often-overlooked contributors.

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LinkedIn is not a place for politics. Ok, but: When fact-checking is being removed from Meta--the biggest social conglomerate--to appease the new US president, it’s impossible not to bring it up. Zuckerberg said, “The recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritizing speech.” Ok, but prioritizing free speech that only benefits certain parties. In addition to ending fact-checking, Meta is also making changes to its hateful conduct policy, which will break down protections for LGBTQ+ people, immigrants, and other marginalized groups. According to The Guardian, the changes suggest: • It may now be possible to compare women to household objects or property and to compare people to faeces, filth, bacteria, viruses, diseases and primitives. • It should also be possible now to say transgender people “do not exist”. • Allegations of mental illness or abnormality are now allowed when based on gender or sexual orientation. • A specific injunction against calling transgender or non-binary people “it” has been deleted. Welp. So, if you care enough, is it time to quit Meta’s platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, and Threads? Well, it’s a bit difficult when Meta has a monopoly over the social space. Especially if you’re a business that relies on social media to attract customers. Are LinkedIn, Bluesky, and Tumblr the only platforms that are safe from political involvement…for now? 

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I'm still dealing with my annoyance at the lack of a "content update protocol." Or maybe I'm just annoyed that RSS has lost support over the years. Someone mentioned Visualping when I posted before, which I've been playing around with (they were gracious enough to give me a free account). It's very well-done -- probably the extreme end of the spectrum for site update detection. Visualping can isolate an HTML element (like, the "What's New" sidebar or something), and it will diff the prior version of that with whatever it finds when it checks. Here's the thing -- it can diff the text, which is expected; but, it can also diff the pixels. And this is so granular that when I changed the JPG quality of a single image, Visualping actually pointed out the pixels inside the image that were different. (There's a quality control play here, I feel like. If you're a site manager and you want to error-check your site as a background process, you could probably find a way to use this.) Someone else mentioned RSS.app, but I didn't get great results out of this. It allows you to make your own RSS feed out of patterns of repeating HTML elements. Problem is, this depends on how the site's HTML is structured, and it depends on that not changing over time. I assume failures would be silent -- you would just stop getting new items if something changed. (To be fair, I didn't get a lot of time to work with RSS.app before the free trial expired. Ironically, the only item I ever managed to get in a feed was the notification that my trial was coming to an end.) So, this brings me back to my annoyance that RSS fell out of favor for some reason. The biggest hit was losing Google Reader. But, honestly, I blame JSON for a lot of it. When JSON became the new thing, anything "tainted" by XML was effectively deprecated in a lot of minds, which is sad. I don't care about language/format in the slightest. Why can't we make JSON-based RSS popular? (Note: someone has tried it with jFeed. There are probably others). I know we don't need another standard, but here's the thing: RSS readers could just check for the format and manage their own parsers. Is it XML? Parse it as XML. Is it JSON? Parse it as JSON. I feel like we should abstract ourselves away from something as pedestrian as the serialization format (yawn) and just concentrate on the logical process of communicating a content update. How we actually send that information down the wire seems like a small detail. If we popularize a JSON option, will people be happy with it again? (Yes, I'm bitter.) I'm ranting. But the lack of penetration of Deane's Desired Site Update Protocol is a matter of ... value. There's a lot of value here that we're all leaving on the table because of some weird hang-ups.

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Lately, I've been reviewing past projects in buried folders dug up from old drives and finding posts I wrote seemingly a lifetime ago. This one in particular has struck me as a pretty spot-on analysis on the product adoption curve of Bitcoin as I was working on refining my pitch for the now defunct Fluyo remittance service. It's funny how naïve I sound that the price of the leading cryptocurrency had broken $9,000 USD for each BTC during that heady November of 2017, given all that's happened since. Seven years on, as Bitcoin makes another run and begins scratching the $70,000 USD mark, many of the fundamental properties that have made cryptocurrencies so resilient remain at play. The concepts of decentralized networks and smart contracts have been super charged by artificial intelligence, coalescing around an ethos that values user privacy more than the increasingly outdated paradigm of Web2. Web3, as this new amalgamation of technologies and user values is now known, is upon us. I'm excited to find ways to contribute to this new, rapidly evolving ecosystem, using the skills I've developed in designing all kinds of experiences on the web. The tech we use has changed so much, but our motivation to shape it more neatly to our present moment continues unabated. Let's go! 🚀

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