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Clujso (David)
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I read Duolingo’s Handbook so you don’t have to. Here’s the core principles, with crypto commentary: Take the long view “A 100 year brand”, if someone cloned Duolingo, they would come back for the characters. “We knew that building the best education app would be a multidecade effort”. Streaks has been years in the perfecting process They even built custom built a notification tool that PMs can use without engineering support to test them out They excel at high impact and low cost efforts,a a thoughtful balance of organic growth and marketing An early story was replacing the “tree” learning structure, with a “path”, even tough it was more restrictive, it helped lay the right foundations to users, and ended up being the right decision Few crypto companies build for the next 100 years
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Clujso (David)
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Raise the bar Duolingo is going to be the best work in their careers. They built a shake to report feature for employees to report bugs and other feedback while testing seamlessly If someone doesn’t own it, it’s not going to be excellent. People ship V1s, and not MVPs. Everything is polished Luis and Severin still approve every hire Crypto talent is often elusive, remote, and sketchy. Get an office and ship
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Clujso (David)
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Ship It “Clock Speed” is the mindset. In microprocessing, it’s how fast a process goes. In Duolingo, it’s how fast the ship goes. How fast can feedback get implemented? They often run “99 bad ideas”, where teams brainstorm all the bad ideas, experiment with them, and find one that might be the next moonshot Crypto often involves long timelines, and cumbersome governance process. Cut them
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Clujso (David)
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Show Don’t Tell First, “prototypes not decks”. It starts with a prototype that actual humans will use, not a deck laying out an abstract narrative “Metrics should be at the center of all our work.” This is how they decide if something belongs in the app In crypto everything is onchain. Get yourself a Dune dashboard and judge objectively
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Clujso (David)
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Make it Fun We’ve all seen Duo on socials. It’s unhinged, and it’s part of the company culture. “Humor doesn’t scale, it’s subjective, and often polarizing.” Most times, not everyone would get the joke, and that’s ok. Commit to the bit, and focus on those who loved it. There’s a lore on Duo Crypto has a dark humor twist, don’t overdo it, but leverage it
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