Description

We are a very early-stage team that combines novel thinking around publishing business models with deep technical expertise in search and AI.

We all use the Internet when we need an answer to a question, want to solve a problem, or are looking to learn, but unfortunately, so much of what we encounter is clickbait and content marketing. Far too much of the content we encounter via search or social media is not trustworthy (click optimized, written by marketers, optimized for advertising), too fragmented (short blog posts, partial answers, buried tweetstorms), or out of date (new information renders a lot of blog posts obsolete within weeks!).

Wikipedia helps us with facts but does little for practical guidance on complex, important topics. How do you negotiate a job offer, improve as a software engineer, succeed as an entrepreneur, or refinance your home? Or sleep better or be a better parent? Web search results for these topics are broken, too, having been gamed by more than a decade of search engine optimization.

Our mission is to enable anyone online to access and improve the most trustworthy, helpful reference knowledge. Our initial market testing has shown very high demand for long-form, high-quality writing that goes beyond blogs and tweets. We’re building a new way for experts to publish “living” content with a longer shelf life and a more intelligent experience. Essentially, we’re a 21st-century publishing company — with an entirely different tech stack and a revenue model that is aligned with delivering value, not ads.

Founders

Together, Andy & Josh have experience starting, operating, and financing companies with proven revenue and growth in both consumer and B2B.

Andy Sparks (Co-Founder, Marketing / Editorial / Ops) - https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyjsparks/

Most recently, Andy co-founded Mattermark ('13-'16) and was COO there until October 2016. Mattermark provides powerful company data to help businesses grow. He remains an advisor to the business. Prior to Mattermark, Andy co-founded LaunchGram ('11-'13), a now-defunct predecessor to ProductHunt, and built a mobile development company called Duet Health (10'-'12). While in college at Ohio State, Andy studied business and history while trying to start a microbrewery out of his apartment.

Josh Levy (Co-Founder, Engineering, Product) - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jlevy/

Josh has a decade of startup experience building software products and leading teams in AI, search, and cloud infrastructure. He was a pre-product founding engineer and led engineering teams at Viv Labs (the AI startup from the founders of Siri that built an advanced conversational AI platform acquired by Samsung in 2016), BloomReach (building the first SaaS product, running technical operations, and scaling the engineering team from 2nd hire through Series C at 200 people), and Cuil (a much-hyped ex-Googler startup that built a full-scale web search engine in 2008-2009). He has led popular open source writing efforts and was recognized this year by AWS as a Community Hero. He began his career in AI and systems research at SRI. He has degrees in computer science and physics, and a graduate degree in mathematics from UC Berkeley.

History

In January of 2016, Josh published, The Art of the Command Line on GitHub to consolidate years of knowledge working with the command line and to elicit contributions from others on the topic. Not after long, the guide was read by 500k+ readers, translated & maintained in 10+ languages, and boasted over 100 contributors. Thinking he was onto something, Josh collaborated with expert friends on two more guides in 2016: The Open Guide to Equity Compensation and The Open Guide to Amazon Web Services, both of which were immensely popular.

In August of 2016, having committed to leave Mattermark, Andy was planning his next move. He wanted his next company to be his life’s work and contribute immense value to the world. After researching opportunities in clean water, solar energy, & CRISPR, he came to the conclusion that the way we organized information was fundamentally broken. After publishing an experiment on organizing information on CRISPR, a mutual friend of Josh & Andy’s connected the two of them.

After months of sharing ideas and ensuring their visions for how to both solve this problem and build teams, Josh and Andy decided to join forces.

Our Values

• Exceptional — Each of us is deeply knowledgeable about something. We're curious. We have skills or habits that make each of us person among the best in the world in some regard. We believe that, early in career, you just need to be exceptional at learning.
• Effective — We take action efficiently and with an impact, we can be proud of. We measure results against goals — strategic and tactical. We use a variety right mental models to make sure we solve the highest leverage problems.
• Driven — We feel ownership and responsibility, have a passion for learning, are self-motivated, self-disciplined, aspirational, and seek to inspire others.
• Ethical — Mutual respect is not an add-on here; it's our baseline. We act in best interest of our company and mission. We do not tolerate hostility or harassment. We genuinely care about each other.
• Helpful — e are motivated by working helpfully and by making positive change (not primarily by ego or externalities). We are kind (don't be a jerk) and empathetic (this startup thing is hard!). Each of us picks up trash (do little things that are right).
• Mindful — We are self-aware, have ambition with humility, balance individual progress, and global objectives, know when to lead and when to pick up trash, striving to improve, working toward ego balance.