True Insights: Onward and Up

We’re only nearing the end of January and, already, so much has happened. Here’s what’s been going on with the True community:

Bandcamp’s Ethan Diamond talked “streaming versus subscription” and what’s required to foster true fandom on NPR’s Marketplace. Bandcamp also reflected on its year of great growth in a non-infographic year-end post outlining the music platform’s perspective on the current state of the music industry.

Cloverpop’s Erik Larson published an article in Forbes about how to “Make New Year’s Resolutions Like a Boss in 2017.” In the piece, he advises “decisions happen, resolutions and goals don’t,” a fair point supported by his study of the science of decision making. I, for one, appreciate his baloney advice explainer chart which pokes a little fun at thought leadership in general.

Decorated entrepreneur and journalist John Battelle, of NewCo, challenged his own 2016 predictions in an end-of-year post covering everything from the invention of mobile strategies that extend beyond just “more apps” to whether or not platforms such as Facebook and Medium would indeed help publishers succeed. Battelle also interviewed Andy Slavitt, who’s known for saving healthcare.gov, on NewCo Shift.

Madison Reed opened its first physical location in the Flatiron District of NYC, garnering attention from CNBC, Forbes, Women’s Wear Daily and more. This follows the launch of the hair color disruptor’s chatbot, Madi, which was released a few months prior.

Machine learning startup Solvvy announced its first product, Solvvy for Support, which allows users to ask questions in natural language to get specific, accurate answers immediately. Every successful interaction enhances the next user’s experience, which the Solvvy team (shown below) was proud to explain in their first blog post following a funding announcement in WSJ.

Alex Kubicek of weather data analytics platform Understory wrote an article about why current weather data is insufficient, the problems caused by it and why insurers need a new data set to fill in blind spots.

Lastly, the Callstats.io team published a piece about how they get new software developers up to speed quickly, in an astonishing 30 minutes to be exact.

While the year is young, news and owned media are barreling at full steam ahead. What will you make a case for this year?

True Insights is a monthly round-up of articles published by True Ventures’ community of thought leaders.