The Great Online Game

What's up, everyone? Welcome back to another episode of Founders Journal. I'm Alex Lieberman, co-founder and executive chairman of Morning Brew. As I have mentioned, with the new and improved Founders Journal, I am going to act as your startup Sherpa, reading the internet and telling you why it matters and how you can use it in your own businesses so you don't have to. I would love to know what you think about this format, so shoot me an email to alex@morningbrew.com. Introduce yourself. I will email you back and tell me what you think about this idea of me curating the best startup resources on the internet. Summarizing them or reading them to you and then telling you why it matters. Now on to today's episode. I am going to read and break down The Great Online Game by Packy McCormick. This essay is probably the most requested by my followers and listeners, and it provides a completely new way of looking at the internet and our place in it. But also, as you'll see when I share my thoughts after reading the essay, I believe Packy's words act as a refreshing and productive way to measure ourselves in our own careers. So let's dive in. The Great Online Game: How to Win the Internet. May 10th, 2021, by Packy McCormick. This didn't start as a piece about games. I set out to answer this question: why are tech growth stocks sagging while crypto moons and value roars back? But I figured out how to explain that in way fewer words. Crypto is just more fun. But crypto itself is not the game. It's just the in-game currency for a much bigger game played across the internet that involves CEOs, influencers, artists, researchers, investors, and regular people like you and me. That's a much more fun topic to explore than which asset class is outperforming which. This is bigger, more permanent than day-to-day market fluctuations. We are all playing a great online game. How well we play determines the rewards we get online and offline. The great online game is played concurrently by billions of people online as themselves, with real-world consequences. Your financial and psychological well-being is at stake, but the downside is limited. The upside, on the other hand, is infinite. Social media is the clearest manifestation of this metagame. Beginner-level Twitter feels weird, like a bunch of people exposing their personal thoughts to the world. Medium-level Twitter is threads and engagement hacks. Twitter mastery is indistinguishable from an ongoing game. This is also true for Reddit, Discord, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and other social networks. But social media is just one piece of an interconnected game that spans online and offline spaces. The way you play in one area unlocks opportunities opportunities in others. Sharing ideas on Twitter might get you invited to a Discord. Your participation in that Discord might get you invited to work on a new project, and that new project might make you rich, or it might bring you more followers on Twitter and more Discord invites and more project opportunities and new ideas that you want to explore, which might kick off any number of new paths. We now live in a world in which by typing things into your phone or your keyboard, or saying things into a microphone or snapping pictures or videos, you can marshal resources, support, and opportunities. Crypto has the potential to take it up a notch by baking game mechanics, points, rewards, skins, teams, and more right into the whole internet. The great online game is free to play, and it starts simply by realizing that you're playing a game. Every tweet is a free lottery ticket. That's a big unlock. Anyone can play. You can choose how to play given your resources and skills at the current moment. You can level up fast. Financial and social capital are no longer tied so tightly to where you went, who you know, or what your boss thinks of you. This game has different physics and wormholes through which to jump. It is exponential instead of linear. To understand how the game works and how to play, we'll work our way up. And now he goes through the table of contents. What is a video game? The great online game. Meet the players. How crypto supercharges the game, which I'm actually going to skip over, and how to play the game. By the end of this post, I hope I've convinced you to throw a couple of coins in and start playing. But I think I might need to show you that we're even playing a video game first. What is a video game? It's Monday morning. You're tired. You have to go to work. You have an assignment that you pushed off on Friday because it's practically hot vac summer. and you had plans, but now it's Monday, and damn, now you need to do that thing. This does not seem fun. This does not seem like a game. So it might take me a minute to convince you that yes, it is, even for you. I'm going to start my argument like a shitty high school valedictorian. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a video game as, quote, a game played by electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program on a television screen or other display screen. End quote. If you're working remotely from a computer, what you're doing perfectly fits the definition of a video game. Nick Milanovich nailed it. And Nick said, sometimes it's weird to remember that we're all effectively competing to hit the right keys on our keyboards in the right order, and that if we do it for long enough, we can buy a house. Hit the right keys in the right order, make money. Work is just an often boring subgame within the metagame. But that's still a little literal and a lot reductive. Let's go deeper. The best games, according to gaming entrepreneur turned top solo investor Josh Buckley, quote, are creating spaces that bring you into flow, end quote. On Invest Like the Best, Buckley said the biggest games today really take advantage of this, but you wouldn't actually think of them as a game. I look at Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram as games, and 3 billion people are playing them actively. They are essentially big layers on top of a slot machine. Buckley went on to lay out 4 elements of successful game design. 1, frequent feedback loops. 2, variable outcomes. 3, sense of control. And 4, connection to a metagame. All 4 are present in the great online game, none more importantly than the connection to the metagame. The internet is incredible. You'll hear that a lot from people who have started to master the game. As I typed that last sentence, Blake Robbins tweeted this: I think people still underestimate the power of the internet. Twitter specifically has changed my life in so many ways. I've met some of my closest friends, mentors, etc., all through Twitter. Getting good at the great online game makes seemingly absurd things happen. Your business icon in your DMs. That person whose videos you don't miss just reached out for a collab. Your dream job reaching out to tell you why Company X might be a fit. Blake has successfully translated hanging out on the edges of the internet into a career as a venture capitalist at Ludlow Ventures. He's a go-to source on creators, gaming, and future internet stuff more broadly for some of the smartest people in the world. Blake summarized his approach in another recent tweet, and Blake said, this is a perfect summary of how I've approached my career and life to date. Try to add value with no expectation of anything in return. Play the long game. He's playing an infinite game, going down rabbit holes, learning, helping people, meeting new ones, going down more rabbit holes, and so on. James Carse, who coined the term in his 1986 book Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility, wrote, quote, the infinite game— there's only one— includes any authentic interaction from touching to culture that changes rules, Plays with boundaries, and exists solely for the purpose of continuing the game. A finite player seeks power. The infinite one displays self-sufficient strength. Finite games are theatrical, necessitating an audience. Infinite ones are dramatic, involving participants. The Great Online Game is an infinite video game that plays out constantly across the internet. It uses many of the mechanics of a video game, but removes the boundaries. You're no longer playing as an avatar in Fortnite or Roblox. You're playing as yourself across Twitter, YouTube, Discords, work projects, and investments. People who play the great online game rack up points, skills, and attributes that they can apply across their digital and physical lives. Some people even start pseudonymous and parlay their faceless brilliance into jobs and money. The game rewards community and cooperation over individualism and competition. You get points for being curious, sharing, and helping with no expectation of reciprocation. By increasing your surface area, you're opening yourself up to serendipity. For good actors, the game has nearly unlimited upside and practically no downside. You can jump into the great online game at any point, whether as a total unknown or an accomplished person, and start building the world you want to build. It can take you on any number of paths, We'll explore a few. Now, this is the next section called Meet the Players. The inspiration for this essay was Elon Musk's SNL appearance. No one plays this game better than Musk. The best way to explain his out-of-body run is that he's playing a video game with cheat codes. He's doing things that people didn't think were physically possible— see Tesla, SpaceX, Starlink— while getting away with things that people didn't think were legal— see pumping Dogecoin, $420 take private tweet. Getting high on Joe Rogan. He's playing a postmodern game against modern rivals. He's like Neo. He's not trying to forcefully bend the spoon. He understands there is no spoon. He has more money points than all but 2 people in the world to show for it. Musk plays an advanced version of the game in which he builds rocket ships and electric cars and internet satellites. But you don't need to bend atoms or become the wealthiest person in the solar system to win. You don't even have to reveal yourself as a real person. A couple of weeks ago, Austin Rief and I had Bored Elon Musk on our weekly Twitter Spaces show, Space Cadets. Bored Elon is a pseudonymous account. He tweets ideas for inventions that Elon might have if he were bored, and 1.7 million people follow him on Twitter. A couple of months ago, he started selling NFTs. He pulled in $1 million in less than a month. How about a non-Elon example? Take Alex Danko. Alex has literally built himself a world, Dankoland. In an excellent post on his journey, Alex drew an actual map of his journey through the great online game. He started by writing about startups, moved on to bubbles and mania, passed through the swamp of scenes, and made it to the humanities mountain range. While he wrote, he got to meet new people, test new ideas, and build up a reputation. It helped him find his next thing. Quote, this newsletter was obviously part of a fishing expedition to find what I wanted to do next, end quote. Next was a dream job at Shopify, thanks in part to the newsletter. Instead of claiming mission accomplished, though, he's continuing to play the great online game, expanding his world by branching into new communities. Specifically, he's going to have a recurring segment on Jim O'Shaughnessy's Infinite Loops podcast and become a more active participant in Anna Gatt's magical Interintellect. Those will no doubt lead to new opportunities and new worlds to explore. Or take Megan Leeds, and he posts in his article a picture of a tweet that says, this is Megan Leeds. Better known as MeghanPlays. In 2018, Meghan was making $400 a month posting YouTube videos of herself gaming. Today, she takes in millions of dollars a year, has 3.6 million subscribers, and launched a game studio that will bring in $8 million this year. Leeds parlayed YouTubes of herself literally playing video games, The Sims, into Roblox content, into making games, into a $1 million YouTube following, $8 million game studio, and a million-dollar online store. Her quote in Rex Woodbury's thread captures the great online game beautifully. Quote, there's nothing I've done that anybody else can't do. It's about learning, learning the code, learning how the game works, and creating. All you have to do is start, end quote. Start, follow your curiosity, build relationships, stay open to new opportunities, keep playing. How about Lil Nas X? Born Montero Hill after the Mitsubishi Montero, Lil Nas X starts messing around on Facebook, Instagram, and finally, hopped on Twitter where he says, quote, I really was a master. That was the first place where I could go viral. He started making music in his closet, and in December 2018, he dropped Old Town Road, which he made with a $30 sample and $20 worth of studio time. The song was played over 2.5 billion times in 2019 alone. He came out on the last day of Pride Month in 2019 and has used his platform to represent the LGBTQ community as one of the very few out rappers. Earlier this year, he released Montero . He gives the devil a lap dance in the music video. Montero to memes to music to Montero, Lil Nas X continues to use Twitter like a young memelord. He is playing the game. The Great Online Game overlaps with the creator economy. Danko wrote a newsletter, Leeds had a YouTube channel, Lil Nas X makes music, but it doesn't necessarily mean living as a full-time creator. Danko has a full-time job. Leads runs companies with employees. There are countless more examples, from Kim Kardashian to Donald Glover to Turner Novak to Andrea Hernandez to Harry Stebbings to AOC to Webb Smith to Deep Fucking Value to Soulja Boy to Extended Pompliano Universe. All these people seem like they are having a blast while they are quote unquote working. And that's just my corner of the internet. There are millions of people playing the game as well. Each one is internet native. Each plays the game, and each has cashed out some internet points for things like TV shows, Grammy-winning records, venture funds, companies, and political victories. It's less about a particular platform or outcome, and more about the idea that there are different ways of playing the game, and new ways to acquire and grow new types of assets, like cities. Miami Mayor Francis Suarez became a Twitter darling last year when he decided to embrace the tech community. Since responding, quote, how can I help, to Delian's tweet in December, Suarez has pulled a ton of high-growth companies into his city. He's become the go-to example of how to grow a city by playing the great online game. Not surprisingly, he's also embraced crypto. With crypto's ascent, there are thousands of newly minted millionaires and dozens of hundreds of billionaires who built their fortunes by hanging out in Discords, learning about and investing in new coins, playing with new protocols, and treating investing like a game. Millions of people are playing the game just by hanging out and watching. I have multiple friends who a couple of months ago had normal jobs at startups. Then they started hanging out in crypto Discords and Telegrams, trading, learning, meeting new people, tweeting, and going deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole. I can't imagine they'll ever work in a non-crypto job from here on out. Crypto is an asset class that rewards participation in the great online game. The fastest way to understand what's legit and what's not, and which coins people are going to buy and which they're going to ignore, is to spend time participating and learning online. The right Discord or Twitter follow is a massive source of alpha. Plus, crypto is kind of the native token for the great online game. Now I'm going to skip the crypto section here and move on to the last part, how to play the game. On Friday, Shopify President Harley Finkelstein joined us on Spaces Cadets to close out the conversation. We asked him for his advice to potential entrepreneurs out there, and he said, quote, the cost of failure is as close to zero as it's ever been in the history of the world, end quote. That is a key mental shift. The cost of failure is as close to zero as it's ever been, and it will continue to fall. That's true for entrepreneurship, and it's even more true for the great online game because entrepreneurs are trying to build a business. When you start to play the great online game, you're just building optionality. Anyone can play the great online game. All you need is some knowledge and curiosity. A typical path into the game starts out in one niche community. Maybe you start thoughtfully replying to a few people you respect in your field on Twitter, or hop into a crypto Discord and get a feel for the things before asking questions and participating. Ask yourself, quote, what am I nerdiest about? And then go find your fellow nerds. They are out there. Over time, you go from consumer to creator. You write, make videos, lead discussions, build projects, collaborate on research, or just share your experience as a new player figuring it out. If you already have an offline reputation, maybe you skip the passive piece and jump right into activity. In either case, be yourself, but play with your character attributes. You can choose to be someone who's a little good at a lot of things or unbelievably good at one thing. Both work, and you can evolve your character over time. Play with the fearlessness of someone playing a game because you are. These are internet strangers. At worst, they'll ignore you and you can keep workshopping and start over. At best, they'll open up new doors. Once you're in, the game follows Buckley's 4 elements of successful game design. First is feedback loops. Once you jump into the conversation or start sharing, you'll start getting feedback. Don't expect it to be much. A like here, a great point there, maybe some questions and conversations. Pay attention to what's working and what's not, but don't be too calculated about it. People can smell it. Your metric may not be likes or views. A real conversation with one person you respect might be the best starting point. Number 2, variable outcomes. Some things will work and some won't. That's okay. If you're treating it like a game, that's to be expected. The goal isn't perfection, it's experimentation. Play around, try new things. Some will hit, some will not. That's part of the fun. It'll keep you hungry. Number 3, sense of control. In traditional game design, this means that the more you practice, the better you get and the better your outcomes. It's not easy. You get out what you put in. That's doubly true in the great online game because you're not just playing, you're designing the game you want to play. Pick the things that you love the most and go deep. Learn, interact, give value with no expectation of anything in return. Keep learning. There's no boss in the great online game. Your success or failure is a direct result of your skill and effort. And number 4, connection to the metagame. I'm going to give this one its own non-bulleted paragraph. It's important. The metagame here is your life and your career. The more you evolve and level up, the more opportunities you will have. If you build up a following, meet the right people, and get involved with the right projects, you'll have put yourself on an entirely new trajectory. The fun part is, if you do it right, it really can feel like a game. Don't take it too seriously. Don't wait for the perfect moment to jump in. The vast majority of people reading this won't want to quit your job and make a living entirely online. That doesn't mean you cannot play. Play on the side, learn some things, build some new hobbies and relationships. Give yourself an insurance plan if things don't work out in your job, and a supercharger if they do. You never know when it might come in handy or what new path you might discover. Important note: don't be an asshole. It's an easy way to get some followers early, and if you're trying to game that metric, it might work, but it's also the easiest way to lose your life in the great online game. I didn't set out to play the great online game when I started writing Not Boring, but that's accidentally what I did. I didn't set out to play the great online game when I started writing Not Boring, but that's accidentally what I did. 2 years ago, bored at my job, I started spending more time on Twitter and writing a newsletter. I just wanted to meet smart people who were interested in the same things I was. I never in a million years thought that my job would become playing the great online game, but that's what it's become. When people ask me my title, I don't have a good answer. Writer, founder, investor. Some guy with a newsletter. They all fit, and I'm sure I'll add more over time. Playing the game is about having fun and opening doors that you didn't even know existed. It's a lot of work, but it's fun work with exponential upside and compounding returns. Go play. And that is The Great Online Game by Packy McCormick. Now I want to share how I think about this essay in the context of my career and other entrepreneurs' lives. Life and work generally become less fun when we place arbitrary levels of importance and expectations on ourselves as we navigate these things. And by looking at our life and our work as a game, I think it necessarily reorients us to looking at our journeys through the healthiest, most fun and fulfilling lenses possible. I want to give you an example. After stepping out of the CEO role for Morning Brew, I felt like shit. I feel lucky that I've never experienced depression in my life, but the 6 to 12 months post leaving my role were the closest that I have felt to being depressed. While I am in a way better place and headspace today, I think it is incredibly interesting and just as important to examine that period of my life. And I promise I'm going to get back to this idea of the great online game. The question that I've examined a lot during that period of time was Why was I not happy? What was preventing me from being happy at that time? I had made life-changing money. The world considered me to be successful. I was healthy. I had loving family and friends. I was so fortunate and privileged to be in the spot I was in, yet I wasn't at all happy, which ironically made me even less happy because I felt guilt around being unhappy even though I thought I should be happy. So the question remains, why wasn't I happy? And the answer is, I believe, because I wasn't playing the right game. As Packy mentions in his piece, when he talks about James Kars's book Finite and Infinite Games, I was playing a finite game. And in my finite game, I had certain stories and beliefs that led me to being unhappy. I had a story that I didn't grow quickly enough as a CEO, so I was a failure. I had a story that Morning Brew would be my only success. I will have peaked in life at 28 years old. And I'd become irrelevant to the quote unquote people that matter. I had a story that I needed to make more money even though I had more than enough. I had a story that what I built next had to be bigger than what I had already built if I wanted to reach my potential. That was the game I was playing. I was playing a finite game defined by fear of not being enough, not having enough, or not being valued enough. Which brings me to the great online game, and specifically an infinite game, as Kars puts it. What I love about this essay and really this lens that Packy equips you with to look at the world through is that by constructing the game and its rules in the right way, in an intentional way, you can positively force yourself into a mindset that is defined by curiosity, collaboration, and growth without expectations. Here's what I mean. Let's frame my work through the rules of the great online game and imagine what that looks like and how that's different from the picture that I just painted post-CEO role. The rules of my infinite game are simple. I am a character in this game. I am playing against myself, and winning in this game happens in 2 ways. The first way is by getting to higher levels on my core skills. Think of these core skills as like what you see on the back of a baseball card or the front of a Pokémon card. And my core skills are 3 things: getting businesses from 0 to 1, storytelling, and coaching. And the way that I level up on these core skills for my character is spending time on things that allow me to practice these skills and exercise these skills. The second way I win this game is through finding gems. Gems are valuable lessons and insights that can be found through reading, building, and spending time with other people playing the game. So put simply, I win my great online game if I play the game, spend time on my core skills, and find gems through wandering and curiosity. I want to point out 2 things here. First, think about how much less pressure and more playfulness there is when I frame my time and my game in this way. Second, literally nothing about the work that I'm doing necessarily has to change with this new framing. But simply by playing the game, knowing the rules of the game, and thinking through the lens of this game, my experience with the work that I do can be completely different. It keeps me focused on myself, what I'm able to grow, and it blocks out arbitrary expectations or the need for recognition by anyone else. And that is why I am in love with the great online game. As always, thank you so much for listening to Founders Journal. Make sure to check out Packy's essay, which I've included in the show notes, and I'll catch you all next episode.