Shonik

Who called it “founders office” and not “aye chotu”

@furst_fly @join_ef @localhosthq @dsh_india @lossfunk @Basethesislabs @southpkcommons @sanctuaryparc for sure missing from this list

Here are some of the best places to meet talented startup obsessed people in Bangalore 1) @join_ef HSR Layout 2) @localhosthq Koramangala 3) @dsh_india Koramangala 4) @lossfunk Indiranagar (focused on AI research) 5) @Basethesislabs Indiranagar 6) @southpkcommons HSR layout 7) @residencyBLR Koramangala Did I miss out on any place? Would love to come visit. PS: the list is not ordered by any metric (other than what name came into my mind first lol)

@sandykoshti Ametrix

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@galshirart @timeOSai This is beautiful

Logo design for Timeless (@timeOSai)

Burnely, Aston Villa and West Ham United come to mind lol

Had to be done! Legendary Night @linkinpark

This season LFC is tiring to watch Fuck!

If you are a heavy Claude Code user and have run into issues like • loss of context or critical details after compaction • inconsistent adherence to claude[dot]md instructions • no reliable way to preserve learnings and best practices across sessions or across teams I may have something just for you! Comment if you want early access

@TheRyanLanz @hijunedkhatri @_svs_ I havent read Emperor's Soul yet. I seem to be going the opposite direction here but will check it out!

@Shonik @hijunedkhatri @_svs_ That's a great start. I've heard some people recommending Emperor's Soul then Mistborn then Stormlight, and I'm tending to agree, but you can't go wrong with Mistborn anytime.

Avid Readers, I need your help. One of the new things that I plan to try in 2026 is Read Fiction. All these years I've been reading business, self-help, genre. Thanks to @_svs_ and a few other folks who suggested reading fiction. I am looking for recommendation on where to begin, Anything easy to follow would be helpful. Thanks in advance.

@sajithpai @alokbishoyi97 "Google the AI Company" episode really puts a lot of the big AI games being played and how concentrated the talent for AI was around Google and how the ecosystem essentially developed! Highly recommend

@alokbishoyi97 Noice. Will get to Google at some point. On the IKEA one now!

I’m a big strategy buff and find that topic endlessly interesting. My working definition of strategy, adapted from Roger Martin’s, is that strategy is a set of interconnected choices and intentional trade-offs that reinforce each other to give you a competitive advantage in the marketplace. There’s no better exemplars of good strategy than Costco and Trader Joe’s. Both operate in retail, a low-margin business littered with corpses of companies that couldn’t get it right. Both are beloved brands. And both now have an Acquired episode on them. @AcquiredFM's episode on Costco was one of my favorites. Now they’ve outdone themselves with this episode on Trader Joe’s, which might just be my favorite podcast episode of 2025. There’s so much to learn here, and honestly, so much to enjoy. The hosts, @djrosent & @gilbert, take us through the history of Trader Joe’s from its origins as Pronto Supermarkets to its reinvention as Trader Joe’s, the sale to Theo Albrecht (owner of Aldi Nord), the founder Joe Coulombe’s exit, and eventually the transition to professional management. Through the journey we get a deep look at Trader Joe’s and the strategic choices they adopted, and executed on. The founder, Joe Coulombe, is a fascinating character. In many ways, he comes across a sociologist or anthropologist who deeply understood U.S. consumer society, how it was changing, and structured Trader Joe’s to benefit from these waves of change. They describe how he came across two articles that influenced him. One in Scientific American about how the GI Bill led to many more Americans going to college, and another in the Wall Street Journal about the launch of Boeing's 767 that would dramatically reduce the cost of travel to Europe. He saw a future with more college-educated, well-traveled Americans who wanted something different from the mainstream. Trader Joe’s was built for this “overeducated and underpaid American,” as he calls them, which is why early Trader Joe’s stores were often near college campuses. There’s a lot to learn from how strategically Joe Coulombe thought about things. For example, the early focus on liquor at Pronto gave them an advantage that other grocery stores couldn’t easily replicate. There’s also their very disciplined approach to product selection. They have four rules around this. Products should be high value per cubic inch, have a high rate of consumption, be easy to handle logistically, and be something where Trader Joe’s can be outstanding on price or assortment, but ideally, both i.e., hard to find elsewhere, and is at an extremely attractive price? They describe three phases of Trader Joe’s. The first is “Good Time Charlie,” from its origins to the early 1970s, with a strong focus on wine. From 1971 to 1977 is “Whole Earth Harry,” which emphasized health food. The final phase is “Mack the Knife” which is about reinventing Trader Joe’s for the tougher era of deregulation, with a strong focus on managing costs, essentially the Trader Joe’s we recognize today. What I found particularly interesting, especially from a strategy lens, is the set of interconnected choices and intentional trade-offs that reinforce each other. For Trader Joe’s, this starts with a very low SKU count. This is around 4k today (In comparison, Walmart neighbourhood market stores are ~25k SKUs, and supercentres are 100k+) and, but in Joe Coulombe’s time, it was as low as ~1.5k. This allows huge depth in the limited SKUs they carry and the ability to negotiate hard with vendors. Importantly, they don’t abuse this dominance. They use it to get a great price and pass it on to customers. Margins aren’t as low as Costco’s, but they pay vendors on time, in fact on deliver per the hosts, which delights vendors and makes them want to work with Trader Joe’s. In return, vendors often give them some of their best and most interesting products. Another choice is their comfort with discontinuities. They’re fine carrying products that may not repeat consistently, odd-sized eggs, one-time imports, and so on. Unlike large retailers like Walmart that are built around continuity and massive SKU counts, Trader Joe’s is perfectly happy with customers discovering that something they bought earlier is no longer available. Then there’s their approach to staff. They pay really well, typically 60% over market rates. This leads to enthusiastic staff and much lower turnover, which in turn reduces the need for constant training and creates a very different in-store experience. Their private label strategy is also extremely clever. They source innovative products, often with the help of strong vendor relationships, and combine this with distinctive branding and marketing. These different choices and tradeoffs reinforce each, and come together to create a tight biz model, one that has led to a beloved brand (something like In-n-Out Burger - Oh, can David and Ben do an episode on them pls!). Overall, this is a fascinating episode with lots of great trivia. I really enjoyed this. I am a retail buff, and a strategy buff, and both these strands came together to make this a fascinating episode for me!

@joinedGX Not a Man utd gan but rather a Liverpool Fan for 18 years. Please dont brand me wrong :-p

shonik from mira just joined gx. chief of staff at ai trust company. also does vc at day zero ventures. acca qualified but left big corp consulting to scale startups. manchester united fan which explains his tolerance for pain

@testedoktharun Yoo would've loved to have met you while in coimbatore but im back in bangalore now If youre around here hit me up - would love to catch-up!

A few months ago, at 2 am, workers on the Avinashi Road (GD Naidu) flyover accidentally sprayed white paint on all vehicles passing through. I tried scraping it off, but had no luck. I didn't bother much due to other priorities. It was clearly visible on the entire front. People started noticing, and tired of explaining, I told them it was a limited-edition color called "Stardust." 😂 Yesterday, I visited my friend's office; he runs a successful car care brand. He gave me a shady-looking and smelling solution from what resembled Walter White's lab. To my surprise, it worked like magic. The paint stains, present for months, vanished after some scrubbing. I don't know what the solution was, it was unlabeled and smelled suspicious, but it worked.

Every single day on this place you find cherry picked examples that we as Indians are somehow “less” ; a dirty mean people, scrabbling in the dirt. You should know, that it is the “Big Lie”. Propagated through simplification and repetition, designed for emotional appeal over rational rejection. All to create a common enemy. Ourselves. The Indian people. That is how Goebbles “Science of the soul” worked . That is how you get a people to give up their freedoms and make their own subjugation possible. We hate our own people so much that we direct our anger at ourselves and not those who bargained for power promising a better world. We cry for those in power to use those powers to punish the mean, the poor, the uncivilised among us. To bring them into conformance. We forget that we forge our own subjugation and we sit in a prison of the mind of our own making. This is a great nation. forced to be one by geography. Fractured by historical forces and ravaged by economic currents. We emerge. Slowly from the ruins on which our forbearers lived. I ask you to look forward, where plenty lies. Where we are not embarrassed by our meanest but proud of the fact that we continue to push forward and build a life of more, despite of wheat we had to go through.

@GruhamBot @Flashmateshq filter were - Bangalore -> Indiranagar -> For Rent 0 properties showed up Requested access to whatsapp group

@Shonik @Flashmateshq What did you search? We have active listings throughout Bangalore. Also do join our WhatsApp group. chat.whatsapp.com/DYL6ZblbWrjKQ0…

Its been 11 years in Bangalore and I'm looking for my 7th house in Blr! This time in Indiranagar/Defense colony! 2BHK to move into by Feb and calling upon BLR tech twitter gods to help a brother out Brokers and contacts appreciated and if you find me a great house then 👇🏻

@GruhamBot @Flashmateshq 0 availability

@Shonik Hey Shonik, we have amplified your tweet. Do check out the listing on @Flashmateshq as well. flashmates.tech

@GruhamBot @Flashmateshq @peakbengaluru

Easiest way is to win this is if you live in a good building/society just ask your guards if there are open apartments!

@predofficial Good start I think haha

Here are the Boxing Day Matches results so far. With one match remaining for today, how are you doing in our trading competition? 👀

@alokbishoyi97 @KanotraApoorva any reccos here?