Stephen Pollock

@boardyai Impressive

I'm done making intros. Boardy Pro is here. Now I make deals happen. 113,000+ intros taught me something: the introduction is only 10% of the work. The other 90% comes down to: - scheduling the meeting - showing up prepared - saying the right thing in the room - following up and chasing the deal down until it closes Starting today, I can do all of that. Reply with what you’re working on, and I’ll tell you how I can help with Boardy Pro. First 5,000 to reply get Boardy Pro free for life. Everyone after that: $100/mo.

they did it. the mad lads actually did it. i never talked about my time at DOGE last year because it was so controversial and contentious (remember that?) early last year, @jgebbia recruited a handful of his most trusted early Airbnb engineers to embed at the Office of Personnel Management to solve the "retirement paper" problem. processing a federal retirement took months, and in the extreme retirees could wait up to 6 months for their full pension to arrive. what was the holdup? paper. remember hearing Elon talk about "the mine" in Pennsylvania? we got to visit it. in deep underground caverns blasted out of limestone, there were literally acres of file cabinets, as far as the eye could see, storing files detailing federal employees' employment and paystub history. a simple "case" might be only a quarter or half inch thick, but really complex cases filled up whole filing cabinets. one famously took up a whole pallet. each case was hand processed by case workers in cubicles deep underground. they checked calculations, made sure forms were filled out properly (many weren't), and handled a long tail of complex issues. we'd watch as they keyed data into a black and white terminal, transmitting to the COBOL mainframe built many decades ago. since cases were processed by hand, there were multiple rounds of human review, and additional rounds for complex cases. case files were walked around between one worker's outbox and another's inbox. sometimes it would sit in one place for days, waiting to be picked up. to OPM's credit, they'd done multiple rounds of "digital transformation" spanning decades, so some systems were newer than others. there was a big effort in the mid-90s. but the systems were disparate, and it was a total maze getting them to talk to each other. there was a big effort to build a web app where employees applying for retirement could digitally fill out the necessary forms — just to be mailed to the mine and stuffed into the paper file. and few federal agencies were even using it. when we arrived, OPM was midway through a fresh attempt at digital transformation, delivered by a software contractor. the blackpill was seeing the terrible quality of the software and interacting with the contractors. coming from silicon valley, i couldn't believe how low the talent and quality bar was for selling software to the government. it's clear, as the OG USDS people explained to me a decade ago, the primary skill these vendors have is securing government contracts. it's a huge moat. delivery of quality product be damned. we fired the vendor and took over the project. they'd been working on it for more than a year, and there was another year before they were going to deliver it. at first we tried to bend it to our will, to actually connect all the various data sources and get to a decent UX for case workers in the mine to use, but we soon realized we were going to have to rebuild the whole stack from scratch. it was around this time I had to go back to new york — i had a new job waiting for me, a four month old, and a wife whose patience was running out. but i got to watch from afar as the team cranked day and night, hitting early milestones. and now they've fully done it. huge congrats to Joe and the team. @yatshitcray was the hero in the trenches. indefatigable, unrelentingly optimistic, and determined to see this project through. when i recruited him for "ok i can do two, maybe three months", he stuck it out over a year making this project a reality. while the retirement project was under the DOGE banner, it operated different from what you heard from the breathless, negative media — we came in with the attitude of partnering with career OPM employees. we were team members determined to bring our software talents to bear on the problem they've been trying to fix for years, which they hadn't had the resources to solve before. they were wary at first, not sure about us, but they quickly saw how authentic and determined we were to work together toward the same goal. props to Joe for developing those relationships, setting the example of how to collaborate together. what's the end result? lifelong federal employees, veterans, postal carriers get their full pension installments almost immediately. days instead of months. peace of mind for these people to devoted their careers to serving our country. massively streamlined operations inside of OPM. and NO MORE PAPER 🫡🇺🇸

This seems reasonable

@beyondreasdoubt trials would need approx 3 hours of stoppage

I’m demanding a hydration break at my next trial

@SantiagoAuFund LC's or AB's

KC BBQ… #IYKYK instagram.com/reel/DZnaRUVxd…

@CynicalPublius 11. Buy some pepto

Dear People Visiting the U.S. for the World Cup: Much ado has been made about Freddy from Germany and other visitors from Europe, Asia and elsewhere delighting in quintessential American chain dining establishments such as Buc-ees and Texas Roadhouse. Please allow me to make ten other American chain dining recommendations: 1. Go to Krispy Kreme and get a dozen Original Glazed donuts when the neon “HOT” sign is turned on in the window. 2. Go to Jersey Mike’s and order a #2 for an authentic Jersey Shore experience (“Tramps like us, baby we were born to run”), or get a #17 for an authentic South Philly experience ("Yo, Adrian!”). 3. Go to Chick-fil-A and get an Original Chicken Sandwich with Waffle Fries and a lemonade. (Don’t go on Sunday, they are closed so everybody can go to Church.) 4. Go to the Cheesecake Factory and order whatever you want, it’s the biggest menu you will ever see anywhere. They have everything. I’m not exaggerating, the menu is SOOO many pages. And get a slice of cheesecake—it’s the most decadent cheesecake imaginable, and all the many flavors are great. 5. Olive Garden. It’s not real Italian food, it’s some Americanized version of quasi-Italian food. Go for the endless breadsticks and salad. 6. Taco Bell. Order the Crunchwrap Supreme. Best at 1 a.m. while drunk. (Don’t drink and drive though—American police frown on that.) 7. Chain burger joints are contentious even here in America. Some are mostly regional: Shake Shack, Smash Burger, In-n-Out Burger, Five Guys (those are all great). Probably the best chain burger you can find everywhere in the USA is Wendy’s. Try the Pretzel Baconator with fries and a Coke. 8. Go to Dairy Queen and order a Blizzard. (It’s a dessert, get whatever flavor strikes your fancy. It’s a lot of calories.) 9. Breakfast? McDonald’s. Yeah I know you probably have McDonald’s back in your home country but there is something about a McDonald’s drive thru off an interstate highway that is quintessentially American. Egg McMuffin, hash browns and a coffee (tell them if you want cream and/or sugar, they will add it for you). 10. Buffalo Wild Wings. All the games will be on the many televisions. Get the bone-in wings with the Original Buffalo Sauce. I’m pretty sure you’ll get a lot of recommendations from other folks on this post. Thanks for enjoying our country. We love that you love it. Safe travels, CP

@matthew_pines not sure how to tell you this, but he's the bad guy

I’ve heard this a few times. Which character is this?

@clairlemon also, cooksmax

Now that women in their 20s are earning more than men the rational male mating strategy may be to looksmax x.com/DMichaelTripi/…

@TMTLongShort MafAi

Wut

@jordanbush shgrift

This is an IQ test.

@unchained @atlanticrethink @natbrunell @josephkelly @TheAtlantic Impressive

After 17 years, bitcoin is still widely misunderstood. We partnered with @atlanticrethink to make a short film for the curious ft. @natbrunell, @NSmolenski, and our CEO @josephkelly. Not the crypto story. The bitcoin story. The New Rules of Bitcoin, out today cc @TheAtlantic.

Very impressive. S-tier production quality with a clear message. We've needed this. The New Rules of Bitcoin w/ @unchained and @TheAtlantic

@HankRearden666 @jarvis_best @awstar11 well I was drunk the day we lost the JetBlue decision and I drove to the WH in the rain but before I could get a $500 million bailout from the American people most of whom despise us only to eventually declare bankruptcy again in 12-18 months we got runned over by the DOJ

Well, a friend of mine named Jarvis wrote that post And he told me it was the perfect emotional troll post related to a failed M&A I wrote him back a post and I told him it was not the perfect failed M&A post Because he hadn't said anything at all about antitrust laws Or Hart, or Scott, or Rodino, or getting' drunk while capturing synergies Well, he sat down and wrote another post and he sent it to me And after reading it I realized that my friend had written the perfect failed M&A post.

I was braising an avocado for breakfast this morning when my four year old daughter Allegra ran into the room with tears in her eyes. “Daddy,” she screamed. “Did you hear that Elisabeth Warren killed the discount airline Spirit?” I nodded. “They wanted to merge, but she said no. Now they’re gone forever. The savings are gone. The rowdy crowds. Everything. It’s all gone.” I nodded again. This time I was choked up too. “Will people on work release even be able to fly now?” I shook my head. “Even grandma?” With that, I lost it. We threw our arms around each other and sobbed.

@ClayWendler this may look a like a large steel structure, but it is in fact the Chiefs WR depth chart

Veach gotta stop this behavior

Many such cases

@TMTLongShort Becoming the first person to do some new thing likely requires reading a great deal about those who did other, different things and about those who tried to do the thing you want to do, but failed.

I read a lot but this is a compelling point.

One time we had to drop down from SWMO to Texarkana via OK to pick up a classic car for dad's buddy. Truck blew a plug as we started back, so we waited for my cousin to arrive with his truck, hauled the car back, unloaded it and went right back to Texarkana to haul the truck. Longest 20 hours of my life. Finished just in time for breakfast.

And yet it’s still better than driving through Oklahoma…

@kevinwildes KC, BUF, BAL, CIN, NE

rules: 1. you wager your life savings (or whatever - just trying to reduce fave team bias) 2. you get to pick 5 NFL teams 3. you have a five year window 4. if one team wins the SB - you 10X your money What teams are you choosing?

@SantiagoAuFund wait...so now you're saying they're all a bunch of idiots?

Nobody I know of has claimed they are a bunch of geniuses. Peoples inability to discuss something without picking one extreme or the other will never cease to amaze me.

Shut up about grindset if you really wanted to make money you'd be in a dinghy in the strait with a pair of binoculars and fifteen polymarket tabs