From the Investors

Jalak Jobanputra of FuturePerfect Ventures documents the emerging markets technology trends that are just now emerging in the United States in “When Third is First”

Garry Tan of Y Combinator remembers Instacart’s “hack” into Y Combinator and the power of showing up with a product in “What Instacart Taught Us: Don’t Be a Dreamer, Be a Creator”

Rob Go of NextView Ventures discusses the tactics and trends used on both sides of the table, paying special attention to diluting and recruiting in “Option Pools and VC Negotiations”

Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint Ventures considers the behavior of your users three minutes before and three minutes after they log on/off in “The Three Minute Technique for Brainstorming Your Product’s Roadmap”

Angela Tran Kingyens of Version One Ventures pinpoints opportunities in patient health data and patient-to-expert networks in “What Excites Us in Consumer Healthcare IT?”

Adam Goulburn of Lux Capital foresees healthcare moving from hospital to employer to patient to consumer in “The Great Hospital Shake-Up”

Christian Hernandez of White Star Capital looks at the daunting odds “emerging managers” face and follows the evolution of venture capital in “Barriers to Entry in Venture Capital”

From the Operators

Marc Köhlbrugge of BetaList tells the story of BetaList—how it began as a hack to get press for his actual startup—in “How I Tricked TechCrunch Into Writing About My Startup”

Scott Adams of Dilbert and CalendarTree embraces pivoting and the “psychology experiment” of the Internet in “The Pivot”

Jason Freedman of 42Floors defends his recruiters, his time, and his culture in “In Defense of Recruiters”

Julie Zhuo of Facebook asks specific questions before the feature or app can finish loading in “How to do a Product Critique”

Tobias van Schneider of Spotify sits down with First Round Review to discuss how great ideas can accelerate when they’re allowed—and expected—to fail in “Why Side Projects Should be Stupid”