Q3 2023

life news, startup updates, cool links, and pics from the last 3 months.

Oct 07, 2023

Updates 🗞️

Wow, only one quarter of the year left 😌 time flies when you’re working very hard, constantly, on a ton of different things… I guess.

The past three months have been pretty jam-packed. I’m in my last quarter of high school, working part-time at a startup, growing my two communities, and building something new in between.

I’m four months into my internship at Corner. Experiencing this team in action as it navigates pivotal first moments of venture-backed flight is a real privilege. So far, I’ve spent my time powwowing with power users, experimenting with community/growth strategies, onboarding people begging to skip the waitlist, and handing over the mysteriously multiplying bugs that users discover in-app to our iOS magician, Qasim, who stomps them out in a matter of seconds.

meeting up with Eliza and Jake, corner co-founders, in NYC :)

In other Corner news, a couple months ago I got a DM from Jason Carman, head of content at Astranis. He wanted to share a new project he’s kicked off called Startup Saturday Stories. In addition to his work at Astranis, he’s filming, editing, and publishing mini-docs about “startups changing the world”. We were lucky enough to be on his list. You can watch Corner’s episode with Eliza and Jake chatting in a San Francisco apartment about all to come.

Next up… 👀 🌾

I want to update you on UltraRice. I’m happy to report that our mission of using ultrasonically nutrient-scalable rice to end malnourishment in India lives to see another day.

After receiving encouragement from people working at organizations like TKS, the UN, and Action Against Hunger, we set out to raise enough money to sustain a research and validation period. We need lab space, machines, vitamin solutions, not to mention, rice (!) to conduct the experiments necessary to bring it to life.

Between Emergent Ventures and generous early-supporters, we’ve raised $20k+ in non-dilutive grant capital. With continued hard work, this will water a well-researched hypothesis into our very first grain of beautifully supercharged rice.

big thank you and congrats to the team (anika, laasya, prabhat 🫶)

So now we’re off to figure out if the solution we’ve developed works.

If it doesn’t work on our watch, our trial and error will save any future innovators the time and money to push potential solutions a few steps closer to the finish line. If we crack the code ourselves, we’ll figure out the best way to implement this solution to the hundreds of millions of people who need it. Throughout our non-profit research phase, we’ll be optimizing for trust and transparency. Our finances are publicly available as are our findings as we make them :)

Deep breaths let’s speedrun some other news

Watch out, pedestrians - I got my driver’s license!
I’ve started getting into film photography; here are my first shots from an expired UltraMax roll from the late ‘90s
My personal site’s photo gallery has been polished up, you can check it out here
Was absolutely gob-smacked by Dylan and Brian’s synchronized walking at Config
I, along with my backpack, got inspected by two cats with no tails, no warrant

Numbers 📊

UltraRice 🌾

$18.3k+ in the bank
12 months left in our planned research phase

Buildergroop 🔨

5.5k+ members (10% increase)
11k+ visitors on BuilderBook (10% increase)

Photography Lounge 📸

14k+ members (13% increase)
7M+ messages (20% increase)
403k+ images sent (22% increase)

Links 👀

Must-watch shows and movies 🎞️

The Bear S3, Hulu

The Morning Show S3, Apple TV

Building a Tech Future in Russia’s and China’s Shadow, YouTube

Searching For Italy, Max

Elvis, Prime Video

Top-notch links and resources 🔥

How Anxiety Leads To Greatness, YouTube

THE HUMAN FUTURE: A Case for Optimism, YouTube

Startup childhood, Dalton Caldwell

Five laws for community-led growth, Bessemer VC

Marginal, Paul Graham

Scrapbook 🤳🏼

After living in Rhode Island for 5 months, I’m moving back across the border to Connecticut. I have a bigger move coming in 3 months so my next update will likely be sent to you from another continent 👀 Here are some pics from my trip to NYC and a beach in Rhode Island.