Casual gurudom

When Anu Atluru’s essay Taste is Eating Silicon Valley went viral, we were already in the middle of an asynchronous email interview. (The title is a riff on Marc Andreessen’s 2011 manifesto.) If X née Twitter is a sinking ship, Anu is one of my favorite fiddlers. Her tweets, many of which read like aphorisms, lend her feed a casual gurudom. When we’ve had the opportunity to talk on the phone, a couple times over the last year, I’ve found her to be a generous listener and enjoyed puzzling through problems together.

Looking through my bookmarks, some recent gems include: “People who can befriend anyone are just experts at platonic flirting,” “Internet beef is just digital road rage,” and “People want to become influencers so they can afford to live the life they’re already pretending to live online.”

I’ve found her to be the rare keen observer of both human nature and the specific humans that are drawn to the world of startups—and nothing about her general vibe or demeanor suggests she’s going to pivot to selling courses. 

As of today, the initial screenshot she posted of Taste is Eating Silicon Valley has gained over 500 retweets and 3,000 likes, touched off days of discourse at the watercooler known as “tech Twitter”, and prompted thoughtful responses from (friends of Dirt) Reggie James and Holyn Kanake.

The following is the product of a few condensed email conversations. 

Daisy Alioto: Do you consider your tweets advice?

Anu Atluru: Nope. I consider them opinionated reflections—there's always source material from my world. I leave it to the reader to decide if there’s anything worth remembering.

DA: Observations about startups and observations about the psychology of relationships are uniquely bad on X—but you weave them both together with so much grace. Do you think there is something about starting a company that forces you to think deeply about human nature? 

AA: Without sugarcoating it—human suffering is the common thread. Starting a company forces you into the path of suffering, and that experience pushes you to make sense of yourself, the human experience, and the world around you. But it's not just unique to startups; any intelligent person going through trials and tribulations is driven to understand humanity.

On another level, people who gravitate towards creating consumer and social products, if they're a good fit, are naturally curious about why people behave the way they do, beneath the surface. For better or worse, I've always been wired this way. It's an archetype of curiosity that's universally relevant since people are at the core of everything we build.

DA: Many people try to be a guru on X but your thoughts come across as things you want to express regardless of engagement. Do you optimize your tweets for engagement at all? 

AA: Yes and no. The ‘right’ way to grow on social media is to figure out what people like and hammer the same 2-3 messages in different ways. But I get bored too easily, and the range of things I care about is too broad for me to be willing to do that. If I were completely unfiltered, I’d tweet more about sports, science, fashion—everything that interests me.

But for better or worse, followers see you as a ‘channel.’ They want to know what 2-3 main things your channel is about, with only the occasional surprise. So I never say anything I don't care about, but I don't say everything I do care about.

DA: You tweet a lot about taste and storytelling. Do you agree that they will play a large role in the future of startups? 

AA: Yes, without a doubt. Taste and storytelling have always mattered, but now they’re an X-factor. We're shifting from scarcity to abundance, and people are overwhelmed by choices—most of which are 'good enough.' The challenge is that people aren't equipped to rationally compare so many good options. This is where taste and storytelling come in as essential filters. But they aren’t singular, absolute truths, which makes it all the more complex, and more fun, to figure out.

Interview continues below

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DA: You recently wrote about how taste is eating Silicon Valley. Were you expecting it to go viral? What has the response been like?

AA: I had a sense that it would resonate with the niche of people and communities I’m closest to, but I didn’t expect it to go beyond that. Going viral is impacting the culture for a moment, which is fun. But that reach inevitably opens up a can of worms in the form of feelings, opinions, adjacent ideas from all kinds of people. If you’re lucky, it includes messages from people you respect.

DA: Which accounts do you find the most useful?

AA: I find the most useful accounts are the ones with sharp, often hot takes on what's happening in tech, business, media, art, and culture. They’re part of my hacky 80/20 research method of soaking up different perspectives to quickly get a feel for what’s worth diving deeper into. I also follow 'good taste' accounts, ones that share beautiful things, and, of course, dog pics.

DA: Where do you spend your time online beyond X?

AA: I get lost down rabbit holes. Essays, op-eds, Wikipedia spirals, random YouTube binges.

Then I hit a point where I’ve had enough of noisy online discourse, and I escape to just watching movies and getting lost in conversations IRL.

DA: Who are your favorite essayists?

AA: I've always admired the likes of George Orwell and Jonathan Swift. They had sharp insights about their times and the courage to speak them. Satire feels like a lost art now. If you want to make potentially subversive observations today, you become a comedian. Essay writing feels like a rare and fading art too. I find myself following more bloggers and novelists!

DA: What’s the distinction between a blogger and an essayist these days? 

AA: I see it like this: A blog post is like a public journal entry, more casual and personal, capturing thoughts as they come in a raw and unfiltered way. An essay stands on its own with a single concept and argument, more intentional, diving deeper into the nuances and meaning behind it.

DA: What are three things you wish more people building companies knew? 

AA:

1. Why they’re building a company (unironically, very few people have true clarity).

2. What they’re trying to achieve (people are mimetic and love to keep moving goal posts).

3. What they’re willing to sacrifice (nothing is certain except death, taxes, and tradeoffs). 🪦

Have thoughts on taste? Come to Discord and chat with us. 

DIRT ON TASTE