Zora

Founder's Journal - Week 2 (8/17/25)

Building the Storytelling Operating System The Platform Play: Learning from Figma's Journey I was listening to Ben Thompson's analysis of Figma's S1 and IPO this week and something clicked. The reason Figma transformed from being an Adobe acquisition target to being positioned to completely dominate the design space isn't just because they built better tools. It's because they became the operating system for designers. Figma didn't just create design software. They created a necessity that takes over your entire workflow. Not only do they build core products themselves, but as an operating system, they focus on the plugins and integrations that make them the essential workstation. Even if you don't want to use every Figma feature, it still makes sense to have them as your hub because everything connects through them. This got me thinking: What would it look like to create the operating system for storytellers in the age of AI? The components are clear: content creation tools, distribution channels, analytics dashboards, community management systems, monetization infrastructure. All the pieces you'd need to really make a living and manage your entire supply chain as a creator. The question isn't whether these tools should exist, it's which ones we build ourselves (focusing on proprietary features with maximum impact and leverage), which ones we partner with through plugins and integrations, and how we build this in an interoperable way where we become the source of truth. Maybe you don't want to use our serialized storytelling tools, but you do want a direct relationship with your audience. Maybe you want to leverage certain monetization features but prefer to manage distribution elsewhere. The operating system approach means you can pick and choose while still benefiting from the integrated workflow. Operating system business models are incredibly strong when you can win them. And here's the thing: there's no clear competitor in this space right now. The opportunity is wide open. The Build or Sell Philosophy: Organizational Anti-Patterns Most companies accumulate organizational bloat as they scale. We're taking a different approach, and it starts with one simple rule: You build or you sell. Period. No support roles. No head of finance. No project managers. If it can be automated, we automate it. If it can't be automated, we contract it out. There's no need for a company our size to have traditional overhead positions. I'll be honest this philosophy means I spend entire days vibe coding internal tools while feeling like a complete moron when nothing works and Claude doesn't want to listen to me. I look up after eight hours of barely moving the ball forward and ask myself: is this useful? But here's what I remind myself: these systems compound. While it feels incredibly grueling in the immediate term, it's all about setting up infrastructure that gives the team time back. The goal is simple: anyone should be able to ask, in natural language, about any part of the company and get instant, accurate information. We're creating a neural network where all our systems talk together. Instead of status meetings, you query the system. Instead of hunting down project updates, you ask and receive. Instead of wondering what the latest numbers are, the data is always accessible and current. Yes, the upfront investment is exhausting. But the long-term leverage is exponential. Even on days when the output doesn't feel like it progressed, the input (the learning) compounds as long as I take something away from the experience. Company Building as Video Game Progression I've been thinking about our business model like a video game, where levels increase in scope, scale, and difficulty—and you don't progress from one level until you've completely mastered the current one. Here's how I see our progression: Level 1 (Current Focus): Building the IP and proving our hypothesis around immersive media. Can we build experiences that fans will enjoy? Can we monetize effectively? Can we own our audience? This level is about singular brand focus—incredibly fragile, where we make or lose customers and revenue based purely on our ability to build the best IP. Level 2: Creation of a platform for other people to deliver IP and content. Once we've proven our IP works, we can sell that methodology and infrastructure to other creators. Now we're not just creating value through one brand, but potentially multiple brands on a platform. Level 3: Becoming a workflow hub. Not only can we explore additional types of content, but we can improve the ability for storytellers to make a living through creator tooling at this level. Level 4: Building other clients. Once we've mastered our own client experience, we expand into enterprise by building experiences for other businesses, studios, and organizations. The insight here is that each level dramatically increases in scope and difficulty. There's something valuable about keeping the model as tight as possible when the product is as small as possible. As you scale the product, opportunities for monetization grow and you become less fragile. The temptation is always to jump ahead, to start building for Level 3 when you haven't mastered Level 1. But premature advancement leads to failure. The discipline is in focusing all your intensity on mastering your current level rather than preparing for future levels. Building for the Creator Economy Platform thinking, lean operations, systematic progression, and technical pragmatism form a blueprint for creator economy companies. We're in a unique moment. The creator economy is exploding, but the infrastructure is fragmented. Creators juggle dozens of tools for content creation, audience management, distribution, analytics, and monetization. They're forced to become part-time systems administrators instead of focusing on what they do best: creating. The opportunity is to become the operating system layer that ties everything together. Not necessarily by building every tool, but by creating the workflow hub that makes all the tools work together seamlessly. The market timing feels right. No clear winner has emerged in the storytelling OS space yet. The first mover advantage is still available for a company that can execute on this vision with the right combination of product focus, operational efficiency, and strategic patience. The execution philosophy that's emerging from our week-to-week learning: Go slow to go fast later- Invest in systems and infrastructure that compound Allow yourself grace to experiment - Build unnecessary things to learn what's necessary Think in compound systems - Prioritize leverage and maximum impact tools over quick wins Focus on the current level - Master fundamentals before scaling complexity The question isn't whether someone will build the storytelling operating system. The question is who will build it first, and how they'll approach the complexity of serving such a diverse creator ecosystem. Catch ya same time and place next week. Austin