NFX
NFX, a venture firm, publishes essays on network effects, marketplaces, startup ideas, founder psychology, and AI.
What HN says
HN commenters recommend its network effects writing as a good resource, particularly for people who have worked on marketplace startups.
Stats for nerds
96HN people shared it
206linked in comments
1.8Kstory points
Apr 2026last shared
Top posts on HN
- 1Life Is Driven by Network Effects7 people · 283 points · first shared 2020 · 53 comments on HN
- 2How Billion Dollar Marketplaces Are Built1 person · 145 points · first shared 2020 · 38 comments on HN
- 3Status, Wealth, & Power: Network Effects Demand a New Social Contract1 person · 123 points · first shared 2021 · 167 comments on HN
- 4Rules of Storytelling for Fundraising2 people · 116 points · first shared 2021 · 7 comments on HN
- 5The Next 10 Years Will Be About “Market-Networks”1 person · 102 points · first shared 2018 · 23 comments on HN
- 6Network Effects Manual9 people · 92 points · first shared 2018 · 4 comments on HN
- 7Viral effects are not network effects1 person · 83 points · first shared 2020 · 23 comments on HN
- 8Darwin, Machines, and the Future: A conversation with George Dyson1 person · 71 points · first shared 2020 · 43 comments on HN
- 9What It Takes to Build a Marketplace: The Poshmark Story1 person · 56 points · first shared 2019 · 23 comments on HN
- 10A Founder’s Exponential Toolset: Wright’s Law, Moore’s Law, & More1 person · 49 points · first shared 2021 · 21 comments on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
- geoahSep 2022
Happened to be reading an old interview with vitalik earlier today which mentioned the following, but unfortunately doesn’t link the studies.
> The idea a few years ago was basically that if you had taken an older person (or this works with animals too) and you basically just connect their bloodstream to the younger person, then the older person would be kind of, you know, quote ‘rejuvenated’ with the younger person’s blood to some extent.
> It was somewhat inconclusive, but of course, it really captured the imagination, just because of the bloody optics of the thing.
> But then there was this interesting study from a year ago that I think, or somewhere close to a year ago, that kind of really changed the narrative on this. It turns out that you don’t need young blood for this. Like, it turns out that if you just replace part of a person’s blood with, I think it was water and with saline, and albumin. Basically just water with a couple of other dumb things, then you can have basically all the same positive effects?
> It turns out that the gains from that procedure don’t come from younger people having good ingredients, they come from older people having damaged ingredients. And if you can flush those damaged ingredients out, then you can potentially reduce the level of damage in a person’s body.
> Once again, this is the sort of thing that’s still significantly too early to be really doing, but it’s the sort of thing that is definitely worth kind of doing more research…
- NetOpWibbySep 2022
Went through my Pinboard to extract all these:
- https://797capital.com/
- https://www.indexventures.com/
- https://www.sparkcapital.com/
- https://www.hcp.com/
- https://hvflabs.com/
- https://www.republiccapital.co/
- https://plus.vc/
- https://www.rarebreed.vc/
- https://www.dragonfly.xyz/
- https://macventurecapital.com/
- https://parafi.com/
- https://www.chingona.ventures/
- https://www.plexocap.com/
- https://lowercarboncapital.com/
- https://www.blckvc.org/
- https://www.gsr.io/
- https://rbf.capital/
- https://www.allraise.org/
- https://betaworksventures.com/
- https://www.gfrfund.com/
- https://www.hustlefund.vc/
- https://www.atelierventures.co/
- https://www.thetwentyminutevc.com/
- https://www.nfx.com/
- https://645ventures.com/
- https://backstagecapital.com/
- https://panteracapital.com/firm/
- https://femalefoundersfund.com/
- https://susaventures.com/
- https://atomic.vc/
- https://homebrew.co/
- https://www.cowboy.vc/
- https://foundersfund.com/
- https://www.kaporcapital.com/
- https://www.felicis.com/
- https://www.cleocap.com/
- https://www.ggvc.com/
- https://www.haystack.vc/
- https://www.menlovc.com/
- https://www.battery.com/
- https://www.nea.com/
- https://www.greycroft.com/
- https://group.softbank/
- https://twosigmaventures.com/
- https://www.redpoint.com/
- https://www.angellist.com/
- https://luxcapital.com/
- https://lsvp.com/
- https://www.bvp.com/
- https://upfront.com/
-…
- IsaacSchlueterNov 2022
> Might be wrong, but brief review of this appears to show the “thesis” of PriceOps is yield-based metered feature pricing
The "thesis" of PriceOps is less "you must have metered feature pricing", and more "you should design your infrastructure so that you can learn from and adjust pricing in the future". In other words, expect that your product, customers, and landscape will change, and understand that the pricing scheme (ie, what you charge for, how much you charge, and how you bundle prices into a packaged plan) will almost certainly need to change as well.
> Do you have an related research to link to?
Here's a selection of links to check out if you're interested in learning more about this subject. I haven't carefully reviewed each one of these to make sure they're 100% what you're asking for, but they're all things I've read and found helpful studying this topic, and many have links to more research and primary sources. Hope you find it helpful :)
On unlocking growth with pricing:
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/11/turn-your-startups-pricing-strategy-into-a-powerful-growth-lever/?guccounter=1
https://www.nfx.com/post/the-hidden-world-of-pricing
https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/saas-pricing-strategy
https://www.bvp.com/atlas/why-pricing-deserves-as-much-iteration-as-product-development-and-how-one-multibillion-dollar-public-tech-company-does-it
More from BVP, this pricing course is amazing btw, I highly recommend checking it…
- maxwellApr 2021
Yeah, grandparents and computer labs kept their old Apple computers around through the '90s when Apple wasn't cool. Before getting a Mac became at first ironically cool in the early '00s (because they looked funny but couldn't run any good games). Apple is clearly just a default and not a preference with kids nowadays in my experience, like they were for kids in schools in the '90s. They have good games now though.
Brands don't seem particularly defensible, and Apple doesn't seem to have any network effects outside iMessages/FaceTime and their accessory ecosystem.
James Currier on brands: "I don't think brand is a worthy defense at all. I've seen companies with phenomenal brands get crushed in a matter of years. If you go back to the early age of PC software, the best brands in the industry were Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect. Microsoft crushed them in a matter of years, and they had the brands. I don't think brand buys you very much. The best brand in search was AltaVista or maybe Yahoo! and now they're roadkill."
https://www.nfx.com/post/the-four-types-of-defensibility/
- daruxcAug 2020
Hi fellows hackers! A few weeks back when I was looking to find mentors to connect with, I noticed as a consequence of the pandemic, that we are witnessing a boost in the shift from the gig economy to the knowledge economy.
You can find a great explanation about it here: https://www.nfx.com/post/labor-marketplaces/I struggled to find a mentor and decided that something had to be done to help people that are looking for mentors/experts.
Wyzr aims to connect experts to users seeking advice in one-on-one live conversations. On this platform, for instance, startup founders can reach out to experienced entrepreneurs for guidance.
Our goal is to contribute to the knowledge economy, make it easy and accessible for people anywhere in the world to get advice for their most specific needs, while experts of any field can earn extra on their own time sharing their knowledge.
We are looking to gather users for our beta version! So we would love it if you checked us out! Feel free to give feedback/ask questios!
- DabbledThingsSep 2022
Sagetap | 100% Remote (UTC-9 to UTC-5) | Full-Time | Software Engineers | https://www.sagetap.io/careers
At a high level, Sagetap is a tool/marketplace for helping our clients (other tech companies building software, largely in the devops, cybersecurity, and infra spaces) determine if the thing they're building, and the way they're pitching it, is actually what the market wants. We do this by pairing them up with anonymized experts / potential buyers at other companies, who get to monetize their knowledge and see the shiniest, newest tools in exchange for their raw feedback.
We're backed by NFX (you'll recognize a few names here: https://www.nfx.com/companies) with about two years of runway and solid traction in the market, with an ever-growing list of exciting clients of varying sizes.
Stack: React (JS, hope to move to TS), Kotlin, AWS
Please apply either on the site or by reaching out to me directly at mike [@] sagetap.io