Most ideas borrow more than they invent

Most product ideas are built on top of other people’s assumptions.

“This is how apps like this usually work.” “Everyone in this space charges monthly.” “This is what the standard onboarding looks like.” You inherit a hundred small defaults before you’ve made a single conscious decision.

That’s not always bad. Defaults exist because they often work.

But when those defaults are wrong for your situation, they’re extremely hard to spot. They feel like the way things are, not like choices someone made.

First-principles thinking is the habit of pulling those layers back. You strip the problem down to what you actually know to be true — and you build your answer from there, instead of starting from what everyone else is doing.

It’s one of the most useful th...

How to think clearly about your product (first principles)