Exponential Hits of the Week - 1 July 2022

In this week’s Exponential ‘Hits of the Week,’ here is what our community is reading:

• Marketing in the metaverse: An opportunity for innovation and experimentation
• How Tony Fadell Evaluates Climate Solutions: The Necessary Ingredients for High Impact
• Does Artificial Intelligence Really Have the Potential to Create Transformative Art?
• Global Alliance of Tech Founders Entrepreneur First Raises $158 Million in Series C Funding
  

Here are our top five Exponential ‘Hits of the Week:’

1. Marketing in the metaverse: An opportunity for innovation and experimentation

Publication: McKinsey Quarterly

Date: 24 May 2022

Talk of the metaverse has been ubiquitous over the past several months. In 2021, internet searches for the term increased by 7,200 percent. In December, Facebook rebranded itself as Meta, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg declared his ambition to “help bring the metaverse to life.” A month later, Microsoft said that its proposed acquisition of gaming giant Activision provided “building blocks for the metaverse.”

Read more here.

2. How Tony Fadell Evaluates Climate Solutions: The Necessary Ingredients for High Impact

Publication: Tim Ferris Podcast

Date: 5 May 2022

Tony Fadell explains how he looks at big opportunities that address systemic challenges and narrows a funnel to focus on the biggest potential breakthroughs.

View more here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVjgNjIGHAU

3. Does Artificial Intelligence Really Have the Potential to Create Transformative Art?

Publication: Lit Hub

Date: 27 June 2022

In 1896, the Lumiere brothers released a 50-second-long film, The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, and a myth was born. The audiences, it was reported, were so entranced by the new illusion that they jumped out of the way as the flickering image steamed towards them.

The urban legend of film-induced mass panic, established well before 1900, illustrated a valid contention if the story was, in fact, untrue: The technology had produced a new emotional reaction. That reaction was hugely powerful but inchoate and inarticulate. Nobody knew what it was doing or where it would go. Nobody had any idea that it would turn into what we call film. Today, the world is in a similar state of bountiful confusion over the creative use of artificial intelligence.

Read more here

4. Global Alliance of Tech Founders Entrepreneur First Raises $158 Million in Series C Funding

Publication: Akshit Pushkarna

Date: 29 June 2022

Scaleup investor Entrepreneur First, a global fund which invests in early-stage founder talent has raised a $158m Series C funding round from a group of veteran technology founders, including co-founders of Stripe, Patrick and John Collison, Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, Taavet Hinrikus, co-founder, Certific and Wordpress developer Matt Mullenweg.

The funds used will be to make investments into new startups. It will also allow EF a capacity to experiment, and innovate on how best to fund the next generation of entrepreneurs by launching new products aimed at up-ending the typical venture capital model.

Read more here

Notable mentions:

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