The posts people share, bookmark, and come back to. Updated as traffic data rolls in.
TL;DR Perplexity cites 5–7 sources per answer, which means the competition for any given citation slot is narrower than the equivalent organic SERP. The structural moves that win Perplexity citations are well-defined: a clean TL;DR, a numbered step-by-step block, an FAQ with literal user-phrasing, and primary-source li
Updated for 2026. I ran the same 50 head terms in ChatGPT search and Google (with AI Overviews) and tracked which sources each engine cited. Source overlap was about 40% — the rest of the time the two engines surfaced completely different sources.
Updated for 2026. Across 50 head terms I applied a GEO scaffold (TL;DR, numbered steps, FAQ, primary-source citations) to pillar posts and tracked Google AI Overview citation rates — frequency rose from 4/50 to 19/50 over six weeks.
Updated for 2026. A TL;DR isn’t a summary of your post — it’s a direct answer to the head query, written in 2–4 sentences, structured so an AI engine can lift it verbatim into its answer. Open with the takeaway, follow with the why, end with the constraint or caveat.
Updated for 2026. From selling chargers on Santa Monica streets to $100k+/month in 91 countries — the unit-economics, distribution, and AI-leverage lessons that still hold in 2026.
Updated for 2026. Ahrefs and Semrush are the two strongest SEO platforms in 2026 — both now track AI Overview and GEO visibility. Pick Ahrefs for backlinks and clean UX; Semrush for competitive intel and breadth. Verify current pricing.
Updated for AI Search (May 2026) TL;DR: SEO in 2026 still rewards the fundamentals — a clean site, strong internal links, content that answers the query — but classic Google rankings are now one of two surfaces. The other is AI search: ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and Claude. The strategies below still wor
Updated for AI Search (May 2026) TL;DR: Programmatic SEO — generating thousands of pages from a template — was a Google-rankings play through 2024. In 2026 it cuts both ways for AI engines: well-structured programmatic pages are easy for ChatGPT and Perplexity to extract, but thin programmatic pages are exactly the kin
Updated for 2026. AI has lowered the cost of launching dramatically — a solo founder can now build, validate, and distribute a product faster than ever. Here's the practical playbook I've used across my own ventures.
Updated for 2026. Classic growth hacking playbooks (Airbnb/Craigslist, Dropbox referrals, Hotmail, PayPal) still work — but AI-era distribution has changed the game. Here's what holds up and what's new.
Updated for 2026. A 2016 memoir of Flux Ventures — the holding company I built out of UCLA. Flux is no longer operational; today I run Pickleland and build AI agent systems.