The Introvert Economy, the Case for Longer Founder Vesting Cycles, What Happens When Your Product Goes Viral on TikTok, and More [link blog]

Winter Break week for my kid more time with her, and when she’s with her friends, more time with New Yorker magazines. Here are a few essays, articles, blog posts, etc that I’ve enjoyed recently.

What Happens When TikTok Is Your Marketing Department [David Segal/New York Times] — Was it organic? Was it spon con? Was it both? Many times we’ll never know, but the random products that end up popping because of a TikTok trend are always pretty fascinating anthropological stories. Here the focus is on Pink Stuff, a British cleaning paste, which was #CleanTok mainstreamed to a quadrupling of revenue ($125m annually) and distribution to 55 countries.

A typical #CleanTok video features a so-called “cleanfluencer” — some have more than one million followers — working over a sink, or a pan, or a floor, with a particular cleaner and a particular brush. There are usually before and after images, which make these little vignettes a cross between a commercial and an episode of “Law & Order.” They start with a mess and end with a verdict.

The Five Lessons That Have Guided My Career [Avni Patel Thompson/Milo] — Derived from a talk she gave at a High School Career Day…