Dan Wang on storytelling

I'm going to revisit Dan Wang's 2025 letter soon, but I loved how he framed this:

The book tour forces you to have answers that last 30 seconds for TV, 30 minutes for a talk, and 3 hours for the more bruising podcasts.

A metaphor I've used a lot with my teams is:

• What's the movie poster?
• What's the movie trailer?
• What's the full-length film?

Back when I was at the Gates Foundation, we would often coach our newer team members (and our more... thorough colleagues) to have one-breath responses to questions asked by Bill.

Sometimes, all you need is a TV spot answer before moving on to other areas. Knowing how to adapt your story to the context is critical.