The Good, The Bad & The Ugly:
Our "Build In Public" Blog Series
What Brazil Taught Us About Building Global Creator Tools (A founder's journey from Silicon Valley assumptions to emerging market reality)
As preparation for the YOUPIX Summit, we went to Brazil a week early to talk to creators and agencies and understand the market better. And what an eye-opener it has been!
Portugal's Startup Ecosystem: The Unfiltered Truth
A candid look at what's really happening in one of Europe's fastest-growing startup hubs: the wins, the walls, and what needs to change.
Coming soon
Coming soon
The One That Got Away: Why I Missed the TikTok Wave by 6 Months
Today's story: the most painful kind of failure: being absolutely right at absolutely the wrong time.
The Startup Rollercoaster: From Rejection to Acceptance in 2 Minutes
Building in public means sharing the downs with the ups, the rejections with the acceptances, and the moments when your emotional GPS recalculates every 2 minutes.
Our NYC Week: Press Publish, Pizza Lessons, and the Price of Ambition
We flew to New York for Press Publish NYC: Colin & Samir's creator economy summit that everyone said we had to attend. What we didn't expect was to learn as much about business from a pizza queue as from a conference hall.
When Your User Becomes Your Investor: The Ultimate Product Validation
Sometimes the market tells you you're on the right track in ways you never expected. Today's story: the moment we knew we'd built something people actually would more than pay for it.
The Faster Horses Problem: Why the Creator Economy Needs Both Creators and Operators
Sometimes the most transformative solutions emerge when we combine different perspectives rather than choosing sides. Today's story: why the creator economy thrives when diverse voices build together, not apart.
The Generation Gap in VC: When Your Champions Aren't Your Decision Makers
Sometimes the most important lesson is knowing when to change your approach instead of changing your startup. Today's story: what happens when the people who understand your industry can't write the checks.
The Week I Accidentally Terrified Creators (And Why That's Exactly What We Built GYST to Do)
The week I learned that showing creators their blind spots hits different than I expected.
75 Minutes vs 30 Days: What Your Response Time Says About Your Character
Why the most successful people often have the best manners, and why gatekeepers are usually the worst part of any process.
From Outsiders to Top 10 Linkedin Voice: Our Six-Month Journey in the Creator Economy
Six months ago, we had barely any idea what the creator economy was. Today, I'm ranked #10 among Brazil's top creator economy influencers by Favikon. What a journey it's been!
The Day YouTube Validated Our Business
A build-in-public story about that moment when a $280B company basically announces they're building what you've been pitching to skeptical VCs
Why VCs Should Care About My Scale (Not My CV)
Today's topic: the kind of grit that doesn't make it onto pitch decks but probably should.
The Day My Kid Handed Me a 20-Activity Summer Schedule (And I Recognized Our Original Startup Planning)
Learning resource allocation from someone who thinks she can master Greek, start a business, and read The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri before Labor Day.
The Death of Playing It Safe: Burning the Rulebook at SXSW London's Inaugural Event
Let's dive into the insights and revelations from SXSW London's very first European edition, where the future of creativity, AI, and human agency collided in Shoreditch (and queues for our badges were longer than Disneyland's Space Mountain...).
The Revenge of the Rejected: How Getting "No" from Every Top Program Set Us Free
Today, we tell you why the best thing that happened to GYST was getting rejected by Sequoia Arc, a16z, and Y Combinator.
Cannes Lions 2025: From Celebrating Creativity to Supporting Creators
Last week, we witnessed something remarkable at Cannes Lions: a festival that built its reputation celebrating big agency campaigns is quietly becoming the epicenter of creator economy innovation. Here's what that evolution looked like from the ground up.
When Your Baby Is Ugly: The Brutal Feedback That Transformed Our Product
Today, we're diving into one of the most challenging aspects of building a startup: receiving brutal feedback that forces you to question your fundamental assumptions.
The First Yes: How Our Initial Client Validated Everything (and Nothing) About Our Vision
Today, we're celebrating a critical milestone that every startup craves: our first client saying "yes", and how that single affirmation both validated and challenged our vision in unexpected ways.
From Stealth Mode to Oversharing: Our 30-Day Transformation at Unicorn Factory Lisbon
Today, we're diving into the month that changed everything: our first 30 days at Unicorn Factory Lisbon, where we went from secretive startup to LinkedIn oversharing champions in record time.
Startup vs. Apocalypse: Building GYST Through Blackout, Falling Trees, and an Earthquake
Today, we're taking a slight detour to share the chaotic, sometimes terrifying, and occasionally comical story of building a startup while Mother Nature seemingly tries to stop us at every turn.
Building the Future of the Creator Economy: How GYST Solves the Hard Problems
Andrew Chen identified four core dynamics that make or break creator economy startups. At GYST, we've used these insights as our north star, and I want to share how we're tackling each challenge head-on.
The Mentor We Never Expected: How an AI Conversation Changed Our Business Strategy
Today, we're exploring an unexpected relationship that fundamentally changed how we think about AI and business strategy: our ongoing "partnership" with an AI that became more advisor than tool.
What's in a Name? Our Identity Crisis and the Birth of GYST
Today, we're diving into the messy, frustrating, and ultimately enlightening process of finding our identity, including the accidental midnight eureka moment that gave us our name.
From Analysis Paralysis to Warp Speed: How We Built Our AI CRO Prototype in 48 Frantic Hours
Today, we're taking you behind the scenes of our most intense coding sprint yet: how we went from idea to working prototype in just 48 hours, with a little help from AI and a lot of caffeine.
Two Birds, One Stone: How Our Content Creator Tool Unexpectedly Became a Talent Agency Powerhouse
Today, we're revealing one of our most surprising discoveries: how we aimed at one market and accidentally hit two; and how that happy accident transformed our business model.
From Meh to Yeah: How GYST Pivoted (for the first time) at the 1Billion Followers Summit
Welcome to our "Build in Public" series, where we're taking you along for the wild ride that is building GYST, the AI virtual Chief Revenue Officer for the creator economy. Buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy (but hilarious) journey!
From Protection to Optimization: The Pivot That Made GYST an AI Chief Revenue Officer
Welcome back to our "Build in Public" series! Today, we're diving into what happened next: the painful pivot that ultimately led to GYST becoming the AI Chief Revenue Officer for the creator economy.
When Our Kids Said 'We Want to Be Content Creators': How the Next Generation Inspired GYST's Mission
Today, we're taking a step back to reveal the true origin story of GYST: a conversation with teenagers that changed everything. "So, What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?"
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