Buffett's Letters go Digital

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Warren Buffett’s annual letters offer a treasure trove of wit and wisdom.

Now, for the first time, they are easily searchable on the web. 

Editor Max Olson announced last night the creation of a new website that leverages the modern search technology of large language models to make the documents more accessible. 

Buffett, regarded by many as the greatest investor ever, has been writing letters to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway every year since 1965. 

The letters were previously available in a primitive form on the Berkshire Hathaway site. 

Olson had worked with Buffett in 2013 to compile the letters into a book available on Amazon, 

Click here to access the site: https://berkshire.memorex.ai/

Buffett’s letters stand out in corporate America for their clarity, humor and extraordinary insights into the thinking of America’s foremost investor. 

Whereas most corporate annual statements are dry and forgettable, Buffett puts in the effort to tell stories and share deeper insights. As a result, the letters are closely scrutinized each year. 

Examples of wit: 

“The world is full of foolish gamblers, and they will not do as well as the patient investor.

If you don’t see the world the way it is, it’s like judging something through a distorted lens.

All I want to know is where I’m going to die, so I’ll never go there. And a related thought: Early on, write your desired obituary — and then behave accordingly.”

Examples of wisdom:

“Charlie and I avoid businesses whose futures we can’t evaluate, no matter how exciting their products may be. In the past, it required no brilliance for people to foresee the fabulous growth that awaited such industries as autos (in 1910), aircraft (in 1930) and television sets (in 1950). But the future then also included competitive dynamics that would decimate almost all of the companies entering those industries. Even the survivors tended to come away bleeding.”

Buffett is famous for being plain spoken. The letters stand out for communicating in plain English big ideas that range from accounting to debt. He also acknowledges setbacks. 

There are few investors who communicate as effectively to their stakeholders via writing. Howard Marks, Marc Andreessen and Paul Graham come to mind. But they remain exceptions. 

The release of the letters raises anew for me the question of why more companies don’t follow the example set by Buffett.

One other curious and notable thing is the low-key way the Buffett archive was released. With no real fanfare, Olson posted a tweet at 5:27 pm on Dec. 21 to his 3,000 followers.

Olsen worked with Buffett a decade ago to publish “Berkshire Hathaway Letters to Shareholders”, a compilation of 50 years of letters. They set up a company, Explorist Productions, to handle it. 

Most CEOs would have tapped one of the big PR firms, which would have coordinated a media blitz with an exclusive dropping in the Wall Street Journal. A hashtag like #buffettletters would have been created. 

Olson explained the origin of the project in a tweet: 

“The idea came about when doing a bit of ”customer development” with some folks at Berkshire HQ. Turns out they wanted a good way to find things in the letters. My book originally did this job for them, now with LLMs there is a better way.”

Olson is an interesting character himself. Here’s a self-description on his website: 

“I’m an engineer, investor, and designer. I run a small fund that invests in early-stage startups and public companies. I work at Mashgin, where I was an early employee and investor. I live in California and grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah.”

Olson lists 10 primary life interests. My favorite is No 1: 

“Fighting entropy by exploring the frontiers of creativity, intelligence, and space.”

The site lists questions he’s interested in like, “How can evolutionary biology and traditional wisdom be combined with modern tech to improve living conditions?”

Finally, there is also a long, eclectic list of projects he’s worked on. 

One was building BuffettBot, an AI Warren Buffett that answers questions based on his letters.

I asked the BuffettBot if the market is going up next year. It provided a predictably Buffett-like answer: 

“I don’t have a crystal ball, and I don’t make predictions about short-term market movements. As an investor, I focus on the long-term prospects of individual businesses and their ability to generate sustainable earnings and cash flows.”

BRIEF OBSERVATIONS

NEWS POPULARITY: I’m big believer in the correlation between media coverage, search and the significance of an event, at least in the short term. The chart shows how search declines in the Metaverse, Blockchain and crypto.

MARRIAGE DELAYED: Great visual showing how much later each generation has waited until getting married.

CHURN IS INCREASING: Rates for customer churn have increased across the board. Starz has shown a huge increase. Netflix is an outlier for its low rate.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING: Timely reminder from the J6 trials that your Google searches can be used against you.

GREENBAY PACKERS: How popular are the Green Bay Packers with their fans? Jerry Patterson, president of Fidelity Investemnts Life Insurance, tweeted that he’s been on the waiting list for season tickets for 34 years.