Updates

  1. Person pages list letters, writing, profiles and links as sortable tables with filters, and show each person's companies as links; Fund letters show each letter's description in its own column.
  2. Experts show a checked job title and a short description of each person; 30 more people have photographs.
  3. Every company, fund, university and publication the experts work for has a page listing the people there.
  4. Fund letters show each letter's thesis and filter by it; 225 person pages list the essays, columns and newsletter issues the person wrote.
  5. Person pages list every essay and newsletter issue a person wrote, and their own books as a table in List view.
  6. Recommends shows the five largest kinds of book and the rest under More; browse pictures load sooner.
  7. Podcasts and talks link the original episode, filter by Audio and video or Press, and list each publisher once.
  8. Pages are wider, Recommends has List and Grid, and a filter clicked again turns off.
  9. Book cards sit in a ruled grid with Open Library and Goodreads links and each book's one-line note.
  10. Funds is now Investors; each investor's styles are buttons that filter the table.
  11. Podcasts and talks on a person's page filter by year and publisher and show as a list or a grid of pictures.
  12. Quotes show only people's own words: 472 summaries written by list sites are gone.
  13. Country pages open from Browse again, and every link on the shelf lands on a page.
  14. Subject and person pages show their sections as tabs, and each book appears once on a person's page.
  15. Book cards show the quote, who said it and the source; grids show five cards to a row.
  16. On a phone, a menu holds the sections, search, Updates, Feedback and dark mode.
  17. Feedback takes a screenshot of the page with no browser prompt, opens a screenshot full size when you click it, and clears itself once sent.
  18. Book cards are centred, search names the topic each book sits in, and any text cut short shows whole on hover.
  19. Search groups its results by kind: people, companies, geographies, subjects, topics, books, funds, fund letters and papers.
  20. The Books table lists who recommended each book by name, and the browser tab names the section you are in.
  21. Feedback can take a screenshot of the page, or one you paste or choose, and opens in the corner beside Updates.
  22. Each rail button reopens its section where you left it, and Browse, Table and People show on every book and subject page.
  23. Filters grey out choices that hold nothing instead of hiding them, and Books › People filters by authors or recommenders.
  24. Feedback takes a subject line and up to three screenshots.
  25. Biographies are grouped by the person they are about: 41 new pages, from Abraham Lincoln to Lee Kuan Yew.
  26. Sport splits into 23 sports, and Religion into one topic per faith.
  27. Book lists show as cards: the cover, one recommendation quote and every recommender by name.
  28. Seventeen subjects that had two or three pages under different names now have one page each.
  29. Every page lists its Experts as authors and recommenders, with a link to them on the Experts tab.
  30. Economics, Financial history, Financial panics and Accounting are subjects of their own, with one page per financial crisis.
  31. Book, person and subject pages open inside the app, so the tabs stay in view.
  32. 996 more book covers, and photographs or logos for 227 more people and companies.
  33. Books › Browse shows every subject as cards, and the rail holds Fund letters, Papers, Experts, Books and Funds.
  34. Every topic over 150 books splits into narrower topics, each with a page of its own.

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Direct selling and multi-level marketing

Business models

Selling through a recruited distributor network paid on downline volume. The critical literature substantially outweighs the neutral literature, and the central factual finding is consistent across it: the great majority of participants lose money, and income derives mainly from recruitment rather than retail sale. FitzPatrick and Butterfield make that case; Van Andel's memoir is included as the founder's own account.

Books 8Recommenders 1

Start here

  1. When the Wolves BiteScott Wapner, 2018
  2. False ProfitsRobert L. FitzPatrick, Joyce K. Reynolds, 1996
  3. PonzinomicsRobert L. FitzPatrick, 2020
Mary Kay on People ManagementMary Kay on People Management
T3 Mary Kay on People Management
Mary Kay Ash · 1984
Open LibraryGoodreads

Founder's own account of recruiting and holding a commissioned sales force.

Amway: The Cult of Free EnterpriseAmway: The Cult of Free Enterprise
T3 Amway: The Cult of Free Enterprise
Stephen Butterfield · 1985
Open LibraryGoodreads

A former distributor on the ideology that sustains recruitment.

False ProfitsFalse Profits
T3 False Profits
Robert L. FitzPatrick, Joyce K. Reynolds · 1996
Open LibraryGoodreads

A critical look at the arithmetic behind multi-level marketing pay plans.

An Enterprising LifeAn Enterprising Life
T3 An Enterprising Life
Jay Van Andel · 1998
Open LibraryGoodreads

Amway's co-founder's own account; read alongside the criticism.

Tupperware UnsealedTupperware Unsealed
T3 Tupperware Unsealed
Bob Kealing · 2008
Open LibraryGoodreads

Brownie Wise and the home-party sales network that made Tupperware.

When the Wolves BiteWhen the Wolves Bite
T3 When the Wolves Bite
Scott Wapner · 2018
Open LibraryGoodreads

Ackman against Icahn over Herbalife; the MLM model argued in public.

“Wall Street"-esque battle between Bill Ackman and Carl Icahn over unlikely target Herbalife.” — Marc Andreessen

Source: @pmarca, 'Thread: Books I've recently read and recommend'

Recommended by: Marc Andreessen

PonzinomicsPonzinomics
T3 Ponzinomics
Robert L. FitzPatrick · 2020
Open LibraryGoodreads

Why multi-level marketing's economics need constant recruitment to survive.

Merchants of DeceptionMerchants of Deception
T4 Merchants of Deception
Eric Scheibeler · 2009
Open LibraryGoodreads

Insider account by a high-level Amway distributor turned critic.

More business models

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