OpenAI co-founder, Andrej Karpathy, published a brief “love letter” to the notes app Obsidian, giving his approval to the product and the company’s approach to running a software business.

I agree with everything Karpathy said. Moreover though, Obsidian is a fascinating example of thoughtful pricing & product strategy, and the tradeoffs that follow.

Just because some companies act in ways which appear — and often are — wasteful, perverse and value-destructive, that doesn’t mean all their employees are blind to the inefficiencies. Ironically, at the heart of effective procurement, are decision makers’ profound understanding of the dysfunction inside their own organisation. It is the dysfunction that will prevent them from realising the full benefits of whatever they’re buying; but awareness of the dysfunction which gives them a truer understanding of the benefits.

The old proverb — about leading a horse to water — has a corollary: the horse won’t thank the person who showed them the pond.

This is a problem for companies who provide SaaS & software services which give customers AI-derived insights. If customers don’t act on those insights, then how much value will they place on the source of those insights? How long will it take them to ask why they’re paying so much?

A B2B founder recently asked how transparent he should be about pricing with early beta users who would initially enjoy free access to his company's proposition.

Other than always trying to avoid nasty surprises, there is no hard-and-fast answer because it will depend on what you’re selling and who you’re selling to. But there are some key points to keep in mind.