Pray.com

Build on substrates nobody owns: chess, religion

Shaan loves businesses built on high-affinity 'substrates' that no one owns the IP to, like chess (chess.com) or religion (the Pray app, 'Calm for Christianity'). You get a billion people who already know and love the brand, with full freedom to use it.

“So still dead simple business model around a classic game that nobody owns the IP to, right? It's not like saying Monopoly. Well, you can't do Monopoly. Somebody owns Monopoly. You know, I don't know who Hasbro or whoever owns Monopoly. You can do it with chess. And this is one of the reasons why we talked about religion as a really interesting, you know, fundamental or like base layer for any business because nobody owns religion, but it's a highly recognized brand with super high affinity.”

Steal thisBuild on a beloved public-domain substrate (chess, religion, classic games) so you get free brand affinity with zero IP risk.