It's not exactly the _intended_ topic of the post, but I had the same reaction. The author seems to want to evoke a sense of calm or slowing down, but the transition between the scene and the diagram-laden advice is really pretty jarring. The weak transition reminds me of the E-Myth, a book which grafted a gratuitous, saccharine narrative onto its small and fairly obvious thesis.
Whatever the calming potato pond is supposed to do here, the subsequent jargon storm undoes it. If "The Startup Owner's Manual" reads like this article (a weird mix of narrative and startup-ese with italics strewn about like a Christopher Walken monologue), I'd be hesitant to spend 40 bucks on it.
Perhaps Blank is just testing a new model for his blog. He created an MVP and is now testing it with us users to see what the reaction is.
I wouldn't be surprised if he just wants to play with his style a little bit, particularly if he has just spent the last year writing a very technical book.
I'll wait for a pattern to emerge and in the mean time I will agree that the style was very unrefined.
Whatever the calming potato pond is supposed to do here, the subsequent jargon storm undoes it. If "The Startup Owner's Manual" reads like this article (a weird mix of narrative and startup-ese with italics strewn about like a Christopher Walken monologue), I'd be hesitant to spend 40 bucks on it.