1/ If you’re a founder you’ve probably heard someone say “oh, I’ve seen this idea before - it didn’t work” or “isn’t this just like that other thing that person/company X tried?”

dude is living every founder's wet dream

Announcing Weekend Fund IV, backed by operators and founders (and maybe you). When we raised Weekend Fund III, we did something different. Toward the end of our raise, we announced the fund in public and accepted applications from LPs. Our goal was to make early-stage venture more accessible and align ourselves with an army of operators and founders to help us and the startups we back. Over 1,000 people expressed interest to join and hundreds did, but there was a problem. Legally, only accredited investors could participate as an LP. Accreditation laws are well-meaning but limit access to the majority of consumers. With WF IV, @vedikaja_in and I are doing something different. Like before, we’re onboarding engineers, designers, researchers, data scientists, salespeople, and other domain experts as LPs in the fund. But this time at a larger scale with USVC. AngelList recently announced USVC, a new kind of fund that’s accessible to everyone, including the non-accredited. It holds positions in private late-stage companies like xAI, Anthropic, OpenAI, Sierra, and Vercel. I personally invested. Today, they just announced their investment in Weekend Fund IV, one of the first early-stage funds added to their portfolio. If you’re interested in being a part of Weekend Fund and getting exposure to generational startups mentioned above, visit usvc [dot] com. Of course, don’t invest what you can’t afford to lose. Investing in startups is risky and you may lose all your money. USVC shares are illiquid with no guarantee of repurchase. Consider investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses carefully before investing. Read the prospectus: usvc [dot] com/prospectus. Also, USVC is currently limited to US citizens. They’re working to open the fund to other geographies. Lastly, my DMs are open. :)

can anyone connect me to someone @cohere for something urgent? 🙏 dms open i am trying to spend lots of money on their product, but it is proving difficult

seems like the tech zeitgeist is turning away from pure growth / $0-$100M in 45 seconds / momentum is the moat stuff to what true network effects look like now ive had more intelligent conversations about this in the last 3 days than in the previous 2 years. nature is healing

i can go on a long rant about what makes a good seed investor, but easier to just say that if you have the chance to work with @semil and @aashaysanghvi_, just do it. we did. excited to see them keep going.

1/ Sponsoring events can have a huge impact on customer acquisition and brand. Most companies do it wrong, though. Here’s how to have the biggest impact sponsoring an event without breaking the bank:

the value in great companies has always been in the network they build, not the software they build. it's just becoming more clear as cost of software goes to zero.

The annual Contrary Research Tech Trends Report is here. 350 slides on everything from computational intelligence to lunar bases to breakthroughs in biologics to AVs revolutionizing land use to the loneliness epidemic and so much more. Full report in reply.

any funds or companies I know want to sublet me a desk / office in the presidio?

as the cost to produce software gets closer to zero, the value of a true network increases exponentially i guess im a boomer now, but im shocked at how few AI apps companies actually care about / understand network effects

Product design is one of the most misunderstood fields in tech. It’s not about polishing someone else’s idea. It’s about discovering what’s worth building. So we raised $3.2M to create Softlight: AI that discovers what to build. Great designers navigate business complexity to explore ideas, visualize them, and uncover new ones through iteration. The “aha” moment is realizing they don’t just make your idea better. They help you find the idea itself. That’s what today’s vibe-coding tools miss. They start with your idea and assume you should build it. Softlight starts with your business context to discover ideas you might not have thought of. Our design partners range from growth stage startups to Fortune 500s. Our team created products at Meta, Uber, and Citadel and we’re backed by product execs, CEOs, and founders at companies like Stripe, Airbnb, and Plaid. If you're interested in joining our NYC team, we'd love to hear from you. Link below.

Friend’s corp twitter account got hacked and is posting weird shit. Do I know anyone who can help?

this looks sick

i have no connection to this company, but i'm very much here for it. i wouldn't wish mold issues on my worst enemy. hoping this is just the start of real and accessible solutions for it

My goal when I became a full time investor was to be the type of partner I would have most wanted during my time building a company: someone who had done the work I was doing before, who had the network to help me reach my goals faster, and who had my back no matter what. I’m really happy to share that we’ve raised Alt Cap II, a $275M early stage fund. We backed ~20 companies at Seed and Series A in Alt Cap I. The new fund will be the same structure with a bit larger checks. But mostly we just want to be in business with people who inspire us. There’s no way to say it without sounding cheesy but it’s true; I feel unbelievably lucky to do this job in the way I get to do it. A special thanks to the founders that let us back them in Alt Cap I, you all are what it’s all about for me!

i am so jealous that there is an othership in wburg. one of the best experiences out there. if you live in bk you should try it. you will def want to go back

best $200 you will spend