dj patil

This month @cwclub — @JoannaStern @StienstraTom @SimoneStolzoff @MarthaRaddatz @manoushz @BenoitDLewis @allstarjukebox @tab_delete @AWeissmann_ @futuretester @DionLimTV and more! Details & tickets: commonwealthclub.org/events

@EmilyDreyfuss @Clara_Gold There is definitely a story to tell here. I'm not sure if it has diminished, the incentive function has changed, or the other "stuff" has swamped out the mission driven. I do think for the big companies margin pressure is an issues etc. Happy to chat!

@dpatil @Clara_Gold I've been wanting to do a podcast about how the mission driven side of the SF tech scene has gotten so diminished. Would love to discuss with you. My observation is that the teams focused on social impacts evaporated at big companies and the funding for nonprofits dried up

6 months ago, I moved to San Francisco. It’s the best place in the world to build, and one of the worst places to stay human. My unfiltered take: 1. SF is both overhyped and underrated The overhyped part: there are a lot of people with incredible resumes who are deeply unimpressive in real life. They were at the right company, at the right time, in the right market, and got carried by the wave. They made money, got comfortable, and now spend their time “exploring opportunities” over coffee, wasting your time. The underrated part: the top 1% here is insane. But almost impossible to get. Hiring in SF feels like being a guy on a dating app: everyone you want is out of your league, and everyone in your league wants someone out of theirs. The best people have unmatchable packages, endless options, and are optimizing for maximum impact: labs, frontier companies, or startups raising $100M pre-seed rounds. If you raised $10M from Tier 1 investors, you’re not hot shit here. You’re a B-player. It’s humbling. 2. There are fewer mission-driven people than I expected Especially on the application layer. A lot of people are in “secure the bag before it’s too late” mode. And honestly, it gives me the ick. The real religious builders I’ve met are often in labs, hardware, biotech, deeptech, defense — places where the work is hard enough that you can’t fake obsession. 3. The status game favors builders This is what SF does better than anywhere else. It rewards obsession. It rewards weirdness. It rewards people who make building their entire personality. Europe punishes that. SF gives it status. If you’ve felt like an outsider your whole life because you care too much, work too much, think too radically, or refuse to be chill about things that matter, this city will make you feel less insane. 4. The market liquidity is absurd Even if you don’t build a billion-dollar company, if you manage to build a strong product with a great team, someone smart might still acquire you for $ 100M. Yeah I know, it’s not your dream outcome as a founder, but on the days you feel desperate, it helps to keep going. 5. SF does not care about the meaning crisis that’s coming Anyone paying attention here can feel that something massive is happening with AI. But I’m shocked by how little people talk about the meaning crisis coming next. Everyone wants to talk about AI liberating humanity. Almost no one wants to talk about what happens when work — the thing that gives most people identity, structure, dignity, status, and purpose — starts disappearing. The vacuum will not be peaceful. People are underestimating the chaos that comes from humans suddenly having no idea why they matter. And I really feel like no one cares. 6. Personally, I’ve never been more unhappy I moved to SF and entered the matrix. I’ve always been intense. I’ve always worked crazy hours. But here, I lost the last parts of myself that were not about building. I don’t go to events. Most networking events feel like theater for people pretending to be important. The only events worth going to are small, curated dinners with people who are actually alive. I’ve made 0 real friends. I don’t do well with transactionality. I don’t do well with people constantly performing greatness. I don’t do well with rooms where everyone is optimizing and no one is being honest. So yes, SF is lonely, transactional, delusional, addictive, inspiring, boring, extraordinary, and completely insane. But it is still the only place to be right now if you’re a founder trying to build the next wave of humanity. And for now, that’s enough.

@michaelsgoodco @jamescham Love that! Really good addition

@jamescham @dpatil Nothing to disagree with here. Both are aligned to what I often share: Observability: We cannot improve what we cannot see and…. Traceability: …we cannot validate what we cannot trace.

In honor of hearing backstory behind @dpatil’s approach to solving big problems, I am sharing it here: - Dream in years - Plan in months - Evaluate in weeks - Ship Daily - Prototype for 1x - Build for 10x - Engineer for 100x - What’s required to cut the timeline in 1/2 - What needs to be done to double the impact

We had an awesome set of people come out for office hours yesterday at @UCSD! Thank you for so many being open with sharing their hopes, dreams, and what is keeping you up at night. Some things that we talked about - challenges in intern market (many have applied to more than 300 internships without a response!!!) - what is hiring going to look like next year? - what is going to be the state of research funding in the country? - we’re about to push out so many incredible immigrants that are exactly the people we need to power innovation - UC San Diego is 💪💯🔥

It's room PEB 520 not 250! 🤦‍♂️

Hey San Diego! I'm going to have Office Hours this Tues from 3-5pm at UC San Diego. I'd love to hear from you! Hope to see you there! @UCSD @UCSDJacobs

Incredible work powered by great science. Basic science at universities gives is this kind of advantage. It’s a big mistake that we’ve massively cut back on this kind of basic R&D.

TOMORROW 6pm in SF near the Ferry Building! We have some tix left to meet @slightchangepod @MayaUmaShankar ! Her book is one of the best I've read this year! @cwclub commonwealthclub.org/events/2026-04…

@FadelMegahed I completely agree. I thinking of the doing the easiest of hard things -- create a discord server and let people self organize. I'm terrified or having to have to do selection + logistics.

@dpatil I think this is a great idea. The selection and teaming up students would likely be a logistical nightmare. That being said, I would be happy to help. In Ohio, we have this program: development.ohio.gov/business/third…. I am wondering how many similar programs exist!!

I've been spending time across the US with college students & faculty. There's a theme: students can't get internships this summer. Not just a few students. LOTS of students. Doesn't matter what kind of school you're at. The pipeline that used to work — apply, interview, get placed — feels broken in a way I haven't seen since 2008. Back then I wrote something called "Hack Your Own Summer" — the idea that if nobody's going to hand you an internship, you should build your own. Make something. HAVE SOMETHING TO SHOW FOR IT!!!! I think it's time to do that again, but bigger. Here's what I'm thinking: What if we stood up a program — free, open, student-led — where students who don't have internships this summer team up and build real projects? Real enough to put on a resume. Real enough to demo. Think of it like a summer-long hackathon or a YC-esque kind of thing with structure: teams, mentors, weekly speakers, and a demo day at the end. I don't have it all figured out. That's the point of this post. I NEED HELP!! If you're a student without an internship this summer — what would make something like this worth your time? I think this would be best if run by a bunch of college kids. Would you want to do that? If you're a professional who'd volunteer a few hours to mentor or coach — what would you need to say yes? If you've run something like this before — what worked and what didn't? Drop your ideas below. I'm reading everything. And if you're a student who wants to help build this from day one — LMK!

@neeksww @neuromatch thanks for the tip!

@dpatil Thanks for sharing your thoughts here. The neuromatch @neuromatch incorporates some ideas you are thinking about. Do check them out. Wishing the best!

@markpinc Speaking of Suicidal Empathy, you’ll want to join me in welcoming @GadSaad to @cwclub in San Francisco on June 10th at 5:30. He is an original 🍯🦡 and directly addresses your lamentations. More details and registration link below 👇 commonwealthclub.org/events/2026-06…

Tix here! commonwealthclub.org/events/2026-04…

This is THE most inspirational book I’ve read this year! Even better, I’m interviewing @mayaumashankar @slightchangepod next Wed April 8 in SF at @cwclub . Meet her and get your book signed! Be ready to be inspired! (tix link below)

@AnjneyMidha @mabb0tt @karpathy @bhorowitz @brendaniribe @DavidBaszucki @LiamFedus @ekindogus @sama 🔥

so @mabb0tt and I are once again volunteering to teach cs153.stanford.edu there are so many new frontiers to be pioneered thank you to our speakers like @karpathy @bhorowitz @brendaniribe @DavidBaszucki @LiamFedus @ekindogus @sama for investing in the next generation

Today’s Figma MCP update makes it one of the strongest integrations with Claude Code I’ve seen. You can now use Claude Code to design in Figma with the the full context of your design systems.

@Farzad_MD @matthewherper 🤞

@dpatil @matthewherper Ah, the good ol “walled garden rant” forbes.com/sites/davechas… I’m more impressed that he is putting money into enforcement, though we haven’t seen that yet

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