Daniel

Here's my thread about why you should: - quit whatever it is you're doing - build the startup you've wanted to build - work with me and the a16z team 1:1 - And yes, I'll invest $1M via a16z speedrun (and the earlier your startup, the better. apply here: sr.a16z.com) I want to start with some things I hear: "Nah, it's not the right time for me to launch a new startup. But why yes, I do scribble down new ideas all the time. And my best friend from work would be the perfect cofounder. Oh I even have a side project going..." There's always something around the corner: - a promotion that might happen - a job you want to get before you're "ready" to start a company - the perfect first hire that might free up in a month - a work project you want to finish up first - a sign that your idea is the perfect idea ... and a million other things But let me make the counterpoint, which is that the AI has created a unique window for launching new products. And it's ephemeral and (unfortunately) rapidly closing. - the startup window opens and shuts for a few years, once every decade. Wait it out now, and you'll have to wait 10+ years for the next one. After all, the AI wave is huge and comparable to what we saw in mobile, internet, desktop, etc. And if you look at the dates, you'll see -- 2007 for mobile, 1994 for web, 1984 for desktop. These waves happen sparingly. You could build Instagram in the first few years of mobile, but you don't want to be the photo-sharing app 8 years in. You could build Uber in the early days, but don't try to compete with them now. These windows are key. - the excitement for trying new products is at an all time high. On social media, we've now all seen first hand when new products are launched and hit great traction right off the bat. People have a hunger to try new products in a way that hasn't existed since the App Store launched. - one of the biggest problems for pre-AI products is that marketing channels are incredibly stagnant. Mobile ad channels are expensive, SEO is slow (and Google keeps taking over the search page), and you can't use aggressive virality anymore. Growth is hard. But if you have a new AI-driven take on a product category -- take advantage of the novelty effect! Before the marketing channels get swamped. - adding AI into an idea no longer requires a PhD in Computer Science :) This means that you can build totally wow breakthrough features into your product and impress your users simply by integrating APIs. You don't need to train any models, and your users may not even care what's under the hood. (just look at cursor, granola, etc -- they just care about great UX). The infrastructure is largely here, but the products are still early. There are still tons of great opportunities. - there's an incredible talent arbitrage right now. There aren't that many AI-native jobs, but everyone wants to learn more, so you can recruit top people if your product starts life day 1 as an AI product. - you might ask, can't I just work on this next year? Well -- maybe. These big waves are intensively competitive. The good ideas are getting snatched up right now, as people ask the question for how to apply AI to XYZ sector. And once the area is taken by a good team with real funding, you could maaaaybe fast-follow, but you're playing on hard mode at that point - there's never been a better time! After all, I found this fun post a while ago: Building a startup in 1995: - Buy & run a server - Code everything from scratch - Handle payments manually - Market with print ads Building a startup in 2025: - Click to deploy - AI writes code for you - 1 line of JavaScript to charge any credit card - 1 tweet goes viral = thousands of visitors (h/t @marclou) - another good reason to get started: You're reading the right essay :) And now you know about a16z speedrun, which makes it possible for us to invest in very early startups, particularly in our favorite area of tech and entertainment and AI. This is still an experimental program, and we're committed to invest up to $1M in teams that are even pre-product and/or pre-traction, if you've had strong relevant experiences. Things are early enough that I am super hands on, and look forward to working with many of you! And the link again: sr.a16z.com and more program details: speedrun.a16z.com Ultimately, a big wave like this doesn't come often. It's easy to make excuses, and for those of you who know you want to be a founder one day, I encourage you to consider jumping in during 2025. - For those of you who want to wrap something at work, or are waiting for a promotion, or something else, I want to tell you a secret: No one will care, after you've spent 18-24 months+ in a single job, what happens next at that job. The tech industry changes quickly and you get rapidly diminishing returns from what you can learn/prove at a single place. You can cut it short, and jump into a new startup. - For those who are waiting for the perfect idea: Your first idea will probably suck. Well maybe that's too harsh, so the more polite way to say it would be that it's based on incomplete information. You don't have a product in front of real users and customers. You haven't explored all the competitive products. You haven't spent 1000s of hours talking to your users yet. You need to get started doing that, to get through the 100 variations of your sucky ideas to get to the real one. - For those who are waiting for a sign: Here's your sign :) - For those who don't have an idea: That's OK. Apply with some areas/sectors you are interested in, and we'll help you talk through the kinds of problems that are exciting - For those who want to work on another job before you know enough to start a company: You know this isn't logical. Plenty of founders get going before they have any significant work experience. Another set of founders often start companies in sectors where they have no prior expertise. You don't need more prep!

"Cursor, please fix this small bug" Cursor:

Let’s have a little chat about market makers. 🥶👇

His overarching approach is simply to make people more mindful of their health and the habits that influence it. In hindsight a lot of it seems like common sense - but just like a kid needs to be instructed to brush twice a day, sleep well, eat healthy, exercise, et al, so do the overwhelming majority of adults. Yes, he does some 'extreme' stuff, but a lot of the things we practice today seemed like nonsense back in the day, and some of his more controversial practices may become normalized if his testing proves their worth.

Bryan Johnson seems so unhealthy to me. I don’t get why people follow him. He looks like a vampire 🧛‍♂️

Spent a few days hunting the most creative activations during Devcon Here're the ones that caught my eye: 1️⃣ @Superfluid_HQ Flow House Loved the play on their "money streaming" narrative. The ugc content generation was insane. Smart way to get organic reach while staying true to brand. The "flow" theme? *chef's kiss *

Make The SEC Great Again. Make Crypto Great Again. Under President Trump, transformative change starts on Day One. #SEC must restore trust, engage with industry, and end regulation by enforcement. It’s time to knockdown needless obstacles, remove burdens, clarify #crypto rules, and promote innovation. Protect investors and our place on the world financial stage. Bring crypto back to 🇺🇸. sec.gov/newsroom/press…

shoutout to all the social media managers & creators who showed up the past couple of years anyone can build an audience when prices are pumping, engagement is thriving, and sentiment is high way tougher to do when things are the opposite

Upcoming deregulation wave will create an economic sonic boom.

3 crucial market insights for new token launches: 1. Launching at a lower FDV is way more appealing to the community and is resulting in a better looking chart out of the gate. See the recent Grass launch. You really don't want to launch above a billion FDV unless you have massive traction, which most do not. Its better to launch lower. Give the community a chance to get in early and actually have real demand. Grass did this well and their chart looks great (and is quietly over $1B FDV). 2. Doing a public round on Echo or Legion is a massive community and public sentiment boost. Even if the actual impact of doing the sale is minimal, the public perception of doing the sale is significant. This has basically become a necessity imo. If a team doesn't do a public sale at or below the most recent VC raise, I'm not bullish. If they do the public sale under the last VC valuation, that is very bullish for community sentiment. See Initia. Their echo sale sold out at a valuation 25% under the last VC raise. 3. Somehow, launching on Binance isn't *that* bullish anymore. This may be a controversial take, but now that we all know Binance is taking a large amount of supply (see Scroll), we know their users are going to dump it as well. This is bearish. The market is adjusting to the fact that if a team is launching on Binance, they are either top 1% or they are paying a lot of their token supply, or sometimes both. Over the course of the next few months, we'll see an influx of token launches. I believe the teams which follow #1 and #2 will have the best results, and am still on the fence about how I'd recommend teams to approach the Binance situation. Once again, I'll repeat: Crypto's capital formation process is beginning a multi-year change, for the better.

1/ Foundations for Web3 projects - what they are, what they are not and why you even use them. In crypto law, the 'foundation' is one of the least understood and most expensive products sold to founders. Oftentimes, it feels like most lawyers themselves do not understand it.

remember the 3 Es in crypto marketing: educate, engage, entertain.

innovation knows to limits; the crypto endgame status quo does not exist. as a founder, keep building, iterating, and launching. keep searching, keep being hungry, and eventually something that's never been done before will hit.

if your project's feed is strictly promotional, you're forgetting that you have to provide value before seeking to extract. educate, engage, entertain.

witnessing an exponential increase in the quality of crypto content. if your stuff doesn't consistently hit the quality mark, then it isn't competitive and users will flock to those that put the work in.

@grahamfergs ̶q̶u̶i̶c̶k̶ ̶c̶a̶l̶l̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶e̶x̶p̶l̶o̶r̶e̶ ̶s̶y̶n̶e̶r̶g̶i̶e̶s̶?̶ 🤢 quick call to explore twitter beef? 🫡

bullish founders who get into twitter beef

PLEASE NO MORE SIDE EVENTS. Let me give u strategy ideas: Hackerhouses gud. Immersive experience events gud. Private dinners gud. Parties okayish (berachain parties gud tho). Pop-up cities okayish. Side conferences bad. Dumb side events even worse.

Over the last 10 years, as a marketing leader in blockchain, I’ve had the opportunity to produce events ranging from intimate dinners to sold-out, multi-day conferences for over 5,000 people, like @AVAX Summit. With @EFDevcon coming up and hundreds of side events already announced, here’s a quick guide on ensuring your event is the best of the best. 1) Define your goals and measures of success: - What are your company's top priorities at Devcon? - Are you interested in impressions? Conversions? How do you define these? - How are you going to measure success? - What are the ways you will market to and capture leads? 2) Define and deeply understand your target audience: - Who are your priority audience targets? Get as specific as possible! - What are your target audience’s motivations? What do they need out of events? - What other events is your audience considering? - Speaking to individuals who are part of your target audience about your event is highly recommended. 3) Be as strict as possible about ROI for all activations: - What are your costs per result (e.g., impressions, conversions, etc.)? - What does it cost to make it all happen (e.g., travel & expenses, swag, etc.) - Ensure everything has a reason to exist, especially if it has a cost. 4) Focus on doing things that others aren’t doing: - Pressure yourself to stand out. Don’t just be another happy hour at a bar. - Are there unique venues that can bring the local culture to life? - Is the format you’re prioritizing interesting? If you’re hosting a happy hour with a panel, could you mix things up? Take risks on new formats! 5) Seek help and collaboration from all walks of life: - Involve people and partners who will bring fresh new perspectives and thoughts to your event. - Diversify your event bit by bit. If you’re hosting a conference, challenge yourself to create a gender balance. Then, a healthy mix of cultural backgrounds. And perhaps push yourself for socioeconomic diversity. And so on! The intention is critical and will result in a much better event experience for everyone. - Go beyond your immediate target audience. The blockchain industry is small, and having people adjacent to your company as advocates goes a long way. 6) Make sure every detail doesn’t go unnoticed: - From the initial invitation to the seating arrangement at dinner, every detail counts. - Use the event and relevant marketing to bring your brand to life. Challenge yourself to align the event’s experience with your brand’s mission and positioning strategy. - Surprise and delight! If all the “essentials” have been met, consider how to “wow” your audience. For example, a brand-aligned, locally sourced gift to a dinner will be a nice, memorable souvenir for guests. Or, consider involving the audience with questions generated by the crowd for panels, which are typically one-sided. 7) Streamline the event UX like you would with any product: - Get deeply familiar with the local culture, cuisine, venues, and everything else. Ask locals for feedback. The worst thing that can happen is doing something insensitive to the local culture. - Is the location central to where people are staying? Does the time not clash with anything significant that might cause people to be late or unable to attend? The best events will be easy to find and get to. - Does your event make sense in the context of the event week? Happy hours in the afternoon might work well or not, depending on when it's scheduled. A full-day conference at the end of a conference week might not be well attended, as people are mentally and physically drained. - Go through the entire attendee experience from pre-, during, and post-event. What is the ticket-buying experience like? Can you easily add the event to your preferred calendar? Can I speak quickly with someone from the events team if I have an issue? 8) Fully embrace the local culture: - Most people travel to international blockchain events to experience a new location and its culture. Bring that to them at professional events, and people will thank you endlessly. - Focus on authenticity over what’s easy. While hotel restaurants might offer easy bookings, a local-owned restaurant will stand out and create long-standing memories for attendees. - If possible, source all items like swag, gifts, and other physical goods locally. This will not only save you a nightmare customs situation, but your event will also stand out as much more authentic to the local culture. 9) The experience (and marketing) starts well before the event: - Starting as early as possible will maximize your success. Try to avoid planning events one after another. You’ll notice that the events with the highest number of RSVPs often publicized themselves early. - Pay close attention to all details for pre-event collateral like invitations, advertisements, etc. Is the language aligned with your brand positioning? Are the designs brand-aligned and help your brand stand out? - Event website or page, social media campaigns, word-of-mouth, etc.? Make sure you leave no stone unturned. People hear about events in all kinds of ways, so make sure your event is everywhere. 10) Measure your success, repeat what worked, and drop what didn’t work: - Remember how we set goals and how to measure success in the beginning? Revisit those and see what worked and what didn’t. See if you can raise the bar for KPIs for the next event. Rinse and repeat. - Capture qualitative feedback from your attendees. Ask them what they liked and what they didn’t like. An incentivized survey is one way to maximize responses. - Think about scale. Are there ways you can templatize your events strategy? Is there a good baseline for meetups, happy hours, and dinners that you can create? Be careful not to repeat these templates every time, as things will get stale; however, having a template will ensure that you can minimize your risks and create a baseline level of success. Contrary to popular belief, events are complex. These are some of the things I think of when producing events. Did I miss anything? Are there any questions? Feel free to reply or DM!

at an early-stage, your single community initiative should be to cultivate superfans. take any project, remove the superfans, and you'll be left with price talk, bounty hunting, and marketing/dev proposals in your chat.

rule of 7s dictate that people must come across you 7 times before they take action. this is why it's never enough to have a single article, a single video, or a single press placement. do them consistently, and they'll compound over time.