My fund is an early stage pre-seed venture fund that backs weirdos. Our thesis is simple. The world is increasingly complex, chaotic if you will, and only the most agile will win. We look for those that have the agency to adapt to the one true constant; change. Circumstances changed by the moment but humans remain reassuringly the same.
If you are working in artificial intelligence or medicine I’d like to pleased my case to you. Id just like to pass along a note.
The current “responsible” safety stance is that we should not have AI agents dispense healthcare advice as if they had the knowledge of a doctor. I think this is safetyism and rob’s sick people of their own agency
I have very complicated healthcare needs and have experienced the range of how human doctors fail. The failure case is almost always in the presumption that you will fall within a median result.
Now for most people this is obviously true. They are more likely to be the average case. And we should all be concerned that people without basic numerate skills may misinterpret a risk. Whether it’s our collective responsibility to set limits to project regular people is not a solved problem.
But for the complex informed patient knows they are not average? The real outliers. Giving them access to more granular data let’s them accelerate their own care.
It’s a persistent issue of paternalism in medicine to assume the doctor knows best and the presumption that the patient is either stupid, lying, or hysterical is the norm. It’s also somewhat gendered in my experience.
I now regularly work with my doctors using an LLM precisely so we can avoid these failure cases where I am treated as an average statistic in a guessing game. I’m a patient not a customer after all. I decided my best interest.
A strict regulatory framework constricts access without solving any of the wider issues of access to care for those outside of norms. Artificial intelligence has the capacity to save lives and improve quality of life for countless difficult patients. It’s a social good and probably a financial one too.
Everyone in my social circle was in a terrific mood yesterday. A small company that was widely supported by angels in my ecosystem was acquired by a larger startup that we all like. Happy investors that we were, Alex and I read the cap table over dinner and celebrated each co-investor that we liked.
It was a jubilant moment across my group chats in a darker wider climate for startups. The federal reserve’s inflation fight has meant tighter dollars. And that means less funding for early stage companies at lower valuations.
The focus has been good for the industry. A reminder that we can’t spend our way to innovation. We’ve relied on bigger companies, weaker talent, and unsustainable growth policies while the cash spigot was on.
I enjoyed the win. I’m happy for the founder and the team who will be going to such a great company. I’m happy a lot of investors got a win. But I know that the good mood will have to sustain us through some rough patches. So it’s good we are all banding together and the wins are shared.
I’ve noticed an distinct uptick in pre-seed & seed startup founders looking to raise smaller rounds. If you think this post is about you, don’t fret I’m into the double digits with examples just this past month. Smaller rounds on reasonably capped SAFE notes are on everyone’s mind.
While not everyone I’ve spoken to has fully thought through what it means to raise less, the market is a muse. And she is always worth listening too. Founders are hearing that raising a round must tied to product milestones. That it is good to raise what is needed to show proof that your idea has demand. In some cases the milestones are proof that your technology or product can be made at all.
When I first got started as a founder a million to 1.5m raise capped at 6m was considered a big and well funded seed round. It was more typical that the pre-seed and angel rounds were done in the half million range and capped at 3m or so if you were dealing with sophisticated angels. The industry was smaller.
It’s fascinating to see that we’ve stepped back to valuations and round sizes from ten to fifteen years ago. The markets have indeed shifted.
But what really got my attention is the undercurrent of planning and go to market strategy work being demanded again. We’d lost some of those expectations during the fervor of the zero percent interest years. Capital has a cost. We’d forgotten that.
Founders should raise whatever they think is right for their stage and what they want to prove. The pro for less is more discipline. The con is you run out of money and you die. The rest is overoptimization about dilution which is not the high order bit.
If you are a founder in this market you must know what you want to do, how much it will cost and how long it will take you to get to the first step of milestones that proves you’ve got something of value. Everything else is noise.
I found myself with a bit of anxiety this morning. I was afraid that I hadn’t done enough to promote some of my commitments this month.
This morning I co-hosted a session on nervous system work for founders and venture capitalists with Jonny Miller. Aside from a few Zoom hiccups, I think it well. But with my anxiety all I could think of is how I should have done more. I could have invited more more people, emailed more reminders, promoted it more on Twitter. Just more.
I am finding myself fearful that I’ve not not done enough to promote it. I’m afraid I’ll look like a fool and fail at my goal of raising awareness (and ultimately money) for our policy goals. It’s probably irrational but it’s sitting heavily on my emotions at the moment.
I care a great deal about the event being a success. And I have done quite a bit to promote it and invite the right mix of folks who will be interested.
I think even admitting to the anxiety helps me recognize that it’s irrational. I do think the BBQ will be a good time. We will have food, drinks, good company and if you’d like to come it’s on August 16th. Worth a drive into Gallatin I promise.
I wish I didn’t get anxiety about if I’m working hard enough to prepare for an event. The balance between preparing and promoting an event and having it go smoothly when it comes to performing live isn’t an easy one for me. I used to obsessively prepare for everything.
Which would then backfire on me as I’d use all my energy on the lead up and find myself exhausted and frazzled when it came time to be present in the moment for a big day.
So I’m trying to not get too much in my head about if I’ve done enough. What will be will be and I can trust myself to be present in the moment to succeed.
And if you’d like to meet me in person August 16th and you happen to be in Montana I’d love to host you at my home. The topic of conversation will be the Montana Miracle and now we can continue to make the state a place for all to thrive.
Please join Alex Miller, Julie Fredrickson, and Padden Murphy as they host a meet and greet with Frontier Institute’s CEO, Kendall Cotton. We will discuss the recently passed YIMBY policies in Montana’s 2023 Legislative Session and the Frontier Institute’s future plans to ensure Montana is a place that all can thrive.
Come learn about the Frontier Institute’s impactful initiatives, enjoy some delicious food, and engage with a group of fellow Montanans dedicated to knocking down bureaucratic barriers and ensuring opportunity for all.
I suppose it’s fitting that just one day after feeling glimmers of hope that our networked chaotic youth culture is rebelling towards whitepilled optimism that my mood would immediately take a darker turn. You just can’t sustain a vibe these days when you have to interact with reality. Or at least reality as intermediated through an algorithm.
I’m planning out a fall trip to Europe to go scouting and meet up with folks. It’s a challenge to get talent into America with our current visa system. So I do my best to get to get abroad to meet founders and builders. I’m considering going to some spots in the Baltics this trip and maybe I’ll do the Balkans on my next go.
So I’m browsing through Airbnb trying to see what could be a home base for me. I’m always looking for spaces that are livable. Function is more important than form.
I focus on kitchens, bathrooms and living areas that are built for comfort. Alas, this is actually a fair amount of labor as much of Airbnb is optimized for what can most kindly be referred to as an InstaHo aesthetic.
Soft pink modernist couch, illustrator triptychs, and geometric rug prints are InstaHo aesthetic
Now I’m not saying that this Apartment Therapy circa 2015 look isn’t easy on the eyes. It’s pleasant and bright. I’m sure if I had colorful outfits I photographed daily and sold some personal brand based how cute I am this would be my first choice for an Airbnb. Alas I’m a professional not an influencer.
I’m sure the algorithms reward being as aesthetically pleasing to as wide a range of people as possible. I was once an Airbnb super host myself so I’ve taken my fair share of over saturated photos. But can’t we just get a couch that is comfortable to sit on while you work?
Does no one else but me require a little spinal support? Is being cozy just too hard to photograph well? Why is everyone stuck with some hideous globalization chic when it’s not even that comfortable or functional?
If anyone has an apartment in Tallin or Prague do please let me know. I am actively looking for a spot.
Most of my social circle is caught up in various internecine dramas. This is really saying something as I have a lot of people in a lot of different demographics across every continent except Antarctica. Which is a pity as I’d love a friend down there.
I am convinced that everyone is losing their fucking minds because we are in the middle of what I believe will end up being recognized as an information war. Maybe one day we persecute memetic crimes against humanity at The Hague.
I realize this sounds modestly hysterical but really you probably don’t appreciate how much your opinions are being courted to different interests groups. It’s not even particularly menacing. We want others to see our humanity and we leverage every tool we have from Twitter to the New York Times.
And it’s important that we fight these wars. You are probably right about a lot of things and I am wrong about them. It’s important that you and I provide participation and consensus to the rest of society so we can come to some form of agreement. If you think something should change own up to it.
I genuinely think it’s a mistake for anyone to pull away from these obligations to society and by extension political and social opinion. I have watched Silicon Valley pull back from participation in its own self advocacy in the wake of the American media coming down so hard on it. I think this is a mistake.
I believe that the technology industry and startups in particular owe it to ourselves and to the rest of the world to remain engaged. I promise it’s not that hard to speak to the media or the general public. If you are a founder or someone participating in this community and need help just send me a DM on Twitter. Consider me a diplomat to the fourth estate.
I myself am going through an exercise of ruthless prioritization of my own focus and find. As in any portfolio, write downs are inevitable. It’s easier to write something down when it’s money. Investments of time, energy, social capital and presence are much harder to let go. A sunk cost never boils? A watched pot never catalyzes? Sometimes a group or a movement chooses to remain outside their power.
I have so much less capacity to be present than I’d like. Others may prefer to be distant and still shower up but I find I’m happier with boundaries that are firm and great remove. That means when I do show up you have my full and intimate attention. It’s only right.
As more of us rise up the acceleration curve of artificial intelligence and must maintain our capacity to sense-make, this will help your mind and body function in a chaotic world.
I myself have taken Jonny’s Bootcamp, intend to be in the next cohort (my code JULIE gets you a discount), and I’ll be sponsoring a founder to attend the September cohort so consider this a chance to see if these tools are right for you. My revealed preferences tell you what you need to know.
We act like our attention is a static thing. You have reading habits and social media patterns and your attention is allocated to what makes the most sense for whatever demographic you have settled into for your life choices. But it can always be changed. And maybe your attention choices don’t serve you.
We have fantasies about our independent mindedness, especially in America. But we are all a product of other people’s attentional priorities. What you are focused on is quite often molded especially for you.
It’s sort of comical how you think that you’ve made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry, when in fact, you’re wearing a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room… from a pile of “stuff.”
Take the principle of this iconic scene from The Devil Wears Prada and apply it to every single area of your life where you made a choice as a consumer, worker, hobbiest, parent or any other identity with a collective meaning.
I’m taking this problem very seriously at the moment as we may be in for a significant attention economy realignment. Big chunks of the social internet appear to be up for grabs as legacy networks like Twitter, Reddit and Stackoverflow go through significant identity alignments issues as competitive pressures from artificial intelligence and increased attention allocation automation. The algorithms are fighting for you.
None of this is bad or good necessarily. Some of it is us fighting to make make some areas more competitive and perhaps other areas will be shown to be unsustainable. And sometimes it’s just management. Don’tk make the mistake of dickriding for someone that is as human as you or I. Stay smart out there and think critically for yourself.
Being valuable for your data has always been a bit of weird feeling for individuals. Because you on your own may have experienced quite varied mileage on being remunerated for your skills, contributions and other ineffable qualities.
We value athletes and business executives and the extremely beautiful and the particularly intelligent and getting paid to be any combination of that is bound up in dumb luck and how you compete in an economy with other humans.
Individually we are all quite unique. But the ways in which we are packaged, marketed, sold and controlled by our social, national and family contracts and norms can make it feel like we are put in boxes. Demographics.
Some professions are very refined at saying what facet of a person is worth something to another person responsible for selling, let’s say, designer clothing or commodity groceries or financial services. We call that cost of acquisition.
The adage in my age of the internet was always “if you don’t pay for the product then you are the product.” And that insight has tainted social media from the start. Even if it was a great deal for all the free users of the social website who didn’t mind using something for free because they couldn’t monetize their attributes at that scale. Generally unless you were in a small class of power users social media didn’t make you money and you weren’t that valuable.
And since you were the product being marketed and sold, other people who market and sold other things (advertising if you will) generally found it was in the best interest of a social media business to make sure there was plenty of flavors of you the user (perhaps SKUs or stock keeping units) on hand so if an advertiser wants to buy access to say a late thirties professional woman with a high net worth, she is online and can be shown an advertisement.
It helps to have active users like that readily available so she might be enticed to buy a $5 sparking water laced with drugs and sugar substitutes. Yes I went to Whole Foods today.
So it’s a mystery to me why you would implode the vast and intertwined delicate tapestry of entrenched network effects so that you can instead deliver less access to the network whose major value is keeping specific demographics on a website for extended periods happy and engaged. But I am not Elon Musk.
Elon Musk rate limiting user access to Twitter because “extractive data” rationalizing
As the age of artificial intelligence trained on reams of user data (available via API or application programming interfaces) gets going the owners of the social web are scared they are getting screwed. Reddit shut down access which is a real blow to Google whose best type of search for niche answers has been amending “Reddit” at the end of a query.
If Elon Musk is selling a dopamine drip of content and access then shutting off the tap is a baffling decision. And I’ll admit I got off the internet today because the strain of whatever is actually happening at Twitter (rumor is server issues and back end chaos and unpaid bills) meant none of my tweets would send.
I quite hope this will be better tomorrow as I rather liked the old system of my data and attention for access to the great wide open feeds. And I actually paid $8 for my account. Can’t imagine what everyone else is experiencing.
