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I am obviously late to the Start Fund party (since I don’t blog on weekends and wrote about games instead yesterday). The Yuri Milner + SV Angels deal to fund YC companies is interesting but I think for slightly different reasons than I have seen mentioned (I have only read a few posts, so quite possible that someone else has pointed this out already).
First, it aims squarely at the critical funding gap that all accelerator programs have. Teams can make impressive progress in just a few months, but few of them really get far enough for a full on Series A round to make sense (by which I mean a priced $1m+ round with the majority coming from a VC firm). I know several teams that went deep into credit card debt following accelerator programs. YC had already made a ton of progress in addressing that funding gap by assembling a really impressive roster of angels to come in and AngelList has further improved this process. Now YC essentially has an “underwriter” for that interim round. This raises the bar for other accelerator programs at a time when several of them are planning to expand (Techstars apparently is adding 10 more cities and DreamIt just announced New York).
Second, this announcement should make clear just how much of a tempest in a teapot “angel gate” was. When an individual and a single fund can promise to supply capital to an entire graduating class of YC companies, it should be eminently clear that collusion among angels to sustain “unreasonable” deal terms was never in the cards. The total amount of capital needed by these companies is tiny compared to the overall supply of capital and it was simply a question of time for capital to flow in that direction.
I am obviously late to the Start Fund party (since I don’t blog on weekends and wrote about games instead yesterday). The Yuri Milner + SV Angels deal to fund YC companies is interesting but I think for slightly different reasons than I have seen mentioned (I have only read a few posts, so quite possible that someone else has pointed this out already).
First, it aims squarely at the critical funding gap that all accelerator programs have. Teams can make impressive progress in just a few months, but few of them really get far enough for a full on Series A round to make sense (by which I mean a priced $1m+ round with the majority coming from a VC firm). I know several teams that went deep into credit card debt following accelerator programs. YC had already made a ton of progress in addressing that funding gap by assembling a really impressive roster of angels to come in and AngelList has further improved this process. Now YC essentially has an “underwriter” for that interim round. This raises the bar for other accelerator programs at a time when several of them are planning to expand (Techstars apparently is adding 10 more cities and DreamIt just announced New York).
Second, this announcement should make clear just how much of a tempest in a teapot “angel gate” was. When an individual and a single fund can promise to supply capital to an entire graduating class of YC companies, it should be eminently clear that collusion among angels to sustain “unreasonable” deal terms was never in the cards. The total amount of capital needed by these companies is tiny compared to the overall supply of capital and it was simply a question of time for capital to flow in that direction.
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Philosophy Mondays: Human-AI Collaboration
Today's Philosophy Monday is an important interlude. I want to reveal that I have not been writing the posts in this series entirely by myself. Instead I have been working with Claude, not just for the graphic illustrations, but also for the text. My method has been to write a rough draft and then ask Claude for improvement suggestions. I will expand this collaboration to other intelligences going forward, including open source models such as Llama and DeepSeek. I will also explore other moda...
Intent-based Collaboration Environments
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Philosophy Mondays: Human-AI Collaboration
Today's Philosophy Monday is an important interlude. I want to reveal that I have not been writing the posts in this series entirely by myself. Instead I have been working with Claude, not just for the graphic illustrations, but also for the text. My method has been to write a rough draft and then ask Claude for improvement suggestions. I will expand this collaboration to other intelligences going forward, including open source models such as Llama and DeepSeek. I will also explore other moda...
Intent-based Collaboration Environments
AI Native IDEs for Code, Engineering, Science
Web3/Crypto: Why Bother?
One thing that keeps surprising me is how quite a few people see absolutely nothing redeeming in web3 (née crypto). Maybe this is their genuine belief. Maybe it is a reaction to the extreme boosterism of some proponents who present web3 as bringing about a libertarian nirvana. From early on I have tried to provide a more rounded perspective, pointing to both the good and the bad that can come from it as in my talks at the Blockstack Summits. Today, however, I want to attempt to provide a coge...
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