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What do you get when you combine LinkedIn, spam, and videos? Gary Vaynerchuk! It took me a few weeks of unfollowing, unsubscribing, or clicking whatever butto

What do you get when you combine LinkedIn, spam, and videos? Gary Vaynerchuk! It took me a few weeks of unfollowing, unsubscribing, or clicking whatever buttons were available for “omfg stop showing me this stuff” to delouse my feed of all things Gary Vee.

ta1234567890 8y ago
This. GV is like a LinkedIn virus, really annoying. Also the guy is like the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, getting rich by selling advise on how they got rich, which is all pretty much useless for others (or at least very disingenuous)
- throwaway9980 8y ago
  Yeah, if I didn’t know better I would say that he’s a Sasha Baren Cohen charector. Literally a caricature of a bunch of stereotypes.
- i_made_a_booboo 8y ago
  totally not how he got rich but OK.
  - tomcooks 8y ago
    not understanding the downvotes, he got rich via his dad's liquor/wine shop
- withdavidli 8y ago
  Did you do zero research on him? He still runs a marketing business with real customers. He also invested early in FB, Snapchat, and Uber. He had a challenge this year on flipping items from free section of Craigslist, yard sales, thrift stores for profit. What is this all pretty much useless? He gives away 99% of information for free (I've been watching his videos for 3 years). He comes out with a book once every two or three years that's a synthesis of mostly what he has already given away. Think of Tim Ferris' book Tools of Titans. Do you think advise like work to make money so you can fund your own businesses if no one else wants to fund you is useless? How about figuring what you want and reverse engineering the path? Or to successful entrepreneur who doesn't find money rewarding anymore, that it's good thing, because most people never get past the phase of chasing money, that he can focus on what he wants and finds meaningful.
  - lloydde 8y ago
    > He also invested early in FB, Snapchat, and Uber. Sources? I suspect origin will be himself. What does it mean to invest early in Facebook? FB completed its last traditional round in 2006. Personally, I’m a fan of GV, but it’s weird when someone says they invested early to mean outside of an angel investment / funding round. I’d be surprised if he was part of a FB round. Instead like other social media entrepreneurs he likely picked up some on secondary market or directly from a shareholder 2007+ as much for the narrative as the financial investment.
    - withdavidli 8y ago
      I don't discount people that got it in secondary markets. It's not like they're only buying a few shares. I can't find outside sources. The most legit one is from WSJ[0], 200k investment in 2009. Hopefully they verified holdings and date of investment before printing. Crunchbase does list him as Angel/Seed Round investor in Uber in 2010[1]. [0] https://outline.com/8HHZFF https://outline.com/8HHZFF [1]https://www.crunchbase.com/funding_round/uber-angel--c76f9429#section-overview https://www.crunchbase.com/funding_round/uber-angel--c76f942...
      - lloydde 8y ago
        Even if you don’t discount, do you agree that his FB investment is different from his angel investments?
        withdavidli 8y ago
        Yes. It’s much earlier. Anything pre ipo, they’re going to be the first 1% of shareholders if the company does well. And many times you can’t even buy into those rounds without the right connections. Early is subjective vs if he said he was an angel round investor.
- hello_newman 8y ago
  I understand you're probably like most people on hacker news and don't care for people on the "sales end" of the spectrum, but he definitely didn't get rich selling advice. He runs a really successful marketing company (https://vaynermedia.com/ https://vaynermedia.com/) a sports agency (http://vaynersports.com/ http://vaynersports.com/), gives most of his content away for free on YouTube, wrote 4 books and is a NYT + Wall Street Journal Bestseller, and is pretty respected in the early stage Silicon Valley investment community (https://www.crunchbase.com/person/gary-vaynerchuk/investments/investments_list#section-personal-investments https://www.crunchbase.com/person/gary-vaynerchuk/investment...). Like most things on hacker news, don't speak on something unless you know what you're talking about.
  - SpecialistEMT 8y ago
    Hes totally fueling his company by being famous. Wouldnt exist otherwise. Elon Musk of digital advertising
    - hello_newman 8y ago
      considering how his company came before he was really famous, I highly doubt that. It's ok if you don't care for Gary V, he's not for everyone, but saying his success is contingent on the fact the he's "famous" is simply not true. Again, if you don't know what you're talking about, you probably shouldn't be speaking on it.
      - SpecialistEMT 8y ago
        I know exactly what I'm talking about. I'm working in the same field, own a digital agency. He's a snake-oil salesman.

ta1234567890 8y ago

This. GV is like a LinkedIn virus, really annoying. Also the guy is like the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, getting rich by selling advise on how they got rich, which is all pretty much useless for others (or at least very disingenuous)

throwaway9980 8y ago
Yeah, if I didn’t know better I would say that he’s a Sasha Baren Cohen charector. Literally a caricature of a bunch of stereotypes.
i_made_a_booboo 8y ago
totally not how he got rich but OK.
- tomcooks 8y ago
  not understanding the downvotes, he got rich via his dad's liquor/wine shop
withdavidli 8y ago
Did you do zero research on him? He still runs a marketing business with real customers. He also invested early in FB, Snapchat, and Uber. He had a challenge this year on flipping items from free section of Craigslist, yard sales, thrift stores for profit. What is this all pretty much useless? He gives away 99% of information for free (I've been watching his videos for 3 years). He comes out with a book once every two or three years that's a synthesis of mostly what he has already given away. Think of Tim Ferris' book Tools of Titans. Do you think advise like work to make money so you can fund your own businesses if no one else wants to fund you is useless? How about figuring what you want and reverse engineering the path? Or to successful entrepreneur who doesn't find money rewarding anymore, that it's good thing, because most people never get past the phase of chasing money, that he can focus on what he wants and finds meaningful.
- lloydde 8y ago
  > He also invested early in FB, Snapchat, and Uber. Sources? I suspect origin will be himself. What does it mean to invest early in Facebook? FB completed its last traditional round in 2006. Personally, I’m a fan of GV, but it’s weird when someone says they invested early to mean outside of an angel investment / funding round. I’d be surprised if he was part of a FB round. Instead like other social media entrepreneurs he likely picked up some on secondary market or directly from a shareholder 2007+ as much for the narrative as the financial investment.
  - withdavidli 8y ago
    I don't discount people that got it in secondary markets. It's not like they're only buying a few shares. I can't find outside sources. The most legit one is from WSJ[0], 200k investment in 2009. Hopefully they verified holdings and date of investment before printing. Crunchbase does list him as Angel/Seed Round investor in Uber in 2010[1]. [0] https://outline.com/8HHZFF https://outline.com/8HHZFF [1]https://www.crunchbase.com/funding_round/uber-angel--c76f9429#section-overview https://www.crunchbase.com/funding_round/uber-angel--c76f942...
    - lloydde 8y ago
      Even if you don’t discount, do you agree that his FB investment is different from his angel investments?
      - withdavidli 8y ago
        Yes. It’s much earlier. Anything pre ipo, they’re going to be the first 1% of shareholders if the company does well. And many times you can’t even buy into those rounds without the right connections. Early is subjective vs if he said he was an angel round investor.
hello_newman 8y ago
I understand you're probably like most people on hacker news and don't care for people on the "sales end" of the spectrum, but he definitely didn't get rich selling advice. He runs a really successful marketing company (https://vaynermedia.com/ https://vaynermedia.com/) a sports agency (http://vaynersports.com/ http://vaynersports.com/), gives most of his content away for free on YouTube, wrote 4 books and is a NYT + Wall Street Journal Bestseller, and is pretty respected in the early stage Silicon Valley investment community (https://www.crunchbase.com/person/gary-vaynerchuk/investments/investments_list#section-personal-investments https://www.crunchbase.com/person/gary-vaynerchuk/investment...). Like most things on hacker news, don't speak on something unless you know what you're talking about.
- SpecialistEMT 8y ago
  Hes totally fueling his company by being famous. Wouldnt exist otherwise. Elon Musk of digital advertising
  - hello_newman 8y ago
    considering how his company came before he was really famous, I highly doubt that. It's ok if you don't care for Gary V, he's not for everyone, but saying his success is contingent on the fact the he's "famous" is simply not true. Again, if you don't know what you're talking about, you probably shouldn't be speaking on it.
    - SpecialistEMT 8y ago
      I know exactly what I'm talking about. I'm working in the same field, own a digital agency. He's a snake-oil salesman.