As much as we'd like to draw a sharp line between "Real Businesses" and "Frauds," so much of it actually comes down to whether you can match your ambitions to t

As much as we'd like to draw a sharp line between "Real Businesses" and "Frauds," so much of it actually comes down to whether you can match your ambitions to the amount of money you're likely to raise. Think about the construction of the Panama Canal. The first few attempts were total fails, because canal-building technology wasn't as advanced as people thought, and eventually the funders got tired of what they perceived as "throwing good money after bad." Eventually the canal did get built. Technology improved and the winning venture had enough funding to make it happen. As a thought experiment, if We/Neumann/Softbank had enough money to buy or lease all the great real estate in the world, and to educate all the population in We schools, so that they needed/wanted We offices when they grew up, it could have ruled the world. Putting it that bluntly makes it sound silly, which is probably the right way to view the Neumann era in retrospect. But when We's future liquidity seemed almost endless, it was possible to dream big dreams. What got them undone is the reality that capital markets do not stay giddy forever. At the top of every cycle, there's always someone who ginned up an enormous flop -- losing their funding partway through for a dream that would not work without more capital.