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I wonder if Marc Andreessen would have invested in any of the things he now says that are in shortage. Words are cheap. By writing his essay Marc portrays that

I wonder if Marc Andreessen would have invested in any of the things he now says that are in shortage. Words are cheap. By writing his essay Marc portrays that he is interested in the greater good but when it comes to actions its all quickbucks.

icelancer 6y ago
This was my first reaction, but Tren Griffin pointed out something fairly reasonable; VC funding is very small ($50 billion/year or so compared to the trillions the central government spends, to say nothing of the states). Your point is reasonable, I think, but the scale is pretty off as it relates to VC funding vs. public spending.
- ignoramous 6y ago
  > VC funding is very small The money does and can make a huge difference even if it only helps with building out a proof-of-concept? Uber took on the entrenched Taxi industry world-wide with VC money. Zenefits did the same to the insurance industry. The problem is, one cannot compete with the incumbents head-on, for which one might need a gazillion dollars from the get-go, but I think one can definitely take on them with a humble investment to the tune of a few million dollars... Isn't that anyway the promise of nimble, innovative startups [0] -- out-manouver large corporations? I don't see VCs balking at startups competing squarely with a FAANG, say, for instance. Somehow, this rationale that the government has deeper pockets seems like a dishonest excuse. I agree public spending does trump any amount of money private investors can conjure up, but I do not agree that they are blame-free for not moving the needle forward, because they don't really lack ambition on-paper at least [1]. And, hey, software has been eating the world without significant public spend for a long time. There's been talk of private money building the future [2] for sometime, now... /rant [0] https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-... [1] https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12508356 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12508356

icelancer 6y ago

This was my first reaction, but Tren Griffin pointed out something fairly reasonable; VC funding is very small ($50 billion/year or so compared to the trillions the central government spends, to say nothing of the states). Your point is reasonable, I think, but the scale is pretty off as it relates to VC funding vs. public spending.

ignoramous 6y ago
> VC funding is very small The money does and can make a huge difference even if it only helps with building out a proof-of-concept? Uber took on the entrenched Taxi industry world-wide with VC money. Zenefits did the same to the insurance industry. The problem is, one cannot compete with the incumbents head-on, for which one might need a gazillion dollars from the get-go, but I think one can definitely take on them with a humble investment to the tune of a few million dollars... Isn't that anyway the promise of nimble, innovative startups [0] -- out-manouver large corporations? I don't see VCs balking at startups competing squarely with a FAANG, say, for instance. Somehow, this rationale that the government has deeper pockets seems like a dishonest excuse. I agree public spending does trump any amount of money private investors can conjure up, but I do not agree that they are blame-free for not moving the needle forward, because they don't really lack ambition on-paper at least [1]. And, hey, software has been eating the world without significant public spend for a long time. There's been talk of private money building the future [2] for sometime, now... /rant [0] https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-... [1] https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12508356 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12508356