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> SV does reject con artists The incredible amount of money Andreesen Horowitz poured into so many different crypto scams contradicts this. Not to mention the

> SV does reject con artists The incredible amount of money Andreesen Horowitz poured into so many different crypto scams contradicts this. Not to mention the incredible amount of terrible companies which had business plans that were prima facie ridiculous.

MichaelZuo 3y ago
Did you really expect a 100% perfect rate? i.e. infallibility? No real system can accomplish that, even 99.9% is already a very high bar.
- reaperman 3y ago
  A16Z has a portfolio size of $35 billion and invested nearly $8 billion in pure cryptocurrency schemes (probably quite a bit more additional investment through some of their funds which aren't exclusively crypto plays). We're not talking "99.9% avoidance of obvious scams" or any other tiny fraction. Their flagship crypto fund was down 40% in 2022. Even if it returned profits to shareholders since its seed investments in 2009, it did so at the expense of people who bought in later, like all crypto wins. They didn't "create value" they, at best, extracted value from crypto scams. And at this point it's not even clear to me how the fund is performing overall.
  - MichaelZuo 3y ago
    Yes but we're talking about SV as a whole, not a specific firm? If we assume a quarter of a16z's crypto investments will turn out to be actual frauds, which is a big assumption, that's only a small bit of all the money flowing through SV. And plus I think even a 98% success rate of avoiding scams is already pretty noteworthy, like I said 99.9% is a very high bar.
    - runnerup 3y ago
      Where did you get 98% from?
      - MichaelZuo 3y ago
        It's my personal bar for someone/some group to be considered honest. I'm not sure what 'reaperman's threshold is but I doubt it's literally 100% or even 99.9%.
        runnerup 3y ago
        So you’re asserting that it’s your belief that less than 2% of Silicon Valley VC money is invested in scams or invested to perpetuate a scam? Besides A16Z, what are the other investment firms that you feel comprises the core of Silicon Valley VC culture?
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        No not really? Why would I be asserting that to you or anyone else? Obviously I don't have access to the detailed financial records of every major player in SV, nor likely does anyone else on HN.
        runnerup 3y ago
        The “major players” post the vast majority of their investments because they’re advertising their funds to potential limited partners. It also publicly signaling the strength of the companies they invest in which improves their outcomes through ease of negotiating future business agreements with potential customers and partners. So it’s definitely possible to establish an approximate upper and lower bound, and it’s way above your 2% limit. You’d either have to accept that SV does, in fact, deal heavily in scams, or post-facto adjust your tolerance limit to set the bar lower.
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        What are you talking about? If you somehow know better then link or reference the sources.
        3y ago

MichaelZuo 3y ago

Did you really expect a 100% perfect rate? i.e. infallibility? No real system can accomplish that, even 99.9% is already a very high bar.

reaperman 3y ago
A16Z has a portfolio size of $35 billion and invested nearly $8 billion in pure cryptocurrency schemes (probably quite a bit more additional investment through some of their funds which aren't exclusively crypto plays). We're not talking "99.9% avoidance of obvious scams" or any other tiny fraction. Their flagship crypto fund was down 40% in 2022. Even if it returned profits to shareholders since its seed investments in 2009, it did so at the expense of people who bought in later, like all crypto wins. They didn't "create value" they, at best, extracted value from crypto scams. And at this point it's not even clear to me how the fund is performing overall.
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  Yes but we're talking about SV as a whole, not a specific firm? If we assume a quarter of a16z's crypto investments will turn out to be actual frauds, which is a big assumption, that's only a small bit of all the money flowing through SV. And plus I think even a 98% success rate of avoiding scams is already pretty noteworthy, like I said 99.9% is a very high bar.
  - runnerup 3y ago
    Where did you get 98% from?
    - MichaelZuo 3y ago
      It's my personal bar for someone/some group to be considered honest. I'm not sure what 'reaperman's threshold is but I doubt it's literally 100% or even 99.9%.
      - runnerup 3y ago
        So you’re asserting that it’s your belief that less than 2% of Silicon Valley VC money is invested in scams or invested to perpetuate a scam? Besides A16Z, what are the other investment firms that you feel comprises the core of Silicon Valley VC culture?
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        No not really? Why would I be asserting that to you or anyone else? Obviously I don't have access to the detailed financial records of every major player in SV, nor likely does anyone else on HN.
        runnerup 3y ago
        The “major players” post the vast majority of their investments because they’re advertising their funds to potential limited partners. It also publicly signaling the strength of the companies they invest in which improves their outcomes through ease of negotiating future business agreements with potential customers and partners. So it’s definitely possible to establish an approximate upper and lower bound, and it’s way above your 2% limit. You’d either have to accept that SV does, in fact, deal heavily in scams, or post-facto adjust your tolerance limit to set the bar lower.
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        What are you talking about? If you somehow know better then link or reference the sources.
        3y ago