11 ms·

Jerry Neumann: Resignation Letter

124 points by vedang 2y ago

snapcaster 2y ago
I have no idea who this person is, but I found their investment philosophy interesting food for thought. I wonder how much of their disillusionment with tech industry is due to just getting older and jaded versus an actual drop in quality/boldness/etc.
Pet_Ant 2y ago
> First, I’ve felt for a few years now that the startups I’m seeing don’t seem so much like progress as just shopkeeping. ... it’s just not that interesting. The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, ... it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. This definitely felt true to me. All the potential of technology seems spent in computers. It seems like it's just a matter of making the existing commerce 5% faster. If I had to restart as a teenager I'd perhaps be looking into 3D printing. That seems like something that can actually make a difference. It's actually exciting. LLVMs are actually exciting, Docker/K8S, but beyond that don't know that anything really excites me.
- dullcrisp 2y ago
  Like CAD designs? Or 3D printer manufacturing? Is 3D printing creating any work?
  - mikepurvis 2y ago
    A lot still needs to be done to make the design pipeline accessible to normal people. Any clown can set up a bambu and print objects they find/buy online, but it's a huge learning curve to get from that point to being able to actually create your own parts, especially stuff that integrates with the complex shapes of some existing object. Recent examples from my life include wanting mounts for flashlights, a thing to attach to bike handlebars, a shelf bracket, a battery cover for a tool, a piece of a bird feeder, etc. Where is the interface that lets me scan the existing objects I need to integrate with and then quickly assemble prefab subcomponents into a printable design and seamlessly iterate on that?
    - fragmede 2y ago
      That would be an application for VR goggles, and it seems Adobe has Medium for that. https://www.adobe.com/products/medium.html https://www.adobe.com/products/medium.html
      - tsimionescu 2y ago
        No, VR goggles can't scan an object and generate precise enough measurements of it to create a basic 3D model that can attach to it. And they don't particularly help in refining this base model afterwards either, because they don't help in any way with the hardest part about 3D interactions, which is not the visualization, but the actual editing/interaction part, especially for fine details.
        tonypace 2y ago
        What you need is a feedback system between your coarse measurements from a low precision system such as a ruler or goggles and the prints that you make. Does the tab you printed fit into the latch? What part fails to fit?
- archero 2y ago
  I’m guessing you meant LLMs, but I choose to imagine that you’re just really excited about LLVM
  - drzzhan 2y ago
    Maybe they really meant LLVM? Large language vision model.
    - Pet_Ant 2y ago
      I meant LLM. Though LLVM is very cool, it's not revolutionary.
      - musicale 2y ago
        It is if it enables memory safety to become a mainstream feature for C++.
        auggierose 2y ago
        Naa. Chucking C++ into the garbage bin is revolutionary.
- kiba 2y ago
  Don't get me wrong. I love 3D printing. Unfortunately, the tech I am working with, FDM, is just the most boring technology you could think of. Really, it's just a hot glue gun guided by a computer. Apparently, it's only until after 3D printers become widespread that they invented a hand tool version of 3D printing. Anyway, a lot of it, the majority of the coolness in 3D printing are the designs. On its own, 3D printing is mildly useful. Learn CAD. That's something really useful there. Then there's other skills such as electronics that would make 3D printing way cooler. It's a cool hobby, but one that won't replace something like woodworking. It's just different and have their own pro and con. Same thing for manufacturing. It won't displace entirely general subtractive manufacturing. It has its own niches and pro and con. On LLVM and LLM, they are indeed impressive, much more so than the boring technology of 3D printing. But after the tech demo? I am ambivalent about it. Cool. Whatever. I prefer creating things and learning technology and science that help me improve my skills at learning things. If using LLM is a skill that isn't just prompt engineering, I might be more open to it.
chiefrubberduck 2y ago
[flagged]
nis0s 2y ago
> The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, ... it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. How can anyone say this when there’s so much amazing research happening in most universities, especially in computer science and engineering. It could be that the sample of prospective startups Nuemann gets exposure to is the same few people from the same few places? There’s such a disconnect between what’s possible, what hasn’t been done, and what’s funded.
- stonogo 2y ago
  Your argument would benefit from some examples of amazing research. Most of what I see is better implementations of the status quo. While I am excited about CHERI and similar efforts, they're hardly revolutionary.
  - Pet_Ant 2y ago
    I assume you mean: https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/ctsrd/cheri/ https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/ctsrd/cheri/ “Capability Hardware Enhanced RISC Instructions (CHERI)”
  - nis0s 2y ago
    I am excited about human augmentation, and I don’t see much work, research or funding in this space outside of work in genetics. If I get the time some day, I may do a blog post on the topic.
tigerstop10 2y ago
If the PC is dead, it's because of SaaS VC's investing in paywalled and members-only web apps, instead of creative tools that push the boundaries of personal computing.
- Baeocystin 2y ago
  Fully agreed. The rentiers have squeezed all the juice they can, and never understood what was amazing about personal computing in the first place. (nb. I am casting no aspersions at the author of the letter; I know nothing about him. Just sharing frustration at what has happened to the industry over the years.)
bsder 2y ago
> It just feels, I don’t know, done. If you can't find something that excites you right now in the technology space, that tells me more about how boring you are than anything else. Real Translation of VC: Wahhhh! With interest rates above zero I have to do actual work!
patrickhogan1 2y ago
This is one of the coolest times to be building technology. Haven’t felt this excited since I got my first PC.
gwern 2y ago
> So why quit? Three reasons. First, I’ve felt for a few years now that the startups I’m seeing don’t seem so much like progress as just shopkeeping. This isn’t a dig: there’s money to be made razoring a thin slice off a huge market, and there’s certainly less risk in that than there is building a market from scratch. But it’s just not that interesting. The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, I just don’t get anymore. And not because people’s lives, the people who have access to the tech, aren’t better, I think they are (although this, of course, has not been as unalloyed as I imagined as a 14-year old.) But because I think the tech is no longer improving lives, it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. This is remarkable to me because I would say that right now is one of the most exciting times to invest ever. We are in one of the new platforms: VC hasn't been so interesting to me since ~2013, when cryptocurrency offered a whole new greenfield, or 2008, when the iPhone changed everything for mobile, or ~1998, when the WWW began to mature enough to allow greenfield everything. (With an honorable mention to VR - still the new platform of the future...) Just think about LLMs and programming! Programming hasn't been about to change this much, this fundamentally, since the invention of networks or timesharing, perhaps. How can you look at this and write it all off as 'shopkeeping' with no 'building a market from scratch' and 'just not that interesting'? I think maybe the real reason is the next one: they're just older, and no longer have the gumption and energy to try to dive into the Shiny New Thing, and it's time to hang up their hat and call it a day, leaving it to the next generation.
- colejhudson 2y ago
  Suspect that a core reason for Jerry's PoV is that the dynamics of the (zeitgeist-related) software industry do not currently favor small teams. That's counter to the ethos of Silicon Valley and it's guy-in-a-garage mythology. Jerry would've been 14 around 1980, plus or minus a couple of years, which would've been in the heyday of personal computing. TRS-80s, Apple IIs, the IBM PC, its clones, etc. Then, and for the next 40-odd years, software was king (read: capital-light). And anybody could write software. LLMs are much less egalitarian. Can anyone write an LLM? Yes. Can anyone train an LLM that customers will want? A few. But most will need a few Ms, maybe even some Bs. Hence the AppAmaGooSoft benefactors and Jerry's complaint about the status-quo. Software-like economic dynamics will return, but it'll take a while, and until they do, it'll be much less morally satisfying to be a VC (in software) than it has over the last 40 years.
alexpetralia 2y ago
Get involved in local politics, Jerry! It's a satisfying way to impact your local community, and they almost always can use some help.
cortesoft 2y ago
> If it were true that financiers on the whole make profits slowly for years and then, every once in a while, lose them all and more in sudden “black swan” events, then there should be some way to lose money slowly for years and then suddenly make it all back and more. Black swans are awful in traditional finance, but they’re the winning lottery ticket in venture capital. Isn't this what every VC is doing? This is why VCs invest in a bunch of startups and expect most of them to fail. Matt Levine writes about this a lot; he talks about how the real risk for VCs isn't losing 100% on a failed startup, the risk is missing out on the one that hits it big. I am not sure why the writer thinks this strategy is novel.
- chrisdirkis 2y ago
  Specifically, he's not just investing in startups, but investing in ones that have a factor that is either unknown or unknowable. That's a different strategy from YC's "Invest in promising founders" or the typical VC "Invest in early stage startups with good metrics".
  - mizzao 2y ago
    It must have been "promising founders working on an idea with an unknown or unknowable factor", right? I can't imagine it working out so well without that qualifier.
    - chrisdirkis 2y ago
      Most likely, I'm just passing on what's noted in the post. There's likely a lot more nuance to the actual decision-making :)
tinyhouse 2y ago
I like this style of writing. Honest and open. Good luck my friend.
timcobb 2y ago
> then there should be some way to lose money slowly for years and then suddenly make it all back and more. This is how I always pictured domain name investing.
merinid 2y ago
Jerry Neumann is a cornerstone of the New York scene. He was helpful to anyone and everyone, with or without investment. He taught a class at Columbia that was the only practical technology entrepreneurship course in NYC for the longest time. His kindness and generosity were matched by his immense curiosity and pioneering spirit. His fund also had the best website in the game (for the longest time, a terminal emulator). Congrats Jerry on one of the best careers in VC. Thanks for showing so many that you can just do things your way and put integrity over hype every step of the way.
bbor 2y ago
Fantastically written article by someone who doesn’t realize (or articulate?) that they were part of a terribly unique, terribly exploitative movement that is reaching its natural conclusion. And, of course, I was lucky. Two of the fifty companies I backed are now among the 30 largest software companies in the world. And my IRR from inception has been consistently above 50% per year…for fifteen years. Of course, my sample size is too small to prove anything, but every venture firm’s sample size is too small to prove anything. I don’t know, really, if it was luck or thinking differently that made a difference. It doesn’t matter to me anymore. You can decide. It’s both, of course! But entertaining the notion that it might be all skill seems dishonest to yourself, IMHO. Investing makes money because that’s how literally everything is setup in our world, and this person was in a unique position to personally assess their investment targets along financial lines in a context where that mattered more than it ever has. This person just seems more self-aware than most about their strategy (“unicorns!!1!”), while paradoxically being very unaware about their own position within the world (they’re very much an economist, even if they lack the training) and history (the reason computers seem to be “supporting the status quo” instead of disrupting socioeconomic systems is very much something that everyone should have seen coming). Right now I have enough money to do what I want. I don’t have enough money that other people do what I want. To me that sounds like the perfect place to be. Beautifully said, really profound thought. This is really the distillation of what socialism promises to strive towards, in my eyes; prosperity enough for personal liberty, without the goal of hierarchy. On dark days I think of what Jung said in his memoirs: “Only if we know that the thing that truly matters is the infinite can we avoid fixing our interests upon futilities…” My view of the infinite is probably different than Jung’s, but I think he’s right: the only way to avoid feeling like your work is pointless is to contribute to something much larger than yourself. Another beautifully worded thought, and I wish them Godspeed on this journey. This is the only path that doesn’t end in futility, as far as I can see. I will say, if this is your mindset, be careful not to fall prey to what Hegel would call “a bad infinity” — a single technology, project, or social mechanism that you invest your entire vision of the future in, kinda like thinking of infinity as some specific really big number (a common practice!). True (“good”) infinity is not an object: it is a process, a practice, a dialectical structure that you employ in the limit. It is perpetually approaching the ethos of planting trees whose shade you will never know, not finding the perfect tree to plant. In the context of pro-social technical contributions in 2024, I think this simply means that you need to buckle down, swallow your pride for a second/month/year, and identify others who are (trying to be-) living the way you think is necessary so that you can learn their motivations and methods, and of course what they need that you can help with. We have been incredibly lucky to be the puzzle-solving class at a time when that was uniquely profitable, but I think humility is necessary when considering these broader questions. I’m a fan of philosophy and cooperative syndicalism, but I’m sure there’s optimistic prosocial groups out there for everybody, if you look deeply enough. Jeez that was long, whoops — and I’m just some kid so probably wasted breath. Thanks for sharing OP, will be thinking about this fella for a while… again, Godspeed. I’ll leave anyone bored enough to read this far with a better writer than I: To consider some Being-there as it is in the absolute just consists in saying of it: of course we have spoken of it just now as if it were something, but in the absolute, the A=A, there is nothing of the sort; in the absolute everything is one. To pit this single insight, that in the absolute everything is the same, against discriminating and fulfilled cognition, or cognition seeking and demanding fulfilment—or to pass off its absolute as the night in which, as the saying goes, all cows are black—this is the naiveté of emptiness of cognition. - Hegel, On Scientific Cognition (the preface to The Phenomenology of Geist)
gklitz 2y ago
This isn’t a resignation letter, it’s a job application for a job he hasn’t been offered yet.
- Nevermark 2y ago
  Yes. A graduation announcement. His unusual experiences and wisdom gained must surely be highly valuable somewhere.
bjornsing 2y ago
LPs can turn you down even if you show them a 15 year track record with 50% IRR per year? What could be better than that?
eps 2y ago
If, like me, you've never heard of him - > My day job was investing in early stage companies through Neu Venture Capital. I’ve also written a book with my friend Liz Zalman: Founder vs. Investor. And I teach entrepreneurship at Columbia University. I was a co-founder of venture-backed startup Root Markets, ran Omnicom Group’s venture capital division in the 1990s, and was once, long ago, a hardware design engineer on IBM’s S/390 series of mainframes where I designed a very small part of the central processor’s microcode execution engine, which is like the computer in the computer in the computer. https://reactionwheel.net/about https://reactionwheel.net/about
DavidPiper 2y ago
> The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, I just don’t get anymore. Confirmation bias on my part: this feels like the core point. Maybe I just grew up at the right time: the Internet was becoming ubiquitous; the iPhone hit right in my teens; social media - for better or worse - slightly earlier. Technology was radically radically changing and improving peoples' lives and that was inspiring. I don't see it doing that anymore. And so goes the inspiration too.
- chipdart 2y ago
  > I don't see it doing that anymore. And so goes the inspiration too. I believe our collective technological progress still has a lot of low-hanging fruits to be picked that radically improve people's lives. I just think that the feedback loop for those in the technology field is not as immediate as it was a few years ago. It was not so long ago that a determined kid with a cursory knowledge of HTML was able to single-handedly deliver the web presence of a whole company. Things have progressed a bit since then and the barrier is now set much higher, but the potential to serve user and customer needs on mere cents per user per month is still there. Every time you help a person achieve their goals (buy something, access a service, deal with a complaint, fill out a bureaucratic requirement, etc) with a mere click of a button, you are making the world a better place. For example, life changed radically for the whole world once people were able to call a cab or order food with a press of a button in their smartphone. We even have services helping to reduce waste by connecting shops with soon-to-be-expired goods with potential customers who love a good deal. That is a small gesture that serves everyone. The potential is still there. Just don't expect to get a medal for it.
wslh 2y ago
I don't get why this was flagged.

124 points by vedang 2y ago

I have no idea who this person is, but I found their investment philosophy interesting food for thought. I wonder how much of their disillusionment with tech industry is due to just getting older and jaded versus an actual drop in quality/boldness/etc.

Pet_Ant 2y ago

> First, I’ve felt for a few years now that the startups I’m seeing don’t seem so much like progress as just shopkeeping. ... it’s just not that interesting. The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, ... it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. This definitely felt true to me. All the potential of technology seems spent in computers. It seems like it's just a matter of making the existing commerce 5% faster. If I had to restart as a teenager I'd perhaps be looking into 3D printing. That seems like something that can actually make a difference. It's actually exciting. LLVMs are actually exciting, Docker/K8S, but beyond that don't know that anything really excites me.

dullcrisp 2y ago
Like CAD designs? Or 3D printer manufacturing? Is 3D printing creating any work?
- mikepurvis 2y ago
  A lot still needs to be done to make the design pipeline accessible to normal people. Any clown can set up a bambu and print objects they find/buy online, but it's a huge learning curve to get from that point to being able to actually create your own parts, especially stuff that integrates with the complex shapes of some existing object. Recent examples from my life include wanting mounts for flashlights, a thing to attach to bike handlebars, a shelf bracket, a battery cover for a tool, a piece of a bird feeder, etc. Where is the interface that lets me scan the existing objects I need to integrate with and then quickly assemble prefab subcomponents into a printable design and seamlessly iterate on that?
  - fragmede 2y ago
    That would be an application for VR goggles, and it seems Adobe has Medium for that. https://www.adobe.com/products/medium.html https://www.adobe.com/products/medium.html
    - tsimionescu 2y ago
      No, VR goggles can't scan an object and generate precise enough measurements of it to create a basic 3D model that can attach to it. And they don't particularly help in refining this base model afterwards either, because they don't help in any way with the hardest part about 3D interactions, which is not the visualization, but the actual editing/interaction part, especially for fine details.
      - tonypace 2y ago
        What you need is a feedback system between your coarse measurements from a low precision system such as a ruler or goggles and the prints that you make. Does the tab you printed fit into the latch? What part fails to fit?
archero 2y ago
I’m guessing you meant LLMs, but I choose to imagine that you’re just really excited about LLVM
- drzzhan 2y ago
  Maybe they really meant LLVM? Large language vision model.
  - Pet_Ant 2y ago
    I meant LLM. Though LLVM is very cool, it's not revolutionary.
    - musicale 2y ago
      It is if it enables memory safety to become a mainstream feature for C++.
      - auggierose 2y ago
        Naa. Chucking C++ into the garbage bin is revolutionary.
kiba 2y ago
Don't get me wrong. I love 3D printing. Unfortunately, the tech I am working with, FDM, is just the most boring technology you could think of. Really, it's just a hot glue gun guided by a computer. Apparently, it's only until after 3D printers become widespread that they invented a hand tool version of 3D printing. Anyway, a lot of it, the majority of the coolness in 3D printing are the designs. On its own, 3D printing is mildly useful. Learn CAD. That's something really useful there. Then there's other skills such as electronics that would make 3D printing way cooler. It's a cool hobby, but one that won't replace something like woodworking. It's just different and have their own pro and con. Same thing for manufacturing. It won't displace entirely general subtractive manufacturing. It has its own niches and pro and con. On LLVM and LLM, they are indeed impressive, much more so than the boring technology of 3D printing. But after the tech demo? I am ambivalent about it. Cool. Whatever. I prefer creating things and learning technology and science that help me improve my skills at learning things. If using LLM is a skill that isn't just prompt engineering, I might be more open to it.

chiefrubberduck 2y ago

[flagged]

nis0s 2y ago

> The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, ... it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. How can anyone say this when there’s so much amazing research happening in most universities, especially in computer science and engineering. It could be that the sample of prospective startups Nuemann gets exposure to is the same few people from the same few places? There’s such a disconnect between what’s possible, what hasn’t been done, and what’s funded.

stonogo 2y ago
Your argument would benefit from some examples of amazing research. Most of what I see is better implementations of the status quo. While I am excited about CHERI and similar efforts, they're hardly revolutionary.
- Pet_Ant 2y ago
  I assume you mean: https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/ctsrd/cheri/ https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/security/ctsrd/cheri/ “Capability Hardware Enhanced RISC Instructions (CHERI)”
- nis0s 2y ago
  I am excited about human augmentation, and I don’t see much work, research or funding in this space outside of work in genetics. If I get the time some day, I may do a blog post on the topic.

tigerstop10 2y ago

If the PC is dead, it's because of SaaS VC's investing in paywalled and members-only web apps, instead of creative tools that push the boundaries of personal computing.

Baeocystin 2y ago
Fully agreed. The rentiers have squeezed all the juice they can, and never understood what was amazing about personal computing in the first place. (nb. I am casting no aspersions at the author of the letter; I know nothing about him. Just sharing frustration at what has happened to the industry over the years.)

bsder 2y ago

> It just feels, I don’t know, done. If you can't find something that excites you right now in the technology space, that tells me more about how boring you are than anything else. Real Translation of VC: Wahhhh! With interest rates above zero I have to do actual work!

patrickhogan1 2y ago

This is one of the coolest times to be building technology. Haven’t felt this excited since I got my first PC.

gwern 2y ago

> So why quit? Three reasons. First, I’ve felt for a few years now that the startups I’m seeing don’t seem so much like progress as just shopkeeping. This isn’t a dig: there’s money to be made razoring a thin slice off a huge market, and there’s certainly less risk in that than there is building a market from scratch. But it’s just not that interesting. The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, I just don’t get anymore. And not because people’s lives, the people who have access to the tech, aren’t better, I think they are (although this, of course, has not been as unalloyed as I imagined as a 14-year old.) But because I think the tech is no longer improving lives, it’s just maintaining the current status quo. It just feels, I don’t know, done. This is remarkable to me because I would say that right now is one of the most exciting times to invest ever. We are in one of the new platforms: VC hasn't been so interesting to me since ~2013, when cryptocurrency offered a whole new greenfield, or 2008, when the iPhone changed everything for mobile, or ~1998, when the WWW began to mature enough to allow greenfield everything. (With an honorable mention to VR - still the new platform of the future...) Just think about LLMs and programming! Programming hasn't been about to change this much, this fundamentally, since the invention of networks or timesharing, perhaps. How can you look at this and write it all off as 'shopkeeping' with no 'building a market from scratch' and 'just not that interesting'? I think maybe the real reason is the next one: they're just older, and no longer have the gumption and energy to try to dive into the Shiny New Thing, and it's time to hang up their hat and call it a day, leaving it to the next generation.

colejhudson 2y ago
Suspect that a core reason for Jerry's PoV is that the dynamics of the (zeitgeist-related) software industry do not currently favor small teams. That's counter to the ethos of Silicon Valley and it's guy-in-a-garage mythology. Jerry would've been 14 around 1980, plus or minus a couple of years, which would've been in the heyday of personal computing. TRS-80s, Apple IIs, the IBM PC, its clones, etc. Then, and for the next 40-odd years, software was king (read: capital-light). And anybody could write software. LLMs are much less egalitarian. Can anyone write an LLM? Yes. Can anyone train an LLM that customers will want? A few. But most will need a few Ms, maybe even some Bs. Hence the AppAmaGooSoft benefactors and Jerry's complaint about the status-quo. Software-like economic dynamics will return, but it'll take a while, and until they do, it'll be much less morally satisfying to be a VC (in software) than it has over the last 40 years.

alexpetralia 2y ago

Get involved in local politics, Jerry! It's a satisfying way to impact your local community, and they almost always can use some help.

cortesoft 2y ago

> If it were true that financiers on the whole make profits slowly for years and then, every once in a while, lose them all and more in sudden “black swan” events, then there should be some way to lose money slowly for years and then suddenly make it all back and more. Black swans are awful in traditional finance, but they’re the winning lottery ticket in venture capital. Isn't this what every VC is doing? This is why VCs invest in a bunch of startups and expect most of them to fail. Matt Levine writes about this a lot; he talks about how the real risk for VCs isn't losing 100% on a failed startup, the risk is missing out on the one that hits it big. I am not sure why the writer thinks this strategy is novel.

chrisdirkis 2y ago
Specifically, he's not just investing in startups, but investing in ones that have a factor that is either unknown or unknowable. That's a different strategy from YC's "Invest in promising founders" or the typical VC "Invest in early stage startups with good metrics".
- mizzao 2y ago
  It must have been "promising founders working on an idea with an unknown or unknowable factor", right? I can't imagine it working out so well without that qualifier.
  - chrisdirkis 2y ago
    Most likely, I'm just passing on what's noted in the post. There's likely a lot more nuance to the actual decision-making :)

tinyhouse 2y ago

I like this style of writing. Honest and open. Good luck my friend.

timcobb 2y ago

> then there should be some way to lose money slowly for years and then suddenly make it all back and more. This is how I always pictured domain name investing.

merinid 2y ago

Jerry Neumann is a cornerstone of the New York scene. He was helpful to anyone and everyone, with or without investment. He taught a class at Columbia that was the only practical technology entrepreneurship course in NYC for the longest time. His kindness and generosity were matched by his immense curiosity and pioneering spirit. His fund also had the best website in the game (for the longest time, a terminal emulator). Congrats Jerry on one of the best careers in VC. Thanks for showing so many that you can just do things your way and put integrity over hype every step of the way.

bbor 2y ago

Fantastically written article by someone who doesn’t realize (or articulate?) that they were part of a terribly unique, terribly exploitative movement that is reaching its natural conclusion. And, of course, I was lucky. Two of the fifty companies I backed are now among the 30 largest software companies in the world. And my IRR from inception has been consistently above 50% per year…for fifteen years. Of course, my sample size is too small to prove anything, but every venture firm’s sample size is too small to prove anything. I don’t know, really, if it was luck or thinking differently that made a difference. It doesn’t matter to me anymore. You can decide. It’s both, of course! But entertaining the notion that it might be all skill seems dishonest to yourself, IMHO. Investing makes money because that’s how literally everything is setup in our world, and this person was in a unique position to personally assess their investment targets along financial lines in a context where that mattered more than it ever has. This person just seems more self-aware than most about their strategy (“unicorns!!1!”), while paradoxically being very unaware about their own position within the world (they’re very much an economist, even if they lack the training) and history (the reason computers seem to be “supporting the status quo” instead of disrupting socioeconomic systems is very much something that everyone should have seen coming). Right now I have enough money to do what I want. I don’t have enough money that other people do what I want. To me that sounds like the perfect place to be. Beautifully said, really profound thought. This is really the distillation of what socialism promises to strive towards, in my eyes; prosperity enough for personal liberty, without the goal of hierarchy. On dark days I think of what Jung said in his memoirs: “Only if we know that the thing that truly matters is the infinite can we avoid fixing our interests upon futilities…” My view of the infinite is probably different than Jung’s, but I think he’s right: the only way to avoid feeling like your work is pointless is to contribute to something much larger than yourself. Another beautifully worded thought, and I wish them Godspeed on this journey. This is the only path that doesn’t end in futility, as far as I can see. I will say, if this is your mindset, be careful not to fall prey to what Hegel would call “a bad infinity” — a single technology, project, or social mechanism that you invest your entire vision of the future in, kinda like thinking of infinity as some specific really big number (a common practice!). True (“good”) infinity is not an object: it is a process, a practice, a dialectical structure that you employ in the limit. It is perpetually approaching the ethos of planting trees whose shade you will never know, not finding the perfect tree to plant. In the context of pro-social technical contributions in 2024, I think this simply means that you need to buckle down, swallow your pride for a second/month/year, and identify others who are (trying to be-) living the way you think is necessary so that you can learn their motivations and methods, and of course what they need that you can help with. We have been incredibly lucky to be the puzzle-solving class at a time when that was uniquely profitable, but I think humility is necessary when considering these broader questions. I’m a fan of philosophy and cooperative syndicalism, but I’m sure there’s optimistic prosocial groups out there for everybody, if you look deeply enough. Jeez that was long, whoops — and I’m just some kid so probably wasted breath. Thanks for sharing OP, will be thinking about this fella for a while… again, Godspeed. I’ll leave anyone bored enough to read this far with a better writer than I: To consider some Being-there as it is in the absolute just consists in saying of it: of course we have spoken of it just now as if it were something, but in the absolute, the A=A, there is nothing of the sort; in the absolute everything is one. To pit this single insight, that in the absolute everything is the same, against discriminating and fulfilled cognition, or cognition seeking and demanding fulfilment—or to pass off its absolute as the night in which, as the saying goes, all cows are black—this is the naiveté of emptiness of cognition. - Hegel, On Scientific Cognition (the preface to The Phenomenology of Geist)

gklitz 2y ago

This isn’t a resignation letter, it’s a job application for a job he hasn’t been offered yet.

Nevermark 2y ago
Yes. A graduation announcement. His unusual experiences and wisdom gained must surely be highly valuable somewhere.

bjornsing 2y ago

LPs can turn you down even if you show them a 15 year track record with 50% IRR per year? What could be better than that?

eps 2y ago

If, like me, you've never heard of him - > My day job was investing in early stage companies through Neu Venture Capital. I’ve also written a book with my friend Liz Zalman: Founder vs. Investor. And I teach entrepreneurship at Columbia University. I was a co-founder of venture-backed startup Root Markets, ran Omnicom Group’s venture capital division in the 1990s, and was once, long ago, a hardware design engineer on IBM’s S/390 series of mainframes where I designed a very small part of the central processor’s microcode execution engine, which is like the computer in the computer in the computer. https://reactionwheel.net/about https://reactionwheel.net/about

DavidPiper 2y ago

> The excitement I had as a 14-year old in 1979 trying to understand everything there was to know about computers, because this was something that could radically improve people’s lives, I just don’t get anymore. Confirmation bias on my part: this feels like the core point. Maybe I just grew up at the right time: the Internet was becoming ubiquitous; the iPhone hit right in my teens; social media - for better or worse - slightly earlier. Technology was radically radically changing and improving peoples' lives and that was inspiring. I don't see it doing that anymore. And so goes the inspiration too.

chipdart 2y ago
> I don't see it doing that anymore. And so goes the inspiration too. I believe our collective technological progress still has a lot of low-hanging fruits to be picked that radically improve people's lives. I just think that the feedback loop for those in the technology field is not as immediate as it was a few years ago. It was not so long ago that a determined kid with a cursory knowledge of HTML was able to single-handedly deliver the web presence of a whole company. Things have progressed a bit since then and the barrier is now set much higher, but the potential to serve user and customer needs on mere cents per user per month is still there. Every time you help a person achieve their goals (buy something, access a service, deal with a complaint, fill out a bureaucratic requirement, etc) with a mere click of a button, you are making the world a better place. For example, life changed radically for the whole world once people were able to call a cab or order food with a press of a button in their smartphone. We even have services helping to reduce waste by connecting shops with soon-to-be-expired goods with potential customers who love a good deal. That is a small gesture that serves everyone. The potential is still there. Just don't expect to get a medal for it.

wslh 2y ago

I don't get why this was flagged.