More or Less: Election Media Strategy Debrief & A Vercel AI convo — Of course we talk about the election…. How could you not - but with our twist on the tech and media angle — what the democrats are missing about modern communication strategy, implications for journalism, etc.
Some Hot Takes
- Yes, this election was the economy, but the democrats also completely fail to understand community in the internet age of communications abundance vs. scarcity…. This was my rant of the week that seems to resonate / people seem to agree with… and here the podcast discussion on the same topic — Obama as the first ‘digital president’ turns out to be a head fake, it feels like Trump really understands intuitively or intellectually modern coms and the Dems are stuck in the broadcast 'scarcity of messaging' era.
- Jessica wrote a great column about where the media goes from here — it is a big big mistake for journalism to once again return to peddling cheap outrage and activism… great business model (broad swaths of people want to buy it NOW and it is cheap to produce!) but bad long-term strategy.
- Similarly, I am worried about college campuses post election — it is clearly so tempting for the left to dig heels in with any institutions they have sway over to ‘fight’ the republicans — cornered animals are always dangerous, and they just got seriously cornered… but I really hope that universities can learn the lessons of the last few years and really stay neutral / out of this… for their own sake and for their critical mission around truth and academic excellence. Not the least because if they get super partisan in this moment and drift from their academic mission, the threat to their tax status is real…. Seriously.
- Private Company Stock Trading Meetup Anyone? — I am seriously sick of how illiquid the private markets … .and how terribly orchestrated with random actors trying to broker deals — we all just need to meet up under an apple tree (in a gym) and host a private company stock trading day… just like the early days of Wall Street and get it done.
- Congrats to Daniel Lurie— I called this election a few days ‘early’ … but IMHO after the first round of ballots seemed like a sure thing (and yes, I didn’t fully understand the system and timing!) — none the less, congrats to Daniel — excited for him and more importantly for SF! Glad to see aaron peskin gone.
- The Tragedy of the Information Commons, and The Coming Information Enclosure Movement… and AI is the ‘cows’ — upcoming rant on the privatization of information / and why this is a really big tragedy (but completely inevitable with AI) — hello digital monasteries and anathem… it just wasn’t the week for it!
- Misfit Marketplaces and AI — this is a pattern I am seeing over and over in different spaces and actually believe is an important AI use case — the internet expanded a lot of marketplace use cases … but misfit / hard to categorize / complicated goods and services are still very under-served… marketplaces for weird services, assets, and people - with weird properties — that is where AI is making a real difference!
- Granola.ai — I want to hate on it because all the norm core VCs like it… but… it is actually pretty good / def will keep using it.
Sam
P.S. With holidays approaching, why not give your loved ones the gift that keeps on giving… bitcoin. Happy $75K+ for real this time…
P.P.S. congrats cousin Danny on the launch of his startup Airtop (fully managed cloud web browsers for AI applications) — this is sweet / played with it last week and I get it / exciting!
P.P.P.S — I got to randomly meet my hero of the Paris Olympics Kristen Faulkner and park the Miata out front at the rosewood … which gives me insane cognitive pleasure :)
sam lessin | @lessin | want to talk | podcast | stop | to get added to the mailing list email [email protected]