Podcasts about ramp

My guest today is Ben Horowitz, the co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz. Since its founding in 2009, a16z has grown into one of the most influential firms in venture capital, reshaping how technology companies are funded and how power and ideas move through Silicon Valley and around the world. This conversation focuses on sides of Ben's story you don't often hear. Ben reflects on the people who shaped him, including Nas, Andy Grove, and his father, and shares why he chose to personally fund new technology for the Las Vegas Police Department. We also talk about how he thinks about a16z's responsibility in shaping the trajectory of America, the scale of his ambition for the firm, and what he sees as the biggest risk facing the country. Please enjoy this great and unique conversation with Ben Horowitz. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.  ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Vanta. Trusted by thousands of businesses, Vanta continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit vanta.com/invest.  ----- This episode is brought to you by Rogo. Rogo is an AI-powered platform that automates accounts payable workflows, enabling finance teams to process invoices faster and with greater accuracy. Learn more at Rogo.ai/invest. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠WorkOS⁠. WorkOS is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit ⁠WorkOS.com⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like the Best (00:02:43) Episode Intro: Ben Horowitz (00:03:27) The State of America Right Now (00:06:06) How Policy Could Destroy America (00:08:29) AI Changes the Laws of Company Building and Investing (00:11:40) Why AI Researchers are Paid $100M (00:13:16) Thoughts on Growing Inequality (00:18:07) Societal Challenges Due to AI (00:19:56) Ben's Scope of Ambition for the Next 20 Years (00:22:48) Andy Grove's Influence on Ben (00:27:44) Starting Andreessen Horowitz (00:32:53) Early Mistakes (00:36:17) What Capital Markets Are Missing (00:37:44) Why VC and Not PE (00:40:03) Tradeoffs with Scale (00:41:10) A Culture is Not a Set of Ideas, it's a Set of Actions (00:43:05) Lessons from His Father (00:45:03) Exciting Use Cases of AI (00:46:46) Ben's Friendship with Nas (00:50:05) Funding New Technology for the Las Vegas Police Department (00:54:07) The Kindest Thing

Marty sits down with Harsha Goli to discuss his decade-long journey building Bitcoin infrastructure, the challenges companies face integrating traditional finance rails, and how Magnolia is launching a full banking API to help any Bitcoin application convert fiat to Bitcoin across all 50 US states. Harsha on X: https://x.com/arshbot Magnolia: https://magnolia.financial/ STACK SATS hat: https://tftcmerch.io/ Our newsletter: https://www.tftc.io/bitcoin-brief/ TFTC Elite (Ad-free & Discord): https://www.tftc.io/#/portal/signup/ Discord: https://discord.gg/VJ2dABShBz Opportunity Cost Extension: https://www.opportunitycost.app/ Shoutout to our sponsors: Bitkey https://bit.ly/4pOv2L4 Promo Code: TFTC99 Unchained https://unchained.com/tftc/ SLNT https://slnt.com/tftc Lygos: http://bit.ly/3ZtQLwp Salt of the Earth: https://drinksote.com/tftc Join the TFTC Movement: Main YT Channel https://www.youtube.com/c/TFTC21/videos Clips YT Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUQcW3jxfQfEUS8kqR5pJtQ Website https://tftc.io/ Newsletter tftc.io/bitcoin-brief/ Twitter https://twitter.com/tftc21 Instagram https://www.instagram.com/tftc.io/ Nostr https://primal.net/tftc Follow Marty Bent: Twitter https://twitter.com/martybent Nostr https://primal.net/martybent Newsletter https://tftc.io/martys-bent/ Podcast https://www.tftc.io/tag/podcasts/

Jon Callaghan of True Ventures joins Nick to discuss Spotting the Next Big Thing, Why This Cycle Is Different, Acceptable vs Unacceptable Risk, and Why Duration Is a Feature Not a Bug. In this episode we cover: Spotting the Next Big Market and Reverse Engineering Success The Role of Curiosity and Risk in Venture Capital Duration as a Feature in Early-Stage Ventures The Importance of Repeat Founders and Founder Referrals The Creative Process and Learning from Other Creative Endeavors Maximizing Risk and Long-Term Thinking in Venture Capital The Role of People and Teamwork in Venture Capital Guest Links: Jon's LinkedIn Jon's X True Ventures' LinkedIn True Ventures' Website The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

My guest today is ⁠Gokul Rajaram⁠, Founding Partner at Marathon Management. Gokul is one of the most prolific product builders and investors of the last twenty years. He has built the core ad and product businesses at Google, Facebook, Square, and DoorDash, working at each company during its most formative scaling periods. Alongside his operating career, Gokul has invested in more than 700 companies, giving him an unusually broad view into how products are built and scaled. This conversation is about how product building is changing with AI. We discuss the one thing Gokul believes is truly future-proof in AI, why companies like Zendesk and Slack are more exposed than Salesforce or NetSuite, and the only sources of defensibility.  We also talk about everything Gokul has learned from helping build the most important ads businesses, including the only three ways an ad business can make money, how those constraints shape product decisions, and what consumer behavior change threatens every major platform. Gokul shares lessons from working closely with Larry and Sergey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey, and Tony Xu. Please enjoy my conversation with Gokul Rajaram. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.  ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Vanta⁠. Trusted by thousands of businesses, Vanta continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit ⁠vanta.com/invest⁠.  ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠Rogo⁠. Rogo is an AI-powered platform that automates accounts payable workflows, enabling finance teams to process invoices faster and with greater accuracy. Learn more at ⁠Rogo.ai/invest⁠. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠ ⁠WorkOS⁠⁠. WorkOS is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit⁠ ⁠WorkOS.com⁠⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (00:00:53) Meet Gokul Rajaram (00:02:05) How Product Development is Changing with AI (00:07:32) Philosophy of Product Management (00:10:19) What is Future-Proof in AI Era (00:11:25) Building AI Applications Today (00:15:03) Systems of Record vs Agent Companies (00:16:58) Which Legacy Software Companies Are Most Exposed (00:22:15) Stickiness in the AI Era (00:24:10) Learning from Larry Page and Sergey Brin (00:28:15) Learning from Mark Zuckerberg (00:31:31) Learning from Jack Dorsey (00:35:40) The Art of Great Product Design (00:36:49) Weekly CEO Communication (00:40:27) Three Ways to Succeed in Advertising (00:44:27) What Should Scare Major Ad Platforms (00:48:24) North Star Metrics (00:50:09) Self-Serve Products (00:54:50) Careers in the AI Era (00:59:03) Stay Long Enough to Have Impact (01:00:10) Founder Authenticity and Superpowers (01:02:21) Navigating the Idea Maze (01:03:42) Role of Boards (01:06:31) Excellence in Customer Acquisition  (01:09:11) The Kindest Thing 

Google dismantles a huge residential proxy network. Did the FBI take down the notorious RAMP cybercrime forum? A long running North Korea backed cyber operation has splintered into three specialized threat groups. U.S. military cyber operators carried out a covert operation to disrupt Russian troll networks ahead of the 2024 elections. Phishing campaigns target journalists using the Signal app. SolarWinds patches vulnerabilities in its Web Help Desk product. Amazon found CSAM in its AI training data. Initial access brokers switch up their preferred bot. China executes scam center kingpins. Our guest is Tom Pace, CEO of NetRise, explaining how open-source vulnerabilities are opening doors for nation-states.  An unsecured webcam peers into Pyongyang.  Remember to leave us a 5-star rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Miss an episode? Sign-up for our daily intelligence roundup, Daily Briefing, and you'll never miss a beat. And be sure to follow CyberWire Daily on LinkedIn. CyberWire Guest Today, Tom Pace, former DOE cyber analyst and CEO of NetRise, joins the show to explain how open-source vulnerabilities are opening doors for nation-states and why visibility into who maintains code repositories matters. Selected Reading Google Disrupted World's Largest IPIDEA Residential Proxy Network (Cyber Security News) Notorious Russia-based RAMP cybercrime forum apparently seized by FBI (The Record) Long-running North Korea threat group splits into 3 distinct operations (CyberScoop) Secret US cyber operations shielded 2024 election from foreign trolls, but now the Trump admin has gutted protections (CNN Politics) Phishing attack: Numerous journalists targeted in attack via Signal Messenger (Netzpolitik.org) Signal president warns AI agents are making encryption irrelevant (Cyber Insider) SolarWinds Patches Critical Web Help Desk Vulnerabilities (SecurityWeek)  Amazon Found ‘High Volume' Of Child Sex Abuse Material in AI Training Data (Bloomberg) Initial access hackers switch to Tsundere Bot for ransomware attacks (Bleeping Computer) China Executes 11 People Linked to Cyberscam Centers in Myanmar   (Bloomberg) North Korean Hackers' Daily Life Leaked in Video (The Chosun) Share your feedback. What do you think about CyberWire Daily? Please take a few minutes to share your thoughts with us by completing our brief listener survey. Thank you for helping us continue to improve our show. Want to hear your company in the show? N2K CyberWire helps you reach the industry's most influential leaders and operators, while building visibility, authority, and connectivity across the cybersecurity community. Learn more at sponsor.thecyberwire.com. The CyberWire is a production of N2K Networks, your source for strategic workforce intelligence. © N2K Networks, Inc. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Chris Rizik of Renaissance Venture Capital Casber Wang of Sapphire Ventures D.A. Wallach of Time BioVentures We asked guests to discuss the most visionary founder that they've worked with and what makes them so special. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

On this episode of the FreightWaves Morning Minute for January 29, 2026, we look at how logistics providers are adapting to market volatility with creative new trade lanes. DHL Global Forwarding has introduced a hybrid truck-air service that relays goods from China through Uzbekistan to Istanbul, offering a faster alternative to ocean freight for bulky shipments. In carrier news, a trucking giant is preparing for a major change at the top as Schneider announces a leadership transition scheduled for this July. Longtime executive and Marine Corps veteran Jim Filter will succeed Mark Rourke as CEO to guide the company through the evolving freight landscape. Finally, Tesla is highlighting progress on its Semi truck even as the company faces a sharp decline in overall profitability for the year. Executives confirmed that tooling is now in place in Nevada to begin the mass production ramp of the electric class 8 vehicle in early 2026. Follow the FreightWaves NOW Podcast Other FreightWaves Shows Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I know, I know. Season 5 wrapped up. But I couldn't help myself.Caitlin Sullivan is an expert in AI for Customer Research. She trains growth-ready product & design teams to know their customers faster. Clients include YouTube, Spotify, Ramp, Meta, and Canva.Here's what we covered:00:00 Introduction to AI in Customer Research03:41 The Shift in AI Usage for Customer Research09:25 Building Systems for Effective Research12:59 Challenges with AI Insights17:55 Completeness in Research with AI21:17 Common Mistakes in Customer Research25:01 Emotional Nuances in Research & Why they're important27:08 Understanding AI's Interpretation of Emotions29:46 The Role of Human Insight in AI Training32:25 AI as a Co-Pilot and The Importance of Collaboration35:37 Catching AI Errors38:30 The Necessity of Human Involvement in Research39:55 Balancing AI and Human Decision-Making45:02 Knowing When You Have Enough Data To Stop And Decide46:44 Favorite Tools for Research and Analysis50:00 Caitlin asks me her burning question which I will answer in a separate BONUS episodeCaitlin on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/caitlindsullivanAI Analysis for PMs course: https://maven.com/caitlin/ai-analysis-pmsSubscribe to Building With Buyers on Apple or Spotify or wherever you like to listen, message me what you're listening to, and don't forget to leave a review if you're lovin' the show.Music by my talented daughter.Anna on LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠linkedin.com/in/annafurmanov⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠furmanovmarketing.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Newsletter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠One Insight

Speed demands preparation.Day 28 brings everything together by applying the RAMP framework directly into sprint work — one of the highest-output, highest-risk activities if preparation is rushed or incomplete.This session reinforces a critical lesson: sprinting isn't just running fast. It's force absorption, force transfer, timing, coordination, and intent — all expressed at speed. Without proper preparation, sprinting exposes weaknesses instantly.You'll learn how to:Use the RAMP Protocol to prepare specifically for sprintingTransition from general movement to high-speed output safelyPrime the nervous system without unnecessary fatigueMaintain mechanics and intent as speed increasesThe focus isn't on volume or exhaustion. It's on quality reps, adequate rest, and staying sharp. Sprints are treated as a skill — not conditioning punishment.This day highlights why RAMP is more than a warm-up. It's a decision-making framework that ensures the body is ready for exactly what's coming next. When preparation matches the task, performance improves and injury risk drops.Move well first.Ramp with intent.Sprint with purpose.Day 28 is about earning speed — not forcing it.Shaun Kober is a Mindset & Performance Specialist, with a unique skillset forged in the trenches, through the various stages of life."I shouldn't be in the position I am right now." The odds were stacked against me: ● Poor family on welfare, eldest of 6 kids, parents didn't work, abusive step-dad, no electricity or running water for a 6 years period of my life ● Caught up with the wrong crowd, stealing, drugs, skipping school ● At 14 years old, I sat on a bus for 3 days with $50 in my pocket, to travel to the next State over West, to begin a new life in the workforce - 200014 - 20: I grew up and learned how to become a man through work and rugby20 - 26: I lived, trained and fought as a professional soldier, at a high level26 - 32: I became a personal trainer, after failing in my pursuit to become a firefighter32 - 38: I worked with, and won world titles with some of the best athletes on the planet, as their strength and conditioning coach38+: The next evolution begins #coachedbykobes#livetrainperform#mindsetandperformance Live Life To The Fullest.Train To Your Potential.Perform At Your Best!https://www.coachedbykobes.com/

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Paul Madera of Meritech Capital Medha Agarwal of Defy Jeff Bussgang of Flybridge Capital We asked guests to tell the most important lesson they've learned in their career. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

Getting ready to report to spring training? Former pro ballplayers Jeremy Hermida and Chase Murray share insider advice on preparing for spring training, from physical preparation to financial planning. Whether you're heading to Arizona or Florida, this episode covers everything minor leaguers need to know before packing their bags. Welcome to "Ahead in the Count," presented by BIP Wealth. Our Baseball Division combines their collegiate and professional baseball playing experience with financial acumen to provide expertise in life on and off the field. We aim to give ballplayers and their families a better understanding about their unique lifestyle, the opportunities that come from playing this game, and insight into the complex financial world. This is "Ahead in the Count," hosted by Nolan Alexander, from BIP Wealth. Key Topics Covered Housing (Priority #1) Book early - Prices increase as spring training approaches Secure your housing in January, not February Costs rise significantly the longer you wait Transportation Ship your car vs. rent - Consider the $1,200-$1,500 cost each way Arizona complexes may require different planning than Florida Factor in where you'll be assigned for the season Having your own vehicle vs. finding a teammate with a car Financial & Tax Documents Set up mail forwarding or have someone collect mail at home Tax documents start arriving during spring training Send financial documents to your advisor immediately LLC expenses - Track them throughout the season, not just in December Business Considerations for Players Off-Season Income Baseball camps and clinics Part-time work (Uber, etc.) Track all business expenses if you have an LLC Keep receipts and notes throughout the season Expense Management Use a dedicated credit card for business expenses Write everything down, even if you're unsure it qualifies Let your financial advisor determine what's deductible Review credit card and bank statements during the off-season Mental Preparation Getting in the Zone Arrive at complex early to flip the switch mentally Separate from off-season distractions and noise Access to facilities, coaches, and weight rooms before official report date Nothing replicates actual on-complex preparation Setting Goals Review what you did last season Set personal and financial goals for 2026 Every season is a new chapter of your career Control your preparation, not the outcome "You're only as good as your next at-bat" Action Items Before You Leave ✅ Secure spring training housing ✅ Arrange transportation (ship car or rental) ✅ Set up mail forwarding ✅ Notify financial advisor of your spring training location ✅ Gather any outstanding tax documents ✅ Track off-season business expenses ✅ Ramp up baseball activities ✅ Set personal and professional goals for 2026 Please like, subscribe, and rate this podcast episode of Ahead in the Count! To contact the hosts, send an email to jhester@bipwealth.com, kschmidt@bipwealth.com, cmurray@bipwealth.com,

4:05:19 – Welcome, hosts and listeners of The Onsug radio universe, to come and join a freeform chat in video, which will be released in audio. The Exit Ramp continues for another amazing group show. Host Frank from The Overnightscape is joined by Michael Feir from Canada, Dave in Kentucky from his various shows, Chad from Chadcast, Nate in Wisconsin, Jan Erik from Norway, Jefferson […]

On his 68th birthday, Kevin Kelly began to write down for his young adult children some things he had learned about life that he wished he had known earlier. Kelly's timeless advice covers an astonishing range, from right living to setting ambitious goals, optimizing generosity, and cultivating compassion. Excellent Advice for Living is the ideal companion for anyone seeking to navigate life with grace and creativity: Episode sponsors: Ramp gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp and learning how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ramp.com Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell them David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠https://collateral.com Some of my favorite quotes from the episode: 1. Choose to believe that the entire universe is conspiring behind your back to make you a success. 2. Mastering the view through the eyes of others will unlock many doors. 3. If you can avoid seeking the approval of others your power is limitless. 4. The reward for good work is more work. 5. Don't be the best. Be the only. 6. The urgent is a tyrant. The important should be your king. 7. Find smart people who will disagree with you. 8. The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. 9. The most counterintuitive truth of the universe is that the more you give to others the more you'll get. 10. Life gets better as you replace transactions with relationships. 11. Courtesy costs nothing. 12. Life lessons will be presented to you in the order they are needed. 13. Cultivate an allergy to average. 14. If you repeated what you did today 365 more times would you be where you want to be next year? 15. If you are alive that means you still have lessons to learn. 16. Master something.Through mastery of one thing you'll command a viewpoint to steadily find where your bliss is. 17. Trust is earned in drops and lost in buckets. 18. First, always ask for what you want. Works in relationships, business, life. 19. If nobody else does what you do you won't need a resume. 20. How to apologize: quickly, specifically, sincerely. 21. You choose to be lucky by believing that any setbacks are just temporary. 22. The best way to advise people is to find out what they really want to do and then advise them to do it. 23. It is certain that 99% of the stuff you are anxious about won't happen. 24. What is important is not what happened to you but what you did about what happened to you. 25. Your golden ticket is being able to see things from other people's point of view. 26. Pay attention to who you are around when you feel best. Be with them more often. 27. To get your message across follow this formula: simplify, simplify, simplify, then exaggerate. 28. You will thrive more when you promote what you love rather than bash what you hate. 29. To be interesting just tell your own story with uncommon honesty. 30. When you truly think for yourself your conclusions will not be predictable. 31. Don't measure your life with someone else's ruler. 32. For maximum results focus on your biggest opportunities, not your biggest problems. 33. Pay attention to what you pay attention to.

成為這個頻道的會員並獲得福利：https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJIPFjZSCWR15_jxBaK2fQQ/join前幾天看到新聞，我的前東家、曾經是矽谷最耀眼的 FinTech 獨角獸 Brex，正式被 Capital One 以 51.5 億美金收購。這個消息對我來說心情特別複雜，不只是因為這代表著一個時代的結束，更因為我曾身在其中，見證過它的瘋狂與轉折。你很難想像，這家公司的起點，是兩位來自巴西的 20 歲少年。他們 16 歲就靠賣掉支付公司財富自由，為了進入矽谷核心圈申請上 Stanford，最後卻因為「身價千萬卻辦不到一張美國信用卡」的荒謬痛點，決定輟學創辦 Brex，發誓要顛覆傳統銀行。九年過去了，這場金融革命的結局不是上市敲鐘，而是估值腰斬，賣給了它原本最想取代的對手。這集影片不只是商業新聞的分析，我整理了 Brex 創辦人的傳奇發跡史、它與競爭對手 Ramp 之間的「哲學之戰」：當「鼓勵花錢」遇上「幫你省錢」，為何在升息循環下命運截然不同？更重要的是，我想用「前員工」的內部視角，公開我當時的 Offer 與最終的 RSU 回報，直接算給你看：在獨角獸公司打工，還要經歷併購的層層資金分配後，到底是財富自由的捷徑，還是一場華麗的賭注？這是一個關於天才、野心、時運，以及矽谷打工人真實回報的故事。本集精彩亮點： 

Episode 144Happy New Year! This is one of my favorite episodes of the year — for the fourth time, Nathan Benaich and I did our yearly roundup of AI news and advancements, including selections from this year's State of AI Report.If you've stuck around and continue to listen, I'm really thankful you're here. I love hearing from you.You can find Nathan and Air Street Press here on Substack and on Twitter, LinkedIn, and his personal site. Check out his writing at press.airstreet.com.Find me on Twitter (or LinkedIn if you want…) for updates on new episodes, and reach me at editor@thegradient.pub for feedback, ideas, guest suggestions.Outline* (00:00) Intro* (00:44) Air Street Capital and Nathan world* Nathan's path from cancer research and bioinformatics to AI investing* The “evergreen thesis” of AI from niche to ubiquitous* Portfolio highlights: Eleven Labs, Synthesia, Crusoe* (03:44) Geographic flexibility: Europe vs. the US* Why SF isn't always the best place for original decisions* Industry diversity in New York vs. San Francisco* The Munich Security Conference and Europe's defense pivot* Playing macro games from a European vantage point* (07:55) VC investment styles and the “solo GP” approach* Taste as the determinant of investments* SF as a momentum game with small information asymmetry* Portfolio diversity: defense (Delian), embodied AI (Syriact), protein engineering* Finding entrepreneurs who “can't do anything else”* (10:44) State of AI progress in 2025* Momentous progress in writing, research, computer use, image, and video* We're in the “instruction manual” phase* The scale of investment: private markets, public markets, and nation states* (13:21) Range of outcomes and what “going bad” looks like* Today's systems are genuinely useful—worst case is a valuation problem* Financialization of AI buildouts and GPUs* (14:55) DeepSeek and China closing the capability gap* Seven-month lag analysis (Epoch AI)* Benchmark skepticism and consumer preferences (”Coca-Cola vs. Pepsi”)* Hedonic adaptation: humans reset expectations extremely quickly* Bifurcation of model companies toward specific product bets* (18:29) Export controls and the “evolutionary pressure” argument* Selective pressure breeds innovation* Chinese companies rushing to public markets (Minimax, ZAI)* (21:30) Reasoning models and test-time compute* Chain of thought faithfulness questions* Monitorability tax: does observability reduce quality?* User confusion about when models should “think”* AI for science: literature agents, hypothesis generation* (23:53) Chain of thought interpretability and safety* Anthropomorphization concerns* Alignment faking and self-preservation behaviors* Cybersecurity as a bigger risk than existential risk* Models as payloads injected into critical systems* (27:26) Commercial traction and AI adoption data* Ramp data: 44% of US businesses paying for AI (up from 5% in early 2023)* Average contract values up to $530K from $39K* State of AI survey: 92% report productivity gains* The “slow takeoff” consensus and human inertia* Use cases: meeting notes, content generation, brainstorming, coding, financial analysis* (32:53) The industrial era of AI* Stargate and XAI data centers* Energy infrastructure: gas turbines and grid investment* Labs need to own models, data, compute, and power* Poolside's approach to owning infrastructure* (35:40) Venture capital in the age of massive GPU capex* The GP lives in the present, the entrepreneur in the future, the LP in the past* Generality vs. specialism narratives* “Two or 20”: management fees vs. carried interest* Scaling funds to match entrepreneur ambitions* (40:10) NVIDIA challengers and returns analysis* Chinese challengers: 6x return vs. 26x on NVIDIA* US challengers: 2x return vs. 12x on NVIDIA* Grok acquired for $20B; Samba Nova markdown to $1.6B* “The tide is lifting all boats”—demand exceeds supply* (44:06) The hardware lottery and architecture convergence* Transformer dominance and custom ASICs making a comeback* NVIDIA still 90–95% of published AI research* (45:49) AI regulation: Trump agenda and the EU AI Act* Domain-specific regulators vs. blanket AI policy* State-level experimentation creates stochasticity* EU AI Act: “born before GPT-4, takes effect in a world shaped by GPT-7”* Only three EU member states compliant by late 2025* (50:14) Sovereign AI: what it really means* True sovereignty requires energy, compute, data, talent, chip design, and manufacturing* The US is sovereign; the UK by itself is not* Form alliances or become world-class at one level of the stack* ASML and the Netherlands as an example* (52:33) Open weight safety and containment* Three paths: model-based safeguards, scaffolding/ecosystem, procedural/governance* “Pandora's box is open”—containment on distribution, not weights* Leak risk: the most vulnerable link is often human* Developer–policymaker communication and regulator upskilling* (55:43) China's AI safety approach* Matt Sheehan's work on Chinese AI regulation* Safety summits and China's participation* New Chinese policies: minor modes, mental health intervention, data governance* UK's rebrand from “safety” to “security” institutes* (58:34) Prior predictions and patterns* Hits on regulatory/political areas; misses on semiconductor consolidation, AI video games* (59:43) 2026 Predictions* A Chinese lab overtaking US on frontier (likely ZAI or DeepSeek, on scientific reasoning)* Data center NIMBYism influencing midterm politics* (01:01:01) ClosingLinks and ResourcesNathan / Air Street Capital* Air Street Capital* State of AI Report 2025* Air Street Press — essays, analysis, and the Guide to AI newsletter* Nathan on Substack* Nathan on Twitter/X* Nathan on LinkedInFrom Air Street Press (mentioned in episode)* Is the EU AI Act Actually Useful? — by Max Cutler and Nathan Benaich* China Has No Place at the UK AI Safety Summit (2023) — by Alex Chalmers and Nathan BenaichResearch & Analysis* Epoch AI: Chinese AI Models Lag US by 7 Months — the analysis referenced on the US-China capability gap* Sara Hooker: The Hardware Lottery — the essay on how hardware determines which research ideas succeed* Matt Sheehan: China's AI Regulations and How They Get Made — Carnegie EndowmentCompanies Mentioned* Eleven Labs — AI voice synthesis (Air Street portfolio)* Synthesia — AI video generation (Air Street portfolio)* Crusoe — clean compute infrastructure (Air Street portfolio)* Poolside — AI for code (Air Street portfolio)* DeepSeek — Chinese AI lab* Minimax — Chinese AI company* ASML — semiconductor equipmentOther Resources* Search Engine Podcast: Data Centers (Part 1 & 2) — PJ Vogt's two-part series on XAI data centers and the AI financing boom* RAAIS Foundation — Nathan's AI research and education charity Get full access to The Gradient at thegradientpub.substack.com/subscribe

Is the AI SOC a reality, or just vendor hype? In this episode, Antoinette Stevens (Principal Security Engineer at Ramp) joins Ashish to dissect the true state of AI in detection engineering.Antoinette shares her experience building detection program from scratch, explaining why she doesn't trust AI to close alerts due to hallucinations and faulty logic . We explore the "engineering-led" approach to detection, moving beyond simple hunting to building rigorous testing suites for detection-as-code .We discuss the shrinking entry-level job market for security roles , why software engineering skills are becoming non-negotiable , and the critical importance of treating AI as a "force multiplier, not your brain".Guest Socials - ⁠⁠⁠Antoinette's LinkedinPodcast Twitter - ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@CloudSecPod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠If you want to watch videos of this LIVE STREAMED episode and past episodes - Check out our other Cloud Security Social Channels:-⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Cloud Security Podcast- Youtube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Cloud Security Newsletter ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠If you are interested in AI Security, you can check out our sister podcast -⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ AI Security Podcast⁠Questions asked:(00:00) Introduction(02:25) Who is Antoinette Stevens?(04:10) What is an "Engineering-Led" Approach to Detection? (06:00) Moving from Hunting to Automated Testing Suites (09:30) Build vs. Buy: Is AI Making it Easier to Build Your Own Tools? (11:30) Using AI for Documentation & Playbook Updates (14:30) Why Software Engineers Still Need to Learn Detection Domain Knowledge (17:50) The Problem with AI SOC: Why ChatGPT Lies During Triage (23:30) Defining AI Concepts: Memory, Evals, and Inference (26:30) Multi-Agent Architectures: Using Specialized "Persona" Agents (28:40) Advice for Building a Detection Program in 2025 (Back to Basics) (33:00) Measuring Success: Noise Reduction vs. False Positive Rates (36:30) Building an Alerting Data Lake for Metrics (40:00) The Disappearing Entry-Level Security Job & Career Advice (44:20) Why Junior Roles are Becoming "Personality Hires" (48:20) Fun Questions: Wine Certification, Side Quests, and Georgian Food

This week is a special episode. Only David Senra could get me to be on the other side of the mic. Because I don't plan on being interviewed often, I wanted to share this conversation, which I so enjoyed, with our audience. It went in a very different direction than I expected. We barely talk about investing or interviewing. Instead, we talk about finding an organizing principle for life, undiscovered talent, and the idea that “the reward for good work is more work.” We also discuss the principles that guide how I think about building Invest Like the Best, Colossus, and Positive Sum. This conversation was originally recorded and released on David Senra, and I wanted to share on the Invest Like The Best feed as well. Please go follow what he's doing, there's no one like David. Enjoy! For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Vanta. Trusted by thousands of businesses, Vanta continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit vanta.com/invest.  ----- This episode is brought to you by Rogo. Rogo is an AI-powered platform that automates accounts payable workflows, enabling finance teams to process invoices faster and with greater accuracy. Learn more at Rogo.ai/invest. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠WorkOS⁠. WorkOS is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit ⁠WorkOS.com⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (00:04:26) Intro (00:05:14) The Joy of Championing Undiscovered Talent (00:07:33) How One Tweet Changed David's Life (00:10:16) The Upanishads Passage That Shaped Patrick's Worldview (00:15:32) Growth Without Goals  (00:17:24) Why Media and Investing Are the Same Thing (00:33:05) The Search for True Understanding (00:35:36) The Daniel Ek Dinner That Launched David's Podcast (00:39:02) Making Your Own Recipe From the Ingredients of Great Lives (00:43:46) The Privilege of a Lifetime Is Being Who You Are (00:52:06) Bruce Springsteen (00:57:23) Clean Fuel vs Dirty Fuel: The Source of Your Ambition (01:01:43) The Unfair Advantage of Podcasting (01:04:12) Relationships Run the World (01:11:10) The Origin Story of Invest Like the Best (01:12:45) Building Colossus: Why Start a Magazine in 2025 (01:18:42) People Are More Interested in People Than Anything Else (01:22:12) Hiring Through Output (01:26:23) Learn, Build, Share, Repeat (01:30:01) The Daisy Chain: How Reading Books Led to Everything (01:33:15) Red on the Color Wheel: Sam Hinkie's Observation (01:40:17) Finding Your Superpower and Becoming More Yourself (01:45:06) Repetition Doesn't Spoil the Prayer: Teaching as Leadership (01:48:11) Life's Work: A Lifelong Quest to Build Something for Others (01:52:00) The Ten Roles Game and What Matters Most (01:59:12) Husband, Father, Grandfather (02:01:52) The Kindest Thing

On the night of October 25, 1994, Susan Smith stood on a boat ramp at John D. Long Lake in Union, South Carolina, and made a choice that would horrify the nation. She released the emergency brake on her burgundy Mazda Protégé and watched it roll into the dark water with her two sons still strapped in their car seats.Three-year-old Michael and fourteen-month-old Alex drowned in that lake while their mother ran to a nearby house and told a lie that would captivate America for nine days. Susan claimed a Black man had carjacked her at gunpoint and driven away with her children. She wept on national television, clutched her estranged husband David's hand, and begged for the safe return of her boys. The whole country searched for a phantom kidnapper while Michael and Alex lay dead at the bottom of that lake, one hundred and twenty-two feet from shore.In this episode, we trace Susan Smith's troubled life from the beginning. Her father Harry Vaughan killed himself when she was just six years old, leaving wounds that never healed. Her stepfather Beverly Russell, a prominent Republican and Christian Coalition member, began molesting her when she was fifteen and continued a sexual relationship with her into adulthood. Susan attempted suicide at thirteen and again at seventeen.She married David Smith at nineteen, already pregnant, and their marriage was plagued by mutual infidelity from the start.When Susan set her sights on Tom Findlay, the wealthy son of her boss at Conso Products, she believed he was her ticket to a better life.But Tom sent her a Dear John letter just eight days before the murders, telling her that while she had many good qualities, he did not want children. In Susan's fractured mind, her boys became obstacles to the happiness she craved.We examine the investigation that unraveled Susan's lies, from the traffic light that could not have turned red at an empty intersection to the polygraph that showed the highest level of deception when she was asked if she knew where her children were. We cover Sheriff Howard Wells obtaining her confession at a local church, the recovery of the boys' bodies with one small hand pressed against the car window, and the trial that exposed every dark corner of Susan's life. The jury convicted her in just two and a half hours but ultimately spared her from the death penalty. She was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after thirty years. Her time behind bars has been marked by affairs with prison guards, drug use, and self-mutilation. In November 2024, she faced her first parole hearing, where David Smith appeared wearing his sons' photograph and pleaded with the board to keep her locked up. They unanimously denied her release.This is the story of Michael and Alex, two innocent boys who deserved so much better than the fate their mother chose for them. And it is a story that still haunts America more than thirty years later.

Ben Orthlieb of Blue Moon joins Nick to discuss AI Native VC, Achieving 50%+ Graduation from Seed to Series A, Why Access Is the Key to Success, and Why Network Driven Firms Can No Longer Compete. In this episode we cover: Challenges of the Traditional Venture Model Blue Moon's AI-Assisted Human Judgment Evaluating Exceptional Founders Access vs. Picking in Venture Capital Blue Moon's Sourcing and Screening Process Non-Obvious Data Sources and Market Dynamics Winning Deals and Founder Relationships Future of Blue Moon and AI in Venture Capital Importance of Price and Pre-Commitments Guest Links: Ben's LinkedIn Blue Moon's LinkedIn Blue Moon's Website The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

This week, Alex is joined by the prolific streamer: Interrobang! The duo dives deep into the latest OTA Balance Patch, debating whether the nerf to Merlin actually impacts the meta and if the buffs to Vulture and Multiple Man are enough to cure "Bounce fatigue." They also break down the new High Voltage card Dragon Lord, analyzing if it's the perfect tool for Chamber & Ramp decks or a risky play for the uninitiated.Alex and Interrobang also look ahead to the massive new dragon Fin Fang Foom, asking if this 7-Cost behemoth is destined to just be Hela fodder or if it can find a home elsewhere. Plus, they review Lin Lie (Iron Fist) with a split verdict: is it a hard "skip" to save tokens, or a secret weapon for Spider-Man Noir synergy?Finally, they answer a spicy Mailbag question about whether Knull and Destroy decks are "free wins" for players regardless of skill. Join Alex Coccia and special guest Interrobang as they chat about this and more on this episode of The Snap Chat—and catch Cozy and Alex every week as they discuss all things Marvel Snap.Have a question or comment for Cozy and Alex? Send them a Text Message.You've been listening to The Snap Chat. Keep the conversation going on x.com/ACozyGamer and x.com/AlexanderCoccia. Until next time, happy snapping!

Founders ✓ Claim : Read the notes at at podcastnotes.org. Don't forget to subscribe for free to our newsletter, the top 10 ideas of the week, every Monday --------- There's no one like Rick Rubin. He's a legendary music producer known for his minimalist approach and relentless pursuit of greatness. This episode is what I learned from reading ⁠Rick Rubin: In The Studio⁠ by Jake Brown. Episode sponsors: ⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp and learning how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠ Go to Ramp.com to learn how they can help your business save time and money. Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell Vanta David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠Collateral.com Some of my favorite quotes from the episode: Less is more but you have to do more to get less. Designing a product is keeping 5,000 things in your brain and fitting them all together in new and different ways. (Steve Jobs) Rubin's most valuable quality is his own confidence. If we're going to do this, let's aim for greatness. You have to believe what you're doing is the most important thing in the world. Everybody engaged in complicated work needs colleagues. Just the discipline of having to put your thoughts in order with somebody else is a very useful thing. (Charlie Munger) The key to it is doing what you believe in, as opposed to what you think is going to work. There were never any plans to make anything happen. I just did what I liked and believed in it, and luckily it all worked out. These things that we don't understand and cannot explain happen regularly. The amateur mind possesses a valuable lack of knowledge about rules when matched with passion and gumption gravity ceases to exist and new things take flight.  To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child. (Cicero) I believe in you so much, I'm going to make you believe in you. I try to make records that have a timeless quality.

There's no one like Rick Rubin. He's a legendary music producer known for his minimalist approach and relentless pursuit of greatness. This episode is what I learned from reading ⁠Rick Rubin: In The Studio⁠ by Jake Brown. Episode sponsors: ⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp and learning how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠ Go to Ramp.com to learn how they can help your business save time and money. Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell Vanta David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠Collateral.com Some of my favorite quotes from the episode: Less is more but you have to do more to get less. Designing a product is keeping 5,000 things in your brain and fitting them all together in new and different ways. (Steve Jobs) Rubin's most valuable quality is his own confidence. If we're going to do this, let's aim for greatness. You have to believe what you're doing is the most important thing in the world. Everybody engaged in complicated work needs colleagues. Just the discipline of having to put your thoughts in order with somebody else is a very useful thing. (Charlie Munger) The key to it is doing what you believe in, as opposed to what you think is going to work. There were never any plans to make anything happen. I just did what I liked and believed in it, and luckily it all worked out. These things that we don't understand and cannot explain happen regularly. The amateur mind possesses a valuable lack of knowledge about rules when matched with passion and gumption gravity ceases to exist and new things take flight.  To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child. (Cicero) I believe in you so much, I'm going to make you believe in you. I try to make records that have a timeless quality.

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Kyle York of York IE Vince Hsieh of Cypress Growth Capital Madhavan Ramanujam of 49 Palms Ventures We asked guests to share the best question they've ever been asked by an allocator. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

Guest mix alert

My guests today are Tom Digan and Greg Stewart. Tom is the co-founder of Ladder, and Greg is its CEO. Ladder was my first angel investment. What followed over the next seven years is one of the most unlikely and dramatic business stories I've been a part of. Today, Ladder is the number one grossing fitness app in the App Store, approaching $100M in ARR with more than 300,000 paying members. But the path from near death to dominance involved debt collectors, leadership changes, and a full reset during the pandemic. Tom and Greg built Ladder by being relentlessly empirical about their customers, ruthless about prioritization, raising money wherever they could, and doing whatever it took when most founders would have quit. We cover the messy early years when survival meant negotiating creditors, how they found PMF by reading thousands of app store reviews, and how they built a TikTok growth engine with no performance marketing experience. They share their long-term vision for becoming the category winner for health and fitness and the impact of AI and GLP-1s on their business. This is a conversation about how hard it really is to build something valuable, told by two people who lived through all of it. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Vanta. Trusted by thousands of businesses, Vanta continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit vanta.com/invest.  ----- This episode is brought to you by Rogo. Rogo is an AI-powered platform that automates accounts payable workflows, enabling finance teams to process invoices faster and with greater accuracy. Learn more at Rogo.ai/invest. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠WorkOS⁠. WorkOS is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit ⁠WorkOS.com⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best  (00:04:26) Episode Intro (00:05:45) Ladder: The #1 Fitness App (00:09:28) The Messy, Early Years (00:14:47) Sponsors (00:16:20) The Darkest Point (00:18:17) Why Greg Joined Ladder (00:19:45) The Turning Point: Ladder 2.0 (00:21:57) The Key to Negotiating with Creditors (00:23:16) Fundraising Challenges and Strategies (00:25:50) Developing Ladder Teams (00:31:31) Listen to Your Customers (00:32:57) Launching Nutrition (00:38:53) Sponsors (00:39:31) Don't Listen to Investors on Product Feedback (00:40:18) The Cave Process (00:43:13) Crossing the Chasm (00:43:53) How to Crack TikTok (00:51:10) The Content Frontier (00:52:07) Controlled Bets at Scale (00:54:19) Why you should Build a B2C Company (00:57:37) The Impact of AI and GLP-1s (01:02:32) Sponsors (01:02:53) Staying Focused on the Core Product (01:05:00) Building the System of Record for Health and Fitness (01:09:45) What It's Like Talking to Investors Now (01:12:32) The Kindest Thing

＜目次＞(0:30) About Ramp and Diego Zaks(3:27) Time = Money(5:47) Measuring and reducing time spent(8:00) Assuming good intent(8:58) Disappearing interfaces and chat UI(12:58) Does AI effect Ramp's design philosophy?(14:41) Diego's reason for joining Ramp(15:52) Building velocity at Ramp(19:36) Finding alignment and fuzzy metrics(21:22) Ramp's pod team structure(22:31) Being right 52% of the time failing cheaply(26:01) Quick decision making culture(28:31) Internal transformation with AI(30:25) Designers and Product Managers(32:37) Evolution of Diego's role(34:01) Creative works Diego keeps coming back to(35:46) Counting days at Ramp(36:56) How Diego describes RampRamp | All-in-one financial operations platform designed to save businesses time and money.https://ramp.com/Diego Zaks (@diegozaks)https://x.com/diegozaks＜About Off Topic＞Podcast:Apple - https://apple.co/2UZCQwzSpotify - https://spoti.fi/2JakzKmOff Topic Clubhttps://note.com/offtopic/membershipX - https://twitter.com/OffTopicJP草野ミキ:https://twitter.com/mikikusanohttps://www.instagram.com/mikikusano宮武テツロー: https://twitter.com/tmiyatake1

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Jeff Bussgang of  Flybridge Capital Nnamdi Okike of 645 Ventures Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures We asked guests to describe the biggest change to their investment philosophy over the course of their career The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

This week, Alex is joined by a very special guest and one of the "OG" Marvel Snap content creators: Prashan! The duo dives deep into the "Dragon" season, debating whether the new Season Pass card Shao-Lau is "overtuned" to the point of being broken or just the meta-warping banger players have been waiting for. They also break down the new Series 5 release Lockheed, analyzing if its stats are solid enough to overlook its "buggy" animations and reliance on the Season Pass card.Alex and Prashan also look ahead to the next release, debating whether Lin Lie (Iron Fist) is a hard "skip" for competitive players or a secret weapon for niche Spider-Man Noir decks. Plus, they break down the upcoming High Voltage card Dragon Lord for Ramp archetypes and discuss Prashan's unique journey from collecting sneakers to digital card splitting.Join Alex Coccia and special guest Prashan as they chat about this and more on this episode of The Snap Chat—and catch Cozy and Alex every week as they discuss all things Marvel Snap.Have a question or comment for Cozy and Alex? Send them a Text Message.You've been listening to The Snap Chat. Keep the conversation going on x.com/ACozyGamer and x.com/AlexanderCoccia. Until next time, happy snapping!

"I set out to write a book about what to do to make a great work of art. Instead, it revealed itself to be a book on how to be.” —Rick Rubin. This episode is what I learned from reading The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin. Episode sponsors: ⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp.com and learn how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell them David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. https://www.vanta.com/founders Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠https://collateral.com Some of my favorite quotes: (00:00) Just one habit, at the top of any field, can be enough to give an edge over the competition. (1:00) It must have been frustrating for these elite athletes, who wanted to get on the court and show what they could do, to arrive at practice for the first time with this legendary coach only to hear him say, Today we will learn to tie our shoes. The point Wooden was making was that creating effective habits, down to the smallest detail, is what makes the difference between winning and losing games. Each habit might seem small, but added together, they have an exponential effect on performance. Just one habit, at the top of any field, can be enough to give an edge over the competition. (8:41) Faith allows you to trust the direction without needing to understand it. (10:16) If you make the choice of reading classic literature every day for a year, rather than reading the news, by the end of that time period you'll have a more honed sensitivity for recognizing greatness from the books than from the media. This applies to every choice we make. The friends we choose, the conversations we have, even the thoughts we reflect on. All of these aspects affect our ability to distinguish good from very good, very good from great. They help us determine what's worthy of our time and attention. Because there's an endless amount of data available to us and we have a limited bandwidth to conserve, we might consider carefully curating the quality of what we allow in. (14:25) We're affected by our surroundings, and finding the best environment to create a clear channel is personal and to be tested. (27:57) Rules direct us to average behaviors. If we're aiming to create works that are exceptional, most rules don't apply. Average is nothing to aspire to. The goal is not to fit in. Communicate your singular perspective. (28:30) It's a healthy practice to approach our work with as few accepted rules, starting points, and limitations as possible. Often the standards in our chosen medium are so ubiquitous, we take them for granted. They are invisible and unquestioned. (29:00) The world isn't waiting for more of the same. Often, the most innovative ideas come from those who master the rules to such a degree that they can see past them or from those who never learned them at all. (38:50) Fear of criticism. Attachment to a commercial result. Competing with past work. Time and resource constraints. The aspiration of wanting to change the world. And any story beyond “I want to make the best thing I can make, whatever it is” are all undermining forces in the quest for greatness. (42:32) To hone your craft is to honor creation. By practicing to improve, you are fulfilling your ultimate purpose on this planet.

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Lara Banks of Makena Capital Management Jim Tananbaum of Foresite Capital David Cohen of Techstars Each investor highlights a situation where they decided not to invest, why they passed, and how it played out. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

Injuries involving the posteromedial corner of the knee have become increasingly described and understood. Musculoskeletal Imaging Senior Editor Eric Chang, MD, speaks with Jie Nguyen, MD, MS, and Todd Lawrence, MD, PhD, regarding their article addressing the MRI and surgical evaluation of so-called ramp lesions of the knee.

The guys are back and ready to discuss some of the 41st annual Tulsa Shootout. Also lingering is the 40th annual Chili Bowl Nationals and Wild West Shootout.Stoking the FireDriller drama. Ramp altercations, a big DQ, drinking game, and the wrong guy is interviewed. Chili Bowl prelim night rosters have been revealed. USAC Midwest Racing Association (MRA) is formed and has a schedule for 2026. Lucas Oil late models purse and bonus program for 2026Kubota drops sponsorshipsNew Trophy Cup datesSocial media of the week: Whataburger, Shootout tweets, yoga pants, and more motor!The Draft(Ends around 32:00 minute mark)Feature FinishHigh Limit International finale at Perth Motorplex41st Annual Tulsa Shootout35th Annual Ice Bowl at Talladega Short Track Frostbuster Enduro at 81 Speedway(Ends around 35:00 minute mark)The Smoke Ribs & mac Steak night for CharlieMiller House - Catfish mealLic'sAir fried wingsMillion dollar spaghetti Crunch wrapsHalf pound burger nightSocial Cantina Beef & cheddars

My guest today is Reed Hastings, the co-founder and former longtime CEO of Netflix. Netflix is an example of two ideas that everyone talks about, but are extremely hard to do in practice. The first is finding a simple idea and taking it extraordinarily seriously. Reed talks about how even the DVD business was nothing more than a stepping stone toward streaming, which they envisioned from the company's inception in 1997. The second is talent density, and what it actually takes to set and sustain an exceptionally high bar over decades as a company grows.  We talk about how those ideas shaped Netflix's culture and strategy, what Reed learned from mistakes like Qwikster, and why Netflix treated content like a venture portfolio. We also discuss Reed's work today. He shares how he's thinking about AI, what he's learned from serving on the boards of Microsoft, Meta, Anthropic, and Bloomberg, and what excites him about Powder Mountain, the ski resort he acquired after Netflix. Please enjoy my conversation with Reed Hastings. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠ramp.com/invest⁠ to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Vanta. Trusted by thousands of businesses, Vanta continuously monitors your security posture and streamlines audits so you can win enterprise deals and build customer trust without the traditional overhead. Visit vanta.com/invest.  ----- This episode is brought to you by Rogo. Rogo is an AI-powered platform that automates accounts payable workflows, enabling finance teams to process invoices faster and with greater accuracy. Learn more at Rogo.ai/invest. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠WorkOS⁠. WorkOS is a developer platform that enables SaaS companies to quickly add enterprise features to their applications. Visit ⁠WorkOS.com⁠ to transform your application into an enterprise-ready solution in minutes, not months. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps (00:00:00) Sponsors (00:03:33) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (00:04:29) Intro (00:05:43) Sponsors (00:07:16) The Concept of Talent Density (00:11:19) Evaluating Talent (00:13:47) Managing on the Edge of Chaos (00:14:51) Why Netflix Gave Large Severance Packages (00:16:37) The Keeper's Test (00:17:07) The Qwikster Mistake (00:19:15) The Informed Captain (00:20:39) How to Come Up with Good Ideas (00:22:32) Transitioning to Streaming (00:23:05) Being on the Board of Facebook, Microsoft, Anthropic & Bloomberg (00:26:25) The Role of a Board Member (00:29:37) Sponsors (00:30:15) Why Netflix Had Open Compensation (00:32:04) Netflix's Content Strategy (00:37:52) Competing with YouTube and Traditional TV (00:39:23) Creating Hit Content (00:40:02) Impact of AI on Netflix (00:41:24) Innovations in Show Formats (00:43:23) Sponsors (00:43:44) Netflix's Technology Backbone (00:45:29) Expanding into Gaming (00:46:06) Lessons from Failed Projects (00:47:30) Financial Strategy and Capital Allocation (00:50:27) Stepping Down as CEO (00:50:52) Powder Mountain (00:56:08) Focus on Education and AI (00:59:00) Risks and Benefits of AI (01:00:56) The Kindest Thing (01:02:56) Sponsors

Send us a textThis episode is for the ones who learned to earn love by being useful.For the people-pleasers, the strong ones, the givers.For the ones who are just now learning to rest in the truth:✨ You are loved because you exist. ✨In this gentle solo episode, I share a journal-inspired word ramp — a guided sequence of healing thoughts to help move from emotional survival to authentic self-worth.You'll hear:The phrase that inspired this episode (and why it hit so deep)A 9-step word ramp from pain → compassion → embodimentA new mantra to anchor your truth:“I am. I am here. I am love. I am love visibly here. I am.”Reflections on being vs. doing, and how to give from your overflowAn invitation to join the Picture Love Collective (coming soon!)

show notes

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Alexander Niehenke of Scale Venture Partners Kyle York of York IE Aaref Hilaly of Bain Capital Ventures We asked guests for the most important piece of advice that they'd share with folks early in their venture career. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

From General to Specific: The Flow of RAMP The strength of the RAMP Protocol lies in how it gradually transitions from general preparation to sport- or session-specific readiness.Each phase builds on the last, narrowing focus and increasing intensity with purpose.• Raise – General movement prep • Activate – Targeted muscle engagement • Mobilise – Joint-specific preparation • Potentiate – Sport- or lift-specific power and speedBy the time RAMP is complete, you've moved from a global warm-up to high-performance readiness — mentally and physically primed for exactly what's ahead.The RAMP Protocol: Flexible by Design The RAMP Protocol isn't a rigid, step-by-step formula — it's a dynamic warm-up framework designed to be flexible.While it includes four key elements (Raise, Activate, Mobilise, Potentiate), you don't have to treat them as separate phases. Instead, movements can be blended to tick multiple boxes at once — for example, a crawling pattern that raises heart rate, activates the core, mobilises the hips, and potentiates the upper body.The goal is efficiency: using the fewest exercises possible to be fully prepared for your session.This is smart movement prep, tailored to you and exactly what's ahead.Shaun Kober is a Mindset & Performance Specialist, with a unique skillset forged in the trenches, through the various stages of life."I shouldn't be in the position I am right now." The odds were stacked against me: ● Poor family on welfare, eldest of 6 kids, parents didn't work, abusive step-dad, no electricity or running water for a 6 years period of my life ● Caught up with the wrong crowd, stealing, drugs, skipping school ● At 14 years old, I sat on a bus for 3 days with $50 in my pocket, to travel to the next State over West, to begin a new life in the workforce - 200014 - 20: I grew up and learned how to become a man through work and rugby20 - 26: I lived, trained and fought as a professional soldier, at a high level26 - 32: I became a personal trainer, after failing in my pursuit to become a firefighter32 - 38: I worked with, and won world titles with some of the best athletes on the planet, as their strength and conditioning coach38+: The next evolution begins #coachedbykobes#livetrainperform#mindsetandperformance Live Life To The Fullest.Train To Your Potential.Perform At Your Best!https://www.coachedbykobes.com/

The RAMP Package isn't just a training program — it's a structured performance framework built for real life.Over 30 days, you'll follow a simple, repeatable rhythm that blends high-impact movement sessions with focused mindset coaching. The goal isn't to do more — it's to do what matters, consistently, without burning out.It starts with Day 0.Before you train harder, you set direction. Day 0 is about clarity — defining your goals and understanding why you're committing to the process. Because effort without intent leads nowhere.From there, the rhythm begins:2 Days Movement → 1 Day Mindset → RepeatMovement Days Each session combines:Prime Time/Movement Prep Module (10 minutes): mobility, stability, and potentiationWODMod (10–20 minutes): scalable strength and conditioningTotal time: 10–30 minutes. High intent. Fully adaptable. Designed to fit busy lives.Mindset Days Every third day, you'll work through a focused coaching chapter supported by practical Top 10 tips. These sessions cover goal-setting, habit-building, accountability, consistency, and momentum — giving you the tools to stay on track when motivation fades.This structure respects recovery, attention, and long-term progress. You're not just getting fitter — you're building capability, discipline, and resilience.No hype. No fluff.Just a system that works.This is Day 0.Let's begin.Shaun Kober is a Mindset & Performance Specialist, with a unique skillset forged in the trenches, through the various stages of life."I shouldn't be in the position I am right now." The odds were stacked against me: ● Poor family on welfare, eldest of 6 kids, parents didn't work, abusive step-dad, no electricity or running water for a 6 years period of my life ● Caught up with the wrong crowd, stealing, drugs, skipping school ● At 14 years old, I sat on a bus for 3 days with $50 in my pocket, to travel to the next State over West, to begin a new life in the workforce - 200014 - 20: I grew up and learned how to become a man through work and rugby20 - 26: I lived, trained and fought as a professional soldier, at a high level26 - 32: I became a personal trainer, after failing in my pursuit to become a firefighter32 - 38: I worked with, and won world titles with some of the best athletes on the planet, as their strength and conditioning coach38+: The next evolution begins #coachedbykobes#livetrainperform#mindsetandperformance Live Life To The Fullest.Train To Your Potential.Perform At Your Best!https://www.coachedbykobes.com/

Today, I am replaying my conversation with Nick Kokonas, one of my favorites from the show. Nick is the co-founder of 3 of the best restaurants and bars in America - Alinea, Next, and The Aviary as well as the co-founder and CEO of Tock, a comprehensive booking system for restaurants. He majored in philosophy before becoming a derivatives trader and is now one of the most well-known names in the hospitality industry. In this conversation, Nick shares his experience of bringing a business mindset to the restaurant industry. I'll remember it for why it's so important for a business to really know what it's selling and then actually sell it. Nick also pulls back the curtain on why restaurants and even book publishers can be great businesses if you do them the right way. I felt like this conversation could have gone on for hours and I hope you enjoy it. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ramp.com/invest to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Head to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the platform. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠AlphaSense⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. AlphaSense has completely transformed the research process with cutting-edge AI technology and a vast collection of top-tier, reliable business content. Invest Like the Best listeners can get a free trial now at⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Alpha-Sense.com/Invest⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and experience firsthand how AlphaSense and Tegus help you make smarter decisions faster. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Timestamps: (00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (03:58) Intro to Nick Kokonas (4:36) – Why it's so important to own something (6:09) – Make decisions that have outcomes (8:34) – His interest in the restaurant business (10:28) – Why restaurants are so tough (13:39) – How their business mindset changed their running of the restaurant (16:09) – Words they would avoid in the restaurant (17:53) – Asking the right questions in the restaurant business (22:14) – Importance in taking the right risks (23:36) – Coming up with innovative strategies for ticketing, selling meals ahead of time, and dynamic pricing (31:42) – Can dynamic pricing be extended to other businesses (32:54) – Origin of Tock (37:51) – Early days of Tock and identifying the right customers/challenges (43:07) – Importance of the first customer (45:56) – The typical restaurant business model (50:57) – Lessons from Tock and the importance of knowing what you're selling (55:21) – Lessons from publishing (57:18) – Other aspects of business that people know but do nothing about (1:01:53) – Their response to Covid and lessons learned (1:09:17) – The real impact to the food delivery companies (1:10:58) – How businesses communicate their end processes to their customers (1:15:41) – The Kindest Thing

The RAMP Package is a 30-day, entry-level performance system designed to build durable fitness, movement quality, and mindset — without requiring excessive time, equipment, or motivation.At its core, RAMP is built on the Raise, Activate, Mobilise, Potentiate framework: a proven approach to preparing the body and nervous system to train, perform, and recover effectively. Rather than treating warm-ups as filler, RAMP turns preparation into training, ensuring every session starts with intent and finishes with precision.The program combines:Prime Time: 10-minute movement prep sessions that improve mobility, stability, coordination, and readinessWODMod: 20-minute strength and conditioning sessions built on time-tested templates, designed for real-world performance and repeatabilityMindset Coaching: Every third day focuses on habits, consistency, accountability, goal-setting, and momentum — ensuring physical progress actually sticksThe structure follows a simple rhythm: 2 days movement → 1 day mindset → repeat, allowing progress without burnout and flexibility when life gets busy.The RAMP Package is not about chasing exhaustion, aesthetics, or short-term peaks. It's about building a foundation — physically and mentally — that supports long-term performance across sport, work, and life.It's the same system used to stay capable across rugby, martial arts, fitness competition, and tactical environments, adapted for everyday athletes.Move better. Train smarter. Perform with intent.Shaun Kober is a Mindset & Performance Specialist, with a unique skillset forged in the trenches, through the various stages of life."I shouldn't be in the position I am right now." The odds were stacked against me: ● Poor family on welfare, eldest of 6 kids, parents didn't work, abusive step-dad, no electricity or running water for a 6 years period of my life ● Caught up with the wrong crowd, stealing, drugs, skipping school ● At 14 years old, I sat on a bus for 3 days with $50 in my pocket, to travel to the next State over West, to begin a new life in the workforce - 200014 - 20: I grew up and learned how to become a man through work and rugby20 - 26: I lived, trained and fought as a professional soldier, at a high level26 - 32: I became a personal trainer, after failing in my pursuit to become a firefighter32 - 38: I worked with, and won world titles with some of the best athletes on the planet, as their strength and conditioning coach38+: The next evolution begins #coachedbykobes#livetrainperform#mindsetandperformance Live Life To The Fullest.Train To Your Potential.Perform At Your Best!https://www.coachedbykobes.com/

In 2024 Brad Jacobs wrote the book How to Make a Few Billion Dollars. In the book Brad explains how he built 8 separate billion dollar companies and other lessons from his 40+ year career as an elite entrepreneur. In the two years since Brad has made a few MORE billion dollars and so the sequel to his first book is: How to Make a Few MORE Billion Dollars. In this episode I share some of Brad's ideas on raising tons of money (Brad has raised over $50 billion), mastering his integration playbook, ideas for organizational integration, org chart design, and how Brad keeps his mind centered and in a positive place to handle the inevitable ups and downs of building great companies. Episode sponsors: ⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp and learning how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ramp.com Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell them David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. https://vanta.com/founders⁠⁠⁠ Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠https://collateral.com

In this special replay episode Aaref Hilaly of Bain Capital Ventures joins Nick to discuss The Biggest Misconceptions About AI Agents, Why Defensibility Doesn't Matter at Seed, and Whether the AI Center of Gravity Is Shifting to China. In this episode we cover: AI Investment Strategy and Market Utility Impact of AI on Jobs and Early Instances of Reasoning Open vs. Closed Source Models and Data Control Scenario Planning and Unique Insights of Backed Companies Infrastructure and Application Investment Focus Future of Vertical Solutions and Infrastructure Investment Guest Links: Twitter/X (guest)  Guest's LinkedIn Company's LinkedIn Company's Website The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Vince Hsieh of Cypress Growth Capital Ryan Delk of Primer Mike Maples Jr. of Floodgate We asked guests to discuss the most visionary founder that they've worked with and what makes them so special. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Aaref Hilaly of Bain Capital Ventures Somesh Dash of IVP Chris Rizik of Renaissance Venture Capital We asked guests to tell the most important lesson they've learned in their career. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

December 19th, 2025 Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and X Listen to past episodes on The Ticket’s Website And follow The Ticket Top 10 on Apple, Spotify or Amazon MusicSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following Investors are featured: Kevin Jiang of Mangusta Capital Shamin Walsh of BAM Ventures Shashank Saxena of Sierra Ventures We asked guests to share the best question they've ever been asked by an allocator. The host of The Full Ratchet is Nick Moran of New Stack Ventures, a venture capital firm committed to investing in founders outside of the Bay Area. We're proud to partner with Ramp, the modern finance automation platform. Book a demo and get $150—no strings attached.   Want to keep up to date with The Full Ratchet? Follow us on social. You can learn more about New Stack Ventures by visiting our LinkedIn and Twitter.

My guest today is Henry Ellenbogen, founder and Managing Partner of Durable Capital Partners. Henry built his reputation at T. Rowe Price, where he led the New Horizons Fund and turned it into one of the best-performing small-cap growth portfolios in the country. In 2019, he left to start Durable. His philosophy is grounded in a simple belief that great investing is about understanding people and change. Henry has spent his career studying the rare 1% of companies that drive nearly all long-term returns . Durable's edge comes from being able to tell the difference between a company that is failing and one that is transforming. Henry often talks about “Act II” teams – founders who take the lessons from their first company and apply them to a new frontier. Durable itself is his Act II. In our latest Colossus profile, Managing Editor Dom Cooke traces Henry's story and specifically how he became one of the most influential investors of the 21st century, having learned from founders like Jeff Bezos and John Malone in the early part of his career. I always hear the same thing from founders who've met Henry: “he understood my business faster than anyone”. The thing that sticks with me from our conversation and Dom's profile is just how much he loves investing. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ramp.com/invest to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Head to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the platform. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠AlphaSense⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. AlphaSense has completely transformed the research process with cutting-edge AI technology and a vast collection of top-tier, reliable business content. Invest Like the Best listeners can get a free trial now at⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Alpha-Sense.com/Invest⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and experience firsthand how AlphaSense and Tegus help you make smarter decisions faster. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Show Notes: (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (00:04:00) Meet Henry Ellenbogen (00:05:29) Origin of Henry's Investment Philosophy (00:08:12) Identifying the 1% of Great Companies (00:12:53) Patterns of Successful Compounders (00:20:34) Act Two Entrepreneurs and Teams (00:25:43) Building Durable Capital: Henry's Act Two (00:30:11) Dollar Cost Averaging Up Strategy (00:35:02) Market Structure and Agency Problems (00:38:26) Impact of Quant Funds and Short-Term Capital (00:42:21) AI as Transformative Change (00:45:30) How Affirm Uses AI (00:48:23) Amazon's Cost Curve Advantage (00:51:48) Leadership Through Change (00:56:54) Robotics and Physical Kaizen (01:01:29) Favorite Types of Competitive Advantages (01:05:25) Investment Memo Structure (01:09:21) 2022 CEO Tour on Market Transition (01:19:18) Hiring and Developing Talent (01:24:09) Making Colleagues Better (01:27:56) Being Intellectually Honest in Investing (01:29:11) Lessons from Success (01:33:04) Case for Going Public (01:36:32) Netflix Transition Example (01:41:29) Two Types of Greatness (01:45:42) The Kindest Thing

December 15th, 2025 Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and X Listen to past episodes on The Ticket’s Website And follow The Ticket Top 10 on Apple, Spotify or Amazon MusicSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A viciously unhappy childhood causes Bruce Springsteen to retreat into work in an extreme way as he searches for success (and control). He channels his pain into focus and drive and gets everything he thought he wanted. He didn't yet know he was lying to himself. He will find that out soon. He falls into a deep depression. One that almost leads to s*icide. With the help of his true friend Jon Landau he seeks professional help. This help helps immediately. The lie he was telling himself was that work was the most important thing in his life. What he really wanted, was what he was incapable of doing: forming a lasting and loving relationship with a woman. For that he realizes he can't run. For that he realizes he has to stay. That thought terrifies him and is what caused him to seek help. He meets a truly singular woman and for the first time in his life he's able to have a healthy relationship with someone he loves. This realization comes almost 400 pages into Bruce's incredible autobiography (one of the best I've ever read) and it is shocking. I originally thought I was making an episode about Bruce Springsteen's extreme work ethic (one example: He wrote this book out by hand, multiple times, over 7 years. It's almost 600 pages. He's like this with everything btw.) But as I read, and reread this book over the last 6 months I realized that is not the most important part of the story. The work Bruce had to do to fix his mind is the heart and soul of the book. The work he did with Dr. Wayne Myers over 25 years is what allowed him to have a life. Not just a job. A life. As Bruce says after coming through the other side of this: “Work is work . . . but life . . . is life . . . and life trumps art . . . always.” This is a very unusual episode of Founders. I hope you enjoy it. If you want to skip to the part where he starts dealing with the struggles going on in his mind that starts 46 minutes in. Episode sponsors: ⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ gives you everything you need to control spend, watch your costs, and optimize your financial operations —all on a single platform. Make history's greatest entrepreneurs proud ⁠⁠⁠by going to Ramp and learning how they can help your business control your costs and save time and money.⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ramp.com⁠⁠⁠⁠ Automate compliance, security, and trust with Vanta.⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Vanta helps you win trust, close deals, and stay secure—faster and with less effort⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Find out how increased security leads to more customers by going to Vanta⁠⁠⁠. Tell them David from Founders sent you and you'll get $1000 off. ⁠⁠⁠https://www.vanta.com/founders⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠ Collateral⁠⁠ transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to ⁠⁠https://collateral.com

My guest this week is Gavin Baker. Gavin is the managing partner and CIO of Atreides Management, and he has been on the show many times before.  I will never forget when I first met Gavin in 2017. I find his interest in markets, his curiosity about the world to be as infectious as any investor that I've ever come across. He's encyclopedic on what is going on in the world of technology today, and I've had the good fortune to host him every year or two on this podcast. Gavin began covering Nvidia as an investor more than two decades ago, giving him a rare perspective on how the company – and the entire semiconductor ecosystem – has evolved. A lot has changed since our last conversation a year ago, making this the perfect time to revisit the topic. In this conversation, we talk about everything that interests Gavin – Nvidia's GPUs, Google's TPUs, the changing AI landscape, the math and business models around AI companies and everything in between. We also discussed the idea of data centers in space, which he communicates with his usual passion and logic. In closing, at the end of this conversation, because I've asked him my traditional closing question before, I asked him a different question, which led to a discussion of his entire investing origin story that I had never heard before. Because Gavin is one of the most passionate thinkers and investors that I know, these conversations are always amongst my most favorite. I hope you enjoy this latest in the series of discussions with Gavin Baker. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ramp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ramp's mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ramp.com/invest to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus. ----- This episode is brought to you by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ridgeline⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Ridgeline has built a complete, real-time, modern operating system for investment managers. It handles trading, portfolio management, compliance, customer reporting, and much more through an all-in-one real-time cloud platform. Head to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ridgelineapps.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the platform. ----- This episode is brought to you by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠AlphaSense⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. AlphaSense has completely transformed the research process with cutting-edge AI technology and a vast collection of top-tier, reliable business content. Invest Like the Best listeners can get a free trial now at⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Alpha-Sense.com/Invest⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and experience firsthand how AlphaSense and Tegus help you make smarter decisions faster. ----- Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠). Show Notes: (00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best (00:04:00) Meet Gavin Baker (00:06:00) Understanding Gemini 3  (00:09:05) Scaling Laws for Pre-Training (00:12:12) Google v. Nvidia (00:16:52) Google as  Lowest Cost Producer of Tokens (00:28:05)  AI Can Automate Anything that can be Verified (00:34:30) The AI Bear Case: Edge AI (00:37:18) Going from Intelligence to Usefulness (00:43:44) AI Adoption in Fortune 500 Companies (00:48:58) Frontier Models and Industry Dynamics (00:56:40) China's Mistake and Blackwell's Geopolitical Leverage (00:57:50) OpenAI's Code Red (01:00:46) Data Centers in Space (01:07:13) Cycles in AI (01:11:10) Power as a Bottleneck (01:14:17) AI Native Entrepreneurs (01:16:21) Semiconductor VC (01:20:41) The Mistake the SaaS Industry is Making (01:26:50) Series of Bubbles (01:28:56) Whatever AI Needs, It Gets (01:29:57) Investing is the Search for Truth (01:31:24) Gavin's Investing Origin Story