Viewing profile — cdixon

Commoditize the complement: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/StrategyLetterV.html

VCs almost always bring in outside experts to diligence ideas that they are qualified can't diligence themselves. That happened extensively here.

Sounds like you are interested in philosophy after all! :) Whether and how there can be a priori knowledge is an old philosophical question.

Yeah I thought about using "vertical integration" but that's a pretty overloaded term at this point. Usually refers to existing businesses buying up suppliers/buyers to control pro…

It is Bitcoin. I was just trying to present some of the ideas behind Bitcoin without all the baggage of the word.

My view is that the whole system was designed for a different era and not for the web. The problems include 1) consumer having to fill out a form at each merchant, 2) consumer havi…

My guess is the exchange fees will go down over time and instead Bitcoin companies will end up making money selling additional services.

I think the original Bitcoin paper said it well: "small casual payments." To pay online right now, you have to decide: 1) do I trust this vendor 2) do I want to fill out this form …

Definitely interested in lots of other uses for the ledger. If you or someone you know is working on something, we (a16z) would love to talk. I'm hoping next year we'll see a lot m…

I also think this issue is going to become more urgent as native mobile apps that do have a "global" (OS-wide) payment system become more dominant. Open web needs something analogo…

Here's one model that could work. Think of Bitcoin as analogous to physical cash. Cash = small casual payments in offline world. Bitcoin = small casual payments in online world. (b…

Great list. I would also add: What is Mathematics? http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-Elementary-Approach-Ideas-...

Great list. I would also add: What is Mathematics? http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-Elementary-Approach-Ideas-...

Yes, our investment was very publicly disclosed on my blog, Coinbase's blog, and multiple news sites. Also, I was posting positive things on my blog about Bitcoin long before I (or…

We (a16z) would love to see more innovation along these lines and would be excited to try to help.

I agree it's imprecise. But I'd argue the de facto fees in the existing system are much higher than 2.5%. The biggest cost are all the transactions that should happen but don't. Mo…

We invested in Oculus after we saw a demo of the new prototype. For me, it was up there with the first time I saw Apple II, Mac, the web, Google, iPhone etc.

I'd strongly recommend having a presentation in the pitch meeting. It helps control the flow of the meeting and ensure you cover all the important points.

Agreed. That is a ridiculously hard problem but in my opinion perhaps the most important tech problem of our time.

This follows a classic pattern. Incumbents once argued that having a 3rd wireless carrier per city was a threat to the public: http://cdixon.org/2012/10/10/regulatory-hacks/

"You have to ignore the elephant in front of you, the likelihood they'll succeed, and focus instead on the separate and almost invisibly intangible question of whether they'll succ…