Kind of depressing that they gave up on the "GPs must have been operators" rule (presumably due to pressure by LPs or the press). Do any large VC firms still maintain that?
A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
161–170 of 360 posts
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is there to believe or not believe in? It is what it is. Bitcoin is a perfectly functional means of financial exchange, and has use cases that beat regular cash, and other use case where it sucks compared to cash.
> and has use cases that beat regular cash, Tell me.
Anonymous transactions at a distance.
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#163tl;dr - A16Z is reclassifying themselves as an "investment advisor", which will allow them to make riskier bets (crypto, real estate, etc). They'll still invest in startups like any other VC firm.
A totally n00b question. Isn't VC the person with the money, so they are more in control. While an "investment advisor" is just advising or suggesting where the money can be put for maximum returns like an investment advisor in banks? So, presumably less in control. I don't understand why a title change was needed. Any technical or legal reasons?
wpennington answered the overall question better than I could, but one clarification on this:
> Isn't VC the person with the money, so they are more in control.
Most of the money VCs invest isn't their own. The money is allocated by "limited partners" (entities such as pension funds, endowment funds, sovereign wealth funds, rich individuals/families), and the VC firm uses their expertise and network to invest the money on the LPs' behalf, in exchange for a "management fee" and a cut of the returns.
The VC firm's partners do usually invest some of their own money (to have some "skin in the game"), but it's a token amount compared to the outside money they're investing.
Due to their role as custodians for huge amounts of other people's money (which, particularly in the case of pension funds, ultimately belongs to ordinary people), there are substantial regulatory controls and requirements.
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#164Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#165Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is there to believe or not believe in? It is what it is. Bitcoin is a perfectly functional means of financial exchange, and has use cases that beat regular cash, and other use case where it sucks compared to cash.
> and has use cases that beat regular cash, Tell me.
Micropayments on the web without users having to create an account. For example paying a few cents for reading a news article, without an account on the news site and without the high fees for a payment processor. (Via Lightning Network)
Example news site: https://yalls.org Example browser extension for great UX: https://github.com/wbobeirne/joule-extension
Or even nanopayments for single API calls, between the browser and a server or between servers.
Example pay-per-call web service / API: https://lightning.ws (disclaimer: my project, based on another project by me: https://github.com/philippgille/ln-paywall)
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#167A16Z’s unapologetic bet on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies is big for the industry. As crypto heats up again and blockchain 3.0 projects emerge (Cosmos, Polkadot, Ethereum Proof of Stake) VC will help legitimize the industry.
Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.
Transactions that are in violation of the law (evading capital controls, buying illegal goods, money laundering) and are not done in person.
Also, replacing trust in centralized banks with trust in mostly-centralized crypto software developers and mostly-centralized majority of miners.
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is there to believe or not believe in? It is what it is. Bitcoin is a perfectly functional means of financial exchange, and has use cases that beat regular cash, and other use case where it sucks compared to cash.
> and has use cases that beat regular cash, Tell me.
Buying drugs, avoiding taxes, money laundering, etc.
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#169If it looks like a duck ...
Quack, quack!!!
Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
> and has use cases that beat regular cash, Tell me.
Micropayments on the web without users having to create an account. For example paying a few cents for reading a news article, without an account on the news site and without the high fees for a payment processor. (Via Lightning Network) Example news site: https://yalls.org Example browser extension for great UX: https://github.com/wbobeirne/joule-extension Or even nanopayments for single API calls, between the brows…
Seeing how slow and expensive both BTC and ETH are, micropayments aren’t really viable, tbh.
The mining and gas fees for BTC and ETH respectively are going to be higher than the cut a payment processor would take.
The one advantage that you might be alluding to is that bitcoins are divisible into satoshi’s, which are much more granular than cents.