Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

The three influencers are part of a broader group of TikTok celebrities called the Sway House and have attracted a fair share of scandal and controversy, including for throwing a large, unmasked party during the pandemic. But tech founders have mostly welcomed them with open arms.

Honestly what this reminded me of is the paper on Veblerian entrepreneurship[1]. People like this might have their finger on the pulse when it comes to entertainment content, or social media, but I have no idea how they're supposed to make informed technological decisions in the more narrow sense of the term. Venture capital seems to be more and more invested in entertainment, lifestyle, and content creation rather than deep technological and material innovation.

[1]https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3479042

Re: Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

#6

Post by PragmaticPulp » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 4:30 AM UTC

I joined one of these Slack groups out of curiosity. They had 700 members, and as far as I could tell not a single one of the people active in the discussions was involved with a VC.

A lot of hustle, but it felt like activity was dominated by people with more free time than actual VC work.

Unfortunately, I worry that eager VC firms are going to use this to their advantage. Plenty of young people hoping to get rich quick in the VC world will do a lot of free work in the hopes of securing a job later.

Re: Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

#7

Post by ffpip » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 4:55 AM UTC

smcleod wrote: post #2

Seems to be paywalled.

Disable javascript for that particular page, or open in incognito, clear cookies, etc. Basically any method works.

Re: Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

#8

Post by lawrenceyan » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 4:58 AM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #5

> This summer, three of the TikTok's most popular stars, Josh Richards, Bryce Hall, and Griffin Johnson, decided to become angel investors. The three influencers are part of a broader group of TikTok celebrities called the Sway House and have attracted a fair share of scandal and controversy, including for throwing a large, unmasked party during the pandemic. But tech founders have mostly welcomed them with open arms…

That's mostly just because you don't hear about the deep technological and material innovation investments. If you're generally in the loop though, you'll know.

Re: Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

#9

Post by smabie » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 5:02 AM UTC

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #6

I joined one of these Slack groups out of curiosity. They had 700 members, and as far as I could tell not a single one of the people active in the discussions was involved with a VC. A lot of hustle, but it felt like activity was dominated by people with more free time than actual VC work. Unfortunately, I worry that eager VC firms are going to use this to their advantage. Plenty of young people hoping to get rich qu…

that's how all forums are. For example I frequent r/quant and the vast majority of people aren't quants and instead high school students asking how to become a quant. it's pretty annoying

If someone made a reddit like site where you had to prove qualifications to get into certain forums, I think it would have the potential to do really well.

Re: Gen Z is using Slack, TikTok, Clubhouse to break into venture capital

#10

Post by hardwaresofton » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 5:06 AM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #5

> This summer, three of the TikTok's most popular stars, Josh Richards, Bryce Hall, and Griffin Johnson, decided to become angel investors. The three influencers are part of a broader group of TikTok celebrities called the Sway House and have attracted a fair share of scandal and controversy, including for throwing a large, unmasked party during the pandemic. But tech founders have mostly welcomed them with open arms…

> Honestly what this reminded me of is the paper on Veblerian entrepreneurship[1]. People like this might have their finger on the pulse when it comes to entertainment content, or social media, but I have no idea how they're supposed to make informed technological decisions in the more narrow sense of the term. Venture capital seems to be more and more invested in entertainment, lifestyle, and content creation rather than deep technological and material innovation.

The same way I imagine random VCs and new funds do it -- hire experts and consultants until they get a feel for the field and more importantly connections to more private placements.

Money is capital because it allows you to do these things -- you don't have to be an expert in a field if you can just hire one.

Also, do we know how much alpha is actually generated by VCs as opposed to random scattershot (especially in a certain niche) and getting lucky?