Re/Code was a Terrible Name

Bob Lefsetz on the fall of ReCode:
“As for the name… What does it mean? Either your moniker has to indicate what you’re about, like Facebook, Snapchat or Instagram, or it must relate to nothing, like Shazam or Corolla. ReCode, what is that? A place where you rewrite C++? And what’s with the forward slash in the middle…yes, technically it’s Re/Code. Most people don’t even know where that key is to type, so you’re inherently limiting discussion. Hell, even the press doesn’t get it right, every story about the sale to Vox calls it “ReCode”!

And dot net? Is it Amazon.net? Google.net? Type recode into Safari and you’ll get Google results, you won’t automatically go to the site, as you will with Amazon and the rest of the .coms.”

Maybe Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg should have just gone with a Tumblr blog.

See Also:
More ReCode –Lefsetz
ReCode to Vox –Lefsetz

Where are the Customers’ Teslas?

Cars parked at the Rosewood on Sand Hill Road. I guess a better question is, Where are the LPs’ Maseratis?

A lot of VCs are blogging about raising funds these days. Probably because a lot of VCs are raising funds. So much money floating around, so little yield.

I don’t understand venture capital as an investment. It’s a pretty lame deal as far as asset allocation goes. The cash is tied up for a decade, and the returns of all but the best funds barely beat the market. Jason Lemkin of Storm Ventures says:

The traditional thinking is VC has to do at least 50% better than Nasdaq to account for illiquidity. That means a 30%+ IRR (i.e., annualize returns) bar these days.

I guess that’s a fair comparison. Venture capital roughly follows the same cycles as Nasdaq. After all, that’s where the investments ultimately get liquidity.

But if venture capital performance is correlated with Nasdaq, and the premium is the price of liquidity, then why not just put money into Nasdaq? The purpose of asset class allocation is not to diversify liquidity, it’s to diversify correlation. If Nasdaq tanks, hopefully you own some other crap that’s still doing okay.

Venture capital isn’t an asset class, it’s a system to transfer wealth from state pension funds into the pockets of general partners. Some of the wealth moves into the pockets of kids working on new technology. This part is important, because that technology can have a moonshot chance of improving the world. Someone’s gotta fund moonshots, and it’s not gonna be banks.

Venture capital, then, is a charitable service. Why not advertise honestly? Nonprofits are allowed a 3% management fee so VC firms can still afford disgusting salaries and daily crudité delivery. Maybe that decreases the likelihood that endowments and pension funds allocate assets to Silicon Valley, but LPs allocate less than 0.5% of their funds to this subset of private equity anyway. Venture capital is already a tax writeoff.

See Also:
So We Raised a $180,000,000 Venture Fund. What I Learned. –SaaStr
Charities are making big money by acting like venture capitalists –Fortune

When Did Flying Become So Boring?

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Flying is the wind, the turbulence, the smell of exhaust, and the roar of an engine; it’s wet cloud on your cheek and sweat under your helmet.
–Richard Bach, 1960

The pilot wore polyester pants. The picture is from 1971, an era when pilots no longer needed helmets and boots and goggles to fly. Wood-and-fabric aircraft had given way to closed cockpits. The woman’s hairdo wouldn’t be mussed.

The purpose of general aviation was never to get from Point A to Point B, but to be in the air between Point A and Point B.

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Pilots used the term “$100 hamburger” to justify a flyout to a passenger. The pretext was that an airport destination served such good hamburgers that it was worth a $100 flight to get there. The trip would then be so exhilarating that the pilot could serve up a bowl of pre-moistened dog chow and the passenger wouldn’t even notice.

We don’t hear the term “$100 hamburger” bandied about anymore, because these days it’s more like a $1000 hamburger. And flying has become so unspectacular that there really better be a $100 hamburger at the end of the runway.

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With each new generation of expanding color displays, landscape is squeezed from the pilot’s field of vision until the windscreen has become a sliver. It is 2015 and VOR navigation systems are being decommissioned. Not because pilots can navigate by dead reckoning. The FAA is retiring VORs because today’s pilots fly by following GPS instructions. You can get the same thrill lining up ILS needles in a flight simulator.

What would Jonathan Livingston Seagull say about Cirrus’s modern glass cockpits? Pilots who train in new aircraft not only have never heard the wind, but also have never seen a tumbling heading indicator or airspeed stuck at 0.

Now flying is not about getting from Point A to Point B nor the wind in the wires. General aviation in modern lightcraft is about raising a high-altitude middle finger to those who can’t afford it.

No wonder people think flying is boring. It is.

See Also:
Richard Bach, I’ve Never Heard the Wind, Flying Magazine, Feb 1960.

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Equality of Information Access

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I don’t understand the paywall business model for journalism. There is zero marginal cost associated with content distribution. Can’t the Wall Street Journal just serve up some porn ads instead of charging for content?

I believe that content creators should be properly compensated for their work. But I don’t like it when that compensation comes from my pocket.

This brings me to horrible moral conflict because I believe in equal access to information regardless of ability to pay. Or willingness to pay, as the case may be.

Here is a browser extension that bypasses paywalls for sites that charge for content. Now readers can decide for themselves whether they want to pay for information.

If you use this tool and find any sites still blocked by paywall, please let me know and I will broadcast a message to the tool’s anonymous creator.

Backup Plans are for Losers

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Boy, I’m sure glad I didn’t have a backup plan! –The Founders of the 90% of startups that fail

In brighter news, you minimized student loan debt by dropping out of school!