Month: February 2024
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Self-Mythology & Authenticity
At the end of his recent interview with Patrick Collison, Dwarkesh asked … what really strikes out to me about you… is just how broadly you think of your job description. To the extent that you think of if science is slowing down and civilization is stagnating, that’ll be bad…
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Vertically Integrated and AI-First
Crossposted from the USV blog A new pattern is emerging that we are excited about at USV: entrepreneurs are upgrading physical industries with an AI-first and vertically integrated approach. Instead of selling software to industry incumbents, startups are increasingly deciding to use their technical know-how to compete head-on. We think…
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Nietzsche and Niceness
My friend Johnathan recently delivered an excellent lecture on Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals. He rightly noted how underrated Nietzsche’s ideas are today, showed how they could be usefully applied to the contemporary world, and offered some fair criticisms of the Nietzschean perspective. After I left the lecture, I…
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Synchronous Digital Experiences
Synchronous digital experiences feel underrated. As life continues to move increasingly online, they’re our best path to sustained opportunities for collective effervescence. The baseline argument for their power is the appeal of watching sports. I’m not a big sports fan, and even I feel the magic of watching the Super…
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Touro Synagogue / President’s Day
I visited the Touro Synagogue in Rhode Island this weekend. It’s the oldest synagogue in the United States, and Washington delivered his “Letter to the Hebrew Congregation” to the community in 1790. Reading his letter was a stirring reminder of the unique greatness of the American project. Happy President’s Day!…
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Underrated Internet Communities
What are the most underrated internet communities today? The rationalists and effective altruists were underrated in the 2000s and 2010s. I stumbled on lesswrong in high school (through reddit) and got a kick out of the quirky perspective over there. It felt interestingly orthogonal to debates I was exposed to…
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AI and Art Demo Night
I recently published a post on the USV blog about AI and art. I’ve been reflecting on how intimately connected technology and art are. The art we make is mediated by the tools at our disposal, and the visions technologists pursue are often downstream of the stories artists tell. Since…
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AI Aesthetics
(Crossposted from the USV blog) The word “technology” comes from the Greek word techne, which refers to an art or skill or practice. Plato writes a lot about the concept, often making reference to artists such as flute players as canonical examples of those engaged in a techne. Though today…
Matthew Mandel 