the only thing i'm checking in the first 30 minutes

A founder came on a call last week. Great background. Security at DocuSign, Coinbase, Uniswap. Built an options protocol on his own because he found it interesting. Somewhere in minute four he said he was retired and living in Japan and had built this for fun.

That was the end of the call for me. The product was fine. He’d just told me what happens when it gets hard.

Every startup gets very hard at some point. Not normal hard. Incredibly hard. Usually when competitors show up, or a hack happens, or the market turns. The founders who make it through that are the ones who take it personally. A 23 year old team I know got hacked for 23 million. Most people would file for bankruptcy and let a16z fund their next thing. These guys are paying it back. That’s going to kill them, and it’s also the only reason they’ll win.

So when I talk to you, I’m not evaluating your idea. I’m trying to figure out one thing. What is the problem you will not leave when it gets hard. If you’re already content, that’s the opposite of being a founder.

There’s an 18 year old I talked to who had built five products in a year. A Polymarket bot, a location app, a billboard marketplace, a tour guide. All clever. All dead. He said his problem was sales. It wasn’t. His problem was that every time he hit a wall he went and found a new wall. He never stayed long enough to learn where the first one was weak.

People ask why they’re playing guitar and say they want to be on stage in front of 10,000 people. Those people never become guitarists. Being on stage is a result of playing in a room alone for a million hours. You can’t maintain that from motivation. You can only do it if you can sit in the room for six hours a day for five years and not mind.

That’s the whole test. Not passion. Passion is a terrible word. Just boring stuff you happen to like doing. For me it’s talking to smart people. It took 15 years before anyone paid me for it.

If you have too many options you have a commitment problem, not an idea problem. Tactics don’t matter if you can’t sit in the room. Pick a lane and get married to it. What are you saying no to today? If the answer is nothing, you haven’t chosen.

the call where i said it best

A founder told me his cofounder would handle sales and he’d just do the tech. I asked him if he was ready to make 50 cold calls a week and hear no from 45 of them. Long pause. That pause is the answer. It’s not a skill gap. Anyone who can talk can sell. It’s whether you’ll do the uncomfortable thing for years.

do this this week

Write down the one problem you’d still be working on in 2031 if no one ever funded you. If you can’t write it, don’t raise money yet.

the line to remember

typically if you are already content and satisfied, that’s the opposite of being a founder.