Voice Input

Smartphones have had voice input for over a decade now and yet I don’t know that many people who use voice input regularly.

I would guess that maybe 10 to 20% of smartphone users are using voice input regularly. That’s a guess based on absolutely no data other than observing friends, family, and colleagues.

However, in the last week I have started to use voice input a lot more as a result of a friend encouraging me to do it.

Also in the last week, I’ve suggested to my mom that she start using voice input on her phone and I recommended that the Gotham Gal start using voice input to text and email.

So why now?

I don’t think it is because voice input has gotten appreciably better in the last couple of years. I think it is because typing on a phone is annoying and I want to do it less.

What I have observed in the last week using voice input is that the speech-to-text recognition is almost perfect.

But I have yet to figure out how to format things the way I like with voice. For example, I don’t really know how to create new paragraphs or punctuation. I don’t know how to embed links or attach files or photos.

I like to write in a list format. I don’t know how to do that with voice.

So I have a lot to learn about speaking to my phone instead of typing on it. But I think voice input is going to stick for me because I can feel the habit starting to form.

I’m excited to start engaging with my phone in a completely different way and learning new tricks.

And I expect I’ll probably write more blog posts this way.

I wrote this one entirely by speaking to my phone.

#mobile#voice interfaces

Coming Back Up For Air

The last time I posted was May 23rd, three weeks ago.

There was a time when I wrote every day. When I had not yet posted on any day, I felt like something was missing, like I had not yet had my cup of coffee.

Clearly, I have moved on from that need to write every day.

I don’t think I have ever gone three weeks without posting in the almost twenty years I’ve been writing this blog. The 20th anniversary of AVC will be on September 23rd of this year.

So why did I go three weeks without posting?

First and foremost, I did not feel like writing.

There are reasons for that.

The last week of May was completely nuts with a ton of stuff coming at me, some planned like a move out of our family office, some expected like a family medical situation, and some completely unexpected. That week was nuts.

And then on the evening of May 31st, the Gotham Gal and I got on an overnight flight to Paris and took a long-planned two-week vacation in a city we’ve been going to for decades to rest, relax, reconnect, and enjoy Paris and each other.

I’ve always tended to write on vacation but on this vacation, I read.

I may write about what I read this vacation. Or maybe I won’t. But it was not about business, tech, or anything that I tend to write about here. I wanted to get out of that zone and take on some new territory. And I am glad I did.

I worked a bit on vacation. I always do. The VC business is about supporting people, teams, and companies. You can’t really take a vacation from that.

But you can cut back a lot on that and I did.

I also slept a lot. In Eruope, if you try to stay on NYC time, you can go to bed late at night and get up when it is almost noon. There is something decadent about that. Like going back to high school and college when there wasn’t always something waiting for you when you woke up. I also took a lot of naps.

We also walked a lot, rode bikes around town, and spent time wandering around a city we know well and love to explore.

It was a great break, one I needed, and I am mostly happy to be heading home. I am writing this on the flight back.

I don’t know if I will jump right back into writing once or twice a week but I hope so.

I like writing. It brings things out of me that I did not know I had. I don’t know any other way to get those things out of my brain and out into the open.

So hopefully you will see some new stuff from me next week. What it will be I have no clue. But I have never planned out my writing. I like to let it flow out of me in the moment.

In closing, I’d like to address this tweet from Liad, a longtime AVC reader:

I understand that a daily dose of anything is a great thing. I love my daily flat white (cortado in the summer).

But these are not dark times we are in. And I am not writing less because of a lack of excitement for the times we are in.

The combination of computer science advances in machine learning, decentralized systems (blockchains), and new forms of interacting with compute (chat interfaces, heads up displays, voice, etc) presents the most potent cocktail of innovation I have ever seen. We are also seeing amazing scientific advances in areas like renewable/clean energy, health and wellness (biotech), robotics, and many other areas.

These are bright times. As bright as they come.

I will try to write more often and shine a bright light on these things.

#Blogging On The Road

The Freedom To Innovate

Back in 2014, USV got subpoenaed by the New York State Department of Financial Services (DFS) over our web3 investing activities. We hired a law firm, answered the subpoena, and that ultimately landed me in public testimony in front of the DFS staff.

In my testimony, I explained to the DFS staff that the difference between the US and China is that the US respects the freedom to innovate:

https://twitter.com/MrBUIDL/status/1395777069074685954?s=20

I was reminded of that moment yesterday when, in our quarterly call with our Limited Partners at USV, we were asked if the regulatory pressure on web3 in the US would result in us cutting back our web3 investing.

To which I responded:

When they want to shut it down, I say double down

The most powerful technologies send waves of fear through the establishment.

When you see that fear in their eyes, invest in the cause of that fear.

#VC & Technology#Web3

Fun Friday: Upside Pizza Club

This is the second post in a row where I am bringing back an old tradition.

This time it is Fun Friday, something I haven’t done in about five years. Like last week, the catalyst is our portfolio company Blackbird Labs, which I posted about a few months ago.

Blackbird is a platform for the restaurant industry to build loyalty/membership and related business models on.

Upside Pizza, which makes some of the best slices in NYC, launched the Upside Pizza Club this week using the Blackbird platform.

While a free slice every day for a year is nothing to sneeze at, I am most excited about the idea of the private concert series that Upside is running at its Nolita location over the next five weeks. Pizza, beer, and live music on a summer evening is my idea of a great time. I suspect it is yours too.

So if you live in NYC, you might want to join the Upside Pizza Club and get access to these concerts. And a free slice every day for the next year too.

You can join here for $199.

#Music#NYC

Funding Friday: Crowdfunding Restaurants Via Blackbird

It has been a long time since I did a Funding Friday here at AVC. I used to do them every Friday. We have funded a lot of bars, restaurants, coffee shops, and bakeries here over the years. Here are a few examples.

L’Appartement 4F

Land To Sea

There is a new wrinkle in crowdfunding restaurants, bars, coffee shops, bakeries, etc courtesy of USV portfolio company Blackbird, which I recently wrote about.

Blackbird is a loyalty/membership platform for the hospitality industry and it allows operators to issue memberships in-store (at check-in or check-out) or elsewhere. Although Blackbird did not imagine its platform being used for crowdfunding, operators have started to use it that way.

A great example is gertrude’s, a new restaurant in Prospect Heights Brooklyn which hopes to open next month.

gertrude’s is offering anyone the opportunity to become a member in advance of opening and there are three levels of membership:

The benefits of each membership ladder on top of each other and get better and better.

If you live in NYC, particularly if you live in our near Prospect Heights, you can help gertrude’s pay for the cost of opening the store and get your money back in the form of dining opportunities and long-term membership benefits.

This strikes me as a fantastic way for restaurant operators to defray (or ideally fully fund) the cost of opening a new venue. They give up less equity and spend less on raising it and their customers become VIPs and regulars and enjoy the benefits of that. A true win/win.

If you want to help gertrude’s get open, go here and become a member.

#crowdfunding#NYC

AI Art

There has been a lot of discussion about how AIs can make art and possibly replace artists, but I think the opposite is more likely to happen. Artists have been using AI to make art for a while now and the pace has picked up a lot in recent years.

I have always loved the work of Ian Cheng who makes computer-generated simulations that evolve using artificial intelligence. His works change infinitely. The first time I saw that, maybe ten years ago now, it made me rethink many ideas I had about art.

With the introduction of NFTs, artists can now make, release, and sell AI-generated art much more easily.

This week, our portfolio company Bright Moments has a big event in Tokyo, and one of the collections being shown features eleven top AI artists.

Though I could not make it to Tokyo this week, I was able to acquire a number of fantastic works in the collection.

My favorite is this piece by Claire Silver which is one of a series she calls paracosm.

Claire said this about the work:

This collection is a visualization of part of the artist’s paracosm. A text-to-image model was trained on some of their memories of that world and its inhabitants. 

I also quite like Helena Sarin‘s Kogei Kats. I picked up this one:

Helena’s website says that “Since 2021 her main creative energy is directed towards the #potteryGAN – making ceramics using her GAN/AI work as designed to 3D functional objects.” I really dig that.

I am very bullish on the creativity that AI will help artists bring to the world. It is a tool, like a paintbrush or a camera, or a kiln. And they will use that tool to make work that will bring great joy to our lives. They already are.

#art#machine learning

AIVC

I was approached by a company this week that has trained a large language model on all of the blog posts I have written here at AVC. There are 9059 of them for those that are counting. They wanted to offer me a chat bot called “ask Fred.”

I told them no thanks.

Let me explain.

I am totally fine with anyone using all of the content I have produced here at AVC to train their AI models. When I started AVC, I put a creative commons license on the content here. It has always been my view that anything I write here is in the public domain. You can repost it. You can do what you want with it. I just need attribution and a link back to the original post. That’s been my deal since the earliest days of AVC.

But an AI is not me. When you ask me something, you get my brain on the problem.

I have put a lot of what is in my brain onto the page here at AVC. But I have not put all of it.

I also don’t think an AI has my humanity, my ego, my empathy, my love, or my hate.

Maybe someday that will change. But we are not there yet. I think we are a long way from that.

So if you want to ask Fred something, you will still have to approach me.

#machine learning

The Annual Computer Science Fair

Ten years ago, a small group of folks in the K12 Computer Science Education community in NYC decided to put on a “mock job fair” for high school students who were taking computer science classes in the NYC public schools. That was the start of an annual day of engagement and learning for high schoolers considering a career in tech.

Yesterday we got the Fair back in person after three years of not doing it or doing it remotely. And it was so great to be there. This is a picture of all of the students making their way around the various booths learning about careers in tech.

Most everyone in the tech sector would like to have more diverse companies but there are no easy ways to accomplish that. Ultimately we need to get young people interested in careers in tech much earlier in their schooling and show them what those pathways look like.

This photo is of a team from Justworks doing exactly that.

I want to thank all of the sponsors who made this event possible:

And most of all I would like to thank Jennifer Klopp, Executive Director of Gotham Gives, who led the effort to get the Fair back in person this year and the team at the NYC Public School System, TEALS, and Tech:NYC who helped get the students and the tech companies there.

Yesterday was one of those days for me where a lot of the work I do across different areas of interest comes together in a single place and time. And those are great days for me.

#hacking education#hacking philanthropy

Etsy Lens

I am the Chair of the Etsy Board and have been an investor and board member at Etsy since the mid-2000s. It is a company that I love and get great joy from being part of. Last year Etsy quietly launched a feature that has completely changed the way I use Etsy. It is called Etsy Lens.

Etsy has millions of items for sale in its marketplace but shopping on Etsy is generally not intent-driven. It is idea-driven. Most people don’t go to Etsy and enter “pizza oven” into the search field. A more common search would be “red pillow for my couch.” As a result, searching on Etsy can be a bit of a “hunt and peck” experience, even as the search on Etsy has improved enormously in the last few years.

I was in a coffee shop in a hotel in NYC this morning and saw an antique typewriter that I thought was great. I opened my Etsy app and got the search field.

I clicked on the camera icon and my phone took a photo of the antique typewriter:

I clicked the blue checkmark and Etsy gave me these search results:

I have been using Etsy so much differently since finding out about Etsy Lens. I see things that I like when I am out and about, use the Etsy app to photograph them, search Etsy for similar things, favorite and curate them in my profile, and then buy the ones I love.

When I showed Etsy Lens to the Gotham Gal, she said “Take photos of things you like to find things you will love.” That sums up Etsy Lens so well for me.

#machine learning#marketplaces

What Is A Protocol And Why Does It Matter?

USV’s current thesis is:

Enabling trusted brands that broaden access to knowledge, capital, and well-being by leveraging networks, platforms, and protocols.

https://www.usv.com/#thesis-3-0

That last word is powerful but unfortunately less understood than the other words in that sentence.

Protocols have been around forever and are well-understood codes of conduct between people.

In computer science, protocols are the same thing, codes of conduct.

I like this definition of computer protocols from the Cloudflare website:

Standardized protocols are like a common language that computers can use, similar to how two people from different parts of the world may not understand each other’s native languages, but they can communicate using a shared third language. If one computer uses the Internet Protocol (IP) and a second computer does as well, they will be able to communicate — just as the United Nations relies on its 6 official languages to communicate amongst representatives from all over the globe. But if one computer uses IP and the other does not know this protocol, they will be unable to communicate.

https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/network-layer/what-is-a-protocol/

Protocols have been around for as long as computers, but we are at the beginning of a golden era of protocols that I like to call “web3.”

Until recently protocols were mostly free and unmonetized. We all use the HTTP protocol every day to access web pages. We all use the SMTP protocol every day to send email. But these protocols are free to use and don’t make money for any company or project or individual.

With the arrival of Bitcoin back in January 2009, we got a protocol that had monetization built in.

And since then, computer scientists have been creating web3 protocols for all sorts of things, most of which have a token that monetizes the protocol.

The monetization is not just about enriching the creator(s) of the protocol. It is also used to incentive usage of the protocol and operation of the protocol. In the Bitcoin protocol, that is operating mining computers that secure the Bitcoin network. In the Helium protocol, that is operating hotspots that connect the network. In the Ethereum protocol, that is staking to secure the network. In the Filecoin protocol, that is operating storage systems that provide decentralized storage.

It is the monetization that sustains these protocols and makes them reliable for others to use and build on them.

And with sustainable and reliable protocols, we will get a new architecture of services that will be much more interoperable.

Let’s look at mobile messaging. Most of my friends and family are on iPhones. I use an Android. Messaging does not work very well between iPhones and Android phones. Many people in the world use Whatsapp for mobile messaging. But Whatsapp doesn’t speak to iPhone’s messaging app. Nor does Signal. And Signal doesn’t talk to Whatsapp. And so on and so forth.

If every mobile messaging app was built on a monetizable protocol, that was sustainably reliable because operating it made people and companies money, and if developers were incentivized to build on it so they could also make money, we would have a different situation. All of our mobile messengers would interoperate with each other.

The same situation will play out in every computing sector over the next few decades as these web3 protocols are designed, built, shipped, and built on. We are in the early days of this golden era of protocols, but we already have many working extremely well in the decentralized infrastructure and decentralized finance sectors.

It upsets me that protocols are both so powerful and also so poorly understood by the media, the mainstream, and the government.

The White House recently put out a document that said “crypto assets currently do not offer widespread economic benefits” suggesting that web3 was not economically important to the US. While the economic benefits of web3 are not widespread today, they are quite powerful and will eventually impact every economy and every market. And pouring cold water on them will not make them go away. Thankfully.

#Web3