Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke publicly endorsed the claim.
Spiros Margaris
Marc Andreessen: We need to drastically increase the number of founders:
"It's shocking to me how few people actually give entrepreneurship a shot. The fate of the world over the next 1,500 years is riding on the people who actually want to give it a shot."
— @pmarca
Many users agree with Marc Andreessen and Tobi Lütke's call for more founders because it revives the spirit of building and entrepreneurship, while others object that most people lack resources or that enough founders already exist.
Absolutely correct: "The fate of the world depends on more people giving Entrepreneurship a shot"
Marc Andreessen: We need to drastically increase the number of founders:
"It's shocking to me how few people actually give entrepreneurship a shot. The fate of the world over the next 1,500 years is riding on the people who actually want to give it a shot."
— @pmarca
@davidsenra @pmarca Does the world need any truly mid founders? I’m down to give it a shot
Prophets were first entrepreneurial types. Fast forward to today: now kids don't want to become: - lawyers/doctors to please folks, - bankers/hedge fund managers/VCs, they want to be entrepreneurs (or creators). Combined with the proliferation of angel investors, VCs, PE funds: there's way too much funding chasing too few REAL entrepreneurs (i.e. the misfits, the rebels, the crazies who jump off a mountain and look for a parachute on way down). So many who would've been bankers, consultants, engineers etc. OR worked somewhere & then become founders later on prematurely rush towards startups for Profit, not driven by Principle let alone Purpose. These trend chasers are DOA. But for years, they anoint themself "founder" with little entrepreneurial traits required (Vision, Ambition, Execution, Persistence, Focus, Luck, Timing, Resilience, Patience). The end result? Startups fizzle. Way too many casualties. Way too much waste. We need to develop entrepreneurship and not merely churn out founders.
andreessen is talking his book, a16z benefits from more founders (more deal flow, more competition for their capital, more upside on portfolio dynamics), the "fate of the world" framing is investor PR
the data also doesn't support founder scarcity, the US has near-record startup formation, the bottleneck is durable success and capital efficiency rather than founder count, customer demand, distribution, regulatory clarity, and capital allocation are the actually scarce inputs
"give it a shot" is also -EV for most individuals, vast majority of founders lose money or earn less than they would have stayed employed, the survivorship-bias of "founders who changed the world" misses the 99% who didn't and are worse off for trying
@ashkan @davidsenra @pmarca How would you incentivize young people to stay with it and keep building and traversing in a very expensive economy for them? What’s been working best, any patterns?
@davidsenra @pmarca He ain't wrong, but by same token: we have way too many FOUNDERS and not enough ENTREPRENEURS.
@davidsenra @pmarca i don't understand how people do it without getting screwed. survivorship bias? maybe we see then that did the screwing 🤔
@tobi This is the way!
@ashkan @pmarca Explain
No problem- I have been here, with a whole cohort of others who WANT to be founders. We have built products, apps, API’s, dabbled in early AI- language and pattern recognition, automation, etc. (that was 2012- so early to the table, we didn’t even name it AI, we just called it automated text recognition)
The problem? Red tape, bureaucracy, runway and funding.
Have I given up? Nope. But the problem isn’t a lack of founders.
@davidsenra @pmarca In 2014 I came to fundamentally the exact opposite conclusion. That we would be corporate umbrella-ed due to our need for standardization. We like Starbucks and McDonald’s because we know how to act there.
@davidsenra @pmarca My plan for innovation at Grok, Inc: 1. The best IC engineers will be player-coaches for the next generation of engineering talent 2. The smartest new grads will build experiences that can get into the hands of millions if compelling creative enough
Enter Ask Apps (Grok growth)
@davidsenra @pmarca Not shocking at all; this is self-injury. Founders pitching to 100 visionless VCs barred by the groupthink of VCs not investing in founders actually giving it a shot
“O woe, why aren’t more people becoming founders?” feels a bit tone deaf
Calling that the great filter is lazy
@davidsenra @pmarca It's shocking to me how you assholes do not actually understand that most people are not rich enough to give entrepreneurship a shot.
@davidsenra @pmarca This is an interesting subject and observation. The follow on question is why is this the case? My guess is loss aversion and the general tendency towards risk aversion and fear of failure. Our view of risk and failure is at the heart of this matter IMO.
@davidsenra @pmarca I think it's crazy how risk averse the world has taught us to be. I guess it's partially to blame with the school system teaching us there's one way to do things, but I don't know. People are so opposed to taking risk even if in small areas of life now
@davidsenra @pmarca yes we need more builders. 100%.
@tobi True.
@davidsenra @pmarca A ton give it a shot, folks just don’t know how to filter the masses for quality. Everyone unknown and credential-less may as well not exist in this context. He’s really saying we need to increase the number of LEGIBLE founders. I’d say we need to increase the number of filters.
@megan_janas @davidsenra @pmarca Seriously. When I was living in LA most founders weren’t able to even meet VCs. They built products generated revenue but there was no capital allocation happening. Obviously SF is diffferent but I think it’s an allocation problem, not a founder problem.
Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke publicly endorsed the claim.
Spiros MargarisMarc Andreessen: We need to drastically increase the number of founders:
"It's shocking to me how few people actually give entrepreneurship a shot. The fate of the world over the next 1,500 years is riding on the people who actually want to give it a shot."
— @pmarca