Same person, same subject, opposite position, months or years apart. Both tapes, side by side. Reversed means no acknowledgement of the change was found; revised means the speaker acknowledged it or new facts explain it. The note on each pair says which.
These are AI-matched pairs of public statements. The match can be wrong; the tapes are the record, and both play side by side so you can read the distance yourself. Report anything off from either claim page. full disclaimer →
Stebbings praised Snapchat's high conversion rates in 2017 but shifted his focus to other platforms by 2022 as its popularity for business declined.
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Harry Stebbings Reports 64% Open Rate on Snapchat Versus 36% Newsletter Rate
“I think for me in particular, the conversion is better than any other channel that I've seen. So if you compare it to like my newsletter, whereby I will have, say, a I think currently it's about a 36% open rate. My Snapchat is currently a 64% open rate”
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Disclosure
20VC Abandoned 100,000 Snapchat Followers Due to Declining Engagement
“I invested heavily in Snapchat stories when they were big for business. We gained a 100,000 plus fans there, but with the reducing popularity of the platform for business, The audience declined, and it was no longer worth the investment for me over other platf…”
In 2023, Lemkin called VCs "losers" for buying Shopify stock; by 2026, he stated he was "betting on" Shopify himself.
Opinion
Lemkin: VCs tweeting about buying public Shopify shares are "losers"
“And so when I see VCs on Twitter talking about how they're looking at buying some shares of Shopify, honestly, I think they're losers.”
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Opinion
Lemkin: Growth momentum is software's only defense in the AI age
“I'm betting on momentum is the only thing that's going to save us. Save us in the age of AI. So I'm betting on overpriced Palantir, Cloudflare, which is re-accelerating and benefiting from AI, and Shopify which is gaining market share.”
Stebbings explicitly acknowledges his changed stance on Andreessen Horowitz, noting he is a big bull on the firm now where he was not before.
Disclosure
Stebbings: Hot seed rounds raised by executive founders consistently underperformed
“I looked at the seeds, and I looked at those that haven't really worked, and all of those that haven't really worked have often been head of product at Twitter, head of product at Twitch, head of product at amazing company, the hottest of hot seed rounds with …”
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Opinion
Stebbings: Bullish on Andreessen Horowitz as partner quality matches boutique firms
“They are as good as the partners at smaller firms with three to five partners, and they have been fantastic. Like, I am a Big bull on Andreessen now where I was not before.”
Stebbings previously called Series A the best risk-to-reward entry point, but later declared it the worst place to invest due to high valuations.
Opinion
Series A Is Currently the Best Risk-Reward Entry Point in Venture
“I think Series A is actually the best risk to reward insertion point in venture stay.”
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Opinion
Series A is the worst stage due to 200x ARR valuations
“I think Series A is the worst place to be today, and my partners always hate me for this, because all Series A founders are like, great, we won't go and see them but it's the worst place to be. You have, like, one to three million in revenue, and you're at 200…”
Lemkin's shift from predicting a wave of tech IPOs to a more pessimistic outlook reflects an evolving market forecast based on two years of new economic data.
Prediction Didn’t hold up
Lemkin predicts 26 tech companies will IPO in H2 2024
“And I may have the timing all wrong. I'm too optimistic, but I think there's 26 of them, which is one a week. I think there's 26 good companies at 200 that can IPO in 26 weeks in the back average.”
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Prediction Not checkable as stated
Jason Lemkin: The tech IPO market will not reopen next year
“I don't think we're going to see it. I don't think we earned it this year. I don't think we have so many. You're better than Figma. You're better than Netscope. It's a high bar.”
Lemkin initially expressed skepticism that AI would drive growth, but later predicted "jaw-dropping" growth numbers fueled by enterprise AI adoption.
Opinion
Lemkin: Skeptical that AI will drive top-line revenue growth for SaaS
“I think AI can create some efficiency, but growth? Growth? Let's see if it can create growth. I'm skeptical it can create growth, right?”
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Prediction Held up
Lemkin: Fortune 500 will actively replace human employees with AI by year-end
“By the end of this year, that, that train is going to be so far out of the station that, that these growth numbers will be jaw dropping because we will decide enterprises will the fortune 500 or global 2000 will decide we are replacing humans with AI.”
In 2024, Lemkin saw no evidence of AI boosting incumbent revenue, but by 2026 he observed AI had returned Box to double-digit growth.
Assertion Supported
Lemkin: SaaS incumbents see no revenue boost from AI features yet
“So far the evidence is no. So far it says the incumbents are gonna, they're gonna do great things with AI, great, great things. The product's gonna be much better, but it's not clear they're gonna get any revenue boost from it. No one's saying that none of the…”
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Assertion Supported
Lemkin: AI features helped Box return to double-digit growth
“It has led to a boost at Box. It hasn't turned Box into a hundred percent grower. It's gotten it back to double digit growths.”
Srinivas previously predicted advertising would be Perplexity's highly profitable revenue engine, but later argued ads fundamentally corrupt user trust in conversational search products.
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Srinivas: Advertising will be Perplexity's primary revenue engine if executed well
“I would predict it'll be advertising. If we crack it, yes, it'll be advertising. If we don't crack it, if we are not, if we don't, if we haven't grown to that level in user basin, or if we grew and didn't figure out how to advertise really well, I think it'll …”
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Insight
Advertising in conversational search inherently corrupts user trust
“And so the chat interface doesn't capture that user intent, that user behavior right now, which is why it was never a great fit for advertising. And it also fundamentally corrupts the trust that people have when they go into a product and they want the accurat…”
Stebbings avoided Nvidia in late 2023 due to its high valuation, but bought heavily in early 2025 following a 16 percent price drop.
Opinion
Stebbings: AI Upside Is Already Priced Into Microsoft and Nvidia
“And my hard thing is like, as a general capital allocator and capitalist who wants to make money, I think the upside is already priced into Microsoft or Nvidia, where I'm not looking at them like, oh, there's a buying opportunity now because they're so richly …”
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Disclosure
Harry Stebbings bought Nvidia stock following post-DeepSeek market drop
“I just bought a shitload of NVIDIA, because they dropped 16% on the thesis that the increasing efficiency means that obviously we wouldn't need as much NVIDIA chips.”
Lemkin initially predicted OpenAI's hardware device would be a huge success, but later revised his view to say it is likely "on the bubble" due to changing circumstances.
Prediction Didn’t hold up
Lemkin: OpenAI's hardware device will launch within a year for $20
“This is going to be huge. It will launch in a year. It will be massively subsidized. So it'll be 20 bucks for this device. Okay. They will figure out the form factor. I don't know what the right combination is, whether it's embedded in your ear, like the baris…”
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Prediction Open · timeframe Jul 2029
Lemkin: OpenAI will likely cancel or pause its hardware project
“Listen, if I had to breathe the tea leaves, hardware is probably on the bubble. This was one of Sam's initiatives that made sense when everything was working and OpenAI had an unassailable lead over, over its competitors, right? Now everything's, you know, we …”
In 2021, Verna stated new growth teams must initially rely on intuition; by 2022, she called making growth teams rely on intuition a mistake.
Insight
Elena Verna: New growth teams must rely on intuition before data
“Any new growth team has to initially rely on intuition or just overall feeling within the company of what needs to be worked on because you don't have data at the beginning.”
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Insight
Verna: Hiring a growth team before establishing data infrastructure is a mistake
“Not having data team ready for growth team. So hiring growth teaming before you have data analysts or data literacy in your company before you're data informed or hiring growth and not attaching any data analysts into their for you. Because if you do that, wha…”
Hulme initially expressed reluctance to invest in OpenAI, but later called it a reasonable investment, citing its $12 billion run rate and downside protection.
Opinion
Hulme: GV would not invest in OpenAI at a $90B valuation
“I would struggle To make that investment today. No.”
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Opinion
Hulme: OpenAI is a good investment at a $12 billion run rate
“I it doesn't mean I think it's the best gen AI investment, but if I was sitting independently, do I think it's a good investment now when your downside is somewhat protected and they're at a twelve billion dollar run rate? Let's say it's a 20 times forward mul…”
Lemkin's assessment of MongoDB's performance shifted from signs of recovery to worsening conditions over ten months, reflecting changing market realities and new earnings reports.
Assertion Contradicted
Lemkin: Atlassian and MongoDB are bouncing off business bottoms
“When I look at what Atlassian is saying, like, they're bouncing off the bottom, and Mongo's bouncing off the bottom, and other folks are seeing things improve.”
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Assertion Supported
Lemkin: Demand environment is worsening for Salesforce, MongoDB, and Workday
“Yamini got on the last call a couple of weeks ago and said, yeah, we saw a little bounce at the end of the year and HubSpot had a great quarter, but it's not any easier. She said, it's not one lick easier right now. So HubSpot, not any easier Mongo worse. Sale…”
In 2025, O'Driscoll claimed Anthropic had access to "infinite" compute, but in 2026 he stated the company was "light on compute."
Opinion
O'Driscoll: OpenAI and Anthropic No Longer Need Microsoft or Amazon
“In both these cases, the small company won. They got the money, they got the critical mass, they got the credibility, and now they've pulled away. And neither on top of now open AI needs Microsoft or Amazon at this point. They don't need them for money. They d…”
Rory O’Driscoll Sep 18, 2025 ▶ 49:41 Opendoor CEO, Kaz Nejatian: OpenAI and Oracle, How Can Either Afford to Do This · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
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Opinion
O'Driscoll: OpenAI has compute but flawed models; Anthropic lacks compute
“OpenAI got one job right, they have enough compute, and they got the model wrong, so that's why they're in trouble. And Entropic did it the exact opposite way, right? They got the model perfect. In fact, they may have over-succeeded, and as a result of that, t…”
Rory O’Driscoll Apr 30, 2026 ▶ 19:49 Anthropic Raises $45B but Falls Short on Compute & Thoma Bravo Hand Back Medallia Keys to Creditors · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Traynor reversed his willingness to bet on OpenAI's valuation, though he consistently maintained his prediction that it would surpass $90 billion.
Prediction Held up
Traynor predicts OpenAI valuation will surpass $90 billion
“I think on the whole, I'd make the bet that they'll pass 90 in value.”
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Prediction Held up
Des Traynor: OpenAI valuation will pass $90B, but Amazon poses risks
“I don't think I would, and the reason, whilst I think they'll pass 90, the areas I'd be wary of is Amazon.”
