The Exchanges

Q Not at all. I've been very looking forward to this one, but I do want to start with a little bit on you. So obviously, hugely successful actor, but how did you make your way into the world of tech and really come to found sound most recently?

A Oh boy, what a journey. So I'd have to probably start, I went to the University of Iowa School of Engineering. I was studying biochemical engineering, but that was Really my first introduction to the power of a computer, and I think it was like, 1998, and I was learning how to program in Fortran, which was pretty bizarre looking back on it now, but you know, it is a base language, so I think that gave me an introduction to something that sort of piqued my curiosity. That being said, I'd always wanted to be an actor, so I ended up pursuing that, and then I started a production company when I was about 25 years old, and we were producing a bunch of reality television shows, Punk'd, and Beauty and the Geek, and a bunch of other things, and films, and whatnot. And at a certain point, I saw buffering speeds online just getting faster and faster. Not to mention, like, when my first film came out that I was starring in Dude Where's My Car, I was in AOL chat rooms starting, like, dude suite arguments as, like, a marketing technique. So I feel like I was, like, one of the first early social media advertisers as a result of that. I would start a dude suite argument or something of that nature, and then I would go to another chat room and then start it again, and then I'd go to another chat room and start it again, and then get the audience to drive continuation on that argument in order …

AI assessment note: “I went to the University of Iowa School of Engineering. I was studying biochemical engineering”

Q How did that then transition to the world of investing for you personally?

A Well, so at that point, I started reaching out and looking for companies that could help me quantify the distribution of content. And then I started looking for other companies that would help me accelerate the distribution of content. And then I started meeting some folks in that world. I met this woman, Sarah Ross, that was working for TechCrunch at the time. And this was one of the very first TechCrunch fifth That they ever did. It was before tech crunch disrupt or any of this stuff. And she was working for Mike Arrington and she'd worked at Yahoo before. And I ended up hiring her to run my digital division. I didn't even know what my digital division was going to be, but I thought she was really brilliant. She understood press and media and really knew the landscape of Silicon Valley and knew who mattered. And then I told her, I gave her a directive. I was like, introduce me to everyone that matters in the Valley. And so she did. I went up to TechCrunch.com and I started meeting folks and met Jason Calacanis and Kevin Rose and Mark Cuban and the list goes on and on and on of folks she introduced me to or set up a meeting with and started just learning and being the dumbest guy in the room and asking all the questions that seemed super simple at the time. And then I kept going up there and I kept going up there. And at a certain point, these folks were like, oh, wow, this gu…

AI assessment note: “And I then made my first investment. It was in a company called Optimizely”

Q How did that then transition to the world of investing for you personally?

A Well, so at that point, I started reaching out and looking for companies that could help me quantify the distribution of content. And then I started looking for other companies that would help me accelerate the distribution of content. And then I started meeting some folks in that world. I met this woman, Sarah Ross, that was working for TechCrunch at the time. And this was one of the very first TechCrunch fifth That they ever did. It was before tech crunch disrupt or any of this stuff. And she was working for Mike Arrington and she'd worked at Yahoo before. And I ended up hiring her to run my digital division. I didn't even know what my digital division was going to be, but I thought she was really brilliant. She understood press and media and really knew the landscape of Silicon Valley and knew who mattered. And then I told her, I gave her a directive. I was like, introduce me to everyone that matters in the Valley. And so she did. I went up to TechCrunch.com and I started meeting folks and met Jason Calacanis and Kevin Rose and Mark Cuban and the list goes on and on and on of folks she introduced me to or set up a meeting with and started just learning and being the dumbest guy in the room and asking all the questions that seemed super simple at the time. And then I kept going up there and I kept going up there. And at a certain point, these folks were like, oh, wow, this gu…

AI assessment note: “I then made my first investment. It was in a company called Optimizely”

Q up with a lot of intros for people. And someone asked you, I think it was Arianna Huffington asked you, how do you introduce Introduce yourself. And you said first and foremost as a father. And so I thought kind of blending this with the investing element, how did becoming a father impact your investing mentality and maybe impact the type of projects you really like to get engaged with?

A Well, here's what's somewhat interesting. You know, I believe that the people who are creating the future of the internet are perpetually young. They're coming out of college. They're seeing what's on the fringe of technology and capability. They're learning about it there. They have an ambition to build something that's different and new and useful to their peers. So when I first got into investing, I was like 25 years old. So I was about the same age as the entrepreneurs that were creating those things. So I felt like I understood what they were doing and why they were doing it and why they were using the tools that they were using. And then as I got older, you know, I was about 35, I had three teenage stepdaughters. That I was raising, and they were all teenagers, and they were the ones that were on the cutting edge of what was happening in technology, and so I was able to sort of mine their interests in order to determine what I would get involved with, and now as a father to a three-year-old and a five-year-old, it opened up an entirely new world of investigation around things that they may be interested in, and as an individual, you have your own scope and lens of the world. And I was listening to Sam Harris podcast the other day, and they were talking about, you can't see your own face. I mean, you really can't see your own head. So the only thing that occupies the space…

AI assessment note: “opened up an entirely new world of investigation around things that they may be interested in”

Q Spotify, one of the founders that you've met before, and he asked a kind of very specific question, but taking that strategy kind of one step forward, what were the ways that you did learn about new ventures, like some of the ones you just mentioned there in Modern Fertility and Carrot, and then how has that changed over time, and maybe with the institutionalization of your investing with sound?

A You know, when I first started, I did a lot of my sourcing based on just raw search and through networks of founders that I would meet or other investors that I would meet that would suggest companies that they thought were interesting or growing. Spotify is actually one of the, it wasn't even in the United States yet when we found it. What we realized was there was a cultural trend once again around people basically just stealing music. They just Wanted all the music available to them all the time and wanted to be able to access it and create these playlists. And that's what they were doing. And they were doing it illegally. And when we saw Spotify, we thought, well, look, wouldn't you pay for it if they make it so much more easy to download all of the music that you can possibly have? And you don't have to worry about, you know, downloading some malware or virus onto your computer or phone or the answer is yes. So once again, it was a cultural trend that led us to that company. I do a lot of sourcing through other people. Like when I meet people, I always ask them, can I see their home screen on their phone? Cause the apps that are on your home screen are likely the ones you're using the most. And I've actually like solicited my entire Twitter audience at times. Like, Hey, can you send me a snapshot of your home screen? I'd like to see what you're using, you know? And then I …

AI assessment note: “I did a lot of my sourcing based on just raw search and through networks”

Q Not at all. I've been very looking forward to this one, but I do want to start with a little bit on you. So obviously, hugely successful actor, but how did you make your way into the world of tech and really come to found sound most recently?

A Oh boy, what a journey. So I'd have to probably start, I went to the University of Iowa School of Engineering. I was studying biochemical engineering, but that was Really my first introduction to the power of a computer, and I think it was like, 1998, and I was learning how to program in Fortran, which was pretty bizarre looking back on it now, but you know, it is a base language, so I think that gave me an introduction to something that sort of piqued my curiosity. That being said, I'd always wanted to be an actor, so I ended up pursuing that, and then I started a production company when I was about 25 years old, and we were producing a bunch of reality television shows, Punk'd, and Beauty and the Geek, and a bunch of other things, and films, and whatnot. And at a certain point, I saw buffering speeds online just getting faster and faster. Not to mention, like, when my first film came out that I was starring in Dude Where's My Car, I was in AOL chat rooms starting, like, dude suite arguments as, like, a marketing technique. So I feel like I was, like, one of the first early social media advertisers as a result of that. I would start a dude suite argument or something of that nature, and then I would go to another chat room and then start it again, and then I'd go to another chat room and start it again, and then get the audience to drive continuation on that argument in order …

AI assessment note: “I always sort of had an interest in playing with these tools”

Q up with a lot of intros for people. And someone asked you, I think it was Arianna Huffington asked you, how do you introduce Introduce yourself. And you said first and foremost as a father. And so I thought kind of blending this with the investing element, how did becoming a father impact your investing mentality and maybe impact the type of projects you really like to get engaged with?

A Well, here's what's somewhat interesting. You know, I believe that the people who are creating the future of the internet are perpetually young. They're coming out of college. They're seeing what's on the fringe of technology and capability. They're learning about it there. They have an ambition to build something that's different and new and useful to their peers. So when I first got into investing, I was like 25 years old. So I was about the same age as the entrepreneurs that were creating those things. So I felt like I understood what they were doing and why they were doing it and why they were using the tools that they were using. And then as I got older, you know, I was about 35, I had three teenage stepdaughters. That I was raising, and they were all teenagers, and they were the ones that were on the cutting edge of what was happening in technology, and so I was able to sort of mine their interests in order to determine what I would get involved with, and now as a father to a three-year-old and a five-year-old, it opened up an entirely new world of investigation around things that they may be interested in, and as an individual, you have your own scope and lens of the world. And I was listening to Sam Harris podcast the other day, and they were talking about, you can't see your own face. I mean, you really can't see your own head. So the only thing that occupies the space…

AI assessment note: “opened up an entirely new world of investigation around things that they may be interested in”

Q terms of kind of that opening up and vulnerability. I do want to ask one other thing, because we mentioned some of the founders That you backed and the, especially the age around them. I spoke to Shahid Aluma, the man who introduced us, and he asked a specific question, which was on product. How do you build strong intuition about products in areas where you're maybe not too familiar?

A So I think it's hard to have strong intuitions about product in areas where you're not too familiar. I think you need to get familiar. And I'm a big advocate of eating the dog food, right? Like when I invested in Airbnb, I went and lived in Airbnbs for six months. Before I invest in a company, I usually demand to use the product unless it's a product that I can't fundamentally use. But for the most part, what's interesting is there was this appleification of UI and UX that took place for consumer products when Steve Jobs launched iOS that suddenly became this almost, it just unveiled an instinctual UI, UX and nomenclature of That people who couldn't use computers before suddenly felt like they understood they had a want or a desire. And in order to get to that want or desire, it was very clear on the screen what your next action needed to be. And that nomenclature led to what I would call the appleification of many consumer products, which were like the first successful applications that That came to the app ecosystem. And then enterprises started to get smart and go, wait a second, it's regular everyday consumers that are using our enterprise software. So what if we utilize that nomenclature, what will happen to our click through rates? What will happen to the efficiencies of our funnels? And then they started to use it, but fundamentally at the end of the day, being good at p…

AI assessment note: “I think you need to get familiar. And I'm a big advocate of eating the dog food”

Q that actually works out in terms of end returns for you, it can be sometimes more profitable to angel invest. My question being, what do you want to build with sound? In 20 years, what do you want to look back on and see? Is it a billion dollar fund? Is it the best series A fund? Is it, is it a legacy play? How do you think about that?

A You know, I've never been one. I mean, we have folks in our team that are, it's their job to track the returns. I've never been one to track returns. Personally, I just like working with the best and brightest people on the planet, solving really hard problems and making other people's lives better. My mantra is invest in a happier future. And if you want to know what the future looks like, build it. And I want to build a happier future, not just for myself, but for other people. And the way I can most effectively do that is work with the brightest people on the planet to solve the hardest problems. Problems on the planet that increase a true enduring happiness index for other people. And if that means investing more capital, that's what I'll do. If that means investing less capital, that's what I'll do. And so I don't have an end goal that's like relative to, I need a five billion dollar fund, or I need three partners or 10 partners. I don't think about it in that metric. I really think about it in the context of how do we build A happier, better future that I would be more excited about living in than the current state of humanity.

AI assessment note: “I don't have an end goal that's like relative to, I need a five billion”

Q Spotify, one of the founders that you've met before, and he asked a kind of very specific question, but taking that strategy kind of one step forward, what were the ways that you did learn about new ventures, like some of the ones you just mentioned there in Modern Fertility and Carrot, and then how has that changed over time, and maybe with the institutionalization of your investing with sound?

A You know, when I first started, I did a lot of my sourcing based on just raw search and through networks of founders that I would meet or other investors that I would meet that would suggest companies that they thought were interesting or growing. Spotify is actually one of the, it wasn't even in the United States yet when we found it. What we realized was there was a cultural trend once again around people basically just stealing music. They just Wanted all the music available to them all the time and wanted to be able to access it and create these playlists. And that's what they were doing. And they were doing it illegally. And when we saw Spotify, we thought, well, look, wouldn't you pay for it if they make it so much more easy to download all of the music that you can possibly have? And you don't have to worry about, you know, downloading some malware or virus onto your computer or phone or the answer is yes. So once again, it was a cultural trend that led us to that company. I do a lot of sourcing through other people. Like when I meet people, I always ask them, can I see their home screen on their phone? Cause the apps that are on your home screen are likely the ones you're using the most. And I've actually like solicited my entire Twitter audience at times. Like, Hey, can you send me a snapshot of your home screen? I'd like to see what you're using, you know? And then I …

AI assessment note: “I do a lot of sourcing through other people. Like when I meet people”

Q terms of kind of that opening up and vulnerability. I do want to ask one other thing, because we mentioned some of the founders That you backed and the, especially the age around them. I spoke to Shahid Aluma, the man who introduced us, and he asked a specific question, which was on product. How do you build strong intuition about products in areas where you're maybe not too familiar?

A So I think it's hard to have strong intuitions about product in areas where you're not too familiar. I think you need to get familiar. And I'm a big advocate of eating the dog food, right? Like when I invested in Airbnb, I went and lived in Airbnbs for six months. Before I invest in a company, I usually demand to use the product unless it's a product that I can't fundamentally use. But for the most part, what's interesting is there was this appleification of UI and UX that took place for consumer products when Steve Jobs launched iOS that suddenly became this almost, it just unveiled an instinctual UI, UX and nomenclature of That people who couldn't use computers before suddenly felt like they understood they had a want or a desire. And in order to get to that want or desire, it was very clear on the screen what your next action needed to be. And that nomenclature led to what I would call the appleification of many consumer products, which were like the first successful applications that That came to the app ecosystem. And then enterprises started to get smart and go, wait a second, it's regular everyday consumers that are using our enterprise software. So what if we utilize that nomenclature, what will happen to our click through rates? What will happen to the efficiencies of our funnels? And then they started to use it, but fundamentally at the end of the day, being good at p…

AI assessment note: “I think you need to get familiar. And I'm a big advocate of eating the dog food”

Q of them, they said about how you've gone deep with Spotify team members and with Both Daniel and Shaq in terms of products. I'm too interested. Where do you find yourself just most naturally drawn to spending time with your founders on? Is it on product? Is it on distribution? And why are you like, I want to help. I want to roll up my sleeves. Let me at it.

A So I think when people approach me or sound as investors, there are a couple of things that we bring to the table that are relatively obvious. One is Our ability to increase the distribution funnel. So early days, it was, I had some five million or ten million people on Twitter and it was like, can you send this tweet for us? This is going to be the most valuable thing you can do. And I would always say, yeah, I can do that, but that isn't a strategy that is going to hold up over time. You know, I remember Shaq and Daniel, different Shaq from Spotify came to me with this signup strategy. For Spotify, where I got my own web Spotify, web domain, and basically published to my fans. I'm getting you a free month of Spotify. It clicked on an Ashton Kutcher, Spotify domain, and then got them a promotion code, and then they were able to sign up. And it really was like a valuable signup flow strategy at the time. So that's one of the things I think people on, they see us and they go, wow, they're going to be able to do that. I just need that pop. And once I get that first corpus of consumers, I can really accelerate The volume of traffic on my platform. The next thing I think my partner, Gaius Siri, is one of the most important music managers in the world. He's been managing Madonna for I don't even know how long and has helped reinvent her branding. I don't even know how many times. Yo…

AI assessment note: “when people approach me or sound as investors, there are a couple of things”

Q the pick. And I think we both share this kind of passion for a very people-first approach. And you said when speaking to founders, Founder. Tell me the hardest thing you managed to persevere through. And I love that. I haven't actually heard it before asked from an investor. What I wanted to ask, and I hope it's not too personal. What's the hardest thing you feel you've persevered through?

A So I'll tell you the answer to that. But first I've now augmented this hardest thing you've persevered through question. I was speaking to a founder. I was doing a study with my team of what are the companies that the most brilliant people in the world all want to go work for. And so we started doing this online investigation as to what those companies were and created a list. And then I started to interview the founders to determine why people wanted to work at those companies. And one of the founders said, I was actually talking about their interview process and distance traveled by an individual. So if you're somebody that started with called a thousand bucks in your pocket, now you have a million bucks in your pocket. That's amazing. If you're somebody who started with A dime in your pocket, and now you have a 100,000 dollars. That's also as incredible, right? So if you look at where somebody came from and where they've gotten to, that is the more important metric than what's the hardest thing that you've persevered through. Although both are really deriving the same answer, right? Which is, are you going to have the grit to gut it out when things get tough? Because it's impossible to build a company without things getting tough. So my personal hardest thing. Oh, it's tough. You know, when I was young, I would probably say I have a twin brother who had a heart transplant wh…

AI assessment note: “So my personal hardest thing... I have a twin brother who had a heart transplant”

Q the pick. And I think we both share this kind of passion for a very people-first approach. And you said when speaking to founders, Founder. Tell me the hardest thing you managed to persevere through. And I love that. I haven't actually heard it before asked from an investor. What I wanted to ask, and I hope it's not too personal. What's the hardest thing you feel you've persevered through?

A So I'll tell you the answer to that. But first I've now augmented this hardest thing you've persevered through question. I was speaking to a founder. I was doing a study with my team of what are the companies that the most brilliant people in the world all want to go work for. And so we started doing this online investigation as to what those companies were and created a list. And then I started to interview the founders to determine why people wanted to work at those companies. And one of the founders said, I was actually talking about their interview process and distance traveled by an individual. So if you're somebody that started with called a thousand bucks in your pocket, now you have a million bucks in your pocket. That's amazing. If you're somebody who started with A dime in your pocket, and now you have a 100,000 dollars. That's also as incredible, right? So if you look at where somebody came from and where they've gotten to, that is the more important metric than what's the hardest thing that you've persevered through. Although both are really deriving the same answer, right? Which is, are you going to have the grit to gut it out when things get tough? Because it's impossible to build a company without things getting tough. So my personal hardest thing. Oh, it's tough. You know, when I was young, I would probably say I have a twin brother who had a heart transplant wh…

AI assessment note: “my personal hardest thing... I have a twin brother who had a heart transplant”

Q of them, they said about how you've gone deep with Spotify team members and with Both Daniel and Shaq in terms of products. I'm too interested. Where do you find yourself just most naturally drawn to spending time with your founders on? Is it on product? Is it on distribution? And why are you like, I want to help. I want to roll up my sleeves. Let me at it.

A So I think when people approach me or sound as investors, there are a couple of things that we bring to the table that are relatively obvious. One is Our ability to increase the distribution funnel. So early days, it was, I had some five million or ten million people on Twitter and it was like, can you send this tweet for us? This is going to be the most valuable thing you can do. And I would always say, yeah, I can do that, but that isn't a strategy that is going to hold up over time. You know, I remember Shaq and Daniel, different Shaq from Spotify came to me with this signup strategy. For Spotify, where I got my own web Spotify, web domain, and basically published to my fans. I'm getting you a free month of Spotify. It clicked on an Ashton Kutcher, Spotify domain, and then got them a promotion code, and then they were able to sign up. And it really was like a valuable signup flow strategy at the time. So that's one of the things I think people on, they see us and they go, wow, they're going to be able to do that. I just need that pop. And once I get that first corpus of consumers, I can really accelerate The volume of traffic on my platform. The next thing I think my partner, Gaius Siri, is one of the most important music managers in the world. He's been managing Madonna for I don't even know how long and has helped reinvent her branding. I don't even know how many times. Yo…

AI assessment note: “when people approach me or sound as investors, there are a couple of things”

Q that actually works out in terms of end returns for you, it can be sometimes more profitable to angel invest. My question being, what do you want to build with sound? In 20 years, what do you want to look back on and see? Is it a billion dollar fund? Is it the best series A fund? Is it, is it a legacy play? How do you think about that?

A You know, I've never been one. I mean, we have folks in our team that are, it's their job to track the returns. I've never been one to track returns. Personally, I just like working with the best and brightest people on the planet, solving really hard problems and making other people's lives better. My mantra is invest in a happier future. And if you want to know what the future looks like, build it. And I want to build a happier future, not just for myself, but for other people. And the way I can most effectively do that is work with the brightest people on the planet to solve the hardest problems. Problems on the planet that increase a true enduring happiness index for other people. And if that means investing more capital, that's what I'll do. If that means investing less capital, that's what I'll do. And so I don't have an end goal that's like relative to, I need a five billion dollar fund, or I need three partners or 10 partners. I don't think about it in that metric. I really think about it in the context of how do we build A happier, better future that I would be more excited about living in than the current state of humanity.

AI assessment note: “I don't have an end goal that's like relative to, I need a five billion dollar fund”