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Jonathan Abrams

General Partner, 8-Bit Capital · 2 appearances on the record.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

founderinvestorengineerexecutive@abrams ↗LinkedIn ↗jabrams.com ↗Wikipedia ↗

Jonathan Abrams is an entrepreneur and investor who founded social networking pioneer Friendster and news discovery platform Nuzzel. He is a General Partner at 8-Bit Capital and a Managing Partner at Founders Den.

33statements → 9claims → 6claims resolved → 83%fully supported → 3.7/5average certainty → 2.7/5average debate potential → 4.3/5argument clarity · the sources → 16said about them ↓

5 supported 0 partly supported 1 contradicted 3 not checkable as stated how the 9 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

2 predictions · 7 assertions · 16 opinions · 6 insights · 2 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 9 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 6 are resolved, and 3 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Jonathan argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Abrams: Friendster Went Through Six CEOs In Six Years
“And selling the company six years later, we went through six CEOs in six years. I was, you know, sort of routinely excluded from board decisions and the, our software was rewritten into worse software. The website barely worked for a couple of years and a lot …”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 23:28 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure

Their most notable contradicted claim

Assertion Contradicted
Abrams: Seed valuations peaked around 2015 and stopped rising
“In terms of valuations, I think those might have already hit their peak in 2000 and maybe 15. So the idea that the valuations have just, you know, as they went up throughout 2000, maybe 10 to 2015, I don't think they've continued to go up in 16 and 17.”
Jonathan Abrams Aug 25, 2017 ▶ 12:01 20VC: Nuzzel's Jonathan Abrams on Why The Top VCs Do Not Have A PlayBook For Startup Success, Why Most Boards Are Not Successful & Why He Is Bored Of Hearing "I Fell Into VC"

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
50% certainty 3
100% certainty 4
100% certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

Argument clarity: do they answer the question? how? →

4.3 / 5 directness 4.2 · coherence 4.6 · precision 4.5 · compression 3.8

redirected or did not address 1 of 11 assessed questions (9%). Watch them ▸

This is a score against a rubric. It is not a rank. Every host question → answer exchange is scored with names hidden on directness, coherence, precision and compression, 1–5 each, on meaning alone: disfluencies are ignored, and only raw unedited episodes count. This is the score that measures thought. Every scored exchange, scores shown → · The rubric and its checks →

How they sound: speaking style how? →

270 words/min while actually speaking · 20.3 um and uh per 1k words

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 4,430 words across 1 episode of raw-level tape, transcribed verbatim with every um and uh kept, each one attributed only where the alignment onto our timed stream is unambiguous. These are measurements of speaking style. We do not rank them: across this corpus, fluency and argument quality are nearly uncorrelated (ρ≈0.2), and smooth talking does not signal clear thinking. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 2 rated episodes:

host pushback ▾ 3.5/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 3.5/10
setup questions received 60%

Everything Jonathan Abrams said on 20VC that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Opinion
Abrams: Machine Learning Software Fails At News Curation Compared To Social
“Not with machine learning software that doesn't really work, but really Harnessing the power of social to help people find the right stuff.”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 26:25 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Disclosure
Abrams: Higher-priced angel investments performed better than cheaper deals
“In my case, the angel investments that I've made that were a little high in price have been ones that I was glad that I've made. And when I see ones that are sort of below market or really on the cheaper side, usually they're not the deals I want to do.”
Jonathan Abrams Aug 25, 2017 ▶ 10:16 20VC: Nuzzel's Jonathan Abrams on Why The Top VCs Do Not Have A PlayBook For Startup Success, Why Most Boards Are Not Successful & Why He Is Bored Of Hearing "I Fell Into VC"
Opinion
Abrams: Netscape Missed Webmail And Messaging Due To Lack Of Focus
“Netscape had a lot of opportunities it didn't actually successfully achieve, because if you think about so many of the things that came after, you think, why didn't, you know, why wasn't Netscape the company that did web mail and instant messaging and just so …”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 4:27 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Insight
Abrams: Startups Lower Their Odds Of Success By Tackling Multiple Priorities
“If you're working on, on something at a startup, the likelihood of being successful is so low. And if you're working on three things instead of one, Then it's even worse.”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 5:06 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Insight
Abrams: Daily Retention Is A Far Better Signal Than User Opinions
“Asking people what they think is a lot less useful than seeing what they're actually doing, and if they're coming back and using it every day, I think that's a really strong sign”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 7:33 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Insight
Abrams: Mobile App Store Distribution Alone Makes User Growth Significantly Harder
“I think just being an iOS app, you know, or iOS and Android app alone, it's harder to grow. There's been some exceptions, but it's tough.”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 10:20 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Disclosure
Abrams: Nuzzel Fundraises Specifically From Investors Who Actively Use The Product
“In terms of the fundraising strategy for Nuzzle, we've consistently gone after investors who are using our product a lot”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 7:40 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Opinion
Abrams: Social Bookmarking Startup Hotlinks Was Launched Too Early
“Hotlinks was sort of a social bookmarking company way too early, trying to help people share cool links with each other.”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 3:15 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure
Assertion Supported
Abrams: News Curation App Nuzzel Operates With A Six-Person Team
“Nuzzle is actually a six-person company. We are very lean.”
Jonathan Abrams Apr 15, 2016 ▶ 25:02 20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure

The other half of the tape: Jonathan Abrams's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 16 times in 10 episodes on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 14Matt Ocko 1Beezer Clarkson 1

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
00438620162017episodesmentions
03620162017episodes it came up in
00132620162017episodesmentions per episode
2017 8 mentions in 4 episodes 2 per episode
2016 8 mentions in 6 episodes 1 per episode

Appearances (2)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: Nuzzel's Jonathan Abrams on Why The Top VCs Do Not Have A PlayBook For Startup Succe Aug 25, 2017 19m
20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure Apr 15, 2016 19m
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