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Matt Lieber

Co-Founder, Heap's Ice Cream · 1 appearance on the record.

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

founderexecutiveoperator@mlieber ↗gimletmedia.com ↗

Lieber co-founded narrative podcast company Gimlet Media with Alex Blumberg in 2014 and served as its president through its acquisition by Spotify in 2019. After departing Spotify in 2022, he co-founded Brooklyn-based Heap's Ice Cream alongside chef Sarah Sanneh.

8statements → 2claims → 1claims resolved → 3.75/5average certainty → 2/5average debate potential → 4.4/5argument clarity · the sources → 1said about them ↓

1 supported 0 partly supported 0 contradicted 1 not checkable as stated how the 2 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

1 prediction · 1 assertion · 2 opinions · 4 disclosures · every statement was checked. The prediction and assertion are the 2 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, and 1 names 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 Matt 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
Gimlet Media generated revenue from inception through podcast ad sales
“Unlike, I think, most sort of Silicon Valley startups that have started in the last year or two, we had revenue from the very beginning, because we were selling advertisements on our show.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 6:56 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet

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

4.4 / 5 directness 4.7 · coherence 4.7 · precision 4.1 · compression 3.9

answered every one of 16 assessed questions directly

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? →

251 words/min while actually speaking · 27.6 um and uh per 1k words

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 3,261 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 1 rated episode:

host pushback ▾ 3/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 2/10
setup questions received 40%

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

Disclosure
VCs told Gimlet Media to ignore revenue and focus on user growth
“We had conversations with some VCs who we would begin to talk about revenue, and they're like, we don't want to hear it. We're not actually interested in that. We want to see just a really steep user growth curve, and like, we know that if you get a large audi…”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 7:13 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Opinion
Podcasting is a hot sector with very few investable companies
“The round went very well, and there was a lot of interest in our company because podcasting is kind of a hot space, but there aren't A lot of investable companies in this space.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 15:12 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Opinion
Founders should not emulate Steve Jobs' monomaniacal management behaviors
“He is a revolutionary, and he's a visionary, and he created incredible products that changed the world, but he, I don't think people loved working for him, and I think that he also has, like, monomaniacal behaviors that I would not want to adopt, because that'…”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 21:01 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Assertion Supported
Gimlet Media generated revenue from inception through podcast ad sales
“Unlike, I think, most sort of Silicon Valley startups that have started in the last year or two, we had revenue from the very beginning, because we were selling advertisements on our show.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 6:56 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Disclosure
Gimlet co-founders retained over 50% voting control after Series A
“It was really important to Alex and I that we both still controlled our own destiny, that we controlled more than 50% of the company, and we wanted to have a small board.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 15:03 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Advertising and subscriptions hold Gimlet's greatest monetization potential
“I think the advertising business, and then down the road the subscription business has the biggest potential, together.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 23:10 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Disclosure
Lieber: 80% of Gimlet Media's listening happens on mobile
“We're totally mobile media company. It's like 80% of our listening happens on mobile devices.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 16:57 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet
Disclosure
Lieber: Mystery Show leads Gimlet Media in downloads per episode
“If you look at, like, downloads per episode, Mystery Show is is the biggest, and, but Reply All and Startup are not far behind.”
Matt Lieber Jan 15, 2016 ▶ 19:56 20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet

The other half of the tape: Matt Lieber's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 1 time in 1 episode on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 1

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
0011112016episodesmentions
0112016episodes it came up in
000.50.5112016episodesmentions per episode
2016 1 mention in 1 episode

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20 VC FF 030: Gimlet Media's Matt Lieber on The Future of Podcasting and Life @ Gimlet Jan 15, 2016 15m
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