Aug 8, 2025 · 53m · more-or-less
#111 Figma, OpenAI, Canva: Meme Stock IPOs in Silicon Valley · More or Less Podcast
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In this episode of More or Less, the hosts dissect Figma's public debut, debate potential IPO timelines for OpenAI, and explore how artificial intelligence is transforming startup diligence, founder demographics, and the creator economy.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. The hosts hold 99.3% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 5.9 Guest teaching 4.3 Guest disagreement 4.0 The hosts pushing back 4.3
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 38:22 Brit rejects Sam's dismissal of older founders
Brit directly challenges Sam's claim that older engineers lose hunger, citing venture data showing superior returns for founders over 45 and refusing to yield when Sam calls the statistics BS.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 35:10 Jessica confronts Dave on repeat founder biasJessica forcefully halts Dave's reliance on backing multi-time founders by highlighting how that heuristic systematically recycles historical demographics and sidelines female entrepreneurs.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 26:13 Dave illustrates capital allocation disparitiesDave delivers concrete research on Big Tech cash flow deployment, educating the co-hosts on how Apple commits only 10% to AI capex while Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet commit 60-80%.
The host holds their own ▶ 13:23 Jessica defends public market demand for OpenAIWhen Sam insists OpenAI is kneecapped by its Microsoft deal and private funding constraints, Jessica counters with institutional incentives and retail meme-stock momentum to justify a public debut.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| More or Less Show Title Sequence and Theme Song | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | The show opens with casual banter covering summer venture capital deal flow and Brit and Dave's family trip to a sold-out Dude Perfect arena show in Nashville. Jessica guides the conversation playfully with low tension and light observations. | |
| Local Circus Visits and the Internet Flattening Talent | 5 | 4 | 2 | 2 | Jessica and Sam contrast a local Cape Cod circus with global YouTube sensations, leading Sam to articulate how the internet flattens geographic moats and drives creators toward extreme niches. The exchange is collaborative and analytical. | |
| Creator Longevity Dilemmas and Sam's Boston Whaler Yacht | 6 | 4 | 4 | 4 | The panel debates Figma's IPO performance, weighing Dave's preference for direct listings against Sam's view that retail momentum drove an irrational valuation. Jessica pushes back against Sam's lukewarm sentiment while the group considers Canva and broader SaaS prospects. | |
| Speculating on OpenAI IPO Timelines and Anthropic Pressures | 7 | 5 | 5 | 6 | Jessica advances a contrarian hot take that OpenAI will go public sooner than anticipated. Sam vigorously counters that Microsoft's partnership and massive capital demands constrain them, prompting Jessica to defend her timeline using Satya Nadella's incentives and explosive user metrics. | |
| Game Show Incentives for AI Engineer Retention | 6 | 4 | 4 | 5 | Sam pitches a comedic game show retention scheme for AI engineers, which Jessica humorously cuts short to redirect toward genuine angst in Silicon Valley. Sam frames tech anxiety around the insecurity of being one trade away from obsolescence. | |
| Infrastructure Capex Overbuilding and Application Layer Risks | 8 | 6 | 3 | 3 | Dave provides an informed historical breakdown comparing AI capex to the dot-com fiber overbuild, citing cash allocations across Big Tech where Apple allocates only 10% compared to 60-80% at peers. The hosts engage with substantive venture analysis. | |
| The Collapse of Traditional Seed Stage Diligence | 7 | 6 | 5 | 6 | Sam explains how generative AI and commoditized code destroy traditional seed-stage diligence signals. When Dave responds that he prefers backing proven repeat founders, Jessica immediately challenges the exclusionary demographic implications of that bias. | |
| Feudalism Two Point Zero and Founder Age Demographics | 7 | 6 | 7 | 7 | Sam argues that older engineers lose hunger after acquiring wealth, triggering sharp, data-backed pushback from Brit regarding founder age performance. When Sam dismisses her data as manufacturing sector noise, Brit firmly stands her ground on tech venture statistics. | |
| Backing Parents Versus Twenty-Something Hustle Culture | 7 | 5 | 7 | 6 | Sam provokes the panel by claiming backing parents of young children is generally bad venture practice, inciting spirited rebuttal from Dave and Brit. Jessica steps in to defuse an emerging debate over early Facebook work schedules before offering a balanced synthesis. | |
| Deep Work Days, Drunk Chatbots, and Grok in Tesla | 5 | 3 | 4 | 4 | Sam discusses scheduling deep work days to keep pace with younger founders, which segues into satirical banter regarding late-night drunk interactions with conversational LLMs and Brit testing Grok inside her Tesla. | |
| Brit's Recommendation: Invitan and Paid Wedding Attendance | 4 | 3 | 2 | 3 | Brit highlights Invitan, an app allowing users to pay to attend strangers' weddings, and recommends the Netflix series The Hunting Wives. The panel banters about vintage HBO programming before wrapping the episode. |
Statements from this episode (27)
Brit Morin: Dude Perfect Is a Top 10 YouTube Channel Globally
“And I just continue to remain fascinated by how a YouTube brand like Dude Perfect, which is one of the top 10 biggest channels globally, can command the adoration and love of young boys in like such a way where they rank it higher than anything they've ever do…”
Jessica Lessin: The internet has killed local performance arts
“And both Sam and I are separately sitting there thinking the internet has killed this art because, which we realized later when we brought up the point, because basically these people who, you know, in their world would have been like the juggler, the town ren…”
Sam Lessin: The internet forces people to niche extremes for community
“And like, you know, I think with the follow on of the internet, what happens with that is it forces everyone towards the fringe of weirder and weirder stuff to right size communities. They can be the best of blank and whatever. And so you end up with like thes…”
Sam Lessin: Figma's IPO does not mean SaaS is back
“I've seen people on the internet trying to claim that SaaS is back, which is just the wrong take.”
Sam Lessin: Stripe has no interest in going public
“I would go super under on Stripe going out. Those guys are too smart. They have a totally different plan. They have no interest in the public market. And there's no point to them in going public. There's plenty of liquidity in their currency.”
Dave Morin: Figma's IPO valuation is driven entirely by AI hype
“The only explanation for this is that this is absolutely based on excess demand for AI plays. Like, it's like, that's the only explanation for the price.”
Jessica Lessin: Satya Nadella will approve an OpenAI IPO at eleventh hour
“Satya will not want his investment that he has also invested a shit ton of infrastructure and supporting to go to zero. And he doesn't have to agree until the 11th hour, but that's like, he'll agree at the 11th hour.”
Jessica Lessin: OpenAI has a 90% chance of going public by 2027
“I will say I'm 40% 2026, but like 90% 2027. So I think there is a re reasonable chance next year, and like, I just think they're not gonna go a Stripe, a SpaceX, and all that kind of stuff. Like, they're just not. The body language is totally different.”
Jessica Lessin: Anthropic will probably IPO before OpenAI
“I think Anthropic probably does it before OpenAI because they need it more, right? So if you put the need before, although I think Google and Amazon will continue to fund them.”
Lessin: Behind Silicon Valley's exuberance lies deep private anxiety over AI
“There's a lot of exuberance. There's a lot of excitement. People are wealthy. They're excited about their startups. They're excited about the hype cycle. They're generally excited about the technology, but there's also this angst that I don't know. Everyone I …”
Sam Lessin: AI disruption makes Silicon Valley feel one move from irrelevance
“And I think that's actually what's going on in the Valley right now is like, things are moving so quickly. AI is so disruptive. There's all this stuff going on. You know, there's super empowered individuals coming out. It's just crazy. And so I think everyone …”
Dave Morin: Tech is over its skis on AI infrastructure investments
“I think that we are really far over our skis in terms of infrastructure investments.”
Dave Morin: Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet put 60-80% of cash into AI; Apple 10%
“Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet are all in the 60 to 80% range right now. Apple is at 10%.”
Brit Morin: Investors will lose money as AI apps are rapidly copied
“I think that we're going to start seeing more and more of these AI businesses get replicated and with like tweaks to business model or pricing or some new sort of virality go to market implementation. Like a lot of investors are going to lose money on the seco…”
Sam Lessin: AI Has Destroyed Seed-Stage Startup Diligence
“That's blown out of the water by AI because all of a sudden, like everything looks the same. Like not to mention the fact that pitches are customized at scale and the decks are all crap. The apps themselves, the V ones are like too similar. So we don't know ho…”
Dave Morin: Investing Exclusively in Repeat Founders to Counter AI Diligence
“My answer to this has been, I'm going to work with founders that are second time, third time, that I know are extremely talented and are working”
Jessica Lessin: Prioritizing Repeat Founders Biases Demographics to a Decade Ago
“When investors use the lens of repeat founders, which economically might be the right lens, historically, that shifts the demographics of the founders to the people who were founders, you know, 10 years ago.”
Sam Lessin: AI will force a massive retreat into closed private networks
“What you do is retreat to private networks in every form. It happens in news. It happens in app building. It happens in who you date or whatever. It's like, there's just going to be this massive retreat away from the commons, which is, I think actually really …”
Brit Morin: Returns for startup founders 45 and older beat younger cohorts
“But statistically, the returns of founders that are like, 45 and up, they're so much higher than those like 20 to 35.”
Sam Lessin: Backing founders with small children is generally a bad idea
“Parents of small children that is generally a bad idea. Not always, but generally a bad idea to back parents of small children.”
Dave Morin: Boasting about 24/7 office culture signals a cycle peak
“This is actually the Harbinger. Of knowing when the cycle has hit its peak, right? When everybody is sort of talking about how they're sleeping in the office and we have, you know, 24 seven coverage.”
Sam Lessin: Rapid tech shifts reward late-night grinding over prior experience
“In times of great change, victory goes to the people who learn the fastest and they're in things are changing very rapidly. All that's stored, how to do things gets thrown out the window. Right. And it's just basic because it's just less relevant. It's less va…”
Sam Lessin: Young, unattractive men succeed in tech because they lack other options
“This is my whole thesis on, like, why twenty-year-old, not usually very attractive men do so well, right? It's because, like, they have access to nothing else, right? And so they just do computer stuff.”