The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 19 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Lessin: Stripe Missed Trillion-Dollar Potential by Staying Private
“If they had gone public like a normal company a bajillion years ago, they could have been a truly important general generational company because they could have used the currency to buy everyone.”
Sam Lessin claims Google's Nest acquisition was incredibly lucky and timed
“Nest was the luckiest fucking acquisition ever, right? Had that been six Six months later, it probably wouldn't have happened, right?”
Sam Lessin: Meta moderation overhaul would not happen under Harris
“No, because you wouldn't have had the opening to it, but it's not, that, that, a hundred percent not, right?”
Aoun: I would have quit Forward rather than run a zombie company
“If you had told me to just sit in that company, I would have quit that company. Like, there's no way I wanted to sit in a company where I already don't believe in the future, but I've somehow managed to get it to continue for in perpetuity.”
Dave Morin: AI built an app in weeks that previously cost $1M-$2M
“I was able to build an app for myself using AI software engineering tools, which would have cost one to two million dollars in seed capital to build in five people and maybe one year to two year, maybe call it 12 to 18 months of time and one to two million dol…”
Dave Morin: AI coding breakthrough wouldn't exist without Claude 3.5 Sonnet
“It was Claude Sonnet that caused this to happen. Like it was to put a fine point on it. If it were not for Sonnet, this software engineering breakthrough, I don't think would be happening right now. So you can like literally go to the day that model was publis…”
Sam Lessin: Remote work allowed older VCs to preserve their fiefdoms
“They should have retired a long time ago, and they would have if it weren't for work from home culture and COVID, but work from home, they preserved their fiefdoms from home while they play golf, and like, we need to kick them out.”
Dave Morin: AI enabled him to build an app that previously cost $2M
“I was able to build an application that would have taken three to five people and probably a two million dollar seed round one year ago to build.”
Sam Lessin: WaPo Would Make More Catering Exclusively to Elite Insiders
“What they should have been doing is saying like, Why do I care? Like, I'll be the Washington Post. I'm going to be super elitist. I only cater to Washington insiders. Guess what? Great fucking business because everyone's trying to influence those thousand peop…”
Lessin: If Facebook had acquired the DMV, online identity would be better
“And candidly, I think had Facebook bought the DMV a long time ago, you know, the world would be a better place. We'd have better, better online identity. And, ah, and maybe we'd be a little bit safer from some of the crazy interference we see, ah, these days i…”
Lessin: A male MacKenzie Scott would face zero criticism
“And if any other man was just doing this, to be honest, it would not even face an iota of the criticism that she faces for like living her life.”
Lessin: Rights holders would have blocked OpenAI's scraping if for-profit plans were known
“I think almost every rights holder, right, would have said no effing way if it had been transparent what they were going to do, and they were going to become a for-profit, whereas everyone kind of was like, okay, and looked the other way.”
Sam Lessin: OpenAI's non-profit origins deflected strict copyright scrutiny
“I think everyone, Would have been way more on top of the copyright thing if they didn't, like, have this kind of, like, altruistic background. They're just doing research thing.”
Sam Lessin: Tesla stock would collapse without the Elon Musk savior narrative
“If it weren't an Elon company and there wasn't a Messiah return story, like this thing would be getting fucking hammered.”
Sam Lessin: Solana founders should have personally delivered their anti-woke message
“It's exactly to a message that if, like, Roger Anatoly, both of whom are great, had, like, gotten up, or one of the leaders and said, this is what I believe, I authentically believe this, I stand behind it actually would have been basically fine.”
Dave Morin: Unsecure import supply chains exacerbate the US fentanyl crisis
“The fentanyl problem would not be what it is if that were a secure part of the supply chain.”
Lessin: The new AI Beatles track is primarily a PR stunt
“They could have done the Beatles album years ago. It's just a good PR moment.”