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If you plug it right now, it'll hit eight hundred. I've no doubt.
without a really streamlined management team that's not bottlenecked on a halftime CEO and without real product Vision yeah it's a company that's going sideways
there's a there's a ceiling on that
obviously stuff like uber that I think is still on its way it could be a thousand X fund it's 500x now is that right I mean that's again you're just clutching at straws right now I love it I'm I'm triangulating here this is like a car Swisher style it's not it doesn't suit you that well I'm just very excited pres the presump question
with Jack in the lead they definitely get a pass to change some stuff to take on some religious issues like uh tweet length
Kickstarter will not have a liquidity event (IPO or acquisition) for at least 20 years.
What happened: Kickstarter has remained a privately held company with no IPO or acquisition up to 2026, but the 20‑year horizon (till 2032) has not yet passed, so the claim cannot yet be fully confirmed or refuted.
Verify at source ↗there have been deals I've locked into Uber I knew it like I knew it right off the bat I knew that team I knew that product I knew I could be helpful I knew it was going to be Global I just knew it I can't say that about Twitter as as much as I think I was ahead of the rest of the world on Twitter I was behind EV and ahead of the rest of the world and that's what allowed me to amass such a big ownership stake but with Uber from the very first day I knew it and I went conses deep into that stock
the relationship with Travis that led to our investment there and Kevin Cam and Instagram and Evan Williams at Twitter
Bing did the same thing from the from the Microsoft side
you've got platforms out there that could easily add distribution to this thing whether it's Google Facebook Microsoft these are these are platforms with massive distribution
Microsoft's the most likely buyer
they give all of their index results to Google to include up at the top of the page it makes Google users very happy because now they have the best real-time results on search awesome and all they get are some incidental clicks back to Twitter
no-brainer for Google to own it
to accelerate its monetization in the face of no user growth right so take each user and make those users who are engaging more valuable to the platform yeah but ultimately there's a there's a ceiling on that
Microsoft's the most likely buyer
the very first Revenue deals we did in the history of Twitter were Bing and uh Google Google yep and we gave them access to to the fire hose it wasn't even called that then but we just gave them access to our whole index that they could find ... we just looked at your index and you guys 62% of the URLs in your index are URLs that our spiders had never seen ... they paid us tens of millions of dollars for access to that data back then
Twitter trying to chase Maus monthly active users to try and keep Wall Street happy is trying to generate some source of inbound clicks so they give all of their index results to Google to include up at the top of the page it makes Google users very happy because now they have the best real-time results on search awesome and all they get are some incidental clicks back to Twitter and a in a process that's way too hard log into Etc I mean you choke on it
they have a unique information asset that nobody hasb brainer for Google to own it Facebook has obsessively tried to go after that and and they haven't been able to replicate it they have better information faster than everybody else on the planet
one of the things that Twitter suffers from is everybody who works there is a power user of Twitter right and so rarely do they get any fresh eyes on the product
it's suffering from distribution and you've got platforms out there that could easily add distribution to this thing whether it's Google Facebook Microsoft these are these are platforms with massive distribution Apple easy ways to get this thing in the hands of more users there's no doubt about it growth could be accelerated immediately right
there's a there's a ceiling on that
the transition from you know text to video Yeah is not only in step with the evolution of how mobile the direction we're all going with web and mobile uh and content but it's also the only way that company's been able to accelerate its monetization in the face of no user growth
over monetized as far as I'm concerned the platform is brilliant and the video stuff that he's been put in charge of has been gone really well
I'm really impressed by Adam Ban's success in monetizing the users they have
without a really streamlined management team that's not bottlenecked on a halftime CEO and without real product Vision yeah it's a company that's going sideways
I think we ended up with unfortunately was a result where we have Jack halime and we get a lot of talented performance from him out of that half time and the employees really like him yeah he has the gravitas of the founder and inventor of the product clearly EV is not that deeply involved and Adam Bane was not given all the responsibilities that I think people expected a see to be given
he doesn't excel at telling a public story to the investor class to a board of directors it's just not his game he's not a schmoozer and that's what caught up with him in the you know the kind of Palace intrigue of Twitter
two and a half years before the Periscope deal he was pounding the table about live video live video we got to have live video he just sees it
I think Evan Williams is the most Visionary product guy in this space
I and the other shareholders that we you know that I was representing in that in those talks really wanted to see Evan Williams come back and have a product role in the company even if it wasn't a formal title as a product role
I was a very vociferous advocate for Jack to get back into the company but that was part of a broader deal
we were kind of taking a flyer on Evan Williams
no one with a straight face can tell you they knew how big it was going to be
I'm very proud of how we've done on paper even in realized returns with the twitters
that was an incredibly High pre-money valuation for something at that in that era
so too has been unbelievable
the relationship with Travis that led to our investment there
I went to work at a place like Google where so many of the most recent computer science grads have never left the country have never had a job they've never worked for tips they've never done anything in the service Community they've never gotten their hands dirty they got essentially paid to go to school and so I worked alongside them and I saw the [ __ ] entitlement that resulted it was painful I would see people yell back at the chefs at Google
with Jack in the lead they definitely get a pass to change some stuff to take on some religious issues like uh tweet length
it's frustrating to me that clicks go off Network just to get extra characters yes I hate that people post to Instagram so that they can post paragraphs or post to Facebook and then have it auto post to Twitter and then that click goes away it's stupid it was a cool device it got us here it may be it may be a device that won't get us there what got you here won't get you there
there is nobody in Tech who understands can speak to and is more appreciated by um employees investors advertising partners ERS media and Publishers um future recruits uh other leaders of companies like just name name a constituency that in by which Adam isn't completely beloved right
I got really comfortable with it particularly because of the team he's got
if I sold six companies to Twitter I have six really angry email threads of Dick Costo about why the [ __ ] are you guys screwing these guys on stock
a management team that was unresponsive to investors to a lot of their own employees a board that was was completely Frozen ineffective um just toned deaf and paralyzed
I've I've had Twitter acquire six of our companies six yeah and are you leading that charge when that happens are you doing a whisper are you doing an intro or would you just tell them go something is a I mean first of all I own a lot of Twitter right so I'm deeply like interested in like long-term health of Twitter yeah and so if I think there's something that we're working on that you know will be helpful to Twitter I want it to be at Twitter like and so and not just companies I'm working on I
now you look at Uber today there are so many people who are full Uber full Uber like I don't own a car
we at in the early days of uber we already had those data points that showed us like if we get you into that ride 2.3 times you're a rider for life if we can get the price down to this Tipping Point then you'll never not use us again
he realized which is so impressive to me about TK is he realized that getting a the Uber was as valuable as the next car the time it took to get your car ... the ability to get a car in under X minutes was really what it's about
he got so much venom over search pricing over such a long period of time and he stuck to his guns about it ... he just knew it was good business and that they were going to use it anyway
look at what TK has gone through with search pricing
I mean think of what TK is doing at Uber now with pool he just knows that the demand is there such that he can lower the price still afford the drivers that make that much more money just got a data Advantage
obviously stuff like uber that I think is still on its way it could be a thousand X fund it's 500x now is that right I mean that's again you're just clutching at straws right now I love it I'm I'm triangulating here this is like a car Swisher style it's not it doesn't suit you that well I'm just very excited pres the presump question
I would write a check to Twitter and then show up at Twitter even though Jack didn't want me around and just force my way into being so that I could get that money back someday right um and ultimately I mean it was lean for years there was a point where I started buying everyone's Twitter stock and I ran out of my own money and so I took a loan for my assistant briefly to float me until I could uh get a little more liquidity so I could buy more Twitter stock and you at the end wound up owning lo
Yeah, I've been a believer in Marissa. And to be clear, like, Marissa can be difficult sometimes, I bumped heads with her, I'm a friend of hers. Andů You know, she can be really tough, but I also think, one other thing, she was known for, rightly, at Google, was, that she invested in her people, in her team, more than anybody [did]. She would take her young product managers, tour them around the world, so they can understand, how Koreans use technology, and what was going on in Israel and Russia
I think a lot of the dynamic, awesome, entrepreneurial people left that company long time ago. And I think Marissa has the ability get those people back there.
They're not MySpace. Users are still like them. Users still use them as a homepage. Their email product is awesome. It might be better than Gmail. They have a leg up in media, and audience, and that kind of stuff.
That's the hard job, man. ... Because they've been going nowhere for so long. Just multiple CEOs.
I bought the day after she took the job.
Marissa knows, that, at Yahoo, she's gotta bring the mojo back. ... I think she understands that mojo drive so much of this, and she has such a huge audience, that I'm actually a believer. I own the stock. I'm long on that stock.
That's how the guys at Twitter think about the folks who invested up to this point, Bijan [Sabet] at Spark [Capital], Fred Wilson at Union Square [Ventures], uh... Peter Fenton at Benchmark. Like, all these guys feel like partners there, right? And... And so they, and the founders, and the management of that team, of that company show the respect to those investors.
Twitter has got a very healthy, obvious way to make money, that's user-friendly, advertiser-friendly, that leaves everybody feeling very confident and trustworthy.
And the ability to actually watch that stuff impact real-life is amazing.
I had a small team of engineers, I backed, called BackType, that Twitter acquired. And uhů those guys could actually track the impact of a tweet not only on Facebook, blogs, et cetera, but they can actually track the impact of that tweet on Foursquare check-ins.
We've never, in the history of advertising, had this kind of engagement happen on a platform before. What's happening on Twitter is just off-scale.
Today's developers on the Twitter platform are a lot of the media creators. The platform, they're building that media, and the content creators are building that, right? I mean, the platforms, the developers are the New York Times, you know, who are building symbiotic relationships with Twitter. The platforms are the Emmys, who are building symbiotic relationships to co-broadcasting. There are a lot of developers. And the developers are Crimson Hexagon, who are building, you know, the ways to un
Again, as an outside investor, uh... it would have been great to have Kevin Systrom and the team working over at Twitter, and having that, you know, photos, integrating in that product.
If Twitter did that deal, it would've been... it's playing offense. Facebook had to do that deal out of defense.
I think that Larry has an amazing ability... but I think, generally, it's hard for that company to wrap their head around social, because it's just a different problem set.
On Twitter, everything is about seeing more and more answers, just more and more responses, because, like, you want a diversity of replies.
Fluther, actually, was acquired by Twitter at the end. Aardvark was acquired by Google. I think it showed the difference in that approach.
Google was really good at finding the right answer. Twitter is good at servicing a bunch of stuff.
Even the weakest signals are amplified, as Biz likes to say.
Twitter lowered the bar even more. ... All you needed to do is to have the cell phone. ... you were suddenly an author. You were a publisher.
I think that's one of the reasons why Google was never really taking Twitter seriously, as it should.
Eric Schmidt goes on stage at uhů a banker conference in San Francisco, and calls Twitter the poor man's email.
If people get the perception that a company is weak, it's not going in right direction,ů JASON: Or even individual! CHRIS: Uhů ůthen talent doesn't show up. And that's the thing. If Facebook is going to enter this next phase, and really drive this evolution of the next phase of advertising, the next phase of monetization, it needs the talent. And right now, they lost their mojo.
The monetization moves have just been a disappointment, and, I think, they try to rely upon what is always work for everybody, and it was easy money, but it's not the big money, and it's not the innovative money.
Facebook, I think, is struggling with a shift from display ads, that theyů they turned all out, they could. And it's a big business, a five-billion-dollar business, but it's not big enough, and it's not growing fast enough. And so I think you have to wait for chapter two there.
They are stuck on display ads, which are underperforming. It's hard to grow that stuff without crushing user experience. They are copying Twitter's model by 'Sponsored Stories.' And uhů And they haven't done enough on commerce, and coins, and all that stuff yet to make up for it.
Facebook operates with the [motto], 'Hey, get over, you learn to love it.' And uhů And that the user impact isn't uhů a big part of their equation there. And I think they play short-term ball, instead of the long-term ball.
He wants to deal with these industries, which make no sense. Where people are pocketing money at the expense of users. Like... He wants... He loves breaking that (bleep) up, and so.
Larry Page said, 'Actually, Sacca... what Sacca said is true. Like, we all know it, and we needed not to back away from this. We need to be truthful.' And so, I, actually, came out of that meeting with a new job. I would, like, go make this happen. [He said,] 'And we might have to tie you to the axle of the bus at some point, but go shake this space up.'
We said to FCC, 'You need to attach rules to that spectrum, to make it open, to make sure that anybody with a handset, with a device [has access to the spectrum].'
That's the biggest hand of poker I've ever played. 4.7 billion dollars.
We were ready to build it out, if we won it.
Sergey is one of the quickest one of the quickest wits. JASON: Yeah. CHRIS: One of the best storytellers of salespeople ever. JASON: A funny guy. CHRIS: And I think um What the two of them do, is they play off each other very well. I think one of the greatest skills, [which] they have, is to uh see the questions that you, and I, and other people skip over, that we assume in the model, as well as play devil's advocate.
I think that Larry has an amazing ability to see the future of energy, to see the future of hard science, the future uh of infrastructure, JASON: Yeah. CHRIS: That kinda stuff, but I think, generally, it's hard for that company to wrap their head around social, because it's just a different problem set. It's a humanist It's It's a humanist, artistic problem set, and they're not here for it.
Google was really good at finding the right answer. Twitter is good at servicing a bunch of stuff.
Eric Schmidt goes on stage at a banker conference in San Francisco, and calls Twitter the poor man's email.
Google was never really taking Twitter seriously, as it should. That's why they didn't take Blogger seriously... they were like the red-headed step children of Google... on their own footing, they were the ninth largest site in the world, and they couldn't get an engineer, any machines, any allocation process.
He has a preternatural ability to know how things are going to turn out... I don't think he ever gave a s**t about social... I think he cares about real science.
If you plug it right now, it'll hit eight hundred. I've no doubt.
YC companies would ask me like oh you're a Google guy we need you for the ads expertise
working at Google I was surrounded by the smartest advertising people in the world all the time
Google's one of these places where if you hustled you could just show up in other people's meetings and if you were helpful they wouldn't really ask why you were there
within the company ericus and I and a couple others developed our reputation as being good negotiators and we won a founders award early on in the company one of the first Founders Awards because the scale of what we're working with if we did it right we could save $400 million
we needed to be quiet because we didn't want Microsoft to know how big our business was at the time they were very paranoid that Microsoft would try and Crush Google if they ever knew how much money was in search
I raised a couple of uh of other small funds that were just to buy Twitter shares and and this is when Twitter is a nine fig company evaluation
I think I think each of us doesn't give ourselves enough credit for how helpful we can be working at Google I was surrounded by the smartest advertising people in the world all the time and so YC companies would ask me like oh you're a Google guy we need you for the ads expertise and I was like oh I don't actually know that much about ads but the reality is because I'd been working at Google and generally paying attention to ads I would find myself in a room with a startup and be like actually i
my second investment was Twitter and um you know because it was 25k and it was so material I just started showing up at the company because I needed that 25k back someday
Evan Williams called me up and said hey I'm just closing up the round for this company I got you down for 25 25 okay great 25 hung up the phone and I said to myself I don't have $25,000
if you piss off an EV Williams now or a Travis cnick you're not going to get that opportunity when they do the next company and people remember right
Travis is an unreasonably fast moving person you know which is perfect for Uber right I mean tra like Travis will show you the expansion plan and it makes me nervous in the and I'm like oh my God no really and and and yet he just crushes it he executes on it he he realizes he has hired the best people in the world to go out and execute on that stuff guys like Ryan Graves who who go and make that stuff happen and so again Travis has a different Gene than I do