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Fred

I'm a VC with a wife and 3 kids.

Interests: music, yoga, golf, art, venture capital, technology, biking, family, skiing, internet

Recent Activity

While we believe in network effects and the defensibility and leverage that comes from them, we have never subscribed to the popular theory that one single company can leverage network effects to "run the table" on a large market on... Continue reading

Posted Feb 19, 2014 at A VC

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Hypercard - Way Too Early

I have always loved the name of my friend Howard Morgan's now dormant blog - Way Too Early. Some ideas are just way too early. And one of them was Apple's Hypercard, which was a Mac application that came with... Continue reading

Posted Feb 18, 2014 at A VC

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Inspired by GitHub

I wrote a post the other day called This For That in which I suggestred that derivative ideas are challenging to execute on and equally challenging for USV to get excited about. But there are exceptions. And Github insipired ideas... Continue reading

Posted Feb 17, 2014 at A VC

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You Can Turn Off Comments, But You Can't Turn Off Discussions

I saw this on usv.com today: Popular Science has decided to turn off comments. They aren't the first and they won't be the last. As Adrian says in the usv comments: Let's face it - dropping comments on PopSci isn't... Continue reading

Posted Feb 16, 2014 at A VC

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Video of the Week: Chris Dixon on Good Ideas That Looked Like Bad Ideas

Chris gave this talk last year at startup school. It's great. It's about 20mins so an easy watch. Continue reading

Posted Feb 15, 2014 at A VC

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Feature Friday: Recognizing Wine Labels

My son turned me onto a wine app called Delectable Wine. I am waiting for the Android version so I can use it too. But I've used it a bit on his iPhone and its a really nice and useful... Continue reading

Posted Feb 14, 2014 at A VC

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The Behavior Of Your Users Normally Doesn't Change Overnight

A few weeks ago the traffic coming to the new usv.com dropped off by 20 or 30% week over week. Brian and Nick were wondering if it was related to the new design we rolled out at the end of... Continue reading

Posted Feb 13, 2014 at A VC

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The Perception Of Conflict Is Conflict

VC is a service business like law firms and ad agencies. Our customers are the entrepreneurs we back. Our shareholders are our limited partners. When we do a good job of helping our customers create value, our shareholders benefit. But,... Continue reading

Posted Feb 12, 2014 at A VC

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Go Bowling With The NYC Tech Community

The annual NYC tech bowling event is around the corner. Kingpins of Silicon Alley will happen on April 7th, at 7pm. Kingpins of Silicon Alley Bowlmor - Chelsea Piers April 7, 2014 7 PM Kingpins of Silicon Alley is New... Continue reading

Posted Feb 11, 2014 at A VC

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What's So Special About DonorsChoose.org?

So Fast Company has selected DonorsChoose.org as one of its most innovative companies and on top of that, they decided to put DonorsChoose founder Charles Best on the cover of the magazine and write a longer article about them as... Continue reading

Posted Feb 10, 2014 at A VC

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If It Sounds Too Good To Be True, It Probably Is

Ben Horowitz has a great post up on his blog, called Why I Did Not Go To Jail. I would encourage everyone to go read it. But in the event you aren't going to do that, he tells a story... Continue reading

Posted Feb 9, 2014 at A VC

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Video Of The Week: Yancey Strickler's Commencement Speech At McNally Smith

I came across this short (<15min) video this morning as I was wandering around YouTube. It's a commencement speech that Kickstarter's CEO Yancey Strickler gave at the McNally Smith College Of Music in St Paul Minnesota. I really like the... Continue reading

Posted Feb 8, 2014 at A VC

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Feature Friday: Kik Browser

On wednesday, our portfolio company Kik added something to their very popular mobile messenger - a browser. I guess a browser can hardly be called a feature. But inside a mobile messenger, a browswer can become a feature. Now when... Continue reading

Posted Feb 7, 2014 at A VC

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Lightweight Engagement Gestures

I was on vacation with my friend John and he asked me how I used the favorite button on Twitter. I told him it is a way to tell people that I've seen the tweet when I do not want... Continue reading

Posted Feb 6, 2014 at A VC

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The Pre-Product Phase

One of my big weaknesses as an early stage investor is my eyes glaze over at wireframes, design sketches, photoshop screens, and prose that describes a product. Until I can get my hands on it and use it, I have... Continue reading

Posted Feb 5, 2014 at A VC

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Dream It. Code It. Win It.

I attended a CS Teacher Meetup last night at USV. We talked about a lot of things but focused on the issue of getting more girls to code. It's an important issue that I think we are starting to make... Continue reading

Posted Feb 4, 2014 at A VC

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My friend and former business partner Jerry Colonna has created CEO Bootcamp. It's a four day retreat in the Colorado mountains with 19 other CEOs and a few facilitators, led by Jerry. The first CEO Bootcamp was last fall and... Continue reading

Posted Feb 3, 2014 at A VC

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iOS8, Health Data, and Open Data

News is leaking out of Apple that iOS8's primary feature will be health and fitness data. Rumors are that there will be a new app called Healthbook that will track a plethora of health and fitness data that iPhones and... Continue reading

Posted Feb 2, 2014 at A VC

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Video Of The Week: The NYS DFS Bitcoin Hearings

I don't know who is going to watch all of these panels. There were five in total. I am not sure who is going to watch this video of our panel in its entirety. However, there are a number of... Continue reading

Posted Feb 1, 2014 at A VC

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A New Look For usv.com

A few weeks ago, Nick came into my office and asked if I thought we could get more engagement out of the new usv.com. He felt that we'd succeeded on the transition from a blog to a link blog, but... Continue reading

Posted Jan 31, 2014 at A VC

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I read this in an analyst report published on Yahoo! yesterday: We believe Tumblr is an underappreciated asset with fast growing user base and engagement levels. We think Tumblr may actually be capable of creating as much value as Yahoo!... Continue reading

Posted Jan 30, 2014 at A VC

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Freedom and Innovation

I testified yesterday in a public hearing on Bitcoin as part of two days of hearings put on by the New York State Department of Financial Services. The hearings are being livestreamed here and you can click on the archives... Continue reading

Posted Jan 29, 2014 at A VC

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Bitcoin Tuesday

There are at least three Bitcoin events that I know of in NYC today. I do not think any of them are public events but the fact that there are three in a single day is interesting to me. This... Continue reading

Posted Jan 28, 2014 at A VC

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Humans Of New York

I have a new favorite blog and I thought I'd share it with all of you. I found it via the Gotham Gal's blog (which in and of itself is kind of embarassing. We sleep together and I found this... Continue reading

Posted Jan 27, 2014 at A VC

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My partner Brad, who is the conscience of USV, said something in one of our recent monday team meetings that has been rattling in my brain ever since. It was a throwaway line for him. He probably doesn't even remember... Continue reading

Posted Jan 26, 2014 at A VC

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