Thoughts on the StockTwits Deal

Full disclosure:  I’m not a user of stocktwits and spend very little of my personal energy thinking about stocks.  I do spend a considerable time with twiiter and even more time with some of stocktwit’s investors.  I think about startups quite a bit.
Stocktwits is interesting to me because they put together a Series A financing [...]

Republican Senators Have Courage

Fred Wilson beat me to a GM post that I wanted to write over the weekend.  If only I had watched less football.  Fred nails it so read his post, but here are my thoughts.   General Motors is a disaster and we send the wrong message to everybody in this country and around the [...]

“Yankees Sign Iraqi Hurler”

Andy Borowitz cranks out a classic this morning.  His email newsletter is among my favorites and certainly the best for a Monday morning.  Enjoy the laugh.

Thoughts on Tumblr’s Financing

Fred Wilson posted on AVC about why he feels Tumblr is a good investment and he went onto discuss the current market for investing.  I decided to comment because historically same investor funding for a series B round has meant that the company may have been unable to attract outside funding somewhere else.  Typically, Series [...]

Why we Need Newspapers

I read some really dumb stuff in the newspapers today.  More than anything I’m bothered by the Wall Street Journal’s slouch towards the New York Post.  The WSJ’s big headline today is that Jesse Jackson might be a part of the Illinois political scandal.  It’s the entire above the fold article space.  Come on, how [...]

Sam Zell Hammered in Washington Post

Thanks to my old friend Betsy Befus Feigin, I’ve been forwarded this savage attack on Sam Zell on the WashingtonPost.com.    I’m disseminating the information because I want my readers to have it.  I want to think and read more about the Tribune situation before I publish anything myself.     There is no question leveraging employee pensions [...]

Pray for Newspapers

The WSJ reports that Tribune has retained Lazard to help restructure its debt and that Tribune may seek Chapter 11 Protection.  A month ago I met Bruce Toll (Toll Brothers) at a cocktail party.  Toll is the Chairman of Philadelphia Media Holdings and had helped lead the deal to buy the Philadelphia newspapers from McClatchy.  [...]

Scott Rafer and Rafernomics

Sunday morning and I’m on my third cup of coffee and finally ready to make sense of my hour and a half with Scott Rafer.  Rafery and I have many intersecting paths.  His current partner David Cancel and I worked together 12 years ago.  Many of his investors (First Round, Betaworks etc) have been my [...]

Venture Capital Notes 12/08

All week I’ve met with different investors (angel and institutional), entrepreneurs, and bankers and wanted to summarize my notes for the community.  Much of the information is hearsay from reliable sources, none of whom can be named.
1.  Companies are finding very little success with venture firms and are trying to appeal to large angel syndicates [...]

Conde Nast Superstar Editors Live in Past

I have a hero and his name is David Remnick. He’s the prolific editor of The NewYorker.  He edits magazines and writes books better than anybody. Unfortunately, He’s blinded by his values and what he’s known and this position threatens the future of our cherished magazine.
Here he is at a breakfast at the SI Newhouse [...]