a16z seems to view turning society into a dystopia as a goal, so that makes sense. Their portfolio includes:
- DoubleSpeed, a bot farm as a service provider, allowing customers to orchestrate social media activity across thousands of fake accounts to create artificial consensus on the topic of their choice. Never pay a human again!
- Cheddr, the TikTok of sports gambling, whose differentiating feature is allowing users under 21. Place live in-game bets with just a swipe!
- Coverd, a new type of credit card where you can wipe off bills by betting on your favorite gambling games in their app. No VPN required!
Wow, I just checked the doublespeed website and it is comically evil. The footer says — verbatim, and in huge letters — "never pay a human again." (I'm not selectively quoting; it's a full sentence, despite their weird capitalization.)
If Neal Stephenson tried to write a villain this on-the-nose, his editor would tell him to tone it down.
Can A16Z tell the difference? Insert that meme "At long last, we have created the Torment Nexus, from the classic sci-fi novel, Don't Create the Torment Nexus".
a16z and others like them never met a dystopian warning they didn't interpret as a titillating invitation to an uncomfortably exciting and inevitable future!
