Sam Lessin
GP Slow Ventures. Intern The Information
Subscriber since 2013
About
Sam is currently an intern at The Information and a General Partner at Slow Ventures. He has co-founded two companies, Fin and drop.io (acquired by Facebook in 2010). Between 2010 and 2014 he was a VP of product management at Facebook, where he managed the People, Places, and Things product group and the Identity product group. Sam started his career at Bain and Company, and attended Harvard ('05). In his spare time Sam enjoys skiing and kite-surfing. He is married to Jessica Lessin, founder of The Information.
Open to
Looking to invest in startups / private companies
I have been an early investor in many notable companies and projects including (solana, venmo, birchbox, makerbot, teamshares, tonkean, blockdaemon, airtable, etc.) At slow we look to back ideally things that are a bit crazy but important.
Looking to hire team members
TI is very much looking for engineers, product, design folks. Slow doesn't really have many opportunities but always open to hearing from folks.
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StartupsGoogleAmazonAppleNetflixVenture CapitalVcSemiconductorsCryptocurrencyCloudAsiaAndreessen HorowitzAirbnbEntertainmentElon MuskFacebookMark ZuckerbergSequoia CapitalSingapore Economic Development BoardEnterpriseSilicon Valley Bank (SVB)PolicyUber/LyftAmazon Web ServicesAIAutonomous VehiclesCryptoVenture-CapitalOpenAIBainE CommerceModest ProposalsFTXSvbMeta PlatformsMedia/TelecomSBFVenture CapitalStartupsSaasIdentityBitcoinLawCryptocurrencyHuman CapitalMarketsCrazy PeopleSkills
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Weekend
Favorite Vacation Spot
British ColumbiaHawaiiCape CodJackson Hole
Favorite Sports to Play
TennisSkiingSurfingFoilingKitesurfing
Favorite Sports to Watch
Mma
Favorite Books
The HobbitThe Biggest BluffSnowcrashDuneThe Hero With A Thousand FacesBusiness AdventuresThe Three Body Problem
Favorite TV Shows / Movies
Game Of ThronesCasino RoyaleCurb Your EnthusiasmIt's Always Sunny In PhiladelphiaFor All MankindLetterkennySuccessionCaddyshackBlazing SaddlesZoolander
Forum Posts
Ex-OpenAI Folks to MSFT is smart for everyone, especially Sam and co.
Posted bySam Lessin
For satya, brilliantly played. enough said. For sam and co this is very smart vs starting something new: 1. "Spite" startups never work. 2. Never in history as a startup with "200" people on day one worked... the number of people who would want to come with them (and are good) far exceeds the bounds of what a successful startup needs to work on day on...Slow Ventures
Governance — So What Do You Actually Do With 'OpenAI' from here...
Posted bySam Lessin
— *NB i write this as someone who doesn't believe in governance for seed stage companies and won't do boards… yes, ironic* — Over the last few days OpenAI’s absurdly strange governance and ownership structure when from funny "haha" to funny :( :(. — While OpenAI's turducken structure of a for-profit wrapped in a non-profit is particularly weird - it i...Slow Ventures
The Year is 2027, China Has Invaded Taiwan.. and American kids are holding anti-war pro-China rallies in the streets of the US … all because of TikTok
Posted bySam Lessin
October 7th was a clear wake-up call that the US needs to ban TikTok for national security reasons immediately. Think what you will of the content on there today, the flat reality is that the last month clearly demonstrated that the youth of America are sufficiently swayed by social media that allowing foreign adversaries to control what is shown to them in times of strife ...Slow Ventures
WhatsApp is actually a lot cooler than I realized… it isn’t a messenger - it is actually a hidden full social network.
Posted bySam Lessin
I have been a WhatsApp ‘user’ forever, but I have to say that I don’t think I really understood the product and why it is so good until recently. If you had asked me even a month ago, I would have said that I use WhatsApp, along with a ton of other messengers — and they are all fine utilities… undifferentiated, high utility but kinda just that — global iMessage. Recently, ...Slow Ventures
One person’s “Shouting Contest” is another’s “Marketplace of Ideas” — On the goals of ‘free speech’ and where digital platforms are failing Democracy
Posted bySam Lessin
The other day I engaged a twitter commenter who didn’t like my call for banning foreign owned social platforms in the US for national defense reasons. In a back and forth I pointed out that a “marketplace of ideas” is not the same as a “shouting match” he retorted: “ONE’S ‘SHOUTING CONTEST’ IS ANOTHER’S ‘MARKETPLACE OF IDEAS’ Huh. Interesting. This felt like a really tel...Slow Ventures