20VC: From Netscape To Friendster To Nuzzel: Jonathan Abrams on A Silicon Valley Adventure

Jonathan Abrams is the founder & CEO of the social news service Nuzzel. Jonathan is also co-founder and Managing Partner of Founders Den, a shared office space and private club for experienced entrepreneurs and their friends. Previously, Jonathan was the founder & CEO of Socializr, Friendster, and HotLinks, and a software engineer at companies such as Netscape and Nortel. Jonathan is a board member at Girls in Tech, an advisor to CodeNow, and has previously been a mentor in Steve Blank's entrepreneurship classes at Stanford and Berkeley, a top-rated mentor at The Founder Institute and a member of the advisory board of the Silicon Valley Association of Startup Entrepreneurs. Jonathan is also an angel investor in over 50 startups including AngelList, Docker, Front, HelloSign, Instacart, Sapho, Seed, Slideshare, Socialcam, and Vouch. Click To Play In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How did Jonathan make his way into tech and come to found the likes of Friendster and Nuzzel? What were his biggest lessons from working at Netscape?

2.) How can founders determine the customer stickiness and value proposition in the early days of product testing with friends and family?

3.) How does Jonathan view the competitive landscape for news aggregation? Why is consumer app such a competitive space?

4.) Question From Matt Mazzeo: How does Jonathan compare this moment in time to previous points in the innovation curve?

5.) Having worked with both the old and the new guard of VC, how does working with Lowercase, Homebrew and Softtech compare with the old guard of Benchmark and Kleiner Perkins?

Items Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Jonathan's Fave Book:

• Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure, Jerry Kaplan

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