Village Global Podcast

Jeff Morris Jr. (@jmj), Director of Product, Revenue at Tinder, and investor at Chapter One, joins Erik on this episode.We sincerely apologize for the audio quality of this episode. We had technical difficulties with the recording.They discuss:- Using tech to bridge online and offline experiences.- The idea of wellness as a status symbol. - What $10B companies may have emerged ten years from now.- The future of dating apps.- Why he’s excited about ISAs.- Why tech talent might need agents.- What he’s learned from the best product and monetization people.- Whether there’s a “Silicon Valley exodus” going on.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Erik is joined on this episode by PJ Kershaw (@pjkershawnz), early stage investor and crypto thinker.They discuss:- Why PJ says that the current model of companies with shareholders has “reached its zenith.”- How DAOs will change the world.- How public goods can be better delivered using new models.- Lessons from Singapore.- The future of venture capital in the age of crypto.- How VC fund structure will change.- Who the LPs will be in new forms of funds.- The difference between investing in Asia and the US.- His investing thesis.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Erik is joined on this episode by Lawson Baker (@lwsnbaker), head of special projects at TokenSoft. He’s also working on a new company.They talk about:* Bitcoin as the future not just of finance, but also of work.* What the internet and the future of work looks like ten years out.* The “de-evolution of the firm” and how corporations will become less important in business.* Where Lawson would be investing if he was running a venture fund.* Why prediction markets are so exciting to Lawson.* How identity will change over time.* The future of capitalism.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. The show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Erik is joined on this episode by Brad Glisson (@GlissonBrad), co-founder and CEO of Quilt, formerly Thoughtblox.They discuss:- What social capital is, why it is important, and how it is distinctive from other forms of capital.- The studies around social capital and some of their insights.- How social capital impacts and intersects with reputation.- Whether a codified reputation system, like a “Yelp for people” would ever be feasible (or desirable).- What makes a great community.- What Brad is working on in this space.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

We are honored to have Anne Wojcicki (@annewoj23), co-founder and CEO of 23andMe, among our small group of luminary LPs whose financial capital and engagement power the next wave of Village Global founders.She joined us in Mountain View for an intimate fireside chat with the first Chief Data Scientist for the United States Office of Science and Technology Policy, DJ Patil (@dpatil).They discussed: - Why the US healthcare system is broken.- The state of direct-to-consumer healthcare.- Tailored medicine and the future of digital health.- 23andMe’s drug discovery efforts and how continuous data monitoring can change how drugs are developed.- The problem with clinical trials and how to fix them.- How Anne would change the US healthcare system if she could wave a magic wand.- The founding of 23andMe and the company’s philosophy.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Michael Dempsey (@mhdempsey), partner at Compound, joins Erik on this episode to talk through a wide array of sectors that he has delved into.(We apologize for the audio quality of this episode. We had technical difficulties during recording).They talk about:- The model and approach at Compound, including how writing definitive blog posts about a particular industry fits into their investing strategy.- The state of robotics today, including why he’s not as bullish on robots in warehouses as he once was, and how robots can potentially transform food and retail.- Machine learning, its applications, and why it’s so difficult to reproduce the findings seen in research papers in the space.- Different approaches to making self-driving cars work, and his predictions for the future of the industry.- The state of the investment landscape for other applications of ML, including radiology, voice and phone calls, image recognition, and animation.- Digital celebrities, identity, and how self-expression on the internet will change in the future.- His deep dive into women’s health, family planning and reproductive health, and what kinds of opportunities exist in the space.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Erik is joined on this episode by Nicolas Colin, co-founder and director of The Family, and author of Hedge: A Greater Safety Net For The Entrepreneurial Age.They discuss:- Why in the future we can expect more social change from tech companies than from government.- The key functions of version 1.0 of the social safety net.- How to solve the problem that most jobs are located in cities, but cities are also mostly unaffordable.- Why the 21st century will be more like the 19th century than the 20th.- Why this is the entrepreneurial age, and what that means for workers.- The story of the Rothschilds and how they prevented potential wars.- The problems with universal basic income.- How China is innovating on the social contract.- The fact that nation-states are a recent invention and are not necessarily the only way to organize in the future.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Erik is joined on this episode by Danielle Strachman (@DStrachman) and Mike Gibson (@William_Blake), co-founders and general partners at 1517 Fund. They also both worked extensively on the Thiel Fellowship.They discuss:- The story of the genesis of the Thiel Fellowship.- The lessons learned from running the Fellowship.- Their idiosyncratic paths to running a venture capital fund.- The signals they relied on to find the right applicants.- How to change how higher ed works in the US.- The lessons that the US can learn from other countries when it comes to college.- How students can have a conversation with their parents about not going to college.- Whether something like the Thiel Fellowship can scale.- The lessons that homeschooling has for other forms of education.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Grace Chen is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Alex Tabarrok (@ATabarrok), economist and author, joins Erik on this episode for a wide-ranging discussion.They talk about:- The contributions of economics to society over the past several decades and the biggest challenges ahead for the field- What “the great forgetting” means in economics and why bad ideas from the past keep coming back- The arguments for open borders- Why Alex thinks we should focus on increasing the number of police as opposed to increasing punishment for offenders- Whether the US or China will pull ahead in the next decades- Whether capitalism and democracy are compatible- Why “democracy is not the secret sauce to riches”- The merits of inductive versus deductive thinking- Why he thinks too few robots, not too many, is the cause of low wages- His thoughts on cost disease- How he would change academia, the FDA, healthcare, the tax code, and other areas if he could wave a magic wand- The ways in which he thinks differently from other economistsThanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Erik is joined on this episode by Seth Rosenberg (@SethGRosenberg), investor at Greylock, and Sheel Mohnot (@pitdesi), fintech investor at 500 Startups.They talk about:- The biggest opportunities in fintech today.- How traditional finance can be rebuilt from the ground up using software.- How to think about different market segments in fintech.- Their requests for startups in the space.- Why the big companies in fintech are converging on the same set of features.- Facebook’s Libra and the impact it might have.- The “Asia model” as represented by WeChat and Grab, and whether that might transfer to the US.… And much more.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Grace Chen is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.