Korva is a scroll of the internet’s best ideas.
Investors are professional storytellers
Selling is the job
Pitching a startup, a fund, or a deal to partners all comes down to a story. That is a big reason investors have long been writers and podcasters. Putting their ideas out brings interesting opportunities, builds a brand, and lets founders know what they stand for.
A split role
Lightseed, a venture firm, formalized the role by giving one person a split between its investment team and its media team. Because that person drives new media and reaches people before they are founders, it also makes sense for the same person to invest in them.
The wide funnel
The media side works as a wide top of the funnel: college kids thinking about AI, Stanford PhDs who have never been exposed to the venture world, and operators who haven't seen how to be a founder. The job is then to convert that talent density into opportunities at the pre-seed and seed stages.
Why have investors long been writers?
Paul Graham began publishing essays on his website in the early 2000s, and founders read them years before they applied for funding. He started Y Combinator in 2005 with Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris, and Trevor Blackwell. His writing on startups became a main way the accelerator reached prospective founders. Y Combinator has since funded thousands of companies.
Why do pre-seed investors cast such a wide net?
Venture returns are heavily skewed, with a small number of investments producing most of the profit. An analysis by Correlation Ventures of thousands of venture deals found that a small minority of investments accounted for the bulk of total returns. Because the winners cannot be known in advance, investors try to see as many early founders as possible. A wide funnel raises the odds of meeting the rare company that produces those outsized returns.
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