Jake Paul & Anti Fund: From Creator to Investor

Summary

The a16z Show – "Jake Paul & Anti Fund: From Creator to Investor"

Date: June 22, 2026 | Host: a16z (likely Sonal Chokshi)
Guests: Jake Paul and Jeff Woo (Co-founders, Anti Fund)

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into the evolution of Jake Paul—from YouTube creator and professional athlete to an ambitious venture capitalist—and his partnership with Jeff Woo in scaling Anti Fund into a $100 million growth fund. The conversation spans topics of investment philosophy, resilience, modern media dynamics, attention economics, advice for aspiring founders, and Jake’s potential future in politics. Together, they share lessons on building durable influence, what founder “taste” looks like, and how social and technological disruptions shape new opportunities.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Announcing the $100M Anti Fund Growth Fund

[00:00, 01:44, 09:01]

• Jake Paul: Officially announces the oversubscribed $100M growth fund, naming tier-one investments like Anduril, SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic, Modal, Saronic.
• Jeff Woo: Shares how top names in venture (like Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon) were early LPs, validating the partnership for them.
• On early skepticism from others: "When we announced, Antifun was like, gw, you're making a mistake. Jake is not like, good, you're ruining your career. And we're just like, whatever, bro." (Jeff Woo, [00:14])

2. Jake Paul’s & Jeff Woo’s Superpowers as Partners

[02:08–04:23]

• Jeff: Credits Jake as an entrepreneur and "cultural leader of his generation." Praises Jake’s persistence, generosity, and ability to "context switch" and endure pain.
  • Quote: "Jake literally created the influencer term in that like job profile. If you think about him instantiating the daily vlog...the underlying trait is...he's a very generous, thoughtful, kind human being who is very ambitious..." (Jeff Woo, [02:22])
• Jake: Praises Jeff's intellect, work ethic, and his blend of technical (Stanford CS) and business skills.
• They agree that shared ambition, judgment, and ability to read people have been critical.

3. Resilience, Adaptation & Building a Career in Public

[05:12–07:43, 13:11–16:20]

• Jake:
  • Entrepreneurship and analysis drive his path—"When things are working, double, triple, quadruple down...when they're not, sweep the things under the rug."
  • "I failed so many times to get to this point and made so many mistakes. And I think it's resilience in this day and age and having a public career as well and being a public figure, I think you have to have tons of resilience." ([05:32])
  • Discusses the importance of network, helping others non-transactionally, and professionalism in entertainment.
  • On pain tolerance: “I had a very intense father… my whole school in high school like turned against me… So I think I’m just used to it because of that… I know who I am… And so if you could just look yourself in the mirror and be like, I’m doing good… then it doesn’t matter what anyone says.” ([13:11])
• Therapy/Self-care: Jake values unpacking childhood trauma but warns against being stuck in a victim loop. ([15:02])
• Jeff: Adds that picking a compelling mission you care about makes enduring hardship easier.

4. From Entertainment to Tech Investing: The Playbook

[07:43–09:22, 21:32–25:06]

• Jake: Shares early love for Silicon Valley after visiting at 17, gradually shifting into investing as another creative/economic avenue.
• Jeff: Notes the power of context switching, pain tolerance ("presidential head of state level courage"), and ability to thrive under constant attacks (from both Hollywood and internet fame).
• "If Jake can just live his life and get a bunch of views and someone has to light $100 million on fire to get a bunch of views, who do I wanna be partners with?" (Jeff Woo, [00:37])

5. Attention, Looks, & the Future of Influence (AI Maxing, Looks Maxing)

[19:49–21:32]

• Jeff: Describes two routes to social capital: “AI maxing” (be the smartest, most technical) and “looks maxing” (optimize vibe/charisma/physical appeal).
  • "If we assume that we’re pretty AGI-pilled... what matters is your relationship with people… can you just have better vibes than everyone else?" ([20:07])
• Advice for young people: Double down on math, computer science, and team up with ambitious peers—whether in startups or joining top AI companies like OpenAI or Anthropic.
  • "The most important thing is just get with really, really smart ambitious people and team up and grow together." (Jeff Woo, [23:17])
• Jake: Doubts the same influencer playbook (YouTube daily vlogs, etc.) would work starting today; more competition, much harder to break through new. ([25:06])

6. Durability as a Creator—What Sets Top Influencers Apart

[25:50–30:52]

• Jake:
  • Durability comes from relentless effort, constant reinvention, and diversification (music, comedy, athletics, politics, business).
  • "I think the modern day entertainers have to do it all." ([25:50])
  • Monetization is key: "People in this space don't know how to pull cash out... they can have a lot of followers, but not the cash. And cash is king." (repeated theme)
• Jeff: Sees Jake as a power-law “startup of himself,” compounding in durability as AI content floods the market but real, known personalities remain valuable.

7. Career Strategy & Filtering Opportunities

[33:14–35:43]

• Jake: Decides on opportunities through time-to-reward ratio, brand fit, risk evaluation, and mostly by gut instinct honed over years.
  • "Things now have to be like 10, 20, 30 million dollar opportunities for me to spend time on it... a lot of it also is just like instinctual and on the fly." ([33:39])

8. Controversy, Press, and Risk Management

[35:43–37:59]

• Jake: "Not all press is good press for certain people. For me, yes... because I can survive it."
• Jeff: Encourages calculated risk-taking; being canceled isn’t possible if you never matter to begin with.
  • Quote: "Most people can't even be canceled because you didn't exist. So the general advice: Yo, just live more, do more shit in general because you're nothing and you maybe can get out of nothing." ([37:02])

9. Streaming, Edge, and the Evolution of Creator Culture

[38:04–43:22]

• Explores streamers like Clavicular who build brands by being raw and pushing boundaries—sometimes dangerously so.
• Jake feels a bit responsible for contributing to the arms race of “out-crazying” content, says the platforms may have reached the limit of what’s permissible.
  • "I feel bad for like sort of contributing to where this has gone, but at the time I like never thought of that or like, okay, I set the bar here as crazy..." ([39:26])

10. On Politics, Impact, & Future Aspirations

[47:02–53:19]

• Jake:
  • Sees speaking out on political/social issues as a duty, given his platform; admires the American right to voice opinions.
  • Open to running or helping others run for office if needed to “help the people of America... make sure we don’t get wrapped up into this, like, whole socialist, communist thing...” ([50:23])
  • Top issues: Education reform, especially financial literacy ("...if that education is in place... I think that would be a much better outcome for the people of America." [53:26])
• Jeff: Praises Jake's willingness to risk business for authentic conviction—"That's what leadership actually is. So there's no leaders out there. We're totally screwed. So we need people to step up and lead." ([48:52])

11. Founder Taste, Reference Checks, and Portfolio Construction

[59:43–62:22]

• Jeff:
  • “Founder taste” comes from thousands of reps, exposure to all types, business “dog years.”
  • "Do they have a passion and a reason to believe why they can be world-class? Are they resilient and tough enough to eat a ton of shit to get there?" ([59:43])
• Jake: Relies on references from trusted network, like checking with Palmer Luckey’s team before investing in defense tech.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Jake literally created the influencer term in that like job profile... he's a very generous, thoughtful, kind human being who is very ambitious and is going to not stop in whatever venues that he chooses to participate and compete in.” — Jeff Woo ([02:22])
• "When things are working, double, triple, quadruple down and when they're not, just sweep the things under the rug." — Jake Paul ([05:12])
• "If Jake can just live his life and get a bunch of views and someone has to light $100 million on fire to get a bunch of views, who do I wanna be partners with?" — Jeff Woo ([00:37] & [30:52])
• “Most people can't even be canceled because you didn't exist. So the general advice: Yo, just live more, do more shit in general because you're nothing and you maybe can get out of nothing.” — Jeff Woo ([37:02])
• “Things now have to be like 10, 20, 30 million dollar opportunities for me to spend time on it... a lot of it also is just like instinctual and on the fly and it becomes more and more obvious as time goes on what the good opportunities are.” — Jake Paul ([33:39])
• "Education first and foremost... there's been no change and the world has changed so much." — Jake Paul ([53:26])
• "That's what leadership actually is. So there's no leaders out there. We're totally screwed. So we need people to step up and lead." — Jeff Woo ([48:52])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Announcing the Growth Fund: 00:00, 01:44, 09:01
• Partner Superpowers: 02:08–04:23
• Resilience Discussion: 05:12–07:43; Deep dive at 13:11–16:20
• From Entertainment to Tech: 07:43–09:22; 21:32–25:06
• Attention, Looks, AI: 19:49–21:32
• On Creator Durability: 25:50–30:52
• Risk, Controversy, Press: 35:43–37:59
• Streaming/Content Evolution: 38:04–43:22
• Politics & Future Plans: 47:02–53:19
• Education as a Core Issue: 53:19–56:20
• Founder Taste: 59:43–62:22

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Takeaways for Listeners

• Focus and Resilience are vital—public careers demand thick skin and relentless effort.
• Building Durable Influence comes from multidisciplinary expansion, adaptability, and knowing how to monetize.
• Tech x Culture is the Future: Smart creators can drive industry innovation and investment by understanding both attention and capital flows.
• Pick Missions You Care About: Authentic conviction makes withstanding hardship (and controversy) possible.
• Reference Your Network: Success in investing (and life) hinges on judgment plus networked intelligence.
• Next-Gen Impact: Education reform and economic empowerment for young people are top priorities for those wanting lasting societal impact.

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For more on the conversation and future episodes, visit a16z.com or follow them on social platforms.

Transcript

[Jake Paul]

We're officially announcing the $100 million over subscribed growth fund and some of the tier one names, maybe all the tier one names. Anduril, etched Cognition, Saronic, Modal.

[Jeff Woo]

When we announced, Antifun was like, gw, like you're making a mistake. Jake is not like, good, you're ruining your career. And we're just like, whatever, bro. Mark and Dreeson and Chris Dixman were some of our very, very first LPs. When you have like the living goats of the industry being like, hey, you guys are good, it's like o, let's do it.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Jake, given your career, you could have partnered with a lot of different people. When did you guys know that you were gonna be such a partner?

[Jeff Woo]

One way I think about it is that like if Jake can just live his life and get a bunch of views and someone has to light $100 million in fire to get a bunch of views, who do I wanna be partners with?

[Jake Paul]

I think a lot of people in this space don't know how to actually pull cash out. They can have a lot of followers, but not the cash. And cash is king.

[Podcast Narrator/Announcer]

What happens when one of the Internet's biggest creators teams up with a longtime Silicon Valley investor? Jake Paul and Jeff Woo started ANT with a simple back ambitious founders building the future. What began as an early stage venture strategy has now expanded into a new $100 million growth fund with investments across AI, defense, aerospace, infrastructure and software. In this conversation they discuss investing, entrepreneurship, resilience and what they look for in the founders and companies shaping the next decade. Jake Paul and Jeff Woo join the podcast to talk about Anti Fund's next chap. Jake.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Jeff, we've got some big news. Thanks for coming on the podcast today to discuss it. We've got a growth fund. Why don't you share the big news?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, we're officially announcing the growth fund that we've been working on for quite some time in some of the tier one names. A lot of the tier one names, maybe all the tier one names. Andoral etched cognition, SpaceX, OpenAI, anthropic, saronic, modal. So yeah, the list goes on a

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

lot where collaborators in maybe let's just zoom out first. Jeff, for those who are not familiar from what you can see beyond the surface, how would you describe Jake's superpowers that led him to be the amazing partner for you here? And then I'm going ask Jake the same.

[Jeff Woo]

I think Jake from the outside could be like a entertainer or professional athlete, but I think to me Jake's always been a constant entrepreneur one, and then two. I think he's really created himself as a tastemaker and a cultural leader of his generation. Right. Like all the young kids today look up and want to be an influencer. Jake literally created the influencer term in that like job profile. If you think about him instantiating the daily vlog. So I think it's easy to, especially with the Internet character, like you take pieces of that Persona and just put that as a whole human. But the underlying threat is I think he's a very generous, thoughtful, kind human being who is very ambitious and is going to not stop in whatever venues that he chooses to participate and compete in. So I think if it's entertainment, media, sports, and hopefully with venture capital growth, equity investing, we take that on together.

[Jake Paul]

Thank you, Jeff.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Why don't you say the same for Jeff? I'll say the same question, then we'll get into both your stories.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I think Jeff is one of the smartest people that I know just across the board and I think the work ethic and his background being so different than mine as well. We make such a great team, you know, computer science, Stanford, but his deep, deep networks and we just think similarly in a lot of things and I think that lends itself really well to being great partners. But yeah, he's non stop thinking ahead and sees a lot of things before they come around the corner. And he actually said no to investing in my first company when I was 18 years old and the company failed. So he was right. So just really great judgment, great people. You know, this is the people business. And so just being able to really read people and have that EQ as well as IQ is really important.

[Jeff Woo]

You're just making us flatter each other.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah.

[Jeff Woo]

Eric, you're an og, so I appreciate compliments you as well, I appreciate.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Well, I mean speaking of og, I remember Corey Levy many years ago said, hey, I've got this kid you gotta meet. He's building something super interesting, he's super talented. And I was out of town, I was like, ah, you know, he ended up introducing but we never ended up meeting. And I remember sometimes I reflect back, I'm like, holy. First off, Corey's incredible judge of talent. But two, it's like you gotta take bets on the up and coming tuck because you never know where they're gonna end up. Jake, the idea that someone would become a media sort of mogul, then professional athlete, then a tech investor, that's like a pretty distinct path. Say more about what other people can learn from how you took your path. Was it all organic or what was sort of your strategy or how do you even retroactively make sense of your sort of multi hyphenate career?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, it's really interesting, I think always being like entrepreneur first and very analytical and when things are working double, triple, quadruple down and when they're not, just sweep the things under the rug. And so that's what someone once said

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

about Async Z. I love that they just launch a bunch of stuff and then when it doesn't work, you just pretend it never happened.

[Jake Paul]

Seriously, I failed so many times to get to this point and made so many mistakes. And I think it's resilience in this day and age and having a public career as well and being a public figure, I think you have to have tons of resilience. You have to know yourself, you have to be go through ups and downs. But I think being an entrepreneur at heart, I always looked at everything from a business lens and always hustled and showed up every single day and knocked down every single door of opportunity and always wanted to grow my network. I think that's been a super powerful thing that differentiates me is always knowing the right person at the right times to ask them for help or ask them for a favor and also doing favors for them when they need you and not charging for it. I think people in this entertainment world are very transactional and short thinking and not professional. They show up late. I've always tried to be the most professional entertainer and so that's lend itself well. And then when I went to box, it kind of started as this crazy thing, but then it was a million pay per View buys, 30,000 tickets sold out. I had a blast doing it. I was like, okay, content experiment for

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

you or did you know you were gonna go all in?

[Jake Paul]

No, I didn't know I was gonna go all in. But after the first one, it was like, this was absolutely massive. I'm gonna become world champion. And that was like a pivot moment where it's like, yeah, this content stuff's cool and doing great, but I can still do content within boxing. But this boxing match was the most viewed amateur event ever. 30, 000 tickets sold. The press conferences were getting tens of millions of views. So I was like, clearly people love this and I love it, and so I'm going to go all in. And then that lends itself to now being one of the highest paid athletes on the Forbes list because of just following the numbers. So I think Being analytical as an entertainer is also important.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Do you have the content you have is massively high grossing boxing career? Why get into tech?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, so I think it was actually, again, just being an entrepreneur at heart, but it was actually one of my first loves was the Valley and coming out here when I was 17 with Corey and Alex Debalov, actually, and they showed me all these crazy companies and I got to meet some really smart people who were building the future and seeing like even Corey's after school setup where he had all the screens and all the employees were there. And it was just like so different and so cool. And that's when I fell in love with wanting to make my own startups and being a founder, but also being in the investor world and even understanding how it works and all the VC lingo and started growing my network. And so it's really always been there since I was a kid and it's always been something that I loved. And then when I was 23, I wanted to take a bigger bite at the apple and that's when I met Jeff and the stars aligned and we just decided to go bigger and bigger

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

and bigger and bigger.

[Jake Paul]

And turns out that we're actually really good at it. So it's fun when things are working and it's fun helping shape the future of America with these companies.

[Jeff Woo]

And it's like a full story. Like Mark Andreessen and Chris Dixman were some of our very, very first LPs. So appreciate them for helping us put us into business and also giving us a confidence. They've seated almost every single emerging manager. So when they see, hey, like when you have like the living goats of the industry being like, hey, you guys are good, it's okay. Let's. Let's do it.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I was just telling the story. I think they were our first pitch call for the fund and I was like all nervous before and didn't even have the full pitch perfected yet. And so, yeah, by the end of the call, they were just like, all right, yeah, we'll like, we'll invest. And we're like, okay, great, perfect.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah. And when did you guys know that you were going to be such a partner? Because, Jake, given your career, you could have partnered with a lot of different people. And for you is also a risk of, hey, it wasn't as common back in the day to maybe partner with YouTubers in this way. When did you know that you were going to be partners?

[Jeff Woo]

I feel if I can start. And it's really funny because we were Just spending the weekend with the all in podcast besties and Jason Kelakanis. And I remember when we announced Anti Fun, J. Kel was like, gw, you're making a mistake. Jake is not good. You're ruining your career. And we're just like, whatever, bro. And it's like a full circle moment because I joke about it now. But one, I think, like, there's no beef. It was fun to play poker with those guys. But two, like, J. Kel, you're a podcaster. You're trying to be what Jake invented. You are a VC turned influencer. And I think we will give you guys a run for money from who can be the better investor. No, but I remember Shots Fired. But I remember that I found that Jake was very wise for 23, 24. And what I mean by that is I think very few people have the amount of inbound requests, outbound requests for their time across so many different spectrums. I would say that one way I compliment Jake is that he context switches so widely, right? There's one moment for this paparazzi, he's going to events and he's like a celebrity on a red carpet and he's blinged out in influencer gear. Next moment he's a professional athlete training and preparing for a massive Netflix headline fight. Next moment he's like negotiating business deals and inside the weeds of numbers and like his, his metrics. And then you pivot off to the next thing, then he's like filming a TikTok, right? And I think in Silicon Valley there's a lot of smart people and I think the context switching is pretty wide as a founder. But to go from like go entertainment mode to like serious quantitative analytic mode, that broadly is. Is very, very impressive. One, and then two, I think Jake has the one word that you mentioned is that resiliency. Like, Jake has just seen a lot of shit like coming up in Hollywood going through the influencer phase, going through controversy, like surviving it, having haters, like most people do not eat that much pain. And I think that if you think about investing or startups, it's pain tolerance. And if you're literally fighting and punching people or getting punched on the face for a living. And then two, like the Internet punching you, right? Which is like the most toxic environment, like Internet troll trolls, like hating on YouTube, if you can survive that and thrive in that environment, that's presidential head of state level courage and resiliency. So those two things I think is what is inspiring to me in terms of how much can I context which how much pain tolerance can I have? And hopefully that's what we can imbue with our startup founders and our portfolio companies and our co investors. Right. That human quality that is very rare is inspiring to me and hopefully for the people that we work with.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

On that note, Jake, what can people learn from you about resilience and pain tolerance? Is it just something you've had since you were a kid? Is something you've learned over time? Is it something you've, you know, just sort of like been pushed off the deep end?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, no, I, I think it's a little bit of all of those things. I think I had like a very intense father, so I think it started there and just being able to deal with, with, with him and growing up in that environment and I think the hard work and that led me to a very public career. It all started with people actually like hating on me from day one, like in my school. So there was never like a moment where me making the videos didn't have like a ton of haters. My whole school in high school like turned against me and was like talking, making anonymous accounts, saying things about me. My principal teachers were saying things. So it's always been there. So I think I'm just used to it because of that, which is pretty interesting. And then you're like, what else are you gonna do? Like, I don't know, just be a coward and quit and give up and let people run you? Like, I could just never be that person. And I just don't think that way. And I know who I am. I think that's very important as well. And I feel like a lot of people know who they are, but they let the comments and critics like get to them very easily. And so if you could just look yourself in the mirror and be like, I'm doing good, I'm a good person, I'm doing good things in the world, I have a good heart. I mean well, and if you can mean those things, then it doesn't matter what anyone says.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah. When people ask you is like, hey, are tools like therapy helpful or other sort of self care tools? They're physical or emotional or mental to help deal with. Like what do you tell them?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, definitely. I fully believe that. I think you just have to be careful, you know, you don't want the therapy to like turn into victimizing yourself and then always being in constant sad loops. So I think you have to be careful and at some points if it feels needed. Yes. But I don't think you should get like trapped into the cycle of therapy and always kind of having a call with someone or an in person meeting with someone that is generally probably going to be negative. And so I think it's very important like who that therapist is as well. But I do think it's important to learn about yourself and unpack things. And I think the childhood like trauma and going back and realizing like, oh, you know, you know, you had this that happened to you and this is maybe why you have anxiety in this moment and these things. And so I really like childhood trauma work that you can connect to why you behave certain ways as an adult. Yeah. And I think it's important to unpack those things and learn about it totally.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Jeff, why don't you also make sense of some of like when you reflect in your career, looking back, you've taken some big swings in some different spaces. When you look back at the, the threads that have tied your career together, how do you make sense of it? What are some of the big insights you've had that have led you to go deep on certain things?

[Jeff Woo]

I guess like I've always been like a, almost an academic or engineer or scientist at heart. How do you, like, what is the nature of reality? What is the truth? What are the underlying systems or rules that govern yourself, a company, a society? Right. So if I think about some of the things I've been interested in, whether it's biohacking, how do you optimize your, your, your singular person? Actually that's how I got to know the Andreessen family with Keaton iq. Chris Dixon was our seed investor. I wanted to figure out how we could engineer better brain performance, human performance. And then you think about at the like the larger scales, right? How do you impact culture? How do you impact society? What is the right way to organize a company, organize a venture firm, organize a nation state, right? Like that's like the largest scale of optimization. So. So I think there's like a tinkerer or like a student or an academic that just likes just figuring out those different systems. And then the second part is I think with a little bit of battle scars and wisdom, just like fewer things that just compound really, really well. So now I think about why venture and growth is a very interesting problem to play with is that managing $1 to $100 to a million dollars to a billion dollars is kind of the same level of hard, right? It's like hard to spend a hundred dollars really well. It's hard to spend a hundred billion dollars really well. But it's you only need like one or two people or three people to manage 100 bucks or 100 billion bucks, right? Like those are the best investors are just like really, really strong conviction folks who just are making big bets. So that's where I think we've gravitated towards. And I think Jake has a different lens on how he can scale his thought leadership and cultural leadership and his ability to convene and bring people together at the higher and higher scales. So I think that's like a shared level of, just like shared ambition and maybe arrogance in terms of we think we can play at those highest levels of wielding capital, wielding technology building culture. So if that is like the end point of just like, okay, what are the underlying rules of nature, rules of reality, what's the most efficient way to start pulling and playing with those levers? So I think science, computer science, physics are foundational to just the nature of reality. And then capital is the lever of, of, of like human society and civilization. And I think where anti fun has been quite unique is that in a world where there's more and more capital, is attention more scarce, is be able to control mind share more scarce. So one of the original questions, like why is Sheik like an ideal partner? It's like you, you really can't name a better partner than Jake Paul in terms of wielding attention and driving cultural taste. So if you can really master those two lovers, maybe we can control the world. Right? Like, or let's just try and have someone stop us.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah, There was a famous tweet of if, if you're smart, pivot to being hot or you know, if you're, if you're focused on intelligence, you pivot to being, you know, willing attention. You had this blog post of, you know, there's two jobs, AI maxing and looks maxing. Why don't you talk about that?

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah, no, I think it's, I think it's actually true, which is that the only thing that really will matter is that if we assume that like we're pretty AGI pilled intelligence is just going to be metered out through computer, then what matters? Then it's like one like your relationship with people. And I think looks maxing is like a pretty narrow focus on like, you know, the physical appearance matters and like people like people that look good and symmetric and healthy. So that's fine. But I think it's beyond just looks. It's like your vibe, your, your ability to just be charismatic and engage with people. So that's like an important skill set in the future, can you just have better vibes than everyone else? And I think with Venture, right, like, I think, I think what you've done with the media strategy for Andreessen Horowitz, I mean, you guys are literally executing on look, smacking the VC world essentially. Right? Like you guys have your own propaganda arm just pushing out your view of the world. And then the second part is that like, okay, if you don't have, maybe you're not maxing out on vibes and you got to just be best at wielding intelligence. So all you got to do is like play with codex and be on the computer all day long. And then on this, on the, on the other side, work out, sleep a lot and looks max, then you got everything covered.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

If you were 22, like just getting out of college today, but in 2026, what would that look like in terms of how you'd want to spend your time?

[Jeff Woo]

I was, we're just, we were just stopping by Stanford and Jake's going to go back to college and so that might be an answer that he can actually think about.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I want to play on the Stanford football team, actually. So we'll see what happens.

[Jeff Woo]

He's going to do one year on the Stanford team and they get drafted. The Cleveland Browns. It's happening.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Let's go.

[Jeff Woo]

I'm actually like old school in the sense that like, and I think I've saw that earlier in my career where like, oh, if computer science and math is automated, then you don't need to study this stuff and just do like cultural or other fuzzy stuff. I would just go deeper and deeper into actually understanding math, actually understanding computer science. Because if you actually know underlying how these large language models are actually working, you actually can wield them and prompt them better. So I'm actually like doubling down that, yes, like get really good at math, get really good at computer science, right? Like the people that are leading these industries are, are like math champions, right? Like Scott Woo. And all these guys are just hardcore at that stuff. And you know, you know, we were hanging out with Scott at their office a couple months back. So you'd get technically brilliant, a version of AI. Like maxing is basically just max your IQ and max your eq, right? Like that's another just like a simpler way to put it. And like looks maxing and a maxing are just like the more culture, like currently cultural relevant terms for it.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Would you start a company? Would you join Anthropic or OpenAI or

[Jeff Woo]

you just gotta gang up with the smartest most ambitious people possible. And that could either be your own startup or it could be joining OpenAI. But I think the most important thing is team up with like minded ambitious people that will push you to be the best version of yourself. So if that's a company then go let's and we'll like Jake and I will back you. If it's joining OpenAI cognition, somebody's like really, really high growth companies so you can learn a little bit before you jump into the deep end yourself. That's also great. But I think the most important thing is just get with really, really smart ambitious people and team up and grow together.

[Jake Paul]

I'm not technical so I think it would be a harder place for me but I think I would probably try to be in VC coming out of college and yeah, hopefully if I made a lot of good connections at Stanford, my buddies that I would seed seed their genius ideas.

[Jeff Woo]

But don't cut yourself short. Like we had Jake was On his like MacBook codexing and yeah I got

[Jake Paul]

my GitHub's popping so

[Jeff Woo]

his commits.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Well, I was going to ask if you were 22 today, in 2026 or 18 even, could you run the same playbook or is there something about what you did, you know, on YouTube or sort of these new platforms when you were younger that is like wouldn't work in the same way today and you'd have to find a new like to me, to me it's obvious, you know boxing you just gotta be the best in the world, you gotta beat the other person. But in terms of what works on sort of the creator space, it doesn't seem to be as an outsider as obvious. And so I'm curious if the same kind of media playbook would have worked, you know, 10, 15 years later or it's.

[Jake Paul]

No, I mean I, I don't think it would. I think there's very few, you know, people breaking through on the media side of things. It's a lot harder to grow, a lot harder to amass a following and to be a known brand and to rise to the top. You know, you kind of had to be there from the start and that's why you really see with brands that have stuck around at the highest level in social Media, it's me, Mr. Beast and my brother and there's really no one else.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

And what was your, for people who are not as familiar, like what was your insight in terms like what were you doing that was so new or that that amassed such an audience so quickly?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I think a lot of it was, I mean, I think you just have to be entertaining. And I, me and my brother were doing that, posting every single day like 15 minute videos that were, that took the whole day to film. So just effort first and foremost, the entertainment in it. And then I think diversifying with like characters. So I basically created like daily reality show with all these people on it and all these crazy things happening. And that was cutting edge at the time. And then just always being the visionary of like what's working, what trends, you know, okay, let's make a rap song. And then all of a sudden it's like one of the generational anthems of this of you know, younger kids know every single word of it. It's like, oh, the music worked. Okay, let's make more songs, let's make a whole album, let's make a Christmas album. So constantly just like bits of iteration but you know, spanning the full spectrum of entertainment. So it was like songs, comedy. I would make like scary videos, you know, have the fear aspect of it. Then all of a sudden I'm going into athleticism, which is boxing and that whole side of entertainment as well. And so I think the modern day entertainers have to do it all.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

We went to Mr. Beast's sort of place in North Carolina, Jimmy's place rather, and he sort of gave us a tour and he was showing how just analytical the whole operation is. Yeah, was much yours, much more kind of artistic or creative or emergent in terms of like, oh, just around and find out or like how did you. In terms of like what to spend time on, what to do in comparison to something a beast operation.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I think it's, it's similar but I think Jimmy is like a numbers guy and is super analytical and mine is definitely analytical but not the level that Jimmy is with, with how he does things. And mine is more creative, like entertainment focused and just like kind of like a feeling thing like you're saying. But that's why, you know, Jimmy just maxed out the Numbers on, on YouTube and just did every little thing possible to hack the algorithm.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

It's interesting because there are a lot of people who will get big but not be super durable. Whereas, you know, you just mentioned you and your brother and Jimmy's the ones that really struck out and I'm curious why. Some people get big for a period of time, but. And I'll hear, hear about them, they're being on TikTok, they've been on some platform, but I, I don't hear about them years later.

[Jake Paul]

Like it's yeah, I've seen the, the biggest stars in the space from like day one. Just not stick around anymore. It's weird. It's really weird. There's a group called magcon. Back in the day they were like the Justin Biebers of the Internet world and actually Shawn Mendes like spun out of there. He was the one that's like obviously made it really big. But it's just interesting. I think people maybe don't have that resiliency. They get tired of working or making content or going to the new platform or you know, lose motivation, whatever it might be. And I think the people who are like truly destined to do this and love doing it and that are talented at are the ones that have lasted longer and I think you almost have to. Yeah, diversify. Like we've gotten into politics, business, growing brands and so you start to have this audience that follows you for multiple different things. Some people Love My Ranch YouTube videos and, and like only know about that and don't even. But I also have, I'm on a 16Z podcast where like now people in the tech world are hearing about what I'm doing, but they probably won't watch my TikToks. So I'm doing all these different things and growing audiences in all of these different worlds and I think that's been the key and then I think also knowing how to monetize it and make money and I think that's been a reason for us to continue to exist because I think a lot of people in the space don't know how to actually pull cash out. They can have a lot of followers, but not the cash. And cash is king. So I think that's been another very important reason for the, I don't even know, 13, 14 years of being at the top of the influencer game.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah, I, I think to me Jake is a startup in it of himself and in startup land, right. It's all power law. And I think essentially Jake has hit escape velocity. So I think, I think Jake gets even more powerful in this new era of AI generated characters and, and just infinite noise because you'll have a lot of AI generated content and the people that you grew up watching, loving and just supporting or hating as, as a child. And like that generation is now going to take over from the boomers who are going to be dying off and all of that I think you compound just like an open AI and anthropic are compounding even faster. So that's sort of like I'm just kind of excited Just on the, on the path forward. Because it's basically like Celebrity Survivor battle, right? Like, literally everyone has died off except for, like, the predestined few. And I think the predestined few literally should be like the future billionaire trillionaires if you just extrapolate out that exponential. Because there's going to be fewer real people that, like, you, like, care about. And I think who I would almost like, juxtapose Jake and Logan with like, a Mr. Beast. And I don't. I mean, whatever. I'll just. I'll just say it as, like, I feel like Mr. Beast is like, so quantitative and analytical that it doesn't matter if Jimmy's in the video or not. Like, swap him out for another, you know, game show host. Maybe they're not as smooth, but I don't think Jimmy would say that he's even that smooth of a natural, like, actor or character. But like, his analytics and his taste in terms of selecting the content format is very, very strong core. I think Jake has a lot of durability. Is that like, you follow his story? I guess one way I think about it is that if Jake can just talk and get a bunch of views or just live his life and get a bunch of views and someone has to light $100 million in fire to get a bunch of views, who do I want to be partners with? Who do I think has true skill and true charisma without overly calling other people? But, like, I think that is like a measure in terms of, like, how do you take like an analytical lens and like a structural lens to how do you backward engineer? What has Jake has been able to

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

accomplish to that end? You said, you just said, you know, casually, people, you need to figure out how to monetize. How have you figured out what's worth doing from a business perspective of what's not worth doing? Like, for example, I don't know if you've been in feature films yet and had major, major roles. Like, should you be doing that or is that a waste of time? Like, there's a whole set of activities that, where you could do it, you'd have some special access or opportunity to do it. People might be telling you you should do it. How do you think about that?

[Jake Paul]

That's something that we've talked about and explored. There's been opportunities on the table to act, for example, but I think it's just like, what was the time expenditure? What was the, like, return in terms of, you know, how much money are we making here? And then who Are the people involved and is it going to perform well? And do we like this script? And there's the risk of something going wrong and just like it flops at the box office and everyone shits on you. Like it happens all the time. So I think it's yeah, just staying focused. Right. Like having the boxing as the core of, of everything for many years and, and content and so never getting away from your bread and butter and staying extremely focused on that and having a great teams around to, to help with all of those things. But yeah, I think things now have to be like 10, 20, 30 million dollar opportunities for me to spend time on it. And so I think it's pretty measurable from that side of things to the, you know, figure out if, if it's exciting in that sense. And then I think just on the, besides the money thing and just brand building, I've just been doing it for so long that it's just like instinctual. Like is this a good idea? Yes or no. And it's pretty, pretty obvious. But there are strategy talks and high level people that huddle around the board and sometimes I'll film a piece of content and maybe not post it because it doesn't make sense. So there is like processes and teams that look at everything and conversations and it, it is pretty strategic. But a lot of it also is just like instinctual and on the fly and it becomes more and more obvious as time goes on what the good opportunities are.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

All good press. Good good press or sorry, is all all press good press or most attention good attention? Or when you look at some of the controversial moments that you guys have been through or that you see other people in through, do you think that they have been successful in spite of those moments or because of the instinct that led to those moments? Or how do you think about in this new era of attention? Yeah, this question.

[Jake Paul]

I would say that not all press is good press for certain people. For me, yes. Because I can like survive it. And like you're antifragile. Yeah. And just it's, it's, you know, what are they gonna say? Like the my neighbor. Like the first reason I was hated from the very beginning like on a mat in the mainstream was because I jumped on top of a news van. So it's like that, that's seriously why people started hating me. They're like, look at this douchebag. And I was like making fun of the news reporters shoes and it's like, okay, like it seemed like bad press at the time, but like that was like my first like mainstream moment really in the, in the press. And so I think for certain people, all press is good press. But I don't think it's a saying that is good for. For everybody and holds true for everybody.

[Jeff Woo]

Everything you do has risk. Just don't take fatal risk. Like just don't get yourself killed and probably. And don't go to jail though people have come back from that. But like don't go to jail, don't die. And as long as you take risks and calculated bets and keep compounding, you'll eventually end up somewhere good. So I think that's like my take on that, on that question, which is that like, I think most people are just too afraid to do anything that even warrants press. So. So like I think when you're already have a platform, then yes, maybe you can be a little bit more cautious, but most people are just totally irrelevant. Like you need to do something a little bit risky to even get to a place to be cancelable. Most people can't even be canceled because you didn't exist. So the general advice like yo, just live more, do more shit in general because you're nothing and you maybe can get out of nothing.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Retard Max.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah. Another way. Retard Max is cool too. Yeah.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

The. I want to understand this new media environment by analyzing a couple of people. Can you guys explain clavicular, as in why is. What's his talent? What makes him so successful? What advice might you have for, for someone like that? How do you make sense of.

[Jeff Woo]

I mean, I mean it's kind of

[Jake Paul]

what you just said. What Jeff just said is. And he's doing it on the, on the highest level. It's entertaining. I think I've. I've had this saying that I've used and I think it holds true in the world of entertainment is that people want to see something they've never seen before. And so it's so new and fresh and different and kind of crazy. But a lot of the stuff he says is true. His delivery isn't always the best or whatever and he is like very abrasive. It doesn't care. But he's talking about a lot of relevant things and everything is out there about him. So you fully know him. And he's not afraid to be fully authentic and say exactly. Expose himself to the world. And I don't think people have done that. And, and that's why I think he's, he's been successful. And then he's also doing things that generate bad press. But it, you know, good news travels fast, bad news travels faster. So it's growing his brand like wildfire and then it just turns into this like loop and he's able to convert it actually into views and then he, he keeps on going and that. But I, yeah, it, it is, it is pretty wild. And I think the streaming culture is like really interesting and probably not the best for society because like there's so many of these kids watching and I actually feel like what I was doing on YouTube, like this is the final iteration of it and I feel bad for like sort of contributing to where this has gone, but at the time I like never thought of that or like, okay, I set the bar here as crazy. And now people, the streamers have to do it every day for multiple hours and to keep people's attention they're having to like do out of pocket shit, which I don't think is like a good influence, but there is. Obviously it's entertaining. So.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

And just to. For people not as familiar. My understanding from my limited, you know, observations is he. Some of his content is, well, he's a streamer and some of his content is him like going to the club and talking to girls and having very sort of humorous conversations. And then some content is sort of focused on his looks maxing journey and just giving a lot of advice and doing interviews and kind of saying, you know, sort of out of pocket. You sort of do your, your term around sort of relationships or gender norms or just sort of like, you know, how to look much better. So much to the extent he's invested, so much that there was rumors for a while that he may be not able to conceive or something that he may have. But I, I think that's no longer true. I can't remember exactly is that accurate summary of what like what is Clover doing?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I would say that's accurate with noting like, yeah, he's definitely like very controversial and like taking drugs on the stream and doing pretty crazy things like that. So.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah, yeah, you spent, I mean he spent some time like he, he like joined Jake's first live stream ever. Like what was like in person.

[Jake Paul]

Like I thought he was nice. Yeah. That he was a nice guy. Definitely pretty wild on his stream though. And I'm wild, you know, as an entertainer known as that. I can turn that on. But yeah, so if I like him saying that then it's probably pretty, pretty wild.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Is streamer culture today when you say you were sort of the previous evolution, where do you see it all going Is it just going to get crazier and crazier? Are we going to sort of see new formats or how do you sort of envision the future of kind of like what you, you know, help. Help create?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I think we will see new formats and people pop up that are unique and different, but I, I think that the players that are in it now and are the biggest now will likely remain the biggest. And so I don't think it'll shift too much in terms of like, all the personalities, but I do think things will get crazy, slightly crazier. But it's probably already near its peak because the platforms now, like, aren't allowing certain things to be streamed and they're already getting, like, you know, deplatformed if they do certain things. So I think it's probably at its. At its peak right now with some of the things that are going on.

[Jeff Woo]

I mean, talking about, like, you can't die, you can't go to jail. Right? Like, at some point someone's gonna step on that and boom. Yeah, you peak, you that the end. End game of that.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

I recently learned that there's like, that kick is like a twitch, but more edgy. But then there's like, Rumble is like a even more edgy version of that. There's just like different streaming platforms for different levels of edginess.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, exactly.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

To your point, which is going to controversy point for, like, when you look at some of the stuff that's been like, the hardest for, for you to handle, or the biggest controversial moments, or when other people come to you and are like, holy, I'm in this, you know, massive scandal or something. How do you, how have you, like, bounced back from that? Or how do you advise people to bounce back from just like the toughest. We were like, people actually trying to cancel you and they're succeeding a little bit.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah. I think faith and God. I think God gives its toughest battles to his most important soldiers. And so there's always, for me, in all of those moments, I had to, like, learn something, go through something and grow. And it's always on the other side of it. Once I've gotten out of certain situations and learned a lot of things, etc, it's prepared me to fly higher in life and do more things. And so I think everything happens for a reason. And yeah, you can't, like, victimize yourself and know that if you come out on the other side of it, you will be stronger and that will lead and lend to a bigger and better life.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah. Jeff, how about You, I mean, I think Jake puts it really, really nicely in terms of whether it's faith in like a higher power or just like a conviction in yourself that what you're doing is truly worth fighting for and battling for and standing and like dying for. Right. So I think it's like. And that's why I think just choosing the right mission is so important. Right. Like a lot of things that people choose to do they probably do not care for, right? Like if you hate your job and be still putting, you know, 40 hours, 50 hours a week on it and you're like getting attacked or critiqued for it and like there's no conviction there. So in some sense, if you just choose the right battles to fight for and you're willing to take those arrows because you believe in the mission, you believe in the message, that almost like helps you with that faith because like you actually believe and have conviction in what you're fighting for. Like, you know, we're invested some of the top, most high profile AI companies and those are some of the topics that we're able to just like, I think especially Jake can like share his perspective on. Right. If people are going through like really high profile, like hate on social media or litigation and controversy, I think Jake having lived through that at some of the highest levels and sharing that how he deals with it is like just super helpful for founders that we talk to and work with. But I think it just goes back to, I think if they believe in the mission they're doing, right? If you think that you're making beneficial AGI or you really believe fusion energy or defense tech and making Americans have the best weapon systems as really important, which we think is really important, then having that strength to fight and battle for that makes it easier. If you have that self conviction that what you're doing is correct.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

You know, someone once asked something like, you know, it seems like you're not that interested in politics. Why is that? Is it something like it doesn't help me with my looks maxing journey. So as I say, how have you guys sort of approached politics or not approached politics or. Yeah, how have you guys thought about that?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I think it's always been my goal and a part of who I am since I was younger is to like help the people around me and to be a leader and to speak my mind on certain things. And I think when I'm in this position of having a large audience and as an American, we all have our right to our opinion and to voice our opinion. That's One of the most beautiful things about this country. And I think with a lot of people following me, I've taken it upon myself to speak my mind on what I believe in and to hopefully help others understand as well and grow a deeper understanding of politics and some of the things that are going on. And I believe it's important as American to exercise that right to our opinion and to voice our opinion. And I've just slowly, you know, started to talk more and more about it openly. And I think it comes from my dad as well. He was very political growing up. And I've always been involved in it and seeing it and talking about it. And I think it's the biggest game in life. And I think it's interesting to be in those rooms and to talk to those people and to help them, you know, potentially win certain elections, whether that's governor or president or senator. So it's just been interesting and fun and. And I think it really, truly does make an impact to the American people and society.

[Jeff Woo]

And I just want to say that's one thing I respect about Jake, because I know that a lot of people in the public eye are too afraid to step into politics because it's not good for business, right? Like Michael Jordan, like, everyone buys shoes or whatever like that, that quote. But I respect that, Jake. And we just had conversations about this where it's like, you know, like, if you actually have conviction, like God or your faith will, like, pay full dividends for that conviction, right? And I think there's. And I think there's something to like, life and your family and your culture, your neighborhood, your communities, arguably more important, just like stacking more zeros behind your account, right? Like, at a certain point, like, you win the money maxing game. You win the money game, then it's like, can you actually create a better livelihood for yourself, your kids, your neighbors, your community? And it takes courageous people like Jake to be like, hey, like, I'm okay to like, take a little bit of risk and maybe piss off a segment of people, but I truly believe in this. It's not some bs. Like, there's like, there's a deep conviction that he will sacrifice monetary opportunity or just reduce optionality because there's true belief and true conviction behind his perspective. That's what that is, what leadership actually is. So there's no leaders out there. We're totally screwed. So we need people to step up and lead.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Could you see yourself running someday for some sort of elected position?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, I could see being involved for sure. And I think it's like, become more and more of a thing. I think Jeff was the first person actually to talk about it six years ago. And then obviously President Trump, like, endorsed me on stage to run for president. And then backstage was like, I think you should really do it, etc. I would only want to be involved in it if I was, like, the best person to do it and to help the. The country. And if some other people on the other side of things that weren't good for the country felt like they had tract, I would probably do it to. Yeah, help the people of America and make sure we don't get wrapped up into this, like, whole socialist, communist thing that's going on, like, in New York with Mom Don. Dummy. Mom dummy. Yeah, that's it. It's really bad. And it will lead to America being in a very, very bad place. And so if something like that's going on and there's something I can do to help, then, yeah, of course I'm gonna want to get involved or even maybe just help push a candidate and support them.

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

So you spent the first 15 years or so, you know, we talk about media, you know, boxing, tech. If you were to guess over the next five to 10 years, what's something else you might add to your repertoire besides obviously going much bigger in the areas you're already in. What. What could that be?

[Jake Paul]

I would probably say the. The most, like, obvious one that I'm, like, super passionate about is. Is definitely politics. And that seems to, you know, grow as I get older as well. Because of what Jeff was saying is like, how do I. Okay, we have the money, we have this stuff, like, how do I help the world and do my part? And I have the courage and I believe the right mindset on it and the right way to think about it and finding truth not only within myself, but that becomes a practice out there in the world. And so I believe that a lot of my takes and opinions and thoughts on it are the ones closest to truth and religious. Finding what's best for the people and for the country and for, you know, creating the future for my kids. And if I can be helpful in that, and I think, and I know I can, and I know I have very. A very good way of thinking about things, then, yeah, I would definitely see myself in the next 10 to 15 years in that arena, for sure.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Last question on this topic. High level. What are the. What's the topic or what are the topics that you care most about in. In that arena that. Making sure we really get Right, Yeah.

[Jake Paul]

I mean, I think education first and foremost and I think it's like, so it's, it's bad. It hasn't been reformed since, you know what, the 1920s, the 1930s. There's been no change and the world has changed so much. And I think there you see with, you know, being in the investing world, you see some of these, like newer aged startups that are focused on school popping up. What's the one? Alpha. Alpha school very like impressed with what they're doing. And I think creating that future, you're almost, you know, planting seeds of a fruit tree with changing the education system because then in 30, 40 years the country is going to have a lot smarter people, a lot better educated people. And that ripple effect just impacts society so much and in a massive way. And we also don't want to fall behind with other, other countries. And I think it also lends itself to finance. And the number one problem I think that's out there right now with young men and young women even is like, how do they make money? Where do they make money? And if that education is in place and you're prepared and you actually learn about maybe how to do taxes in school and not like about the Pythagorean theorem, I, I think that would be a much better outcome for the people of America. And it's just wild to me that something like that isn't taught amongst many other things. And so I believe the economy would thrive more from education. And yeah, the list goes, the list goes on.

[Jeff Woo]

But I mean, I think one thing that's cool is like the Invest America accounts, the Trump accounts, I know that Jake is supporting the team there on that. Maybe you want to talk a little bit more about that. But I think in terms of allowing the next generation of young Americans actually participate with the fastest growing private companies and having them be a shareholder and a stakeholder in success of American innovation is really, really important. Right. That ties into education. Right? To Jake's point, if people don't grow up knowing how to compound their money, right. Like, I think it's, I, I, people should know the Pythagorean theorem and the quadratic equation. But yes, you should know, they shouldn't.

[Jake Paul]

It's literally taking up space in my brain, but like knowing and I don't have a lot of space.

[Jeff Woo]

Okay, so, but knowing how like wealth compounds and how is really important. And I think with like the Trump accounts, like having every little kid see their little stock portfolio and realizing, hey, like this is how money and investing Works is super important to that end.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Jeff, if you were 18 today, knowing what you know, would you go to college? Or like, do you advise people to go to college? How do you think about that?

[Jeff Woo]

Yeah, I think Peter Thiel in some sense is kind of hypocritical when he's like, don't go to college. Where he had Stanford undergrad, Stanford Law School, he got all the badges, right? So not. But I think the underlying point is correct. But to me, like getting a badge is useful if you don't have any other badges, right? Like Jake could not have to have the institutional badge of being educated because he became world class at what he does as a content creator, an athlete, a media personality, an entertainer. But if you're not like Jake, then you need to like get some external badges, right? Like you gotta win a science fair, win a math competition and if happens to be like, you know, you get, you go to Harvard. That's a really good badge to say like, hey, at some external validator that you're at least good at something, right? So to me it's like you, you, I think all of us should try to aspire to be best in the world at something. And it could be the best violin player, it could be the best business person, be the best boxer or the best like, I don't know, podcaster, or just the best like artist or the best like doodler, right? But like everyone should have some God given talent to be potentially the best in the world at. And then two, if there's education badges that help you validate and give you that confidence that you can be, I think it's actually very valuable. But I think in terms of the educational content, I think that will be reformed there. I think the education system will change, but I think the badging system will not change. So my advice would be collect some badges as a kid, right? Become the best YouTuber or go to Stanford, go to Harvard, get some badges. And that I think gives you a lot of confidence to like do the next thing, like a real thing.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Jake, are you seriously considered going to Stanford?

[Jake Paul]

I went there today and I was like, this is beautiful. We went to the church and yeah, I don't know, I think it could be funny or interesting, but I, I, I would definitely, I think it would lend itself. Like I do have NFL aspirations. After boxing, I want to play slot receiver and so I think to, you know, get that experience in college first would be good so I could walk onto the Stanford team. It, yeah, I'm being serious though.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah, well, this might be the first podcast you mentioned it.

[Jake Paul]

So it is and it happened. The idea of it happened today because I was like, well I was originally thinking I'll just go straight to the Cleveland Browns or Dallas Cowboys, but they're probably going to want to see me play first. And so it might be better if I start off in college and have a little bit of an advantage over the younger, not as big kids before going into the NFL.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

That's amazing. The I want to close in some anti fun topics. Jeff, you talked a little bit about founder taste and how important it is and how rare it is to actually have it. Talk about what it means and how you guys have developed it.

[Jeff Woo]

I mean I think through both our journeys, I mean I think I remember like some of our early conversations with Jake. Like Jake's met some of the most weird, crazy, hustler, scammy people through his career. Like going you know, 16 to Hollywood and just like getting thrown to the wolves. Right. So I think, and like me coming up in Silicon Valley, Stanford, Y Combinator, I think we just got a lot of reps at meeting people getting pitched things, doing bad deals, making mistakes. So I don't there might be some talent or EQ or people reading skill, but I think a lot of it is probably just a ton of reps. Right. Like and again going full circle at the top. Like I think I remember, you know re catching up when Jake was 23, 24. It's like, oh man, this guy's like got a lot of reps on a lot of stuff that like 50 old men never deal with, right? Just like, oh like litigation, this business deal someone business issues or success like right. Like just you just had a, like he just like he lives in dog years, right? Like that's like I feel like that's. Laura recently joined a stand up Jake's family office and running it. I mean it's like like the amount of stuff that we've done in the last couple months is just like probably it's like two years worth of like shit in like two months. So. So I think there's like that people reading aspect but I think it ultimately goes down to like okay, do they have a passion and like a reason to believe why they can be world class of what they choose to pursue? And then two are they resilient and tough enough to eat a ton of shit to get there? Those are like the two like attributes and I think that's like, you know, some measure of IQ and then personality

[Jake Paul]

read and, and just yeah track record, you know, and leaning on, on other people that we trust and respect for background on certain people and their dealings with them. So I think reference checks are also very important for us. It's yeah, one of the companies we invested in like a defense tech. We just like hit up Palmer Lucky's team and we're like, yeah, what do you think of this group? So always referencing our, our network for the certain categories of things that we're working on and that's proven to work really well.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

You, you've made investments in some iconic companies. We listed some of them earlier. We'll also put, you know, a bunch of the show notes. But you've also incubated, you know, getting better. Could you see yourself incubating more companies where you have unfair advantage like you did in sort of, you know, betting or. How do you think about that?

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, definitely. I think have been noodling on certain things to found currently and just like seeing how the world is evolving with this current, you know, AI boom and just seeing the world change and all of this stuff. And so there's been ideas and you know, we've grown some of these companies so where they like run themselves, like better, for example. And I spend a limited amount of time on it now because it's just the team is fully built out. And so I think there is a dynamic shift happening for us right now where there's kind of an open slot to potentially found and start something new in this current landscape. And it's definitely enticing, but obviously there's so much going on right now and you know, you could launch a company and then, you know, OpenAI or Claude replicates it next week and you're kind of out of luck.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah, totally. I. And we were talking earlier about the need to monetize it anecdotally. I've seen the sort of creator class get a lot smarter and more sophisticated about, you know, we've never like yourself getting into venture, getting to private equity. But even, you know, Jimmy was originally making chocolate, now he's just bought a bank. He's like, hey, I can make a dollar off a customer. Maybe you can make hundreds of dollars of a customer. And so you guys getting into actually building software product, you know, and companies sort of, I feel like people are getting more sophisticated about where the value is and I'm excited to see that trend continue.

[Jake Paul]

Yeah, thank you. And yeah, I think as we become more sophisticated, yeah, it's like cool to sell. You know, I won't say like which companies or whatever. But like we want to play a bigger game and and shift humanity, you know, while doing that.

[Host (possibly a16z Podcast host, e.g., Sonal Chokshi or another a16z team member)]

Yeah, I think it's a good place to wrap. Yeah, Jake, Jeff, you guys are doing something really exciting. We're excited to be co investors in a number of companies together and more to come. Thanks so much for coming on the podcast.

[Jake Paul]

Thank you man.

[Podcast Narrator/Announcer]

Thanks for listening to this episode of the A16Z podcast. If you like this episode, be sure to like, comment, subscribe, leave us a rating or review and share it with your friends and family. For more episodes go to YouTube, Apple, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify. Follow us on X A16Z and subscribe to our [e-mail] thanks again for listening and I'll see you in the next episode. As a reminder, the content here is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, business, tax or investment advice, or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any A16Z fund. Please note that A16Z and its affiliates may also maintain investments in the companies discussed in this podcast. For more details, including a link to our investments, please see a16z.com disclosures.