Garry Tan is Out Of Office

24:36I guess I just started like church, going church hopping, like trying to find a community, try to see what really resonated for me. Was this a family thing or just you? No, just me in my 20s, you know, a single dude trying to like make my way. Wow. And, you know, there are some pretty fun experiences going to different kinds of churches. I mean, I went to a Korean church and they made me do a faith healing. I went to a Pentecostal church and I had to speak in tongues. Yeah, it was like really interesting to see how many different types of faiths there are. But now I'm on the board of Acts 17, which is sort of the nonprofit that brought Peter Thiel and Pat Gelsinger onto the stage.

25:17And, you know, they talk about their careers and but they also talk about God and they talk about their faith. and one of the things that we really want to give people an option for, especially in this modern time, is the chance to be seeking, right? It's not saying this is definitely right or this is the only way that you could possibly think about the world, but more like, hey, why don't you just go to church and see if it resonates for you. Yeah, and see. It's interesting. I mean, it feels like there's... I don't know if you want to call it a resurgence or maybe people are just being more open about it, but it does seem like there are a lot of people who are starting to take religion and faith more seriously in the tech community, which I will admit for me when I learned that it seemed somewhat counterintuitive.

26:01I think I always felt like science and religion were two very, very different things. Help me make sense of that. Why do you think this is such a—faith and religion is so at the forefront right now in the technology community? I think we're just looking for meaning, right? And then we're at the dawn of AGI. We don't know if a singularity is coming. Maybe it is. I think that there's this very deep existential angst, not just in tech, but broadly. Life, yeah, especially post-COVID. I think that it might be, it's not for everyone, but I think it will help. Maybe a return to Christianity or any faith.

26:43I think that the world actually desperately needs a lot more of that. So, I think it's a different thing in the Bay Area too. I mean, what do you mean? Interesting thing. I mean, it's all non-denominational. It's just like, I guess California faith, it sounds like it's very different than other parts of the country or even the world. Yeah. Sorry. Explain that more. I mean, my sense is there's Methodist, there's Presbyterian. Like these are like very like old traditions that are like very specific. Yeah. And then, you know, if you go to a church in San Francisco or anywhere in L.A. or, you know, or even New York City, like you go to a Redeemer.

27:21And it's not like, you know, steeped in like Baptist, Baptist, Baptist, like, you know. Guilt. Guilt and or like, you know, hellfire and brimstone. Right. It's I mean, it's very Jesus focused. So I think it's just interesting. It's like a cultural experience in some way. Science versus Christianity. it's not really like that orthogonal. We had the head of the NIH come and speak at Acts 17. He talked about how faith actually, you know, really integrated with like his life and how he thought about his work. And so I actually approached faith through worship music. So rather than, you know, I spent a lot of time trying to approach faith from like purely intellectual.

28:10And like, I think some friends of mine like are actually able to do that, but there's nothing like going to a really good worship and like, like singing and just like allowing sort of the Holy Spirit to enter you. I mean, it's just an interesting thing that I want people to be at least open to. Right. And, you know, this is speaking as an atheist growing up. Like I remember being in history and English class and there'd be like a world religion unit. And I was the guy who like the Christians in that class would say like, you're going to hell. And I was like, oh yeah, that's not very welcoming or inclusive.

28:47I'm like, I don't think Jesus would say that. Does your family go? Is this not like a whole 10 family experience? Oh yeah, we've been going to Epic Church in San Francisco and, you know, yeah. Your kids go and they love Sunday school. Yeah, I mean, I think there's a real resurgence. you know, Epic Church more than doubled the number of people who go to that church in the last, you know, I think, year. Wow. So there's something happening. There's totally something happening. I think Bible sales are through the roof, apparently, globally. So you make a good point about AGI. Like, I do wonder how much of it is driven by the interest in AI and people sort of like, what's it all mean?

29:27Like, what's, you know, where does this all lead? And maybe that's where people want to find an answer. Yeah, I mean, one of the other people who actually the ED and founder of this nonprofit is actually Michelle Stevens. So she's, you know, Trey Stevens' wife. And Trey famously started Anduril. I mean, my favorite, he has this amazing essay and talk about good quests. You know, you can work on a lot of stuff, but hey, maybe we should actually work on and things that link us to our fellow man, but actually solve real problems. Like, we don't have to help people click on ads. Like, there are bigger, meatier problems in the world than that.

30:07Speaking of worship music, I believe you are next going to show me your favorite karaoke bar, The Lion's Den. So let's head over. Yeah, let's go to Chinatown. Awesome, thanks for giving me a tour of the place. Yeah, thanks for coming.

30:32I haven't taken that many Waymos because I don't live here. Yeah, totally. I heard they're coming to New York, though. Oh, that's exciting. I started the ride right now, so here we go. You know, today's kind of an emotional day because I'm sort of absorbing. We reject 99.3 % of people who apply to YC right now. Today is the day that the rejections go out. Yeah, they just went out today. and so the internet is processing it so i you know i think a lot of people i'm feeling like in the newest sphere a lot of hate but i'm also like guys like the first step to getting into yc is getting rejected from yc to most do many applicants that get accepted have they previously been rejected i mean i think the average number of times people who got in this last batch who like they applied maybe at least twice wow that's the average yeah oh that's fast it's very very normal to get rejected from YC before getting into YC.

31:25Oh, wow. There are more people who got rejected multiple times from YC in the batch than people who got in the first time. I had no idea. That's fascinating. And so when you said there's hate brewing on the internet, we talked about being a public figure earlier. On a day like today, do you and the various group partners at YC, do you just get bombarded with tweets, angry tweets, angry emails? Does that get filed for future applications? I mean, I think it's a resiliency test at some level. Yeah, that's interesting. Because it's like, look, we're not clairvoyant. Right. And also, just because if 99.3 % of people are getting rejected, it's almost like you can't get that mad.

32:07It's just so unlikely. And you're going to be rejected in countless ways as a founder at every turn. That is definitely true. At every turn of the journey. So just get used to it. Start getting used to it now. That's right. You're going to have to overcome so many no's and so many hurdles. You're going to get rejected. People don't want to work for you. Investors are not going to want to invest. They're going to say no. Yeah. I mean, how often is it that someone gets rejected? Users are not going to adopt your product at first. Reviewers? Reviewers hate it. Reviewers? Hacker news commenters hate it.

32:35Oh, yeah. Everyone's going to hate you. And then, I mean, it's actually fascinating to see that play out at YC because some people have never failed in their entire lives. and then they get punched in the face with users. They get punched in the face with investors. And it's a problem. Like I was just, the joke internally, this batch was, I was thinking when you get into YC, maybe I should make people do a 60 second hang from a bar, like a fixed bar. You ever do this? No. This is like a thing when I ran cross country in high school. It's really hard to do. Hang from a bar. Yeah, we're going to hang in a bar.

33:14But, you know, one of the true tests of like, can you overcome? Yeah. And if you could do it for a minute, like, great. Like, you're probably resilient enough to, you know, take a few slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. And, you know, if you can't even do that, maybe we will force you to watch this seminar about mental toughness. I mean, it is, building a startup really is kind of, there's almost no better exercise or test of endurance. than building a stardo yeah right it's just like every corner you're getting punched in the face and it's like how much can you take and eventually you know hopefully you break through uh and the snowball starts to roll down the hill it's a pretty painful experience yeah that's right having i know you've gone through it i've gone through it it's uh it's not a feel-good experience most of the time or at least until it starts working now we've talked a little bit about um you know like times we've hung out or the podcast I did with you at YC, just kind of how awesome it's been for you to be at YC as the CEO.

34:18I've always wondered sort of what the transition for you was like coming from Initialized, which I believe you founded with Alexis, right? Like that was your And Harge actually. So I'm working with Harge, who is one of the co-founders and he hired me at YC back in the day. So I feel like we sort of, you know, YC is this tree of prosperity. And then And for a time under Sam, I went off and went into one of the branches of the tree of prosperity. And then... As in a company or that's when you... Oh, that's what initialized was. Like all of our wins, you know, rippling, flock safety. Really, like I credit being a part of that ecosystem for all of our success.

35:03Sorry, just to make sure I understand this. So you were at YC, because you were like a designer in residence at YC, right? You did design stuff at YC back in there. And then I just did so many office hours that it was probably too awkward to not make me a partner. So they made you a partner, but then you're saying you went off and you started initialized and because you were part of the ecosystem, you just saw so much of the deal flow and funded so many YC companies. Yeah, and all of our wins, like 90 % of our wins were YC. I didn't know that. But yeah, I mean, that's how I feel about being president of YC.

35:32It's like I was a part of the tree. You know, I was someone in the ecosystem and the ecosystem was incredible for me. And, you know, I funded like multiple Decacorns because, you know, at the earliest stage, just because I was like - You were there. Yeah, I was there and I couldn't meet these people. And like, that's what YC represents to me. It's like, you know, yeah, it's the outcome of a, you know, 0.7 % acceptance rate. And then these are like the best of the best people, you know, like we're not going to get it right every single time. The thing that gets me is people get so mad when we make a mistake.

36:06It's like, oh, yeah, sorry. You reject something that ends up working out. Both ways, right? They get more mad when we let in someone who turns out to be not quite as good. And then they're like, but I got rejected, and I'm way better than these people. And it's like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It turns out we're human beings. But that must be hard to point out, right? I mean, because not all YC companies make it. I don't know. I have to imagine a lot of them don't. Yeah, that's right. I mean, the unicorn rate is only 6 % to 12%. Only. Of course, of course it's low. But it's also tiny. Yeah, no, it's tiny.

36:39I think it's tiny, which makes sense. So then obviously you went back to YC after initialized. Like, what? Was that hard? Leaving your baby initialized? Oh, it was so hard. Yeah. But how did you do that? A lot of it is like, you know, YC. It was working, wasn't it? It's working great. And some of it, I gave it to my partner. So Brett Gibson runs it now. Okay. And he's like just knocking it out of the park over there. And then, I mean, basically being able to go from like the branch back into the root and to be like sort of the central gardener of the tree. I mean, it's a dream job. Yeah. So was that why you did it?

37:16Because it was a dream job? It was like, oh, shit, I can be president of YC. Yeah. I mean, Paul and Jessica like tracked me down and said, Gary, we need you back. And I'm like, you know, honestly, it was very hard. I had to say goodbye to the team that I brought together, but I also set them up for success. They were able to continue to invest and do an incredible job. And so, initialize is as strong as ever. And then I can go back to the tree and make sure that I can actually support them even more from outside the tree or from outside the branch. It feels like there's been a lot of changes to YC.

37:56and you've talked to me about this stuff a little bit. You know, I think around the time when you joined, YC had, they had a growth fund. I think you called it like continuity fund or something. That's my understanding is that's gone. Yeah, we're out of competing with you guys. So we want to be your best buddies. And all we ask is please let us, you know, keep funding the companies as they go. So we want you to lead and we just want to take our paradas. Yeah, but what's the, I appreciate that. You're very generous. But what was the strategy? Like, why wasn't it working or? I mean, it turns out that, like, if you own, like, you know, 7 % to 9 % of all of these companies, just taking the proratas means you never miss the decacorns.

38:38And you know how the power law works. Like, you know, 6 % to 12 % of the companies will end up being worth a billion dollars or more. And then actually, you know, that's not even the bulk of the return. The bulk of, like, you know, we think that a really good return for YC would be 8x. and the bulk of that is actually not even in the unicorns, it's actually in the decacorns and the Stripe, the DoorDash, the Coinbase, the Airbnb, right? And so if most of your return is that, then it's binary whether you are in the proratas and continuing to own pieces of the company or do you like let yourself get diluted down.

39:20So YC famously invested like what, $12 ,000,$15 ,000 to own 7 % of Airbnb. But at IPO, it returned$2 billion. Wow. But if it took pro rata, it'd be$7 billion. Whoa. And you'd only have to probably invest like another couple hundred million for that. No, I mean, structurally, there was no way to do it. But now we do. Because of the continuity fund? Because there was more allocated to that or something? They just hadn't raised the money. Hadn't raised the money. Yeah. Wow. So, okay, so then is the idea, I think what I just heard you say then is, turns out the core YC business is just so good. So why focus?

40:01Why have any distraction from that focus? Structurally, economically, team-wise, like just put 100 % of the energy into the core. And have one team doing it. It's like I have 15 equal general partners. And it's, you know, people talk about benchmark as an equal partnership. Like I think YC should be, you know, people should think about YC as the defining equal partnership in all of venture. Right. Wow. It's just such a good business on its own. Why defocus the business? And I mean, it probably saves a lot of operational overhead. Let's have one team that just focuses on, and one relationship. There's one partner, that partner - Oh, right, because it was a completely different partner.

40:38Yeah. Different partners. Yeah, why have a different team? It's probably confusing for the teams. Yeah. Yeah. And then basically now, the experience of going through YC is very straightforward. Like you interview with the partner, if the partner likes you, like they're your person for the life of the company. And like, you know what? Like YC actually owns a lot of these companies. Right. Like we own, you know, like you're giving us 7 % ownership. Like, you know, help us. You know, we just graduated, you know, 160 companies this week. And I told every single one of them, like, listen, guys, like we're actually big major investors in your company.

41:16Yeah. So make us earn it. Yeah. Like come back, like do office hours with us. Like we're here to help you like for the life of the company. Like YC doesn't, the only thing that ends at the end of YC is like we don't have regularly scheduled things. Like just come talk to us anytime. Like literally here's my cell phone number. That's become very clear to me. I mean, you and I, and plus, you know, some of the other group partners, like we actually talk about companies that are in older batches. And I didn't actually know that until you guys started talking to me about that. Naturally, if we didn't have that, you know, sort of actual continuity, then actually we wouldn't be able to do that.

41:52We'd be like, oh, yeah, I met those guys a couple of years ago and that's it. They're part of the later stage. Yeah. That's super interesting. The batches have gotten a lot bigger, right? Yeah. I mean, that's mainly a function of like, you know, our acceptance rate used to be like two, two and a half percent. And then it was like over the last 20 years, it went from that down to like 0.7%. Oh, wow. So, you know, I think net net, you know, the number one thing that people are always worried about is like, oh, shoot, there's so many companies. But I think that, you know, this has become a real bit like I think the size of the outcomes is 10x bigger.

42:26Like I remember first raising initialized fund one and thinking like, man, the biggest exit we can possibly imagine is like Dropbox. You know, I think it was worth four billion dollars at the time in 2011. And I was like, no, no, no, like 50 billion is on the table. A hundred billion is on the table. Like, you know, I mean, if anything, like I would love for YC to help create all the next generations of Elon Musk's. And if that happens, then we're talking$1.5 trillion. Great. Like, that's what the world needs. Like that going back to technology, like that's how we evenly distribute technology to all the people who should have it.

43:03So is the idea then like you actually would scale the batches to be as big as operationally possible? But I need you to be making money. And I need more mics. I need more people who are - Because you need them to get funded when they graduate. Well, I want you to do well and I want everyone in venture to do well because that's how we all rise together. Right. And then that's how founders win, right? Like it doesn't have to be this adversarial, there can only be one. This is the most abundance growth mindset business that has ever existed in humanity. And do you feel like a big part of why there are so many, well, you mentioned the acceptance rate, but so many more companies in the batch.

43:42Do you think AI has a lot to do with that? Oh, absolutely. Just because it's getting so much easier to start and to build? The really interesting thing is like, it's not clear to me capital is going to be a bludgeon anymore. So, I mean, and that might actually be a really good thing. You know, there's like discernment, taste, ability to help, like ability to, I mean, do what you're doing right now. Like, you know, I love that you're a consumer founder because turning around and applying that to investing is like the most intelligent thing you can do, right? Say more. Oh, yeah. I mean, this is, you know, you're building your audience.

44:17Ah, okay. I see what you're saying. This is awesome. I mean, this is why I started doing YouTube. This is a consumer experience is what you're saying. It is, right. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

44:26I think it's parking. Oh, nope. And it just, it's very confusing. It is parking. It's, I think it's parallel parking. Finding a spot to pull over.

44:43All right, here we are at Chinatown. I wanna see this. So this is like your spot. Yep. The lion's den. This is, I mean, it's a little hole in the wall, but it's the best karaoke joint. And you know that because you've frequented all the karaoke places. You're like a karaoke connoisseur? I usually do karaoke at home at the church. Oh, yeah. So, yeah, we have a good setup there, too. Where are we going? Yeah, there it is. Okay. What's your song? What's your karaoke song? Oh, man, Because I Got High. What was that guy's name? Afro Man? Yeah, that's a good one. That's another reference people will not get.

45:21Yeah, I mean, you know, being 44, that's just how it works. Yes, of course. You just get older and then the founders, you know, they're young and they don't watch the same movies that like brought us up. They don't. I thought you were going to say Tupac hit him up. That's right. Isn't this the scene of the infamous Tupac? This is the scene. Hey, great to see you, Stephen. We were just talking to you with Forrest. Oh my God. It's so cold. Oh yeah, thanks for opening up the bar for us. Oh yeah. Thank you. Isn't my buddy Mike? Are you guys coming tonight? Thanks for doing this. We're coming right now.

45:55We're just filming real quick. Oh, that's you guys with the podcast? Yeah, we're just filming like for a... You mind? No. All right, let's do it. I thought you guys were going to be in VIP. Now they just want to take a full hour. Oh, yeah, we just want a drink, yeah. We're just here to... Oh, the Nigel. Thanks for opening up for us. Yeah. This is the famed Lion's Den. The infamous. I've heard a lot about this place. Gary's been telling me about it. We built this for Chinatown. Really? Yes. Okay. This is kind of built for the community. This has been something to bring more people to Chinatown.

46:28Instead of buying back scratchers and walks, now they can have cocktails and whatever. Well, I'm excited to have one. Are we too early to order something? We can do it. I have some connections. What's up? Negronis? Yeah, Negroni sounds great. Thank you. My usual.

46:51Well, cheers to the Lions. Cheers. Thanks for having us. Thanks for hosting us. Cheers. Thanks for hosting us. Yeah, no problem. Wow. So, yeah, this is the place. You've been telling me about this place. Oh, yeah. Speaking of Tupac. Yeah. This is where that all happened, right? Give us this. This is another one. This is like Sonagate. Oh, yeah. This is another Gary controversy. I'm trying to get over it. You know, I'm trying to get over this stuff, you know. So, but you know, the story is me and a bunch of dads from my oldest, you know, we were all in fourth grade at the time. We'd like come and have a nice dad's night out.

47:25Okay. And downstairs we're doing karaoke. Is that a normal night for you guys? Oh, I love karaoke. Okay. Yeah, I mean, we have a, we call it the Case Dad's Drinking Club. So we like to, it's actually a dining club, but we do a little drinking. Okay. But, you know, we came out, we had some karaoke. I happened to have just done Hit Him Up by Tupac. And, you know. It's a classic. It's a classic for our generation, I guess. Yes. And people didn't really get the joke. You know, I was really fired up about politics. And I, you know, said some things. I sort of made that lyric something that it shouldn't be.

48:03And, you know, I woke up in the morning. I apologized and realized, you know what? Like, that's just not me. Like, I, you know, don't need that out there. People didn't get the joke and I kind of get it. And especially now with so much political violence in the world, it's just not the vibe that is me. But I don't know, this is where it happened. It starts with karaoke and then all I know is I delete Twitter off my phone after I have a couple drinks, especially when I'm at a lion's den. This is your move now? It's just a move. You delete Twitter. Yeah, it's an if statement and it just keeps me out of trouble.

48:37You should get like Opal, have you seen Opal? It's this app that locks certain apps. Very smart. And you can make it extremely difficult. I think the only way to do it is to either uninstall the app or shut down or restart your phone or something. Yeah, the reality is in the future, the phone actually will just do this for us. It'll know us. Stop. Do not open Twitter. Yeah, that's right. Do not rage tweet. How did you find this place? How did this become the dad's favorite karaoke spot? Oh, I mean, I got to know a local organizer activist named Forrest Liu, and then he had us over, and then we decided to become members of the place.

49:19Because, I mean, I think this is one of the stories. This is a membership? Yeah, there's a members club downstairs, and I'm a member. I have a little box. Oh, wow. On the little placard, it says Twitter Menace. What? That's amazing. Yeah, but, I mean, it's a local place. You know, politicians hang out here. local business people, Chinatown activists, people just this is the local place. I think that's important for tech. I think that we should get involved in our communities. For sure. So this is the jam. I feel like that's what I'm learning about you, is that's your thing to get involved with the community, get involved with the local political community, and your local actual community, to get involved with the religious community and the faith community.

50:10Obviously, YC is a giant community. It feels like you really... Now I understand that home that you showed me a little bit better. It feels like community and bringing people together is kind of your thing. Yeah, so the internet is this crazy thing, and obviously we get attacked. These cancel mobs come for you, all this stuff. But when you sit down for a drink with someone and you get to know someone, Yeah. It's just, it hits different. And so I do think that we need to do a lot more of that. And I think we can do that right here in San Francisco and we can build a better one, a much better city if we do that.

50:45What's the future of San Francisco in your mind? Where do things go from here? I am someone who's like from the Bay. I feel like there's this weird anti sort of tech culture where people who grew up in San Francisco often don't feel like the prosperity of tech like sort of goes over to them. And I think that that's actually, you know, somewhat of a failure of community and it's a failure of government. And those are things we can do something about, right? Like, you know, I'm the last person to be like, oh, you know what? Like, I don't want to pay taxes, right? Like, I think the tax, like, I'm fine to pay the taxes, but I want the dollars to go to things that protect our community, that make sure our kids can learn algebra.

51:27Like, they should have good educations. I believe that like rent should not be$10 ,000 a month for a one bedroom. And that's what it's going to be. Which is why you want to build housing. We need to build housing. And so, you know, it is a failure of government. And, you know, it's dereliction of duty to the people. But you know what? Like this is America. You know, I remember going on a walk with my friend Nancy Tung, who we were mentioning earlier. Yeah, you mentioned it. She's now the head of the San Francisco Democratic Party. Wow. We won back even the Democratic Party in San Francisco. And if we're successful in the next 10 years, you're going to hear San Francisco Democrat, and it's going to mean a different thing.

52:04Right now, it means like, you know, the worst of what you might, you know, I am a Democrat. And, you know, I am not OK with what the vibe is when someone says I'm a Democrat. Because, you know, people don't hear the things that I want for the Democratic Party out of San Francisco. But I think that that's what we can and will be. Like in 10 years, people will look at SF and say, actually, they did it. and they did it right. They made it work. You can be in tech, you can be pro-prosperity, you can create abundance, but then also you can make it work for everyone in your community, like the people who live next to you who might not work in tech.

52:40What's the future of YC? We talked about the batch size, we talked about AI, we talked about how it's changed since you got there, but now where does it go from here? I think of YC as, we said it's the tree of prosperity. Actually, the vibe I think is actually like Airbnb. like it's a two-sided marketplace. YC is. Yeah, and the interesting thing about Airbnb is that there's virtually limitless demand, right? Like there's always more people who want to stay in any given city in the world. And the limiting reagent for Airbnb is actually hosts. Right, it's supply. So that's why some of it is like, I'm so glad to hang out with you, befriend you and like just like see you grow as like you know one of the top investors at demo day that like our friendship grows and then i want you know i want to fund all the things that uh you know you precede and then on the flip side i want you to come and like get into all the best companies at yc because like that's how we actually build this thing like you're my super host actually i appreciate you saying that so so you're saying it's the the supply is the is the the batch the YC company.

53:49Oh no, supply is you. Supply is great investors who are going to do the work. Got it. And then demand is the bash. I mean, I'm at like 99.3 % of people I have to reject. I'm like totally pegged. And so I need to grow YC so that we can have more startup founders and more success in the world. And then I need to make sure that you make a lot of money and and your team can grow and you guys do great. And that's the world that I want to live in. I think the venture can and should be 10 times bigger than it is now. Do you think that, we talked in the car a little bit about capital not being a bludgeon anymore.

54:31Do you think the capital needs, oh wow. That's awesome. That's the Christmas, it looked like a pig. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's for the Toys for Tots drive. Do you think the do you think that capital becomes less of a bludgeon therefore There's less of it. There's less demand for capital. Therefore. There is less capital over time Do you think I don't go far? No far. It'll go further. Yeah And so like how did maybe I asked you what do you think the future of YC is what do you think the future of VC is I mean, I think that like people should Maybe club together less and then do more early stage Like I think that that might be where a lot more of the outcome.

55:12What do you mean clubbed together or less? Oh, I mean, there's, you know, the 2018 version of venture is like, you know, such and such firm comes in and then, you know, our other buddy comes in and then our other buddy comes in and then the fix is in. Handing things off. It's like, look, like, don't even try to attack this market. Yeah. And, you know, sometimes it'll work. And then I think increasingly in the age of AI, it's not going to work. Yeah. And that's good news. Like, I don't want, you know, there are seven companies worth a trillion dollars. Like, I think that that's bad. I think that we should have thousands of companies worth billions to tens of billions of dollars.

55:45And I actually think that now is the moment where that's going to happen. So what is your advice for the average VC right now who invests early stage? What would you tell them to do? I mean. Somebody like me. I mean, I think you're already doing it. Like, show up. Thank you. Show up, do early stage. You know, fun people before it's obvious. And then I actually think now is the moment where all of that is going to work. Right. Well, thank you so much. I mean, not only do I feel like I got to know the real Gary Tan better, but I feel like I got to know this city better from somebody who probably knows it better than most.

56:22So I really appreciate it. Looking forward to a happy new year. And thanks for showing me around. Cheers, brother. Cheers, man. Thank you so much for watching this very special episode of Out of Office with Gary Tan. I feel like I really got to know Gary and the city of San Francisco. If you don't already subscribe, do me a favor and smash the subscribe button or the follow button, depending on where you're watching or listening to this. And of course, do us a favor and give us a thumbs up or five stars wherever you're watching or listening. As always, you can learn more about Lightspeed at LightspeedVP.

56:58And you can follow me at McNano. This has been a production of Lightspeed and Pod People. Thank you so much. And we'll see you next time.