With the likes of FTX, Wave, etc, I agree that the EV of EA startups is now obviously high. But this is because EAs are much better at startups than average, to an extent that was not entirely obvious (at least not to everyone) a decade ago.
Yes, startup people always said we should start startups, but it wasn’t clear whether they were right.
On initial investigations, we could see that given VC-funding, founders exit with an average of $10M (and only ~1% of startups seemed to attain VC funding). Stanford-alumnus founders attained (unconditional on funding) a net worth of ~$10M. YC founders around $20M. And then the first dozen EA and rationalist startups were false starts. Whereas folks in software or finance could make a million a year.
So yes, it seemed good, but exactly how good was not obvious at that time. One could argue it is a good case for more people exploring unusual things, for reasons of value of information.
With the likes of FTX, Wave, etc, I agree that the EV of EA startups is now obviously high. But this is because EAs are much better at startups than average, to an extent that was not entirely obvious (at least not to everyone) a decade ago.
Yes, startup people always said we should start startups, but it wasn’t clear whether they were right.
On initial investigations, we could see that given VC-funding, founders exit with an average of $10M (and only ~1% of startups seemed to attain VC funding). Stanford-alumnus founders attained (unconditional on funding) a net worth of ~$10M. YC founders around $20M. And then the first dozen EA and rationalist startups were false starts. Whereas folks in software or finance could make a million a year.
So yes, it seemed good, but exactly how good was not obvious at that time. One could argue it is a good case for more people exploring unusual things, for reasons of value of information.