Tomorrow I will be at the Geo Loco conference in SF, interviewing Fred Wilson, partner at Union Square Ventures, investor in Twitter, Zynga, Etsy, Tumblr, Foursquare, and many others, and general good guy.
Fred is great on stage, and we have a lot to talk about, given our mutual interests. But as I was preparing for the discussion, I pinged Fred and asked if he thought it’d be a good idea if I asked all of you for input. Of course he said yes.
So, what do you want to hear from Fred? What should I ask him?
(Hi John! Comms/PR person here for Hilary Schneider that linked her up with your CM Summit in June)
My Q for Fred.
Several analyst reports indicate that the VC industry is at an all time low and shows no signs of life.
http://gigaom.com/2010/07/12/vc-fund-shrinking/
With all the paradigm shifts in marketing, advertising, technology, et al, do you see a paradigm shift in the VC world and how are you adapting for the sweeping changes?
Scott
Question to Fred: How negotiations works in acquisitions? say a company wants to acquire you at millions at that is fine for you, how do you negotiate?
Putting this in perspective: how negotiation works in acquiring companies like YouTube?
Please ask Fred why such a important and visible service as Twitter is “constantly” experiencing infrastructure problems on a daily basis. Would any other service such as Facebook or Google tolerate such horrific performance from their engineering team, and would users and the press give them such an easy time? It may be that people have come to accept daily problems at Twitter as the norm, and forgive them for some reason, but it’s beyond belief what they seem to get away with. This week they actually had to shut down customer Help and any user profile modifications, including new user signup. W-T-F?
Q1: As an investor in Foursquare, does it worry you that companies like Facebook, Twitter and Google loom large over the geo-location space, or will there be room for these smaller, more focused companies to continue growing?
Q2: Do you plan to continue investing in the geo-location space, or are you focusing on other verticals?
Q3: If you were just graduating college today, would you still see an MBA from a school like Wharton as an important stepping stone in your career, or has the importance of continued schooling decreased?
I’d suggest you throw him an Orwellian type question and see what you uncover 😉
Has thought about where these services are taking us, beyond the profit motive?
e.g. what will our geo loco future look like in 5, 10 , 50 years?
(When) Will we live in a world where everything is mapped and everyone tracked?
Will that be a good thing, and what safeguards do we need to ensure that it is.
1) What do you think is Google’s biggest threat?
2) What would you do to fix Yahoo? (I did read your recent post on it being a potential winner, but I’m afraid I don’t see it)
3) What’s the most exciting new business model you’ve gotten a chance to see recently?
For any entrepreneur, Fred’s blog is an enormous asset, not only because it is influential, but because it is good.
But I sometimes wonder if entrepreneurs ever feel put on the spot by a blog post that expresses a general opinion with connotations specific to their situation: about going public, or investing in mobile, or conserving capital or whatever issue is in play at the time.
I ask because I sometimes because cautious blogging in a way that could be interpreted as airing a disagreement, or campaigning for a point of view.
What are Fred’s no-fly zones for his blog?