"The rules of the game are different in tech," argues W. Brian Arthur, the economist who first described network effects/ positive feedbacks in the economy aka increasing (vs. decreasing) returns... This hour-long episode of the a16z Podcast takes us from "the halls of production" to the "casino of technology"; from the prehistory to the history of many technologies; from the invisible internet of things to the internet of conversations; from externally available information to externalized intelligence; and finally, from Silicon Valley to Singapore to China to India and back to Silicon Valley again. Who’s going to win; what are the chances of winning? We don’t know, because it’s a very different game… Do you still want to play?​

Owning a home has long been a pillar of the American dream, but the mortgage process that powers it is complex, opaque, and downright anachronistic. And we continue to complacently accept this reality, despite living in an on-demand age where we expect more speed, transparency, and ease of use. Yet this complexity is also where the opportunity for startups (and even incumbents) lies. What new strategies could help create a much better mortgage process, while still balancing necessary risk controls? How and where does technology come in?

When it comes to B2B2C business models -- which combine both business to business (B2B) and business to consumer (B2C) -- who really "owns" the customer? That question might not matter as much in more symbiotic, mutually beneficial marketplaces and other platform contexts, but can be a problem in other contexts... or if not done right. So how does one figure out if and when a B2B2C approach makes sense? Finally, how do we differentiate between a B2B2C arrangement and a "channel partnership"? (Hint: they're not the same.)

The greatest problem of healthcare in the United States isn’t just about the quality of care -- it’s access to care. There are many factors that contribute to this growing divide, but some of the biggest include: not enough physicians in the right places; soaring prices of medical care (especially chronic conditions); and Eroom’s Law, the evil twin of Moore’s law, where the cost of healthcare exponentially increases (vs. decreases) over time. Can new technologies -- including artificial intelligence -- slow, or even reverse, these exponentially rising costs to help democratize healthcare? 

From the quest for digital money and recent history of bitcoin, to the emergence of ethereum and smart contracts, the below presentation/video [originally delivered as part of an “Intro to Crypto” event that Andreessen Horowitz and #Angels put on in April 2018] provides an introduction to crypto -- currencies, applications, tokens, and networks -- including commonly used terms. And if we go beyond the hype and instead focus on the bigger picture, what are some analogies and considerations (especially the developmental stages or "lifecycles" of) for regulating cryptonetworks?
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