the reflexions insider

Like the flying car, teleportation, and artificial intelligence, the concept of micropayments has been espoused for years by some futurists — and many crackpots — as not just a good idea but something that will do nothing less than transform society. Others have been less than thrilled with the idea. But what has happened over the last 10 years or so since real investments were made (and almost without exception, lost) on the concept is startling. Micropayments are fast becoming a part of the fabric of the commercial internet, although in very practical context and mostly due to two companies - Apple and Amazon - who are competing for the future of digital music sales.

The comic artist Scott McCloud made a name for himself during the early 2000’s with unique and visually compelling arguments in his own web comic form for why micropayments were the future of at least one type of digital content: web comics, drawing the ire of everyone from Clay Shirky to Tycho of Penny Arcade (many original links of what became one of the web’s legendary flame wars are dead but see Wired’s coverage of McCloud from 2001 here). Micropayments - a simple and innovative idea in principle if not in practice - has been one of the [...]

For anyone who caught the Powerpoint slide deck from what has come to be known as Sequoia Capital’s “Holy Sh*t” Meeting, this is shaping up to be a challenging environment for even the most innovative startups to raise capital or indeed, survive at all.

But if you heard the who’s-who of Silicon Valley venture fund partners that were gathered for a panel at the recent Web 3.0 Conference, or even a recent NYSIA panel discussion featuring Fred Wilson from Union Square Ventures, you’d come away with more of a sense of cautious optimism rather than the “OMG it’s the freaking apocalypse” ethos that many seem to have adopted as the the startup worldview du jour.

So for the benefit of those who might have an interest in what some of Silicon Valley’s VC wonks were saying, I’ve compiled the highlights from the discussion in this third installment from the Web 3.0 Conference. The panel was moderated by Rebekah Wu, CEO of Right Hand Partners. I’ve done my best to attribute comments where possible.

On what should make it into a presentation or pitch to [...]