[inputcoffee]

1) I was thinking of GV's investment in Uber as an example. (Not a PE firm). But the point still stands, the Austin kid isn't going to swing $1-5m. Even if they were brilliant.

2)You missed the point about the training. The point isn't that they are trained. The point is that we know that they are trained. There might be dozens of people better than the traditional VCs at identifying the right opportunity but who are they and how do we find them?

The last half of your response makes me think I may have missed the original point. I thought the original point was that the VC skill set is being democratized because data is more freely available. My two points were meant to be reasons why that may not be the case.

This point about being in the middle between very large and small players might be right. I have to think on it, but it was not what I thought I was commenting on.

[randomnames]

1) GV has $2bn under management, plus it is a corporate VC.

2) No, no or yes, yes - totally agree about training, it is still a USP. But as markets are much more public, it´s easy to follow the development even without being invested. Most of the data can be assumed from what´s publicly available (app store ranks, alexa ranks, disclosures of competitors, headcount etc.)

Admittedly I worked in VC myself - so certainly I look as well differently at news and have maybe a different analytical tool belt.

Interesting is your remark / question, about “how do we find them?” - will think about that part :-)