The Bitcoin Angel
2 stories about Google
Story #1 — Jeff Bezos and Google, circa 1998
Legendary investor Ram Shriram was secretly advising two PhD Stanford students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who were building a new internet search engine. In February of 1998 Google was a tiny startup in which Ram has invested $250K, along with 3 other investors.
6 months later while on a camping trip Ram Shriram told Jeff Bezos about the startup. Bezos, intrigued asked to meet them, and a couple of days later on a Saturday morning Shriram picked up Bezos and his wife from the Inn at Saratoga to meet the Google founders over breakfast at his house.
Bezos was so impressed by the technology and the team that he insisted on investing his own money, $250K, yet demanded the same terms of the previous financing round. It took some mighty convincing but the deal was struck and Bezos became the proud owner of what is today over $1B of Google stock.
Story #2 — David Cowan and Google, circa 1999
David Cowan, one of the worlds greatest investors was visiting his college friend’s house in Menlo Park. “I have these two really smart Stanford students developing a search engine in my garage”, She said. His reply is the icing on what is probably the greatest VC screw up of all times: “How can I get out of this house without going anywhere near your garage?”
But Bitcoin is not a startup and you are not an Angel investor?
Bitcoin is an exciting new technology. It is revolutionary — think personal computers / the Internet / smartphones / the cloud. Startups are spawning left and right to utilize it, yet we have just begun to comprehend the possibilities and potential applications.
I have personally been exposed to cutting edge security development for the past 20 years and have never seen a crypto protocol so beautiful.
I’m not even going to try to list the benefits. Marc Andreessen does a much better job than I ever could.
And smart money is pouring in. Hundreds of millions of dollars.
Would you know the next Google if you met it in a garage? And if you did, how much would you be willing to invest? Would you be pushing to invest?
You don’t have $250K to invest. You can’t even risk $25K, but to be an angel investor you need to be willing to risk a significant chunk of your money. Yet once in a lifetime you get the opportunity to invest in the latest technology at an early stage — when that technology IS money.
You don’t need to be rich. You can invest $1000. $100. In fact, I urge you to buy $10 worth of Bitcoin right now. Google how. It has become that easy.
But is it a good time to invest in Bitcoin? Am I not too late?
Take a look at the famous “Hype” curve and ask yourself this simple question: How many people do you know that have invested in Bitcoin?
Ask your family, friends and co-workers.
I did. I’m a tech startup founder with great smart employees. You would not believe how many PhDs my immediate family achieved. I’m surrounded by ultra smart people.
The number of them investing in Bitcoin — 0.
The public is not there yet. Institutional investors are not there yet.
In fact, I would argue that when all your friends start buying, when Bitcoin becomes a family dinner topic — that’s probably when you should sell.
When will that be? How high will this rocket fly? Who knows. Consider that some of the best investments of all time were in technology plays with a completely unknown ultimate market size: Apple, Intel, Facebook, Google. After all, disruption rests on the creation of a completely new market so if you can size the market beforehand, then by definition the technology isn’t disruptive.
Oh, and after you buy some Bitcoin let everyone know that you are investing. Be a Guardian Angel.
Parting thoughts:
- Sure, Jeff Bezos was lucky. But how can you be lucky if you don’t even try?
- Give your friends some Bitcoin. It’s a fun and original birthday / wedding / baby shower gift!
- Bitcoin is waiting for you in the garage. Would you like an introduction, or will you run out the back? Here is the best technical explanation of how Bitcoin works that you can find on the web.
If you enjoyed this article, it would mean the world to me if you hit the recommend button and shared it.
Oh, and it would be cool if you Bitcoin tip: 12UybtoxVHFrdgrVHr2NP5NCdCEjTKXkEE
