The Twenty Minute VC
Jake Paul: Traditional VC is Toast & Attention is More Valuable than Cash
Jake Paul and his Stanford-bred partner Jeffrey pitch Antifund as the anti-thesis to traditional VC: attention is the new capital, taste is the new diligence, and the next generation of great investors will be native internet characters. Also: running for president only if he has to, Ramp as a 300x angel, and why public markets are the next product.
Key points
- Founding principle: 'attention is more valuable than capital.' As coding and financial analysis get commoditised by AI, taste, culture and distribution rise in relative value. Antifund's thesis is to own the late-stage distribution-leveraged bet.
- Antifund's edge: mass-channel distribution (Jake's billions of impressions) + Jeffrey's Stanford CS rigour + cold outreach to any executive on the planet. Combined response rate 'super high' vs boomer-suited VCs.
- $30m fund is the starter. Stated ambition: $10-20B AUM, modelled on Josh Kushner's arc from $4-5m to Thrive. Public markets fund next — 'trillions of dollars we could prosecute against.'
- Jake's investing record includes Ramp at ~$50m angel entry (≈300x on that ticket), Flock Safety, Polymarket, Cognition, Chronosphere, and Better (co-founded, high-ownership incubation).
- Politics: Jake says he'd run for president only if the alternative was someone like Kamala Harris that would 'ruin the country.' Believes Trump is 'arguably one of the best presidents in this term' and is a 'founder president' who takes real risk.
- On tech + war: democratic governance should make war decisions, not tech executives. Anduril's Matt Steckman framing ('we support democratically elected governments') is right. Critique of anthropic's DoD refusal positioned as techno-fascist arrogance.
- Culture: Michael Phelps as greatness model. Jake positions himself as 'uncancelable' because, in his telling, the bar for cancellation is actual bad behaviour; he's only been a 'dumb arrogant kid.' Running tension: content addict trying to channel addiction into work.
- Creator-economy framing of sport: boxing is a storytelling business; 'attention makes money' regardless of win/loss; McGregor fight would need ~$150m minimum.
Notable quotes
Attention is more valuable than capital.
The first startup in America was America. Like it was, it's a fucking business. And so you don't want a career politician running things.
I take home like nearly 100%.
If we don't set limiters in terms of our ambition and our skill set, like, you play the largest markets.
Themes
- Attention as the new capital
- The creator-economy turn in venture
- Founder-presidents and the politics of boldness
- AI commoditisation of 'smart people' work