What It Takes to Win as a Founder | Ben Horowitz

Horowitz argues AI-era defensibility comes from proprietary usage data and 10x-better products, not network effects, while VC's core value remains compounding founder momentum.

• AI as new computer: Horowitz calls AI "the new computer" (probabilistic, not a network), meaning adoption is near-instant versus the internet's slow, infrastructure-bound buildout in the 1990s.
• Small teams, big outcomes: He cites Instagram's 13-person, $1B sale to argue tiny teams can build huge businesses, though he doubts the "solopreneur" extreme given Keynesian-style ever-expanding human wants.

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