The media side is the sell side the VC side is the buy side. You trumpet your companies and people so you have more brand around them. Other people buy into those companies and brands which increases the value of those items. Rinse and repeat until you go to the public markets or found an exit worthwhile.

They realized that buy having strong promotion that increases the perceived value of their people, companies and founders. It also makes getting LPs easier.

Look to Elon for a core example of this phenom.

Arguing if they are a media company or a VC is irrelevant - it serves the same purpose.

One could argue YC is close to that too. But instead of having them in house - their relationships with TechCrunch, HN, etc are a broad megaphone to their desired audience.

I'd say YC is more organic.

A16Z is more direct.

A16Z made investments directly in actual media outlets like BuzzFeed, ProductHunt, Future.com, etc.

That was my hunch with Clubhouse. Clubhouse would've never got the reach if it was not for A16Z hyping them up.

Probably - Clubhouse had a lot of action before they really started hyping them. That failure probably hurts a bit since there was a lot of literal time spent speaking on platform which I think they truly thought Clubhouse was going to be a lasting change. I think the discovery aspect and the spammy, vapid conversations on platform once you reached scale tanked that product.

That said that if there was an audience for their efforts still functionally valuable for the time spent on platform.

It'd sure be interesting to see what they spend on marketing and PR vs. other VC firms. Only because I think of their product being "successful exits", I lean toward a framing of "VC with an emphasis on content and brand marketing".

If you run the media and investment efforts into a company does that make it insider trading?

There’s precedent for that in illiquid alternatives - several publishers had internal investment arms that grew into distinct GPs.

totally agree and know many who recognize exactly that