Hey, friends of Soapbox! Welcome to our February Newsletter.

Is it just us, or has January felt like an entire YEAR?! We’re glad it’s February; the days are getting (slightly) longer, and we cannot wait for Spring. 🌷 

Here’s a couple quick headlines to recap 2025 so far:

🥂 New Year’s Resolutions & Dry January – Did you stick with it? Research says that most people have quit their resolutions by now.

🤖 DeepSeek’s AI Breakthrough – OpenAI and Anthropic have some competition. DeepSeek-V2 just launched, and it’s blowing up news headlines and the stock market.

🎤 Grammys – we’re currently celebrating Beyonce’s long-overdue Album of the Year award and Chappell Roan for Best New Artist 💅 

📱 TikTok Goes Dark in the U.S. – Do you still have the app on your phone? After a momentary pause, the app came back to full functionality. But the app is no longer available in the app store in the US.

🚫 Brands Quietly Ditching DEI – After years of corporate DEI pledges, some companies are walking them back…

❄️ Winter Storm in the South – Snow in Texas, ice in Georgia—cue “Snow on the Beach” by Taylor Swift.

Soapbox of the Month

On Curiosity

Written by Maria

The summer I spent in Barcelona was one of the most important experiences of my life. Like most college students studying abroad, I was excited about a "Cheetah Girls Summer". What I didn’t expect was that what I’d take away would have nothing to do with travel or language but with how to think.

My internship at a proptech startup started the day after I arrived. I barely knew the company’s name before walking into the office, jet-lagged and (embarrassingly) late. The moment I sat down, I realized that no one spoke English. I had taken Spanish for years, but the classroom had not done much to prepare me for the speed and complexity of real conversations in a working environment. That first day, I understood very little. I went home, convinced I wouldn’t last the summer.

But something interesting happens when you’re forced into a situation where you don’t know enough to pretend. You stop worrying about how you sound. Since I couldn’t talk much, I listened. At first, I asked only the simplest questions - enough to get through the workday. But as I got more comfortable, my curiosity took over. I started asking my coworkers about their lives, their weekends, and their opinions. I stopped filtering for what I thought was “smart” to ask and just asked what I genuinely wanted to know.

That’s how I got to know Núria, my boss. She had grown up in the Soviet Union before immigrating to Spain, and I was fascinated by her story. One night before post-work drinks, I wrote out a list of questions I wanted to ask her - big, possibly naïve questions about her past and how she saw the world. I brought that list to our happy hour the next day. When I hesitated, worried that some might come across as uninformed, she laughed and told me to ask anything. That conversation led to a weekly happy hour, and during my last week in Spain, she gave me a journal filled with books to read - her way of continuing the dialogue.

I think about that summer often, especially in my work as an investor. The same curiosity that helped me navigate Barcelona is what now guides my conversations with founders, LPs, and peers. Investing is an industry full of pressure to appear certain - to have well-formed opinions, to ask the “right” questions, to never admit what you don’t know. But I’ve found that my best investment decisions have come from doing the opposite. Instead of approaching diligence with a fixed lens, I approach it like my conversations with Núria by setting aside preconceived notions and asking questions that cut straight to what I truly want to understand. Why now? Why this market? What do you believe that others don’t? It's basically an exercise in first principles thinking but from a place of insatiable curiosity.

The same applies to my conversations with other investors. Some of the best calls I’ve had with my peers aren’t the ones where we exchange fully-baked theses but the ones where we openly challenge our thinking. How are you looking at this trend? What assumptions am I missing? It’s in these back-and-forths where we’re willing to be wrong, to ask the obvious questions, to push beyond the surface-level consensus that the real thinking happens.

What I learned that summer wasn’t just Spanish. I learned that the best conversations and the best thinking come from removing the fear of sounding dumb. Some of the most valuable insights I’ve had in my career have come from simply asking, How do you think about this? The ability to ask questions without hesitation and to be fully present in a conversation without worrying about how you’ll be perceived is a radically underrated skill.

Read & share this Soapbox Moment Here  

CAREER 🧑‍💻

We’re loving this thread by Andrew Rea. Andrew speaks on this topic from the founder perspective, often working with junior VCs. How often do you think about standing out as a junior VC? Probably all the time.

Here’s a snapshot of his thoughts on what holds many early VCs back:

• Wasting time

• Being dishonest or disingenuous (and it’s usually pretty obvious)

• Zero effort in going above and beyond—sending the same generic outbound email that everyone else is sending

• Not establishing credibility or rapport early on

• Not doing the homework

• “Not having a single original or interesting opinion (don't need 20 years of experience to have this or sounds like a chat GPT 3 trained on the past 2 months of VC twitter)”

• A lack of empathy

It’s easy to get caught up in the grind—going through the motions, sticking to routines, and following the crowd. As a junior VC, you’re often sourcing hundreds of companies each year and having countless interactions and calls with founders.

Andrew also notes:

We really like his point here. Being an incredible investor is a special craft—it’s not about doing what’s expected of you, but about pushing the limits and striving for something more. If you're willing to put in the extra effort and embrace the hard work, you’ll set yourself apart in ways that others might not even notice yet.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of doing just enough to get by. But to really thrive as a junior VC and eventually climb to partner, it requires constantly thinking outside the box and being willing to challenge the status quo.

Big fans of Andrew, his story, and his content 👏 

CULTURE 🌈

Most narratives about Gen Z are oversimplified. We’re either painted as screen-addicted doomers or fearless entrepreneurs rejecting all tradition. A new study, Life Actually, A No Bullshit Study, surveyed over 1,000 Gen-Zers aged 18-25. They break the generation into three key groups: Neo-Traditionalists, Fluid Pragmatists, and Internet-Age Explorers. Instead of treating Gen Z as a single mindset, the study reveals a spectrum of values shaped by economic realities, digital culture, and shifting definitions of success. The report points out that Gen Z does not possess a single point of view, and brands would be wise to reflect that instead of jumping on every generational cliché.

“The brand communities that actually work are rooted in a true need among younger consumers—a tangible benefit (community, exploration, stability) and not a buzzword. The product is useful, and so is the content.”

🏠 Neo-Traditionalists

Gen Z isn’t just a generation of digital nomads and TikTok hustlers—about 29% of them are leaning into something older: stability. These are the Neo-Traditionalists, the ones who still dream of homeownership, long-term careers, and suburban life. They’re not rejecting modernity, but they see security as the real flex. The world might be chaotic, but they’d rather double down on what’s proven to work. While the media often paints Gen Z as rejecting all tradition, this group is proof that many are opting in, just on their own terms.

🌀Fluid Pragmatists

Then there are the Fluid Pragmatists, the largest segment at 33%. They aren’t chasing extreme wealth or fame, nor are they clinging to rigid traditions. They play the game but refuse to be defined by it. Work-life balance is their priority, and they see financial independence as a necessity, not a status symbol. Unlike older generations that linked success to climbing the corporate ladder, these Gen-Zers are more adaptable, making trade-offs as needed but never fully buying into any single definition of success. They don’t care about the hustle myth; they care about what actually works.

🥾 Internet-Age Explorers

And then there’s the wildcard group: Internet-Age Explorers. Deeply embedded in digital culture, this segment is the most experimental. They see identity, work, and even reality itself as fluid. They aren’t following a set script; they’re remixing it. Their ambitions aren’t necessarily tied to stability or traditional success but to experiences, creativity, and online influence. These are the people shaping internet culture in real time, treating the digital world not just as a tool but as a playground. They’re pushing boundaries, questioning norms, and creating new ones along the way.

CAPITAL 💸

📢 The State of Venture 2024 by AngelList

According to this report, the venture market didn’t get much worse in 2024—so we’ll call that a win. After a brutal 2023, the ecosystem found some stability, but optimism remains cautious. The highlights?

💰 Seed Valuations Are Holding Strong
Despite broader market uncertainty, seed-stage deals are thriving. The median seed round? A staggering $20M pre-money valuation. It seems high-priced seed deals aren’t going anywhere, but the rise of smaller “pre-seed” rounds could create opportunities for scrappier founders.

🤖 AI, AI, and More AI
AI-driven startups dominated the scene in 2024 (no surprise here), outpacing previous hype cycles like crypto and fintech. But not every "AI" startup is actually an AI company. Many are just using AI tools or branding themselves that way to attract funding. Investors are still buying in, but as the trend matures, differentiation will matter more than the label.

📉 The VC Fund Squeeze
The post-pandemic hangover is real. Many funds from 2021-2023 are underperforming, squeezed by high entry valuations and low markups. LPs aren’t getting cash back, and the overhang from the “boom years” is slowing new fund formation. 2025 might be the year we see more secondaries, markdowns, and funds pushing for liquidity—even if it means taking a hit.

🔮 What’s Next?
2025 probably won’t be a breakout year, but it’s also unlikely to get worse. With valuations slowly adjusting and AI still driving excitement, the market could shift toward a slow recovery.

Buckle up. 🚀

From Our Feed to Yours

Tweets, Memes, and other things from our feed that gave us a laugh.

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