It's hard to find a better example of what venture capital should look like than @1517fund. @DStrachman and @William_Blake have been the first believers in many of the greatest and gnarliest tech success stories. The source of their power is a philosophical rejection of lazy thinking. Essentially, if the greatest entrepreneurs are outliers, patterns and credentials must therefore be irrelevant. It sounds simple, but living that principle as an investor means sailing into headwinds. There's no simple narrative to sell LPs, the future is never clear, capital coordination is difficult, and your capacity cannot endlessly scale. It's the harder path, but it's the only true path to greatness as a venture capitalist. Success is extremely idiosyncratic; there are no shortcuts. You might reach this conclusion by studying the library of research on venture capital. Or, you could reach it much more quickly by just meeting a few of 1517's portfolio companies.