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Members of Technical Staff

The State of AI Startups

April 13, 2026 • Atlas Media Labs

0:00 | 21:58

I had @0thernet over and instead of just hanging out over coffee or tea like normal people we decided to podcast like absolute morons. Anyway this MOTS extra is timely because I got a glimpse into the state of AI startups in 2026.

Watch on X; listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

ben pitches me to @Anthropic

SPEAKER_01 0:00

You're listening to a special edition of Mods here today. Some might call it a Mods Extra. Basically, what I call it is Ben of Zoe Computer is in town and he is in my house. So welcome to my house, Ben. Hello. Yeah. Good to be here. It's very cozy. It's good to have you here. You know, some might say it's cozy, some might say it's a little bit dark. You know, others might say it's a bit old. I mean, all of those things are true. All of those things are true. But you know, I'm actually on a mission for this background to become iconic with my um kind of like frazzled shells. I get I get a lot of comments talking about how like um, you know, like like a lot of like a lot of my female friends, they want to organize my shelves. And I say to them, actually, if you look at it, it's actually it's kind of organized, there's just like a bit of miscellaneous things.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

This is like the anthropic vibe, and you know, if TBPN is the open AI vibe, I think this is very much anthropic. Hey, you don't mind if I do.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

Uh yeah, any any anthropic listeners uh listening, uh your boy is uh up for sale always. Everyone has a number. That's all that's all I'm gonna say to that. And I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_00 1:03

I I appreciate the the uh the sprooking. Dario, please, please buy Jaden.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

Yes, I will fix your messaging and I'll stop swearing on camera. You know? Uh for anthropic, I would do it. For for any other lab, uh no. The terms would be slightly different for any other lab. Uh but anthropic, I would. Anthropic, I would. I will I will um I'll read as many shrimp welfare books as I possibly can. You know? Like I'll be one with the shrimp. I'll go get pet shrimp. You'll become a shrimp.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Don't mind if I do. Sounds kind of cool, actually. I think that's what we're all becoming, right, in the future. We're all becoming shrimp. Shrimp or paper clips. It's like no nowhere in between. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:41

Yeah, I mean, I mean, uh, it just doesn't sound it doesn't sound the worst. Yeah. They seem kind of cool. That's not not the poorest outcome for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

Better than the permanent underclass.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

I agree, I agree. We will get to this. We will get to this because um, you know, I think I'm not sure I'm not sure when the permanent underclass thing will go away. I think it's probably here to stay. And um for for those that don't really like that, uh, my sincerest apologies because I tweeted about that a lot. For sure. I I have as well.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

And it goes south sometimes.

demonstrating the @zocomputer tab

SPEAKER_01 2:10

It can, it can. But you know, I think as long as there is um, as long as there's like a large enough gap between major AI releases with like what is perceived to be step changes in the progress, I feel like people, you know, people people have time to relax. Yeah, people have time to relax a little bit, you know. It's just like like clawed code uh in your sort of November, December, engineers started using it and they're like, okay, well, my entire life has changed. And that was probably true. But December was uh four months ago. So naturally, we're we're on the flattening out of the S curve and AI progress is done. Yeah, totally. It's boring now. Yeah, yeah. That's right, that's right. We don't have a major release every week. So um what we can get into today, I think, is basically, you know, you run an AI startup. I think that's pretty fair to say. Zoe Computer. It is, yeah. And thank he's got the uh he's got the nice little bit of map. We're actually we're actually, you know what? Let me get my little key. This is, you know, we won't cut this out. Um for what what people didn't don't realise is that uh um well people people listeners of Moss uh certainly realise that we had uh Moth's Zoe Valentine's Day. Yeah. But what they gave out, and I it's not really gonna be in the frame, um, but we got these nice little uh Zoe keyboards. It's kind of like the cursor tabs, except you get two. Two, yeah, that's the Zoe way. Don't mind if I do. Yeah. I mean, and so this has gone onto my little uh and they sound really good actually.

SPEAKER_00 3:36

Yeah, it's very satisfying.

being non-technical in an AI startup

SPEAKER_01 3:37

It's like just an ASMR right in the detail. I mean, that this is this has got to be such a like a listening experience. Oh yeah, but we can just do this for the whole part. Yeah. I mean, do you wanna do wanna do wanna bum a tab? Oh yeah, sure. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. For those that are listening, you guys are screwed. I'm so sorry. Um that's quite an experience. That's quite an experience indeed. Mots first for that one. Um where is even getting to this? But yeah, AI startup, so computer, of course, uh personal assistant in the cloud. Uh I mean the way that I like to say it's actually open claw before it was cool. That's true, yeah. And it's probably it's actually easier to use, but you know, that's that's me saying that. I can be the like kind of cynical and you know, those sorts of things. Um but where I'm going with this, state of an AI startup. Especially in 2026, like it's like uh, you know, I have not been running a software startup for about six months now. I've been running a media company by myself. Very, very, very different vibe. But the the AI startup, the venture-backed tech company, um, the way that these things are run is is sort of like changing in front of our eyes. Yeah, right. Totally. And I have like I have a few little subtopics, and then we can start kind of clean, and then we can get into more of like the culture stuff, which is you know what people what people really are here for. Um when it comes to startup culture in 2026. I guess my first question uh uh you know, you got you got a few non-technical people at your team. And I don't I don't meant to say it uh, you know, it's like like I'm now non-technical as well, so I can use that as a slur. It's probably a good thing nowadays. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Um do you find that like are the non-technicals at your company just like spinning up agents like the like the engineers are?

SPEAKER_00 5:11

Yeah, so we we only hire Zoe power users as our non-technical users. We find them in our community and they're using Zoe a lot um to do lots of cool stuff, they're non-technical, but they're like building automations, yeah, crazy stuff. Um and we find the ones that are like kind of really into it, spreading the word and like um using Zoe to like do like kind of stuff at scale. And I think anybody can do that now. Everybody has like this kind of leverage, and yeah, yeah. I I I think like for non-technical roles, it's all about hiring for people that kind of can think in systems and like build stuff, um, basically. Totally.

permanent underclass discourse on startup morale

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Was Jamie doing that? Yeah, Jamie uses it a lot. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Shout out to Jamie. Shout out to you. You would have you would have seen you would have seen Jamie on the um the Valentine's Day episode, and of course, you know, helped helped us put put Valentine's Day together. She was instrumental in the in the effort. Yeah, uh they're the rager. We need more corporate rages. So I I think this is just the way to go. And but we'll we will get to that. We will get to that. And my my other question, because you know, and we can't it comes back to sort of like the the uh you know the permanent underclass discourse, really, but company morale, you know, I'm sort of thinking about okay, all of this is happening, you know, the step change in AI progress, all of this sort of thing. Um, you know, if you're working in a fast growing startup, I I wonder, do you find that all of this discourse affects company morale in any way, shape, or form? Right? Do you ever have conversations at at Zoe about this sort of thing, like like a lot of the discourse online, or is it kind of just like, you know what, we got new tools now, uh, this is gonna help us operate and we're like it'll be fine.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Yeah, I mean I think we hire for people that are excited about it. So I I don't think it really affects morale. I think it probably affects morale positively if anything, um, that we have like so much more leverage, and like these models are really cooking now in a way that they weren't just like you know last year, last fall. Right. So um I think it's been great for morale. Um the main thing that affects our morale maybe is like our token spend has increased a lot.

SPEAKER_01 7:04

Um you're getting the um you know the the the clawed code bill from the from the non-technical. Yeah, you know, you haven't even opened a PR, what are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 7:14

Exactly. Yeah, I mean soon we'll be paying people less than we pay anthropic. Yeah. So um, yeah, it's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Yeah, I think uh yeah, I'm gonna say, uh well that is, yeah. I mean, I would say uh many many AI startups are in the same boat. Yeah, for sure. Many AI startups are in the same boat. So no, I think that is, and and it's important to know because again, like I feel like so many people in San Francisco, they just get caught up in this. It's like, oh, you know, like like uh, you know, maybe I'm like I'm an I'm an employee in a startup and I'm not at a frontier lab or I'm not like a I'm not a I'm not a startup founder with the potential for an exit. Like there's so much there still is a fair bit of angst around it. Totally, totally. So yeah, you know, I think um yeah, definitely like feeling like you're in in an environment in which is going to benefit from well, like whatever the change is happening next. Totally.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

Yeah, it's like a wave is happening, and if you're not surfing the wave, then then maybe you should feel a little bit uh uncertain. But um but I think there's there's definitely things to do to like kind of uh take advantage of it.

fundraising in 2026

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Totally, totally. So my next point here, the next one here, um is actually more along the lines of fundraising in 2026. Yeah. Uh it's actually been a while since I personally fundraised. Uh I think gosh, when was the last time I fundraised? We've been at the end of 2024, actually. Putting together a little angel round, so it's a little bit different, you know. It's like like one of those things. But I do remember, um, I do remember back then the the the the the bar for entry was kind of would it felt like it was starting to go up pretty significantly. I feel like 2025 you had a lot of like there was a lot of press about sort of like these unicorns, you know, going from zero to a hundred million like two years versus say seven pre-COVID. Totally, yeah. And so like the the bar just got really high really quickly in terms of like growth curves, growth expectations, these sorts of things. For sure, for sure. Um, you know, without disclosing anything, yeah. What is what you know what have you seen, you know, as somebody who has raised in the last you know year?

SPEAKER_00 9:14

Yeah, totally. Um so yeah, we raised it back in 2023, um, and then we have been raising again and closing. Um but um yeah, it definitely feels different. Um I think it's a lot more crowded for sure, um, noticeably, even since like 2023 or like you know, back in the day when I remember I was in tech. Um yeah, it's like everybody and their grandma is like you know starting a company now. Right, right. Um so there's a lot a lot of competition and the the the buried entry in some ways is lower, um, at least for like kind of getting started, I think. Um there's probably well a lot more noise for VCs to sort through. Um and I think there's definitely like something different um in deep in the water. Um yeah, um I don't know. Um I I think the market's still hot.

SPEAKER_01 9:54

Yes, yeah. Oh, totally, totally. Have you seen sort of like and you know this this doesn't necessarily have to be like your own experience, but it could be, you know, uh the experience of those around you. I think the last time I really spoke deeply about this topic would have been towards the end of last year. And um what was mentioned was that the the bar for an A round is particularly high, but the bar for pre seed and seed is not as high, kind of like what you're alluding to, right? You know, there's there's a lot more lot more capital available at the early stage, but then you know your your growth curve and and you know the the the proof has to already be there by series A. And you've sort of seen the same thing.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Totally, yeah. I think people are like uncertain about what the future of SaaS is in general. So like um I think that just means that like a lot of people are probably setting it out or like kind of they just want to wait and see what happens, yeah, which is a totally valid um approach if you're an investor, I'd say. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Oh, so does that so does that mean does that mean you're seeing um or you know, like like does that mean there may be more like more investors actually waiting out the the the early stage rounds and then waiting for more of that proof from A and beyond?

SPEAKER_00 11:01

I think so, yeah. I think people really want to see that like kind of hockey stick or like signs of the hockey stick, um, which is totally valid, I'd say, um, especially in this kind of current dynamic where like software is like so easy to make. Yeah.

the state of corporate sponsored events

SPEAKER_01 11:14

Totally, totally. Yes, the the hockey stick reference is very, very important because it's like I feel like so many people in Silicon Valley, so many young people who's like, cool, like like build a product, raise money, or raise money, build product. Um there's so many like caveats to taking on venture capital, right? It's like it's always something, you know, some people will find that out the hard way, or it's like, oh no, like I'm probably building something that I didn't need a raise for, and now I'm sort of subject to hockey stick growth versus like you know, I can sort of take my time and you know, like like sustainably build a business. It almost like puts a shelf life if you're not growing that way, right? So there's um it's a high bar, it's a high bar across the board. Yeah, okay. So the uh to get into some more of the startup culture, because that's that is that is really what that's really what we're here for. It's the culture stuff, it's the culture stuff. And we alluded to it before with Monts Valentine's Day, um, but something that I've been noticing quite a bit this year is just the like how how corporate events are changing. Now they're just dinners. Totally, yeah. It's just like it's just like, oh yeah, um, we're just gonna bankroll a dinner and we're gonna say it's our dinner. Yeah. Uh you guys get a free dinner, but it's our dinner. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:23

Uh have you been going to a lot of these? I've been to some dinners, yeah. Uh you you know, it's hit or miss, honestly. There's so many of them. But uh you don't have to name the food's the food's good, right? Yeah, of course, of course.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

So then because you're because you're based in New York, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:35

Yeah, we are in New York, yeah. There are lots of good restaurants. So it's it's a good opportunity to get out there and eat some good food.

SPEAKER_01 12:40

How many of the I mean it's you know it's like like you can sort of have an estimate, but how how many um how many invites per month would you say, like to corporate dinners do you that you get?

SPEAKER_00 12:49

Yeah, a lot. Um like at least one a week. At least one a week, yeah, yeah. I don't usually go to them, but um um but there's a lot of them.

SPEAKER_01 12:57

Wouldn't be got dead like gone in network, but post-networking. I am post-networking. I am post-networking too, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's like like you know, got got the got the stuff, you're right, it like like built something a little bit. Sure, and that's what Twitter's for. That's I was it, I was exactly read my mind. I was about I was exactly about to say just that that's what we have x.com, the everything app for that. X.com is my networking, it is my dating, it is my our friends, my paycheck, exactly right. Um, and so you know, I just I just need the website to stay up. Um otherwise, like I'm in deep trouble. Yeah, and and don't change the algorithm, please. That's it. Yeah. You know what's kind of crazy is that like whenever they tweak it now, I feel it. I know, I'm sure you do. And I'm like, this is this is like a special level of brain, right? It's a special level of like of of hell that I've um you know put myself into. But you know, I'm better than LinkedIn. Yeah, for sure. There's that. Um what else here? What else here? Yeah, on the corporate events and dinners, like obviously, yeah, because we we we we did the we did the rager. Are there many other companies just like straight up hosting rages, or is that just kind of like I haven't seen it yet?

SPEAKER_00 14:03

We hosted a bunch in SF. Um and uh yeah, it's funny. Um it's it's a good way to tap into a certain crowd, I'd say. Um and uh especially in SF, I think it's like a good thing to do. Totally, totally. You know, definitely sponsor the Moths future Ragers for listening. It's um it's a great way to get out there, I'd say. Um and you can have a lot of fun while you're there. Totally, totally.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

Yeah, I think it's it's cool, right? I mean, it's like um, you know, the way that I think about it, you know, especially when I go ahead and facilitate it, right? It's like I think um, yeah, the the the it the rager is it's a it's an underappreciated art form, yeah. Um which is which is ironic because I barely drink. Um but but it's like it's like one of those things in which uh I find that you can get a decent amount of reach with a with a worthwhile crowd if you just make it memorable. And it's not to say that corporate events can't be memorable. Yeah. I do find that like in SF in particular, there's a lot of there's a lot of companies that try and like they kind of like they try and blur that line between like some sort of like hip, maybe rager-ish event, but while it also is kind of corporate, and I find that the ones that that kind of sit in the middle don't really work. Yeah, totally. Like unapologetically corporate is fine, actually. Yep, for sure. Um, but then unapologetically rager is is pretty cool. If you can get close to that, totally. That's how I think about it. That's how I think about it.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

That's what events are about, I think. Yes. It's like creating this like kind of like uh world. Um and and if it's just somewhere in the middle, that's that's a little weird. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 15:30

Yeah, yeah, it it it it and it comes across that way because it's like, okay, like like do I give my email address or like like are we like like is that what we're doing here? But I see you know, it's like like there's like a DJ and people dancing, but then you know, I'm giving like my LinkedIn to get in, and it's like it's like okay, like what like what are we doing here versus like curated list, we're coming in, we're drinking, or vice versa. It's like cool, we have um, you know, like tables set up, and you know, like like we have like snacks and those sorts of things. Uh people people might even wear a name tag, and it's like, okay, this is just like this is what it is. It's like maybe it's an office warming or something, um, but like very unapologetically corporate. Like, it's like I think the the main thing is to sum it all up, it's like as long as people just like know what they're gonna get or have an idea of what they're going to get, I think it's like people can sort of have an expectation that way.

SPEAKER_00 16:19

Yeah, and a Breath of Fresh Air for me actually has been a claw-con. I've been going to a bunch of clock-ons around the country um and going to London next week, going to Singapore later. But um went to the one Miami and it was in a club, the literal club, yeah. There's like visuals uh powered by open claw. Oh no way. It's actually pretty sick. Um there's like a lot of normies there, like not just techies, and I think that's how you get it into like kind of Rager territory. Totally, totally the normies there.

distribution in 2026

SPEAKER_01 16:46

This didn't need the normies there, couldn't have said it better myself. I mean, I mean, I mean, we're we're out here in in this little bubble. Um, who is appealing to the normies? Turns out ClawCon is. Yeah, they totally are. Props to them. Props to them, props to them. All right, the last one, the last one that I have here, um, you know, uh under the guise of uh AI startups in 2026 and the state of them is distribution. Yeah, it's like to rage bait or to not rage bait. Yeah. To to make people mad online or to, you know, do something else. Yeah. You know? Yeah. What's the say to that? Obviously, obviously, you've had a you've had an interesting bit the last couple of months.

SPEAKER_00 17:23

I have had some some rage bait. Um, it's been interesting. Um, yeah, I I think it can be effective. I even ran some ads that were kind of rage baity, which is an interesting thing to try. Oh, interesting. You do like like Instagram or TikTok or just X ads, yeah. Oh really? X ads are really great, they're a really a useful um platform, I'd say. Wow, wow.

SPEAKER_01 17:41

That is a meta that I've not tried out before. Try it out for your pod.

SPEAKER_00 17:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:45

Yeah. Some X ads for mods. Yeah. Not a bad idea. Not a bad idea. Just funnel your payouts back to the ads and yeah. True, true. Hey, I mean, there's something, there's something there. There's something there for all the posters out there that are that are getting. Never thought about it like this. Never thought about it like this. That makes sense. That makes sense. I mean, how are you how are you sort of thinking of like, you know, because obviously Zoe goes, I mean, yeah, consumers mostly. Is that would that be fair to say? Yep, definitely for normies.

SPEAKER_00 18:16

Um but also techies. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 18:18

And so so like like what have you found, like like have you found say like, you know, um, you know, create like UGC content on Instagram versus say like ex ads or just or just organic like ex shit posting. Yeah. Like what have you found to be perhaps the most effective channel so far?

SPEAKER_00 18:35

Yeah, we've been doing some UGC, um, not the Cluley way, but yeah, we're doing it in a very like very demure uh way. But uh we have a big iMessage chat with a bunch of kids in it. Um and one of the kids has like become the leader, um, self-elected leader. Um it's been great. Um is doing a great job actually finding more people. Um yeah, I I think like DIY UGC is very possible in this day and age. Um you don't even you can like definitely layer in like AI content, but like there's a lot of kids out there that just want to make content and they're like you know, they're they're they're born for it basically. Right, right. Oh totally, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:08

They're like they're like Instagram reels native. Exactly. That's terrifying. But hey, some some of them are gonna do it. It's like like like the meme where it's like you know who would win like US government propaganda or a 14-year-old with Cap Cut. Oh yeah, totally, totally. Some true next president. 14-year-old with Cap Cut. Yeah, put him put him in the White House, put him in the White House. Yeah, that's fascinating. I mean, I think you know, um like like what like how do you how do you see uh X as a part of that strategy? I mean, you know, regardless of whether it's like regardless of whether it is um like rage bait or not, yeah. Like how how how do you see it playing into an AI startups distribution?

SPEAKER_00 19:47

Yeah, I'd say that like UGC is like lower market, X is like mid market, I'd say, and then YouTube is probably like up market. Yeah. Um that's kind of like how I how I see the kind of like space of like video content generally. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

Yeah, makes sense to me. Makes sense to me. YouTube's a hard one to crack. Those ones that those ones that can crack YouTube, um, yeah, that's it's it's a big deal. I mean, it's what I'm what I'm trying to do with uh swall as a service. Uh-huh, yeah. Love it. It's the attempt. So we'll we'll see, we'll see how it goes. We'll see how it goes. Um yeah, that those are those are really the main ones that I wanted to wanted to cover. Um if there's anything off the top of your head that you wanted to add, you can feel free to do so.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

I mean I I swallow as a service sounds good to me. I can definitely get more swallow in the case. Yeah, totally, totally.

SPEAKER_01 20:32

Yeah, well, there's it's funny that you know we can we can we can talk halfway about it, but I have I have some plans with it. I have some plans. So that'll be um yeah, that'll be that'll be interesting. Swall as a service continuing on. Obviously, yeah, Liam was on the other day. Yeah, so um, and yeah, he's just jacked. So I mean, like I expected him to top the leaderboard. Is it only jacked people allowed? Oh no, no, no, no. It's a common, it's actually a common misconception, it's my fault because you know I'm always just trying to gas up the home. He's been like, you know, like if they're jacked, I'm gonna be like, this guy's the most jacked person ever. And you know, like they really just gass them up. Yeah, yeah. Um it did lead to some a little bit of controversy. Uh a few questions asking, like, um, you know, like, did you consider any women for this? Uh and then to to those, all I say, all I say is check out Motspod, please. That's all you're gonna do. Um, and you know, the other one is like, it's the second episode. And two, um, Liam just is more jacked than my female friends. Yeah. And I think it's fair to say. Yeah, totally fair. He's pretty jacked. Pretty jack. Anyway, see if that one cancels us. Um I think that's probably a good place to wrap. Yeah. Pretty pretty nice place to wrap. You've been listening to another uh another Mots extra, actually. We're not sure when we'll release this, but you'll see it when you see it. That's the cool thing. Uh, as I always like to say, I love to say stuff like I guess we'll see. You know, it's like NPC stuff like, hey, time will tell. I like that. It's like, what does that even mean? Uh you've been listening to another episode of members of technical staff. We'll go ahead and see you on the timeline again real soon.