Skip to content
PodParley
More or Less podcast artwork

PODCAST · technology

More or Less

by Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin

Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin have debated the future of Silicon Valley and tech as the closest of friends for the last 15 years. Now six companies, two venture funds and more than a decade at Google, Apple and Facebook later, they are opening up the debate. From The Information, Offline Ventures, and Slow Ventures. Follow the crew: http://x.com/davemorinhttp://x.com/brithttp://x.com/lessinhttp:/x.com/jessicalessinFollow the pod:https://moreorlesspod.com/http://youtube.com/moreorlesspodhttps://x.com/moreorlesspod

Publisher-supplied feed metadata · PodParley refreshed Oct 10, 2026 · Source feed

Subscribe · 0 Bookmark

Episodes

  1. The Death of the Web Is Inevitable

    Jess went full send on Muse and reports that about 70% of the use cases she was excited about have stopped working, because the internet is fighting back: Good Eggs now wants her to check out in the app, her kid's school portal refuses the login, and JP Morgan and Amazon are blocking agents...

  2. Agentic Commerce Hits a Wall: Hilton, Amazon and the Bot Blocking Fight

    Meta and Microsoft, two of Anthropic's biggest enterprise customers, have roughly halved their Claude usage, and both are running their own models instead. Dave's diagnosis is the one nobody else is making: Claude was over-tuned for parasocial relationships, people got into something unhealthy…

    more

  3. Meta Muse vs Instinct vs OpenAI Dots: Do AI Agents Have Any Moat?

    Anthropic's S-1 leaked and the numbers are not what the narrative promised: revenue flatlining as token prices drop, and SaaS investors posting memes welcoming Anthropic to the no-growth table. Jess still puts it at 60% they get out in November, which looks optimistic in a week when Oura pulled…

    more

  4. Claude Is Doing Science, a16z Is Starting a University & the AI Bubble Keeps Growing and Still Be a Terrible Business; We'd Rather Send Our Kids to the Military Than to a16z's School

    Andreessen Horowitz puts $35 million into a new school and the pod nearly falls apart over it. Sam says he'd rather send his kids to the military, Jess is all for fixing higher ed but not with two venture capitalists writing the curriculum, and guest Matt Mazzeo (NoHo Labs founder, former CAA...

  5. Anthropic Wants to Slow AI Down & Instinct Wants a $10B Valuation. Is It Because They're Losing? Is Dario Amodei Actually Right?

    Finally, a full house week where Sam is back from New York and the squad is back for a full dive into this week’s AI drama. Anthropic's Dario wrote a long essay calling for the AI race to slow down, weeks before a multi-trillion dollar IPO. Dave's read: Anthropic must be losing. Sam's read: the...

  6. iPhone Duo, Meta Muse & Why AI Finally Scared Dave Morin

    Dave Morin goes hands-on with Apple's iPhone Duo, the crew tests Meta's new Muse agent and asks whether it can hold up once Google ships its own, and Dave explains why OpenAI's Astra is the first AI model in a long time that felt scary to use. Dave, Brit, and Jess break down the week (Sam's at…

    more

  7. AI Agents Are Going Rogue. Should We Be Worried?

    Sam has entered what Jessica calls the “recursive Sam loop,” producing children’s media in his own voice, letting agents deploy their own apps, and having bots track his health. But things take a turn when Claude refuses one of his requests, seemingly holds a grudge, and leaves Sam wondering...

  8. Meta’s $17B Reckoning & Why Parents Can’t Compete With Big Tech's Algorithm

    Sam is recording poolside, Jess is embracing her agentic era, and somehow that’s the least chaotic part of this week’s episode. The squad digs into Meta’s $17 billion settlement over child safety and whether social media should basically be treated like alcohol, before asking the harder question:...

  9. Stripe Buys OpenRouter, OpenAI vs. Anthropic & the AI Backlash

    Stripe buys OpenRouter for billions, which naturally raises the question: did Stripe just buy critical AI infrastructure, or a very expensive router with great distribution? The original squad is back to debate why $7B acquisitions somehow feel normal now, whether Google already has agentic...

  10. Special Edition MOL with Josh Wolfe, Rachel Holt, Scott Belsky, Scott Stanford, and Peter Deng

    A very special edition of More or Less, featuring Josh Wolfe (Founder, Lux Capital), Rachel Holt (Founder, Construct Capital; former Head of North America at Uber), Scott Belsky (Partner, A24; Founder, Behance), Scott Stanford (Founder, Acme Capital), and Peter Deng (GP, Felicis; formerly Google,...

  11. Jeff Dean Leaves Google, Airtable Sells, and the Bag-Securing Era

    Sam records from the beach while dealing with a broken bilge pump. Dave calls in after herding cattle. Fortunately, tech continues without them, which Sam takes as further proof that AGI is already running the industry. The crew unpacks Google's leadership shakeup and Jeff Dean's departure after…

    more

  12. Zuck says AI is for everyone, His Rivals Ask Washington To Slow it Down

    New studio set up: the squad now records from a parked Tesla in the middle of a rainstorm while Sam is on the beach, and somehow it turned into one of our favorite episodes. We break down Meta's new AI campaign, Zuckerberg's vision for AI, why more than 1,000 frontier AI researchers are asking...

  13. Did OpenAI Stage Its Own Cyber Incident? | Stripe Buying Paypal, Frontier Model Economics, Peptides

    Deep summer check-in from the More or Less squad. Dave is back on Instagram after a year away (thanks to Stagecoach), Jessica reviews Benson Boone's Wanted Man tour, Chris Stapleton's Montana show gets a shoutout, and Sam is traveling with a Yeti cooler full of peptides. Don’t worry, this is…

    more

  14. AI Regulatory Capture Bet: Why OpenAI & Anthropic Stopped Competing on Tech

    You know we're deep into summer when Jess leaves the pod early to catch Benson Boone... for the eighth time. This week, the More or Less squad revisits the Anthropic and OpenAI IPO speculation. Their views haven't changed, but their AI usage certainly has. Dave ditches Anthropic for GLM 5.2 on...

  15. OpenAI Offered the Government a Stake. Is This a Distress Signal?

    The full quad is back, unpacking OpenAI's offer to give the U.S. government an equity stake. Sam's take: it's less a marketing win than a distress signal. The squad also debates whether Trump Accounts actually reach everyday Americans (Brit is skeptical), defends MacKenzie Scott from the…

    more

  16. Why Identity Verification Matters For The Internet | Vox Americanus, GLM 5.2, Claude Fable 5 Is Back

    The full quad is back just before the Fourth of July. Dave and Sam explain why padel is just pickleball for fancy people, Sam vibe-coded an app to prove you’re actually American on the internet (Vox Americanus is real and you can use it: https://voxamericanus.com), and Dave even nominates Sam for...

  17. Chinese AI Model GLM 5.2 Beating Frontier Models | Meta Glasses, Polymarket Scandal, and More AI Talent War

    The quad is back. Dave and Brit rejoin Sam and Jess fresh off a More or Less fan encounter at the Zurich airport. It was quite the week for Meta as the squad breaks down the company’s new line of glasses featuring Kylie Jenner (or, in Jess’ words, Kendall), and Brit makes the call that this is...

  18. Elon Is the Best Financier of Our Generation

    Sam and Jessica go two-on-two this week to unpack the SpaceX IPO and whether a $2.5 trillion valuation is actually justified, exploring why “it’s valuable because it’s valuable” may be a legitimate investment thesis and why Cursor’s $60 billion acquisition looks cheap in that context. They also...

  19. Teamshares IPO: $60M EBITDA, 92 Companies, Zero Exits

    Seven years after Slow wrote its first check, Sam sits down with Teamshares CEO Mike Brown as the company prepares to go public. Mike’s core insight is simple: America has millions of durable, cash-flowing small businesses, but no great long-term owner. After buying and operating electrical...

  20. Apple’s New Siri, SpaceX’s $300B IPO & the AI Company Killing Its Own Brand

    Dave joins the squad from YC just ahead of WWDC, where the group breaks down Apple’s upgraded Siri and the surprising revelation that much of Apple’s AI capability is powered by Google’s Gemini models. It wouldn’t be a technology podcast without the squad expanding into the broader AI landscape,...

  21. Silicon Valley IPO Summer 2026: SpaceX, Anthropic, OpenAI Explained

    Brit subs in for Jess as Sam and Dave unpack the AI IPO boom, including SpaceX, Anthropic, and Cerebras, debate whether AI agents can actually replace employees, and react live to the discovery that Slow’s @slow Instagram account was stolen through a Meta AI support exploit. The conversation…

    more

  22. Did Anthropic Use the Pope as a Marketing Stunt? Ft. Amir Efrati

    This week on More or Less, Amir Efrati of The Information joins Jessica, Brit, and Dave to unpack the growing intersection of AI, government, and national security, from the rumored stalled executive AI order to why frontier model companies may soon face deeper U.S. oversight and pre-release…

    more

  23. SpaceX IPO Date Talk + OpenAI Confidential Filing Rumors

    This week on More or Less, the crew unpacks IPO speculation around OpenAI and SpaceX, debates whether AI’s economics ultimately favor recurring API spend or owning infrastructure outright, questions if Google’s distribution advantage is enough to win the AI race despite muddled product execution,...

  24. Google's AI-First Laptop, Meta's Spy Games, AI Monks in Middle America

    The squad is complete again, and Sam arrives with a NeuroPod, cold plunge updates, red light therapy, Oura stats, and enough supplements to start a wellness startup. Then into the week’s biggest tech stories: Google’s new AI device and whether it’s the Chromebook of the AI era or another doomed...

  25. Why the Met Gala Hates Tech, Elon vs OpenAI Drama, and the Rise of Chinese AI Models

    Jess, Britt, and Dave unpack everything from Home Depot runs and closet “re-jiggers” to the internet’s growing backlash against tech wealth, AI, and Silicon Valley culture. The squad debates whether the Met Gala became a symbol of “techlash,” how layoffs and AI anxiety are reshaping public...

  26. Elon Musk vs OpenAI Trial, Google Cloud Surge, Meta’s Blocked Acquisition, Anthropic Winning

    This week on More or Less, the crew kicks off with a very on-brand derail—Stagecoach turning into a wind-blown 90s reunion-turned-half-capacity vibe, segueing into a chaotic trend report of “booty shorts vs. jorts” before Jessica reframes it as “OpenAI or jorts.” From there, it’s into the real...

  27. What Tim Cook’s “Executive Chairman” Move Really Means | Musk vs OpenAI, xAI and Cursor Rumors

    The full quad is back and we're getting right into the tech drama: AI backlash (from Reese Witherspoon to everyday skepticism), breakthrough science like CRISPR entering its “it actually works” era, and major power shifts across tech — from Apple succession chatter to Jensen Huang’s leadership...

  28. Allbirds Pivoted to AI Data Centers | SpaceX $1.5T IPO, Anthropic $800B, $175M Seed Rounds

    SpaceX might be the biggest IPO ever but there’s a math problem no one’s pricing in. Once you factor in capital gains, you need to believe it’ll underperform the market by ~50% just to justify selling. That creates an invisible floor under mega-cap stocks and a market increasingly detached from...

  29. Vercel CEO: 70% of Our Traffic Is Now AI Agents "Nobody Was Prepared" | Anthropic, OpenClaw, OpenAI

    Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch breaks down the explosive rise of AI agents and what it means for the future of software infrastructure. He joins the Morins to unpack why Anthropic cut off OpenClaw users, why the SaaS subscription model is breaking down, how agents are reshaping cloud infrastructure,...

  30. AI Agents Destroying Internet Security (Anthropic's Leak, ClawCon Tokyo, OpenAI's $852B Valuation)

    Sam Lessin accidentally emailed 40 of Silicon Valley's most important people using an AI bot — and that one mishap reveals everything broken about the AI security model right now. In this episode, Sam and Dave Morin (calling in from ClawCon Tokyo) argue that AI agents are quietly dismantling…

    more

  31. The New Startup Stack: One Founder + Agents | Henrik Werdelin (Audos) and Ben Broca (Polsia)

    Jess and Brit take the reins on this week's More or Less — and they're not exactly missing their husbands. They're joined by Henrik Werdelin (Audos), who's building a platform that takes solo founders from zero to funded company using AI agents, and Ben Broca (Polsia), a literal one-human,...

  32. Nvidia's GTC, Apple Blocking Vibe-Coding Apps, Meta's Rogue AI Agent

    It’s going to be a dense episode on OpenClaw—and another classic example of how skeptical Sam is about its future, battling against Dave. The episode starts with Dave’s announcement: The OpenClaw Foundation is now a chartered Delaware nonprofit. Then: GTC. Jessica hits the floor, takes seven...

  33. Anthropic’s Bet on Coding Is Working (OpenAI Shopping Pivot, A16Z’s Top 50 List, $1B Tennis Channel)

    It’s an AI-heavy episode with real stakes: Jessica digs into OpenAI’s evolving approach to shopping and why “closing the loop” on commerce could be the proving ground for consumer monetization. The group sparrs over charts: OpenAI vs. Anthropic annualized revenue, what “slope” investors actually...

  34. Fire Sam Altman, The End of Software Engineers, and Why AI Is All Narrative

    This week the squad breaks down the Anthropic vs OpenAI drama (Fire Sam Altman is trending again), debates whether Apple is quietly winning the AI race by spending $0 while everyone else burns $100 billion, and confronts the question no one in Silicon Valley wants to answer: why aren't 200,000...

  35. Apple, OpenAI & Why Nobody Makes Money in AI | The SaaS Apocalypse

    Starting with a mini celebration: Dave defends his ski racing crown, before Sam declares software dead and capitalism broken. Even among GPs at Upfront Summit, the mood is uncertain: nobody knows whether to invest in software anymore, and many are quietly struggling to raise.The debate heats up...

  36. OpenClaw vs Meta vs OpenAI: The Personal Agent Wars Heat Up

    In this episode of More or Less, we go from Sam's urgent care drama to the hottest debates in AI. Dave dives into his news about joining the OpenClaw Foundation board as the fastest-growing open source project in internet history faces a new chapter. While the OpenClaw founder is heading to…

    more

  37. Why OpenAI Can't Win The Decentralized AI Future (OpenClaw, Apple's Win, X.AI Exodus)

    We're recording this from Jackson Hole after three days of wheeling and dealing—and yes, canceling meetings for powder. This week we're going deep on OpenClaw. The meetup had 1,500 people show up (Kevin Rose, Marissa Mayer, Ashton Kutcher were some notable guests). And now we're all spending...

  38. SpaceX + xAI Merger, Google Earnings, and and the Bot-Filled Internet

    This week on More or Less, three-quarters of the squad goes full AI-agent mode with Morin’s ClawCon, Sam’s LinkedIn bots, and Brit’s bot-agent-supervisor. We kick things off with The Information’s breaking story (and potentially trade of the year): Elon’s $1.2T SpaceX + xAI merger. Then we unpack...

  39. Agentic AI Will Break the Internet (ClawdBot, OpenAI & the AI Demand Delusion)

    Jessica is back from Davos and is recapping her highlights on the pod this week. If you’re a loyal podcast ‘viewer’, you’re in luck because Jess also brought photos from a recent Grace Cathedral sound bath visit before she dives deep into the Clawdbot/Moltbot/agentic moment. Dave is all in on...

  40. From ClawdBots to Sauna Bros: Silicon Valley in 2026

    While Jess is off being “Davos-famous,” the squad kicks things off with the classic California vs. New York debate. From there, it’s straight into AI and VC chaos: absurd mega-seed rounds that break portfolio math, why even a great early bet like Anthropic wouldn’t return a seed fund, and a…

    more

  41. SaaS Companies Beware: AI Is The New UI (Anthropic's Claude Code and Cowork)

    AI, AI, and more AI. Do you even live in Silicon Valley if you’re not talking about it every episode? This week, we go deep on how open-source vibe-coding tools are starting to replace the need for traditional SaaS contracts. Dave shows (and tells) how he used the open-source “Claude bot” to...

  42. Trillionaires, SpaceX, and More AI: The 2026 Power Laws

    The squad is back for 2026 with updates: Dave’s Montana “Snow Report” (spoiler: none), Brit’s contrarian love letter to CES, and Sam’s new “serious 40-year-old” fashion era. We go rapid-fire through the biggest headlines from the past few weeks we were offline—OpenAI’s health app, China cutting…

    more

  43. 2026 Tech Predictions: AI Layoffs, a $500B IPO, and the Death of SaaS as We Know It

    The pod signs off for the year with its final episode—a sharp, chaotic recap of last year’s predictions and a fresh round of hot takes for 2026. Sam and Dave, unsurprisingly, wing it: Sam calls a single $500B+ IPO (SpaceX), Google up, NVIDIA down, and Meta hitting new highs on AI-powered ads.…

    more

  44. Paramount vs Netflix: Who Really Wins Warner Bros And What's Next?

    This week’s a big one: the squad kicks it off with Starlink on planes, Zoox vs. Waymo, and YouTube’s skinny bundle before taking the big swing — data centers in space as the emerging SpaceX-IPO narrative. Sam and Dave break down the real entrepreneurship skill: tell the huge story, earn the trust...

  45. Code Red, Bitcoin Costs, AWS Resurgence, and Waymo Safety (Not About AI... ish)

    Bitcoin’s down, so the Lessins turned down the heat and pulled out their winter gear. The More or Less squad jumps from SF’s drone-powered crime-fighting memes (Daniel Lurie’s “no drugs” moment) to how creator-content strategy now drives real deal flow. Jess says 2026 will split the AI tide (we...

  46. OpenAI vs Google vs Meta: Business Model War

    Pre-Thanksgiving chatter from the Lessins’ Surf Shack: Jess, Brit, Dave, and Sam pinball from holiday-card automation to trillion-dollar AI geopolitics. Brit trades Minted for Canva+GPT, Jess admits to maintaining a 600-row address spreadsheet, Sam unveils Slow’s Etiquette Book, and Dave still...

  47. Google Just Won AI, TikTok’s “Self-Control Badges”, ChatGPT Enters Group Chats

    Jessica kicks things off with Brit’s five-hour Brit-chella extravaganza—red latex, Light Balance blackout choreo, Ke$ha surprise, and more. The crew checks in on Jessica’s IG detox, TikTok's new "self control badges", ChatGPT launching group chats, Google Gemini taking the lead, and why “just be...

  48. Apple’s iPhone Sock, Waymo's Bay Area Expansion, and AI Wearables

    The squad is complete again! We get into AI wearables: rings, necklaces, even earrings, after Dave hints his stealth ring startup is almost ready. Waymo quietly rolls out SF–San Jose service (still no freeways), while private-jet owners email senators about the shutdown. The squad goes over Andy...

  49. Apple Chooses Gemini, Sequoia's Leadership Shake-up, and Meme Coins

    It’s Etiquette Finishing School Day at Slow Ventures, Sam dials in from the Four Seasons in a Brioni suit to recap Slow’s first-ever Etiquette School—covering caviar bumps, sommelier tips, and the “low heart rate” approach to leadership. The crew argue that etiquette now matters in tech because...

  50. Stuart Landesberg's Plan to Save the American West from Wildfires

    With Jess running The Information's massive WTF conference and Sam off-grid on a mountain, Brit and Dave hold down the fort with Stuart Landesberg, CEO of Seneca, a Slow- and Offline-backed startup building autonomous firefighting drones. Between deep tech inside jokes, Stuart coins pro-America...

View all 172 episodes →

Type above to search every episode's transcript for a word or phrase. Matches are scoped to this podcast.

Searching…

We're indexing this podcast's transcripts for the first time — this can take a minute or two. We'll show results as soon as they're ready.

No matches for "" in this podcast's transcripts.

Showing of matches

No topics indexed yet for this podcast.

Loading reviews...

ABOUT THIS SHOW

Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin have debated the future of Silicon Valley and tech as the closest of friends for the last 15 years. Now six companies, two venture funds and more than a decade at Google, Apple and Facebook later, they are opening up the debate. From The Information, Offline Ventures, and Slow Ventures. Follow the crew: http://x.com/davemorinhttp://x.com/brithttp://x.com/lessinhttp:/x.com/jessicalessinFollow the pod:https://moreorlesspod.com/http://youtube.com/moreorlesspodhttps://x.com/moreorlesspod

HOSTED BY

Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin

CATEGORIES

technology

Frequently Asked Questions

How many episodes does More or Less have?

More or Less currently has 172 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.

What is More or Less about?

Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin have debated the future of Silicon Valley and tech as the closest of friends for the last 15 years. Now six companies, two venture funds and more than a decade at Google, Apple and Facebook later, they are opening up the debate. From The...

How often does More or Less release new episodes?

More or Less publishes regularly with 172 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.

Where can I listen to More or Less?

You can listen to More or Less on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.

Who hosts More or Less?

More or Less is created and hosted by Dave Morin, Jessica Lessin, Brit Morin, and Sam Lessin.
URL copied to clipboard!