Ben Kahan

We are a venture firm, not a software company. But when we need a tool now, the first question is not what to buy, it is whether we can just build it ourselves. A few subscriptions we used to renew without thinking are gone.

Curious what others are seeing. Have you cancelled anything because you built the replacement, and did it hold up?

Not which model benchmarks best.

Which one is actually open on your machine right now? And what did it replace?

I spend a lot of time on the investor side of the table, and the thing that surprises me most isn't bad decks. It's good founders following bad advice with total confidence. Someone they trust told them to do it, so they don't question it. Then they watch a raise stall and never connect it back to the "tip."

A few I run into constantly, and what I think actually works instead: