Patrick McClain

[Guillermo Rauch @rauchg]

Ship the best product. Use lots of AI, some AI, maybe no AI. Just be the best.

[Hubert Thieblot @hthieblot]

The only unbreakable moat is a founder who literally cannot imagine doing anything else.

Competitors can copy your features and VCs can fund your rivals, but they can't replicate the stubborn refusal to let a specific future die.

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@bchesky @benhylak I agree, the interface people will use won't be a chatbot. It will be primarily ambient and visual, paired with voice. I've been working for the past two years on something in this direction

[Klaas @forgebitz]

personal computer -> personal software

most saas will become headless, api based

people will generate the exact UI and UX they want

generative UI will become fast enough (JITUI)

[Sebastian Siemiatkowski @klarnaseb]

Being "AI native" will mean a complete rebuild of the entire tech stack to run a business.

Every tool. Every system. Every workflow.

The companies that figure this out first will make everyone else look like they're still running on fax machines.

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@Teslaconomics @aelluswamy Yeah the tech is definitely there. Now the time and will is all it takes.

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@chrisfirst Fr 😂

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@rohanjamin Sora 2 looks incredible! Can I get an invite?

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@ninzo121 Can I get an invite?

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@andrewmccalip This is awesome! I would love to give it a try

[GREG ISENBERG @gregisenberg]

A mini-essay on this moment in history:

We're living through something our grandkids will study in history class, and we're experiencing it as just ANOTHER Thursday.

You don't really feel paradigm shifts while you're in them. They feel like normal life with slightly better tools.

The printing press was just a faster way to copy books. The internet was just a better library. AI is just a smarter autocomplete.

You get numb to launch after launch and it all sorta blends into the new normal. Claude writes entire codebases and you're frustrated it missed a semicolon.

The audacity.....

Then ONE DAY you wake up and everything changed while you were sitting in a pointless meeting. That little startup that went viral on X is suddenly the incumbent. That 18 year old kid with a GPT wrapper with no moat is now suddenly the most interesting man in Silicon Valley.

The history books won't capture how mundane it felt. How we spent the revolution arguing about return-to-office policies. How we witnessed the death of gatekeepers while refreshing our email. How the greatest democratization of capability in human history happened mostly on Tuesday afternoons between Zoom calls.

You exist in the 20-year window where individuals can compete with institutions. Where a laptop equals a team. Where David doesn't need a slingshot because Goliath's advantages are somehow available for $20/month.

Soon, the window closes. The regulations arrive. The moats get built. The incumbents adapt. The wild west becomes the suburbs.

But today... on this Thursday... today you can still build something in a weekend that changes everything. Today it's tilted in favor of the individual for the first time in history.

Enjoy this moment while it lasts.

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@gregisenberg Neither.

[Ryo Lu @ryolu_]

There is no secret sauce to making something great.

It just takes a group of believers who care, who are unafraid to build and try crazy ideas.

https://t.co/JwnNQCGS2P

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@skirano Looks awesome!

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@gregisenberg 🔥🔥🔥

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@djcows @sama 😂😂😂

[Cristóbal Valenzuela @c_valenzuelab]

Runway is not an AI company. Runway is a media and entertainment company. And I actually think the era of AI companies is over.

It's not because AI failed - quite the opposite. It's because AI is becoming infrastructure, as fundamental as electricity or the internet. Calling yourself an AI company today is like calling yourself an internet company. It's meaningless because it's universal. Every company uses the internet; every company will use AI.

For Runway, our focus is art, media, and entertainment at large. We began Runway almost seven years ago with a vision that remains largely unchanged today: AI is a necessary tool for storytelling. To achieve that vision, we had to work backwards to build the best research team that could deliver the best models on which we could build the best products.

I often talk about our work as a new kind of camera. Not in the literal sense of capturing images, but in terms of its historical impact. The camera didn't just create photography - it birthed entire industries, economies, and art forms. Cinema, television, TikTok - all children of that first revolutionary tool that could capture light and time.

I think the work we are doing at Runway is part of a new foundation for an entirely new media landscape. Just as the camera transformed how we capture reality, AI is transforming how we create it. The models and technical capabilities we've built are just the beginning - they're the equivalent of those first daguerreotypes, primitive yet pregnant with possibility. The mistake many make is seeing AI as the end goal. It's not. AI is the mechanism, the underlying infrastructure that enables something greater. The real revolution isn't in the technology itself but in what it enables: new forms of expression, new ways of telling stories, new methods of connecting human experiences.

Media has traditionally operated like a one-way street. Creation flows down established channels to reach consumers. Even when distribution was disrupted - first by social media, then by streaming - the fundamental pattern remained: someone creates, others consume. The roles were clear, the boundaries defined. But we're witnessing something different now. Imagine watching something that generates itself as you watch it - truly dynamic content that responds to you, understands you, creates for you. Universal Simulation and world building. The distinction between creation and distribution dissolves when content can shape itself in real-time. That is the foundation for an entirely new media landscape. It's about fundamentally reimagining what media can be: interactive, generative, personal - yet simultaneously shared and universal.

This is also why pure AI companies are becoming obsolete. The interesting questions aren't about the technology anymore - they're about what we build with it. The next wave of innovation won't come from companies focused on building better models. Models are commodities. The technical foundations are now well-established and known by everyone. There are no secrets. The wave of change will come from those who understand how to use these tools to create new forms of media, new types of experiences, new ways of telling stories. The infrastructure is laid. The foundation is built. Now comes the exciting part: creating something meaningful with it.

The end of AI companies marks the beginning of something far more interesting: the birth of truly new media. Not just new platforms or formats, but entirely new ways of creating and experiencing content. We're not building an AI company. And that's a far more exciting mission. Like it has always been; back to our roots.

[GREG ISENBERG @gregisenberg]

you don’t need a cofounder. you need a niche.
you don’t start with a deck. you start with a protoype
you don’t chase virality. you solve a boring problem in a fun way.
you don’t raise a seed round. you ship something weird and useful in a weekend.

you don’t run ads. you own a keyword.
you don't sell access. you sell outcomes.
you don’t build everything. you chain tools together like a hacker.
you don’t need scale. you need a dozen obsessed users.

you don't optimize for valuation. you optimize for freedom.
you don’t overhire. you automate.
you don’t beg for attention. you earn it by being helpful.
you don’t aim for perfection. you aim for traction.

you don’t write a blog post. you drop a loom and wait for DMs.
you don’t create noise. you build something that spreads in group chats.
you don't hire resume builders. you hire problem owners.
you don’t sell. you show.

you don’t guess. you ship, you watch, you tweak.
you don’t need funding. you need leverage.
you don’t write copy. you write what people wish they could say.
you don’t make a website. you make a rabbit hole.

you don’t build a moat. you build a magnet.
you don’t talk about the tech. you talk about the change.
you don’t sell utility. you sell identity.
you don’t build MVPs. you build moments.

you don't need an exit strategy. you need an earning strategy.
you don't need to own the stack. you need to own the relationship.
you don't need to be first. you need to be unforgettable.
you don't worry about competition. you worry about irrelevance.

you don’t A/B test the button color. you A/B test the story.
you don’t track monthly actives. you track how many people would be devastated if it disappeared.
you don’t need PMF. you need groupchat-MF.
you don’t ship what’s requested. you ship what gets screenshotted.

you don’t make it about the product. you make it about the people who use it.
you don’t start with pricing. you start with proof of obsession.
you don't need to time the market. you need to time the insight.
you don’t build a startup. you build momentum.

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@dariusdan I would love to try it

[Patrick McClain @patrick_mcclain]

@sonnylazuardi I’m down to try it!