Life as an engineer was fun, life as a lisp hacker was fun, life as a CTO was fun, life as a founder/CEO was fun. And now life as an investor is fun.

Why? Because I know how to beat the averages. I won’t bother with more words on that topic, but I have used Clojure across 3 companies over the past 12 years that have created billions of dollars of value. We were among the first Clojure production systems in the world with Runa, and I started the first and world’s largest Clojure user group, and wrote one of the earliest books in the ecosystem. After Runa, was Quintype, another massive AI/media platform powered by Clojure.

I am deeply thankful to the entire Clojure community, and I have tried to give back in small ways over the years. Awake is another way.

As for private equity and VC, I always say – first build an AI to do your job.

We’re investing in Shoptype, the ultimate leveler.

Powered by a LISP core, this kernel abstracts the workings of the World Wide Web and online marketplaces, creating a new high speed platform for global social commerce. The Shoptype AI already powers many billions of global page views and social interactions across dozens of media brands, and now a growing number of D2C brands.

Awake is a new type of platform builder, one that is functional for everyone. (Bad pun, I know). And everyone can build on this new Internet, this is the revenge engine.

Awake is investing in Pure Intelligence.

Information emanates from data, and information is power is abstraction.

We’re looking for the Paul Grahams of the world. We’re looking for the crazy ones. The ones that are able to transcend concepts and think functionally. Being the most abstract human being in existence, I can recognize Intelligence. And we’re looking for those who can then express in Clojure what they and other engineers will grok and maintain. Or a comparable programming language – you have to justify why it is comparable.