What Would Make an AI Assistant Worth Paying For?

a16z · · 50 min

a16z and David Pawlan discuss what makes AI personal agents worth paying for, covering specialization, proactivity, and how agents could reshape commerce.

a16z host DP David Pawlan guest · 3 picks
Watch the episode 50 min · YouTube

The gist

  1. Agents earn trust through proactivity and invisibility, doing things without being asked, but crossing into unwanted autonomy breaks trust immediately.
  2. Cost-saving use cases like flight price tracking and HSA reimbursements drive better long-term adoption than attention-grabbing tools like travel booking.
    ChatGPT

What they recommend · 3 picks

17:41
ChatGPT Strong yes AI tools

"I was biking to work, hands are busy, I want to get stuff done, and I just start talking to ChatGPT voice. I just open up a session, start chatting with it. And throughout my 30..."

David Pawlan ·163 creators recommend it·David's AI tools →
2:28
Poke Productivity

"I was an early adopter of Poke. That launched, I believe it was September 8th, and then I started using it September 11th, like 3 days later. And I remember it so vividly becaus..."

David Pawlan ·2 creators recommend it·David's productivity →
14:13
iMessage Software & apps

"The personalization that comes with iMessage is just because I already live there, it feels like something that's already connected to me. It doesn't feel like an added workflow."

David Pawlan ·5 creators recommend it·David's software & apps →

a16z, Riley, Claire and Liam agree on 31 things

See what they all use, in their own words. Paid ads are left out.

See what they all swear by Or pick your own people

Also mentioned

1:20 ChatGPT · "ChatGPT was a big one, you know, I think for a lot of folks in November '22 and a bit of '23. It was like,..."
3:06 Instinct · "Most recently we saw Instinct really blow up the tech Twitter bubble. Just absolutely rode a wave, went..."
3:13 Muse · "You have Grok Bot, you have Muse, you have a bunch of long-tail ones like Caddy or Ollie or Palley."
3:53 Assistant Benchmark · "Assistant Benchmark is a site that essentially compares all of these AI assistants on a use case basis...."
8:34 Claude Code · "People are talking a ton about development agents — how does this now translate to this coding world on..."
11:09 Grok · "I have a friend who hooked up his Grok Bot to his sprinkler system at his home and connected it to the..."
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What do a16z and experts like them all swear by?

31 things in common

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