I tried to get interest in Silicon Valley for my project. I'm in NYS US.

I tried a lot of advice on how to contact VCs. All my efforts were a huge waste of time.

So, I got a lot of advice, about introductions, how to write a pitch deck, and more. As far as I can tell,
all of that advice was nonsense and,
for me, a big waste of time.

Sure, I could get an introduction from one of my Ph.D. dissertation advisers, past president of one of the world's best research universities with one of the most famous computer science departments. But I doubt that many or any VCs know this guy personally and in that case I would have insulted my former dissertation adviser, the VC, and myself -- no thanks.

Once I did get a warm introduction from the CIO of one of the world's most famous companies, very successful, and famous for a lot of use of technology. As far as I could tell, the warm introduction was, for the VC, just a throwaway. A waste
for the CIO, the VC, and me. Bummer.

Really, an introduction is the VC having others do part of the VCs work, and this should not be justified: E.g., some of the standard advice is to write a very short, general pitch deck, with only a few foils and only a few words per foil, with the only purpose being to get the VC interested enough to ask for more information. Well, if this is the purpose of the first contact, no way should I bother the president of a high end university or the CIO of a top company; instead, the VC can just glance at a few foils and words in a PDF file, type "Sounds good. I'm interested. Please send more." and hit Reply.

To be more clear on what VCs are not responding to, my project is to get the world's best solution, much better than anything else, for a problem that is pressing for nearly all users of the Internet, in the US and around the world. So, some back of the envelope arithmetic is

5 ads per Web page

10 pages per usage

$2 per 1000 ads displayed

2 * 10**9 usages per week

52 weeks a year

5 * 10 * 2 * 2 * 10**9 * 52 /
1000 = 10,400,000,000

dollars of revenue per year.

Status: Production quality software --
from carefully designed, highly
scalable software and
server farm architecture --
written and running with no known
problems, currently in alpha test.

All that information above has been essentially ignored by essentially every well known VC firm
in Silicon Valley.

So, if that doesn't work, what does?

Well, about all that is left is what is still promising but nearly never in the
advice. So, here is what is left:

Go ahead with the business. Go live.
Get publicity, users, and revenue.
Have significant traction growing
rapidly. Wait for the VCs to contact
you.

Of course, I'm a solo founder, CEO, CTO, CIO, Software VP, all of the development team, Server Farm and Network VP, ..., janitor. So, by the time my company has traction significant and growing rapidly, if the project will work at all, then
soon it should have plenty of revenue for rapid growth. If the growth
happens, then there will be plenty
of after tax earnings to make me
financially successful. That is,
the cost for me to run the server
farm will fall quicly to less than 1%
of revenue with 99+% of the revenue
pre-tax earnings.

One server from
less than $1000 in parts should
have the capacity to generate
$200,000+ a month in revenue.
For a solo founder, why then take
equity funding?

By the way, it's all safe for work,
legal, ethical, squeaky clean,
etc.

Still, essentially no one on Sand Hill
Road gives a sh_t.

Okay: They have
their ways of making money, and I
have mine. Apparently we have
nothing in common.

Lesson: I no longer place much value
on advice for how to contact VCs. Or,
if they are at all interested, then
they will contact you.

If there is
a mob of them on the front lawn
waving stacks of $1000 dollar bills
at you and screaming for you
to take the money, then maybe
open the door and otherwise
call the police to have them
run out of the neighborhood!

That is, if you are a solo
founder, then by the time they want
you, you won't want them.

So, what ARE the VCs looking for?
How about young, naive founders,
traction significant and growing
rapidly, no earnings, five founders,
all credit cards maxed out,
each founder with a
pregnant wife,
and eager to sign any
term sheet.