A number of factors play into investment and status in Silicon Valley. Lately, one intangible has emerged as a predictor of success or failure: “signal.”
If your behavior is considered high-signal: Congratulations, you look like a winner and rewards may follow. If your actions are seen as anti-signal: Sorry, you exude cringey energy that may hamper your chances.
Both terms are ubiquitous in social media posts, blogs and public comments by those in the industry. Chris Lehane, Chief Global Affairs Officer of OpenAI, which recently acquired the popular tech podcast TBPN, told Puck that the show had “a high-signal, Silicon Valley ‘opinion-elite’ audience.” A blog post by a division of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz said it offered the founders access to a “high-signal talent ecosystem.”
The famous warn of anti-signal moves: Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, has said that going to dinners hosted by venture capitalists “tends to be a big anti-signal.” Other anti-signal moves, according to social media users, include being on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, putting an “open for work” tag on your LinkedIn and even taking venture capital funds.
How it is pronounced
/sig-nᵊl/
The concept “probably comes up in every conversation I have when I’m talking to a portfolio company about either fundraising or hiring,” said Yoni Rechtman, a partner at Slow Ventures, a venture capital firm, in part because image has become increasingly important in technology lately.
“I think 10 years ago there was a lot more belief that reality would drive perception,” he said. “Today, it’s the other way around, where perception drives reality.” Many in technology, he added, are “literally just trying to affect the aesthetics of success,” trying to look like a winner to become one.
What qualifies as high-signal or anti-signal behavior is not always obvious to the untrained eye. That’s part of the point: The most competitive tech fields are teeming with complex social cues—and knowing how to act is seen as a predictor of success.
“Part of being a good founder is that you learn the game,” said Andrew Yeung, who runs a company that hosts tech events. “You never want to show that you are desperate for a job or capital.” Instead, he suggested that you should convey that you are “highly regarded by everyone in the market and that you are a scarce asset.”
Are you putting together a pitch deck ahead of a meeting with investors? It may act as an anti-signal, said Mr. Young. It shows that you want it way too much. Do you spend all your time going to founder events? Also anti-signal. You should be shipping code instead of networking so much. All of this reflects the “consensus mindset of Silicon Valley investing,” he said, acknowledging the toughness of the culture.
Of course, the idea of ”signal and noise”—the apparent linguistic progenitor of current usage—is not entirely new. But separating signal from the rest has become more urgent in a world with so much AI-generated slop, suggested Mr. Young. He added that an over-reliance on AI can be seen as anti-signal.
It indicates that you do not have good judgment or taste, or at least the skill to mask the fact that you have used the technology. Even the word signal that Mr. Yeung said, appearing frequently in AI-generated writing, began to look a bit gross. The latest anti-signaling behavior, he suggested, may be “use of ‘signal’ and ‘anti-signal’ in public.”
