Colin Flaherty

About

I’m passionate about underrated ideas, undiscovered people, and creating products that try to answer the most important philosophical question.[1]

A short biography about me:

  • *-2017: Born in San Francisco, California to an old-school police officer dad and a hippie journalist mom.
  • 2017-2021: Went to UChicago because I couldn’t pick between liberal arts and science (still haven't, really).
  • 2021-2023: Moved to New York. Got my start as a researcher at Facebook AI Research. Coauthored 2 papers on AI reasoning (science.org/doi/10.1126/science.ade9097) and pretraining architectures (https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.07185).
  • 2023-2025: Moved to Palo Alto. Joined a small AI coding agent startup built by Sutter Hill Ventures after noticing that Github Copilot was really helpful. Saw it grow from 5 -> 90 people.
  • 2025+: Quit my job to build the next generation of internet treasures.

Check out what’s inspiring me right now.

Angel Investments

6 product ideas I’m passionate about right now

  • Inspiration & serendipity in just the right moment that keeps you out of local maxima
  • Consumer health & wellness unhobbled by legacy healthcare systems or excessive cost
  • Post-AGI digital 3rd spaces for social connection and advancement
  • Post-AGI education
  • Fandoms for AI characters and AI media
  • AI friends that live amongst us

Writings

[1] A wise professor once advised me that every important philosophical question can be found in the dialogues of Plato. And that the most important question of all is really the most practical one: How should we spend our precious few moments alive? I agree. ↩