E1008: VSCO CEO & Co-founder Joel Flory is building a photo-sharing platform free of ads, likes & comments to empower creators, shares insights on appealing to Gen Z, expanding their global reach & the magic of subscriptions

1:08 Jason intros Joel Flory

2:12 What is VSCO? How is it different than Instagram, Facebook & other photo-sharing apps?

4:33 How does VSCO grow at hyper speed without follower counts, likes, etc.?

8:28 What is VSCO's scale so far?

12:23 How does VSCO get people (mostly Gen-Z) to pay for a social network? How do they view pricing?

18:09 How VSCO uses themselves as a tool for other social networks

19:52 What is a VSCO Girl? How have they capitalized on the Gen-Z meme phenomenon?

21:31 Joel's thoughts on e-commerce

27:19 Joel is a long-time TWiST fan!

30:00 Mistakes Joel learned from in his 9-year journey at VSCO

32:26 Has iPhone photography ruined the photography industry?

36:53 How does VSCO deal with inappropriate content? How does their feed algorithm work?

43:59 Jason goes through VSCO's funding history and asks why Joel didn't sell VSCO for a massive profit

46:06 Is the greatest art created by those who don't care about what others think?

47:41 Collapse of the photography industry & sense of belonging at VSCO

51:44 Advantage of having HQ in Oakland

54:59 VSCO global expansion

57:17 Magic of subscriptions

1:05:01 The 3 truth's of VSCO