Stephen Huang

Roy Lee's name was on my C-programming roster last fall. I'm not sure if we've ever met. Months later, I hear him on the a16z podcast talking about raising $15 million for Cluely. Here's the catch: before that, Columbia suspended him for Interview Coder, an app that captured your screen and listened to coding interview questions through your microphone, then displayed solutions in real-time through a discrete UI overlay. Think of it as having a genius programmer sitting next to you during your Google interview, except the genius was an AI that could see your coding environment and hear the interviewer's questions, then silently provide answers on your screen where only you could see them. The campus called it cheating; the internet called it interesting; investors called it opportunity. Before diving into Roy's story, let's define what we're actually talking about. Social capital isn't just "networking" or "having connections." It's the accumulated trust, reputation, and influence that

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• Andy Kong