Why everyone in tech is suddenly talking about LARPing

Now, the term is all the rage in startup land. A LARPer is someone who's playing founder more than actually being one. They loudly flex their work and the circles they run in, rather than fighting for customers.

Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan fashioned it into a warning: "Be earnest, don't larp."

Intercom cofounder Des Traynor warned about it in a September email to Business Insider: "Look, you get one shot at this life, don't waste it LARPing as a startup founder for followers."

Indeed, the founder-influencer type is growing — and it's hard to distinguish earnest marketing from performative hype-cycling. Is that 996 post a real portrayal of your hustle, or is it merely grindslop?

> grab 10 founders you know > book a mansion in bali with a home gym> hire a private chef > lock the fuck in > 10x your revenue in 30 days > larp pic.twitter.com/sY313TYcF5

Posting about 996 on LinkedIn — but having an ultra-high screen time spent on the X app — was on Christian Di Bratto's list of attributes of an LARPing founder. Others he listed were sleeping on the floor of a WeWork and quoting Paul Graham essays like scripture.

Graham himself has commented on the rise of LARPers and how difficult it is to spot them. He responded to a comment accusing Y Combinator of being full of LARP.

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Tan asked Sam Altman about the LARPing accusations at YC Startup School in July. (Rather than pronouncing the acronym, Tan spelled out the words — "live action role play" — over and over.) Altman was confused: "They say that about YC specifically?" he asked, before questioning, "What's the claimed larp?"

What is new, then, is the power of social media marketing. "Too many 'founders' these days need to quit larping and just admit they're content creators," wrote product designer Alec Freese.

Cannot stand founders that don’t have that dog in them They just want to larp as a founder and look like they’re doing the thing Not actually about it

The trend may also have to do with the market itself. AI is hot, and startups are raising rounds previously unheard of. Put frankly, it's a good time to be a founder.