Founders Fund is making an unconventional push into media, bringing some of Silicon Valley’s most recognisable figures together for a reality-style game show built around deception, deduction, and social strategy.
The venture capital firm this week launched MAFIA the GAME, a new video series on YouTube and X that places leading founders, investors, and technologists around a table to play the popular party game Mafia.
The debut episode, titled Can Tech Legends Find the Liar?, brought together OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anduril Industries Co-founder Palmer Luckey, Blueprint Founder Bryan Johnson, Figma Co-founder and CEO Dylan Field, Signal founder Moxie Marlinspike, and Flexport founder and CEO Ryan Petersen.
The cast also includes investor Cyan Banister, writer Tim Urban, professional poker player Liv Boeree, AI policy expert Ryan Beiermeister, Founders Fund partner Trae Stephens, and several other founders, investors, and technologists.
The 33-minute first episode was filmed at San Francisco’s historic Tosca Cafe, a location with symbolic ties to Silicon Valley history. The venue previously served as the backdrop for the famous ‘PayPal Mafia’ photograph published by Fortune in 2007, making it a fitting setting for a game centred on trust and betrayal.
In Mafia, participants are secretly assigned roles, with a small group designated as the mafia. Their objective is to eliminate other players without being identified, while the rest of the group attempts to uncover the impostors through discussion and voting. The format turns every conversation into a test of persuasion and credibility.
The project is being spearheaded by Founders Fund Chief Marketing Officer Mike Solana, who has increasingly positioned the firm at the intersection of technology, culture, and media. Solana described the show as a more engaging way to understand influential founders and investors than traditional venture capital podcasts and panel discussions.
The episode quickly leans into the personalities of its participants. Luckey’s humour makes him an early target of suspicion, while Johnson’s well-known obsession with longevity becomes the source of jokes from fellow players.
Beyond the game itself, the series reflects a broader trend of technology firms and venture capital investors experimenting with original media formats. Rather than relying solely on podcasts, newsletters, or conference appearances, firms are increasingly producing entertainment-focused content to build audiences and shape their public identities.
Additional episodes are expected to be released weekly, as Founders Fund tests whether viewers are interested in watching some of the technology sector’s biggest names compete not over startups or investments, but over who can best deceive.
Your reaction
Discussion
What's your take on this story?
No comments yet — be the first to share your view.