But since then, Asparouhov has mellowed out online. When I texted him after our podcast recording session and mentioned that his Founders Fund colleague Mike Solana was sassing me on Elon Musk’s social networking platform, Asparouhov wrote back, “Bro I’m tryna do 3 jobs over here. I don’t have time to pay attention to what Solana is up to.”
Besides Varda and Founders Fund, I wondered what the third job was.
He texted me back, “Fatherhood.”
On the latest episode of the Newcomer podcast Asparouhov and I covered a lot of ground. We talked about Varda’s satellite mission and its ambitions to manufacture in space. We discussed SpaceX’s reusable rocket and the media conversation around Starship’s explosion. Asparouhov mused about UFOs and missions to Mars. It was a wide-ranging conversation about space and technology.
The conversation started off digging into Varda’s excited research into LK-99.
Varda ran an experiment which they initially thought might show verification of room temperature semiconductors.
By the time we recorded our conversation, you could tell Asparouhov was more muted about Varda’s findings.
Later he tweeted, “alas, the rocks we made floated due to iron impurities.”