# 341. Why the Best Founders Are Neither American nor European

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/deconstructor-of-fun-223878/341-why-the-best-founders-are-neither-american-nor-european
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/deconstructor-of-fun-223878/341-why-the-best-founders-are-neither-american-nor-european.md
Podcast: [Deconstructor of Fun](https://stenobird.com/podcast/deconstructor-of-fun-223878)
Published: 2026-08-10T13:21:12+00:00
Episode link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/deconstructoroffun/episodes/341--Why-the-Best-Founders-Are-Neither-American-nor-European-e3n7atj
Audio file: https://anchor.fm/s/500026c/podcast/play/124021107/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-7-10%2F429564259-44100-2-4702f9b620288.mp3
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/deconstructor-of-fun-223878/episodes/341-why-the-best-founders-are-neither-american-nor-european
Duration seconds: 4126

## Resource

Emmanuel De Maistre didn’t build Scenario by choosing between Silicon Valley ambition and European pragmatism. He learned to use both.In this conversation, the Scenario founder breaks down what years of building in the US taught him about ambition, failure, and venture-scale thinking, and why European founders often bring the grounding that Silicon Valley lacks. We also get into what AI adoption actually looks like inside top game studios, why buying tools rarely translates into real usage, what happens to creative teams when AI enters production, and why today’s AI economics may be hiding problems that surface when cheap tokens disappear.This is a conversation about AI, gaming, and startup culture from a founder who has already learned what happens when growth outruns fundamentals. Fewer than 20 people, near-zero customer churn, profitable before a Series A. No “AI will replace everyone” predictions, no ARR theater. Just a founder making the case that the best operators combine American ambition with European grounding.

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## Transcript

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