How Discord’s CEO used fake screenshots to fundraise

May 15, 2025

“We made a bunch of fake screenshots in Photoshop… put up a webpage, got TechCrunch to cover it, and raised a bridge round”

Jason Citron (Discord CEO) initially raised venture capital to build a mobile game. When that didn’t work, it looked like they were going to run out of money.

”I remember calling my dad and saying I think I’m going to have to move back home because this startup thing’s not going to work,” Jason recalls. He was 24 at the time.

Then he had an idea for a pivot: take the in-app chat feature and spin it off to a standalone product.

There was just one problem — it didn’t exist yet.

“It was gonna take four or five months to build.”

With no time nor runway, Jason got creative. He launched a landing page with nothing but mockups and a waitlist to validate customer demand.

It worked. Discord got 200 developer signups — enough traction to raise a round.

”We went and raised the bridge round on it. No product. And then we built it and shipped it and it worked.”