
The myth of the overnight success - parth16
http://cdixon.org/2012/03/16/the-myth-of-the-overnight-success/
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mmaunder
Patterns I've noticed (wrt monetary success):

It usually takes decades which is why old guys are richer.

You can do it as an exec-employee or founder.

Contentment, comfort, routine, closed mindedness, dogma, not questioning the
status quo every day, following established patterns of entrepreneurship
because "that's how it's done", these are all your enemies.

Greedy and selfish people seem to do better in business. [Yeah, it's not a
feel-good statement, but go out there and count the beans.]

Iterating in cycles less than 2 years with a new company every time is a sure
fire recipe for not succeeding outside the Valley. Inside the Valley, you'll
probably eventually get your talent acquisition money from Google. You simply
don't have time to learn the market, your customers and to surround the
business with people who trust it.

It takes time for you to empathize with your customer. In other words, to
understand why the hell they'd give you money for your product or service.

As a founder, not fighting tooth and nail to keep as much control of your
business as you possibly can is usually a leading indicator of failure. Not
saying you must keep control, but there's a level of passivity I've noticed in
this that usually indicates an entrepreneur who doesn't have their heart in
their business.

Of course overnight success is bull. But the lottery ticket perception
outsiders have of tech entrepreneurship is actually good for attracting
investors and new blood, some of whom actually become real entrepreneurs. So
the myth of overnight success does have it's uses.

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thesash
Add OMGPOP and the recent "overnight" success of Draw Something to the list.
All the articles touting it as the fastest growing game of all time ever
painted the story as an overnight success, and failed to mention the backstory
of the company. Not only has OMGPOP been around for 5 years, and raised 17M in
VC funding, but the game itself has been around almost since the beginning as
a web version, but only exploded in usage when it launched for iPhone.

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alaskamiller
Two myths at play:

1\. Overnight is never overnight. More probably you just never heard of it
before.

2\. If you just keep going you will eventually make it. But probably not.
(<http://swombat.com/2012/3/10/successful-people>)

Believe what you want and act accordingly.

~~~
sskates
It's not "just keep going and you will eventually make it". It's a question of
continuing to learn and make progress towards your goal over a long period of
time (in this case, how to build a successful startup). Malcolm Gladwell calls
it "deliberate practice".

For whatever reason most people can't do it, and that's okay, startups are not
for everyone. But if you want to be a Pinterest type success, then that's what
it will take.

~~~
tokenadult
_Malcolm Gladwell calls it "deliberate practice"._

Malcolm Gladwell, who has said in an interview that he writes to try out ideas

<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671211614230261.html>

"Q: Do you worry that you extrapolate too much from too little? "A: No. It's
better to err on the side of over-extrapolation. These books are playful in
the sense that they regard ideas as things to experiment with. I'm happy if
somebody reads my books and reaches a conclusion that is different from mine,
as long as the ideas in the book cause them to think. You have to be willing
to put pressure on theories, to push the envelope. That's the fun part, the
exciting part. If you are writing an intellectual adventure story, why play it
safe? I'm not out to convert people. I want to inspire and provoke them."

is good, while trying out ideas, at crediting his sources. He correctly
sources the term "deliberate practice" to its coiner, psychologist K. Anders
Ericsson, a world-leading expert on the subject of the acquisition of
expertise.

<http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson.dp.html>

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rjurney
Since moving to silicon valley I've had the good fortune to know a group of
highly motivated, talented entrepreneurs. They are some of the leaders in
their industry, the spearhead of an important movement.

When I first met them, none of them had achieved wild success. I watched them
struggle through failed startups, crap jobs, endless fundraising and calamity.

Now several game changing startups have emerged from this group. I am proud to
know them. Not one of them was an overnight success. Just determined hard
work, learning, and picking themselves up off the floor.

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tyree732
To be a pedant, I can't imagine the coiner of this phrase or really anyone who
has ever thought about it uses the term in the sense that something or someone
became successful because of actions taken over a proverbial overnight. The
examples he mentioned are things which became popular abruptly, which seems to
embody the spirit of the phrase just right.

To take the point to the extreme, absolutely nothing could be considered an
overnight success if we use the term in the sense the author implies because
noone is wildly successful at something they attempt for the first time if
they have no apriori knowledge of how to do it from previous attempts or
study.

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petermcd
Great that Rovio makes the fact that Angry Birds was their 52nd game part of
their mythology.

Every time I read a glossy write-up, I find myself wishing they'd dig a bit
deeper into the trial-and-error and near failure that went on before companies
became successful.

It takes grit, y'all!

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staunch
One of my favorite examples is YouTube. They actually were about as close to
"overnight success" as it gets. It was still something like a year and a half
before they had significant traffic and most of us heard of them.

~~~
chubot
That's not accurate -- they launched the domain in Feb 2005; they uploaded the
first video April 2005; they officially launched in November 2005; then Lazy
Sunday went viral in December 2005.

They were already well known before Lazy Sunday, but that tipped them over the
edge.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YouTube>

YouTube the company was an overnight success, if anything can be called that.
I wouldn't say the founders had overnight success, but pretty close to it.
They put in some time at PayPal and probably made out quite well from its
sale, which allowed them to start YouTube. Some people just have talent +
luck.

~~~
staunch
Depends how you define well know I guess. I think mid 2006 was when the world
at large heard of them.

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InfinityX0
To me the closest example of an "overnight success" is where someone bursts on
the scene as a celebrity because of their discovered personality. For example,
people on reality shows become "niche" successful because they are discovered,
rarely because they toiled away at that skill. However, their "success" still
comes from years upon years of refined, unique experience to create the
look+personality that created a star. If they had been discovered in the
prepubescent period, it is almost a certainty nobody would have cared.

It's the same idea, just with different variables.

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dm8
Agree with Chris. Also, how do you define overnight success? Huge traction in
first few months? Significant revenues in first year? Or something else? If
its building wildly profitable company then I don't think anyone (at least
Internet companies) can claim they had overnight success.

Edit: Missed word "wildly"

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rokhayakebe
But be careful. If you are getting series of tiny successes, or even if you
have great engagement from 100 users, it is good sign. However, if your site
is a ghost town after 1 year, you may want to rethink it.

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stevenj
Anyone know of any examples of overnight success or close to it?

Edit: Maybe Hot or Not?

~~~
michaelkscott
This isn't a start up or anything like that, but since you asked for overnight
_success_ , I think the Kony 2012 stuff is a good example of that.

~~~
guynamedloren
Are you kidding me? Did you even watch the video? Correct me if I'm wrong, but
they've been trying to get him forever, and they still don't have him, so I
wouldnt call that a success. Eyeballs != success. Accomplishing a higher goal
(ie catching kony, making huge profit, getting acquired) == success.

Also, invisible children has been hustling for years without a huge 'hit'.

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mycodebreaks
Dropbox was also not the first company that Drew started.

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funkah
If only it was as simple as hard work and persistence. Taleb does a great job
of covering this in "The Black Swan". You may strike it big. But you may spend
your whole life in the antechamber of hope.

~~~
justin
Maybe so, but the answer isn't to worry about toiling away ad infinitum in
failure. Better to be a modern day Calvinist and act as if your actions will
make a difference even if you aren't preordained to reach Heaven.

