
Startup lessons - coffeemug
http://www.defmacro.org/2013/07/23/startup-lessons.html
======
pg
Wow is this list good. It has the kind of resonance you only get when you're
writing from a lot of hard experience.

As I just wrote when I sent this link to the current YC batch, if you see
advice here that puzzles you, it may be a sign of a painful lesson you're
going to learn in the future.

~~~
philsnow
> if you see advice here that puzzles you, it may be a sign of a painful
> lesson you're going to learn in the future.

Ugh, does anybody mind taking a stab at paraphrasing this one:

> Don’t say things if your competitors can’t say the opposite. For example,
> your competitors can’t say their product is slow, so saying yours is fast is
> sloppy marketing. On the other hand, your competitors can say their software
> is for Python programmers, so saying yours is for Ruby programmers is good
> marketing. Apple can get away with breaking this rule, you can’t.

This is the only bullet out of the list that I can't quite brain.

~~~
pmarca
Hard won marketing lesson: being different is way better than being better.

Scott McNealy polarized this further -- he would say, I want half the
potential customers to hate my products but half to love them.

~~~
philsnow
Ahhh, that reminds me of the wonderful success that was OS/2\. Makes perfect
sense now, thanks.

~~~
pmarca
Yep. Scott's nightmare was that everyone would think his products were fine.

------
liveinoakland
Lesson #58: Don't always believe your own BS.

There is some good stuff in here, but it's not all right all of the time. The
part about firing people is interesting. Maybe there is friction because the
manager/CEO is doing something wrong and the employee is merely agitating to
make things better for the business? The ability to self-evaluate and take
criticism/recognize the difference between "difficult" employees and employees
who are trying to fix things you are doing wrong seems important and missing
from the "people" section.

~~~
pmarca
That's what pain in the ass employees who get fired for being pains in the ass
always think on their way out the door.

~~~
david927
And Marc that's also what really good employees who leave because they're not
listened to always think on their way out the door.

~~~
greghinch
Everyone who isn't listened to is, in their own mind, really good ;)

~~~
david927
Jeff Immelt, CEO of GE said this recently:

 _Every idea begins with a constituency of one. There’s probably one or two
times a year that I turn to our very top leaders and say, “we’re going to do
it my way.” Do that too often and good people will leave. But if you never do
it, nothing ever happens._

------
mindcrime
_If you can’t get to ramen profitability with a team of 2 – 4 within six
months to a year, something’s wrong._

That probably makes perfect sense for some random SaaS app or consumer facing
app, but for an enterprise startup, I'll argue that it's off the mark. Just
doing market research, a few rounds of customer development interviews, and
building the product out to prototype phase could burn up the better part of a
year, and enterprise sales cycles are often
slloooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.........

 _Pick the initial team very carefully. Everyone should be pleasant to work
with, have at least one skill relevant to the business they’re spectacular at,
be extremely effective and pragmatic. Everyone should have product sense and a
shared vision for the product and the company._

That's one of those things that is on every one of these lists, and for good
reason. But, by the same token, you could spend the rest of your life looking
for the "perfect" co-founding team, never build a god-damned thing, and die
peacefully in your sleep, of old age, at 97. By the same token that "good is
the enemy of great", one has to realize that "perfect is the enemy of good
enough".

That said, I worked alone for quite some time before inviting anyone else to
join up, because this does matter. But you can't wait indefinitely... in the
real world, the environment around you is changing, and windows (of
opportunity) come and go. You could easily miss one trying too hard to find
the ideal co-founder(s).

~~~
d0m
imho being solo-founder > having a bad co-founder any day. Agree you can't
wait indefinitely, but if you're onto something and you can't find someone
great to help you grow it, the problem might be elsewhere. (Bad
product/market, Hard personalty, etc)

~~~
mindcrime
I think there's some room between "bad" and "great", though. My point isn't to
accept a "bad" co-founder, but rather to not let the quest for a "great" co-
founder keep you from going with a "pretty good" co-founder for so long that
you miss the opportunity anyway.

That said, this is all pretty subjective and hard to measure anyway. I mean,
do you _really_ know that a "great" co-founder _is_ "great" from day one? Or
that someone you think is just "good enough" actually is "great"? Of course,
that fuzziness is part of why I say "just pick somebody and get started
already" to some extent.

~~~
d0m
Fair enough. That's why sometimes the best cofounders are old colleagues at
university or company (or hackatons!). They've already worked together and
know they can get shit done quickly.

~~~
mindcrime
_That 's why sometimes the best cofounders are old colleagues at university or
company (or hackatons!). They've already worked together and know they can get
shit done quickly._

Good point. I know I went that route, recruiting a co-founder from among the
group of people I had worked with at Lulu.com.

------
jpatokal
A bit of self-contradiction here:

* Product sense is everything

* Product comes first

* Sales fix everything

* Development speed is everything

* Do everything you can not to attach your self esteem to your startup

I'm reminded of a former CEO who, after careful analysis of a failing
business, decided there were nine critical areas of focus for the company.
(She was eventually fired.)

~~~
timruffles
This type of post often uses the Goldilocks fallacy to appear like it offers
advice when it's actually restating the actual problem: the way to achieve Y
is with just the right amount of X.

"A successful startup is easy: simply build the right product in the right
market with the right team, and don't forget to build it at the right speed!"

~~~
dylangs1030
I've never heard of that term, good explanation.

------
dcraw
A lot of these resonate with me... to the extent that I already believe them.
It's tough to absorb these sorts of generalities though, which is why startups
make the same mistakes over and over again... not because they haven't heard
the advice, but because it's hard to apply. I'd love to see, over the next 57
weeks, the author take one of these per week and tell a real story about how
he learned it. An example: "Your authority as CEO is earned... don't try to
use authority you didn't earn." When did you learn this? You certainly didn't
think before "I should use authority that I haven't earned." So how did it
stand in your head before, and what experience made you rethink it? Overall, I
love stories that give me more concretes to absorb into my understanding of
cause and effect, and details that I can use to bolster my understanding of
the pithy advice. Thanks for sharing your hard-won experience, and I look
forward to more posts in the future.

------
crazygringo
> _Split the stock between the founding team evenly._

I've heard the exact opposite from VC's -- fact is, the engineer or product
founder might be bringing _way_ more value to the table than the business guy.
Or sometimes it's vice-versa.

And that "unfairness" in an initial even stock split will come back to haunt
the company, since certain founders are not being rewarded justly for their
contributions, and will come to resent it later. And that VC investment can be
contingent on founders adjusting their ownership stakes beforehand to match
the reality of what each founder is actually bringing to the table.

~~~
d0m
That's why you want to split the stock evenly with co-founders you know will
put as much effort/time into it. Starting a business with not-evenly stock is
akin to saying "I'm better than you" which is, arguably over-simplified, but
not a meaningful way to start a long adventure with someone.

Obviously, if someone is ready to join part-time or come more as an early
employee with more salary, then the variable changes. I'm talking here about
the "I start with 60, you get 40 because I've got the idea first and I've been
working on it for 2 weeks". That's a recipe for trouble.

~~~
laglad
What about "I've tested the market with a prototype over the last year that
has generated revenue (not much but some) and now I'm recruiting a cofounder?"
Still 50/50? Or should the earlier founder be compensated for earlier work
with future work being earned evenly b/w the two cofounders on a vesting
schedule?

~~~
amirmc
You might find Mark Suster's opinions helpful. The podcast of his Stanford
talk(s?) are also pretty good.

[http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/05/09/the-co-
founder...](http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/05/09/the-co-founder-
mythology/)

~~~
pmarca
Mark's advice on these topics is some of the best ever.

~~~
ajju
Marc, you and Mark seem to disagree on at least one thing:

You:

 _if you 're considering a cofounder who you don't want to give equal stock
to, do you really have the right cofounder?_

Mark:

 _I meet far more second or third time entrepreneurs who wouldn’t do a 50 /50
(or 33/33/33) partnership ever again than you would image.

I am one of them._

Based on my experience, I'd recommend finding a co-founder you _want_ to split
equity evenly with before you start up as you recommend.

------
mikeknoop
There is good advise in this list. But I also know counter-examples from
"successful" startups for many of the points.

Given that, I'll propose a 58th: be formidable enough to overcome any of the
other 57.

------
jwilliams
"11\. If you have to give away more than 15% of the company at any given
fundraising round, your company didn’t germinate correctly. It’s salvageable
but not ideal."

I thought the rule of thumb was a lot higher than this. Any good references
this one?

~~~
pytrin
This article says the industry norm is 20-25% at the early rounds, which has
been my experience as well.

[http://techli.com/2012/02/the-founder-dilemma-risk-equity-
di...](http://techli.com/2012/02/the-founder-dilemma-risk-equity-dilution-
term-sheets/)

------
mixmixmix
> #25 Don’t build something that already exists. Customers won’t buy it just
> because it’s yours.

Not a good rule. I know many guys that are making serious money because they
improved something that already existed.

~~~
swah
Opposite view: building something that already exists is the easiest way to
know that there is a market. Then try to steal the market from other players
with a better product.

------
thejerz
I disagree with PG entirely. These lists are thoughtful, but they are 100%
subjective. The only rule with startups is there are no rules. There is a time
and a place for EVERYTHING. There is no "always," and there is no "never."

I have a funded startup. I can list 5 counter-rules for every rule he lists.
For example: "Don’t build something that already exists. Customers won’t buy
it just because it’s yours." Living Social, anyone?

The phrase, "There is more than one way to skin a cat" comes to mind.

------
nandemo
Good list. From my point of view, it's also a good source of questions for an
employee to ask the founders when interviewing at a startup .

I don't get this, though:

> _Watch Jiro Dreams of Sushi, then do marketing that way. Pick a small set of
> tasks, do them consistently, and get better every day._

How is that marketing? That's getting good at your craft and improving your
product.

I watched the movie, but I'm not sure that Jiro is good at marketing.
Apparently he's very good at making sushi, but it seems he became successful
(and later world famous) despite being bad at marketing.

Incidentally, his shop's average ratings at Tabelog (one of the biggest
Japanese gourmet websites) is only 3.8 out of 5, with quite a few "bad"
reviews.

------
ballard
Read anything by Felix Dennis, and you'll be able to see the meta: it's a mind
game and quite fun when you can step back a bit. Also, he's comes off as
wickeder than Ben Franklin if that were possible.

------
Sealy
> 2\. Split the stock between the founding team evenly.

I can tell that you have all honest intent for writing this, but from
experienced accounts I have read (a lot from PG and this forum). Many startup
veterans strongly advise against this.

> 33\. Watch Jiro Dreams of Sushi, then do marketing that way. Pick a small
> set of tasks, do them consistently, and get better every day.

I've seen this and I love it. I love how you tied it in to startups too. That
man is an inspirational model of a life long determination to be the best at
what you can be.

------
aptwebapps
_30\. Learn the difference between people who might buy your product and
people who are just commenting. Pay obsessive attention to the former. Ignore
the latter._

How do you do the first part?

~~~
pmarca
That's a great question and a really important topic.

You use a sales technique called "qualifying", and when you figure it out, you
do it all the time, and not just with potential customers, but also with
potential investors, candidates, and even reporters.

(This is part of the art of sales that many founders today refuse to learn.)

To qualify a prospect (potential customer), at the end of every interaction,
you should determine from them what has to happen from here for them to pull
the trigger. You do this by asking questions, and testing the answers -- have
them lay out their process for making the decision, have them identify the
steps that have been reached and the steps that have not, have them identify
other people in their organization who can block the purchase, and so on. And
you do this over and over again until you get the sale.

If the prospect can't lay out the logical sequence of steps from here to
close, then you need to qualify them out and stop spending time with them,
because they're not going to buy.

Two interesting corollaries:

* Yes, there are a LOT of people in a LOT of companies (as well as a lot of potential investors, potential recruits, etc.) who will spend a lot of time with you even though they can't ultimately pull the trigger. A lot of people like to windowshop, and a lot of people have nothing better to do.

* Like a lot of sales techniques, this sounds to engineers like it might be hard (will the potential customer tolerate all those questions?) But any serious potential customer will have a very easy time answering the questions, and will respect their potential vendor for being professional in the sales process.

~~~
majani
The hard part of qualifying is actually not that people will lack the time,
but people feel guilty about financially profiling people superficially. Just
check the recent Oprah scandal. It could be said that the sales girl was
'qualifying' Oprah's sale and directing her to buy the cheaper handbag, but
turns out that she had misjudged the book by it's cover.

~~~
dhimes
She may have been better off if she asked questions rather than jumping to
conclusions. In other words, if she had read pmarca's excellent advice, she
may have made the sale and earned a repeat customer.

~~~
pmarca
Yes! You ask polite questions. "Have you been here before? What product do you
use today? What are you looking for? That's a beautiful watch/scarf/sweater.
Where are you visiting from? What do you do for fun?" It's not that hard.

------
Patrick_Devine
While I do agree with many of the things which are on this list, most of them
have trade offs. They certainly are not as black-and-white as the author has
stated it.

I really recommend reading The Founders Dilemmas. It covers many of these
issues in detail. Here's a link: [http://hbr.org/2008/02/the-founders-
dilemma/ar/1](http://hbr.org/2008/02/the-founders-dilemma/ar/1)

------
snoonan
This list is amazing. I will offer a counterpoint on the free side of freemium
users. Have a plan to cultivate their love and action. Ranking in Google, the
app store, etc is a part of your revenue path, so don't ignore your army of
likers, linkers, etc. Just don't waste time _disproportionally_ in their favor
when you have paying customers to service.

------
the_economist
I would add exercise daily, sleep well, eat a healthy diet, and get some
sunlight to the list. You'll be happier.

------
thsiao
Marketing after product - totally disagree. Today marketing and product is one
in the same, no way to tell when one begins and the other ends. Basically what
he should have said is start with deeply understanding your target customer,
that's the hard part and people always screw that first step up.

~~~
tchock23
100% agree.

Above all, understand who your customer is, what they need and how they value
that need before you begin to think of your solution...

By all means, start with a hypothesis and "big idea," but conduct thorough
qualitative research with your prospective target customer before you start
building in any real sense (beyond simple prototypes).

As a marketing research consultant, I've worked with too many companies (large
and small) who flail around to find target segments after not spending the
appropriate time upfront understanding and qualifying their target audience.

Despite seeing so many companies fail at it, it's even tough advice for me to
follow on my own personal projects because I love building things and just
want to get started right away...

------
jmngomes
It's refreshing to see someone defending a point that, IMO, should have been
obvious all along, instead of encouraging the "lifeless code-drone" style:
"Every once in a while, get away (...) It will make you more effective and
make the people around you happier."

Today, I'm releasing my product's 3rd alpha version for testers and then
leaving for a small break. My main goal will be to read the two books that are
waiting for me for a long time and, to the extent possible, NOT think about
anything work related. I could do some productive work these 5 days, but in
the long run it'll cripple my stamina when things get rough in a few months.
So, it's time to restore balance.

------
derstang
The problem with "rules" is that they live in an ideal world, not the real
world. "Give up only 15% of your company" sure, if you are the next Google,
but even then every raise they did wasn't perfect. Let's be honest there is an
ideal way you would build a company, but it doesn't exist for anybody.
Startups are hard and messy. You do the best you can, but you can't just know
in advance you're picking the best idea, the best people and fundraising
quickly. It's not like that at all.

------
ph0rque
_Product sense is everything. Learn it as quickly as you can. Being good at
engineering has nothing to do with being good at product management._

How do you know if you have it? How do you learn it or improve it?

------
Jormundir
My experience has given me a simple litmus for whether a startup is going to
fail or not:

Are they trying to build a small idea into a great company, or are they trying
to build a giant idea into a giant company?

~~~
AVTizzle
Which one of those two options do you feel is the one more likely to fail?

~~~
Jormundir
I hoped it was obvious:

There are huge advantages to having a small idea. There's a clear MVP, a clear
short term goal to achieve. This has a big effect on morale: the developing
team has a series of short development bursts ending with an achievement and
the vision of the company in eyesight. The quality of the product tends to be
higher sheerly out of being simpler.

A small idea can have very wide reach, and can be an essential need to users,
or a new pillar of infrastructure. Often after building a small and strong
product, a company has the freedom to apply and maximize it for the full range
of possible use cases. The easy example is Google, but I like to use the
StackExchange network. They started with a Q&A site for software engineers,
and once that was successful they expanded to a huge range of fields.

Huge ideas often send startups down a path to failure. Morale gets drained
over time as features get completed but the vision remains too far away.
Complexity increases greatly, and the core product gravitates to
unmanageability as it grows. Even a best in class engineering team can be
toppled by the exponential complexity of a large product, there's a potter's
field of large products being built by awesome engineers, in big companies and
small.

I could go on and on for each side, but the main point is, having a company
vision that is the MVP is amazingly powerful, and opposite, having a company
vision that is massive even with an MVP that is a stepping stone on the way to
the massive vision, is a swamp to trudge through for years.

------
Noxchi
>Marketing >Product comes first

Marketing should always come first, in terms of what you do.

Don't build a product and see if anyone wants it. See if anyone wants your
product and then build it.

~~~
mindcrime
Or you can do those two things at the same time. That's the essence of
@sgblank's "Customer Development Process" \- it's mean to run _in parallel_
with the Product Development process, with periodic synchronization between
the two.

------
wmougayar
Re: "Market to your users. Getting attention from people who won’t buy your
product is a waste of time and money."

That statement is misleading. It's not an "or" situation. You need to market
to both your existing users and your prospects (users or customers). You can't
just rely on viral and word of mouth for growth. Yup, good marketing is not
easy- you need to figure out your segmentation and reach your prospects
cleverly.

------
fphilipe
> Split the stock between the founding team evenly.

I worked as the first employee at a now successful start up. They were 5
founders with each 20% of the shares. What I heard from them after several
investment rounds is that investors _don 't_ like evenly split stock and
prefer that _one_ of the founders has the most stock, even if that's just a
single stock more than the other founders.

~~~
philsnow
N/5 + 1 is just plurality.

"most" == majority == N/2 + 1

which is it, is it just that VCs want to see that there is a designated leader
among the founders, or do they want the relative amounts of stock to not ever
become an issue for the viability of the startup ?

mere plurality is risky, because any of the founders could sell their share to
another, creating an ownership crisis where the nominal head of the company
has a minority share.

~~~
fphilipe
Thanks for clarifying the semantics :)

------
comatose_kid
This list is so good, I should memorize it to the point when I can look at
what I'm doing wrong and shout out one of your numbers! I've made many of
these mistakes (#1 in particular).

Here are my top picks by number referring back to the article, for some of the
sections (YMMV of course!):

PEOPLE: 1.

FUNDRAISING: 12.

MARKETS: 18.

PRODUCTS: 24 (and 27 which to me is a subset of 24)

MARKETING: 32, 31 (I wonder how RethinkDB or companies like it can do 32??)

SALES: 40

DEVELOPMENT: 45 (and 46 which is a subset of 45)

------
Eduard
> Working on the wrong thing for a month is equivalent to not showing up to
> work for a month at all. I cannot agree to this statement. Even though some
> venture turns out to be a flop, you did learn a lot while trying to conquer
> it. And additionally, it's only trying out something to find out that it was
> the wrong thing - also you learned this about your field of study.

------
hynahmwxsbyb
A list full of startup platitudes dressed up in pedantic rhetoric. Did you
really learn this o'wise oracle, or did you just plagiarize a bunch of wisdom,
rewrite it in your own voice, and claim it as your own? Elements of Style you
are not because there is no great sense of consistency. And who the hell are
you anyways?

------
rsingel
I don't know that you get to say that something is wrong if you can't get to
Ramen-profitability in 6 to 12 months and then later say to follow the example
of Google and build something that touches billions of people's lives. Adwords
didn't show up for a long time.

------
captn3m0
I liked the "Jiro Dreams of Sushi" bit. I saw it yesterday, after seeing a lot
of recommendations on HN for it. Excellent movie for all of HN. Go watch it.

~~~
McUsr
I haven't seen it yet, but will today. One other thing, which is that I
associate the whole blogpost with the movie "Revolver". It is like Jason
Statham, speeking the words; I guess it is the "former and latter" phrases.
IMHO also a good movie, when it comes to be better. "You only get to be
better, by playing a better opponnent."

------
rdl
Point #11 seems different than my understanding of most VC Series A rounds. It
tends to be 20-40%, so almost always over 15%

------
edo
I feel as though this list overly generalizes. Don't just blindly follow
these; many of them can be proven to be wrong.

~~~
pmarca
I feel as though your comment overly generalizes. Don't just blindly follow
it; it can be proven to be wrong.

------
swah
I guess another valuable hidden lesson is that Slava is a lisp lover working
in a C++ product.

------
marcamillion
This is a wonderful list.

Is RethinkDB a YC company?

~~~
coffeemug
We are.

------
mmaunder
Cashflow.

~~~
GregorStocks
Yep, that's the first thing on the list, all right. Okay, my turn: split the
stock between the founding team evenly.

~~~
nandemo
No, it is not. The first item on the list is about profitability. Being
profitable isn't the same thing as having positive cash flow:

[http://www.investopedia.com/articles/01/110701.asp](http://www.investopedia.com/articles/01/110701.asp)

------
SingleFounderCo
"ramen profitability" \- LOVE IT!

------
beachstartup
> If it doesn’t augment the human condition for a huge number of people in a
> meaningful way, it’s not worth doing.

this is the kind of arrogance i find disheartening about these kinds of lists.
really - things aren't _worth doing_ unless they clear this impossibly
ambitious bar?

should i tell the owner of the corner cafe i stop into after work every other
day, and that gives me a huge amount of joy nearly every time, that she should
give it up because her business doesn't "augment the human condition for a
huge number of people"? how about the guy who wrote the $5 clipboard app that
makes my life much easier? i'm sure he has lots of customers but "a huge
number" that have "augmented" their humanity because of his clipboards....

and i hate to be an ass, but ... under whose criteria does rethinkdb qualify
for this, anyway? how meta do we have to go here? how many degrees of
separation are we talking about exactly?

the problem with these kinds of statements is they can be rationalized by
smart people into all sorts of justifications for doing and/or not doing a
huge number of things.

~~~
tlb
It's not an impossibly ambitious bar. Many people have cleared it in the past,
and many more will clear it in the future (including Slava the OP).

~~~
ezl
"people have done it" doesn't mean that its a good lesson (or a lesson at all)

i think @beachstartup's point is that the problem with treating this as a
"lesson" is that you're imposing a value judgment on other peoples' value
creation by saying that what they're doing, possibly their LIFE'S WORK, is NOT
WORTH DOING just because they may not "augment the human condition for a huge
number of people in a meaningful way".

For example, any failed venture could probably be said "not to augment the
human condition for a huge number of people in a meaningful way". Goodbye
scientists who are trying to cure cancer but haven't succeeded yet. No
offense, patio11, but bingo cards? Come on... try to augment the human
condition a bit.

It just comes off as judgmental and moralistic bs.

~~~
tlb
I would guess people spend billions of hours a year staring at bingo cards. So
having nice ones is not a small thing.

~~~
networkjester
I believe his statement was that of mockery or sarcasm when using the
"augment" line. Not actually demeaning some of patio11's work. :)

------
sscalia
This article's advice creates the same kind of terrible, derivative "feature"
companies that simply exist to get acquired, rather than really breaking new
ground.

There's gems in there, but lots of bad, bad advice.

------
dylangs1030
I take issue with a lot of these, but a bunch of other commenters have covered
most of them.

This:

> _" Assume the market is efficient and valuable ideas will be discovered by
> multiple teams nearly instantaneously."_

That's just irresponsible and unrealistic advice.

Splitting stock evenly and governing yourself as a "final say" CEO seems a bit
self-contradictory, to say nothing of whether or not you _should_ be a "final
say" CEO in a startup (debatable).

This is also deplorable:

> _" If it doesn’t augment the human condition for a huge number of people in
> a meaningful way, it’s not worth doing."_

Yeah, it's wonderful to "augment the human condition...", but don't be a
condescending prick about it. Things are _perfectly worth doing_ even if they
don't impact a large number of people.

The trouble with this is, Slava inherently claims superiority to his audience
when he declares (not suggest, _declares_ ) that things are not worth doing
just because they aren't up to his self-defined standard of ambition.

Such a statement is not for him to make; it wouldn't sound right coming
straight out of one of Paul Graham's essays, so on what authority does he get
to make this statement?

~~~
gruseom
I see nothing condescending there. "Augment the human condition" means making
someone's life better. "Huge number of people" means going after big markets.
"Not worth doing" means not worth doing _as a startup_ —it might be well worth
doing in some other context, and that's clearly not the scope of this post.

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dylangs1030
Perhaps I worded that comment too harshly.

However, that's a distinction you're making, gruesom. The OP doesn't say it's
not worth doing as a startup, he says it's not worth doing in general. There's
no qualifier. Had there been, I wouldn't take the same issue with it. This is
something other commenters have pointed out down and upthread as well.

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gruseom
"He says it's not worth doing in general."

He did not. It's you who read that in and became indignant at it.

"There's no qualifier."

Certainly there is—the title of the post. Plus its whole context, which is
obviously that of a classic Silicon Valley venture-funded startup.

Look at it this way. When people in this context say "You should go after a
big market", do they mean that anyone going after a small market is an
inferior person? Of course not. What they mean is that if you're going for a
classic high-growth startup, you'll need a market big enough to support that.
They're communicating a distilled lesson about startups, not the world in
general. Same with Slava's post.

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dylangs1030
You know, I guess you're right. I was off base with this comment - I tried to
be more neutral and less critical in my top level comment to pg. But yeah, I
concede. I see your point.

