
I Have No Idea What This Startup Does and Nobody Will Tell Me - joeyespo
http://gawker.com/i-have-no-idea-what-this-startup-does-and-nobody-will-t-1771036238
======
aresant
Top comment on the article is probably partially correct, if snarky:

"Well, at the very least, it’s the most elaborate iteration of “Daddy needs a
tax deduction” that I’ve ever seen."

That the pocket-square emblazoned founder of a sexy non-profit is the son of a
well-heeled VC is old hat.

"Changing the world" is one of the well established paths for masters-of-the-
universe in training.

But the attachment to also running his own "Venture Fund" as a 20 year old
made me realize what a crazy good time to be young, in any Ivy / forward
thinking school and have a pocket full of cash - just saw the official UC
Berkeley House Fund (1) news last week in this vein.

As an investment thesis getting your money first in line before the next Zuck
or Gates drops out of Harvard / Yale / Berk ain't a bad idea

(1) [http://news.berkeley.edu/2016/04/22/the-house-
fund/](http://news.berkeley.edu/2016/04/22/the-house-fund/)

~~~
gr3yh47
Helena sounds vaguely like Builderberg Jr to me

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tsunamifury
The first time I met a few semi-prominent VC partners to casually chat about
an startup I was thinking about, I was surprised at how well received my
napkin idea was. At the end of the walk around building they had said they
would love to help find an angel round and I was taken aback at how eager and
positive they were. I even mentioned that it seemed unreal that they'd be
willing to jump in that quickly. One of the partners laughed and said "Are you
kidding, you gave me a solid pitch with technology we believe you can build. I
spend half my day sorting through pitches that involve some obscure form of
perpetual motion or pyramid schemes. Our chat was better than most formal
presentations we get."

I've since made it a bit of habit to gauge the quality of pitches a VC I talk
to has gotten recently. Many of the stories I've heard make this pitch seem
almost competent.

~~~
beat
The absolute worst thing about going to events where a bunch of people pitch
is just how _awful_ most startup ideas are. Not awful in the too-crazy-to-work
sense (like Uber or AirBnB), but awful in the entering-a-crowded-market-with-
a-very-timid-idea sense. Things with no reasonable path to monetization.

The opposite of pg's "frighteningly ambitious" is "unfrighteningly
unambitious". There are too many startups out there that won't scare anyone -
_especially_ their founders.

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raverbashing
This hurt to read.

It seems this Helena was made by some Markov chain or CNN that read too many
startup and corporate prospects

Oh of course it already has a board and investors

And it's going to use synergy to empower the next level of corporate
creativity or something like that

Really

One of the commenters gives a plausible idea: 'Well, at the very least, it’s
the most elaborate iteration of “Daddy needs a tax deduction” that I’ve ever
seen.'

~~~
Jugurtha
Yeap. Looks like a new Hooli venture, or something made by these two "Start-up
Guys":
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMmdl4VltD4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMmdl4VltD4)

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Zanta
I got a good laugh out of his bio line 'After leaving traditional high school
to compete on the international ski racing circuit...,' trying to throw off a
genius-playboy-athlete vibe.

His FIS profile has him as a 100 point skier (1). I was a 100 point skier, and
I sucked ass, miles away from any reasonable standard of international
competition.

(1) [http://data.fis-ski.com/dynamic/athlete-
biography.html?secto...](http://data.fis-ski.com/dynamic/athlete-
biography.html?sector=AL&competitorid=169128&type=fispoints)

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arihant
This is harsher than it needs to be. A lot of us as sophomores started clubs,
companies, organizations. I sincerely think this guy is trying to do something
similar. He just seems to have better contacts. We also made (or projected)
embarrassing mistakes at our first ventures. He maybe doing some of those too.

But from the look of it, it is simply an intellectually curious kid trying to
keep himself busy. He also has a venture firm which backs that he has that
kind of flare.

Not every 20-year-old student venture should be a Snapchat. Relax and let the
guy do what makes him happy.

~~~
overcast
It's actually right on point. Don't act like this is just some kid in his dorm
coding up a new idea. This is just a giant money laundering scheme for the
rich father.

~~~
tdaltonc
> giant money laundering scheme for the rich father.

How does this do that?

~~~
overcast
Rich people funnel money for their cause of the month to a shell company,
which filters it around, and at the end they get a big tax write off. I would
have thought the stock photos, buzzword bingo, and the clueless responses from
the publicists would have tipped it off.

~~~
messick
"Money Laundering" and "Tax Write-off" are barely related activities.

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joezydeco
_" How does a 20-year-old college kid come to be the CEO of an international
startup and the owner of a VC firm? If his last name is familiar, it’s
probably not just because he is the Founder, CEO and Chairman of the Helena
Group, but because his dad is Bill Elkus, a successful venture capitalist
(“one of the top 50 to 100 Venture Capitalists in the United States by Forbes
Magazine in its annual Midas List on three separate occasions,” according to
his website bio)."_

Is it really that hard to figure out this is just something to keep the kid
busy (and maybe brush up against some Hollywood starlets)?

C'mon, at least mount a hostile takeover of zombo.com or something.

~~~
sharkweek
Wow zombo.com what a throwback -

"Anything is possible... at zombo-com"

~~~
joezydeco
Still going! They even migrated to HTML5!

[http://html5zombo.com/](http://html5zombo.com/)

------
jasonlfunk
I think it's clear that the company doesn't know what they are doing. It's
hard to be that consistently unclear. It sounds like they are trying to pull a
bunch of smart people in a room and come up with a problem they can solve.
Most people figure out what they want to do first and then start a company. It
appears that they decided to start a company and then figure out what they
want to do.

~~~
beat
I heard a couple of founders pitching the other day, and answered a question
from a VC with (and I paraphrase) "We'll implement this, and then figure out
what problem it solves".

To an extent, you _can_ work by simply building a basic technology and, as
William Gibson said, "The street finds its own uses for things". But doing
that requires a fundamental new tech.

Likewise, you can work by simply getting a bunch of smart, powerful people in
a room and seeing what happens. But at best, the street finds its own uses for
things. At worst, it's a venue for networking and a free catered dinner. If
you don't bring them a problem to solve in advance, they'll just do what they
want, which probably won't be useful to anyone but themselves.

Looking at this, though, the one thing that _does_ stand out from all the mush
is the idea of getting different generations to work together. Which is (I say
this as an old fart) _stupid_. A bunch of entitled college kids complaining
that the old people who run the world don't listen to them or let them
"innovate" solutions? Feh. All those old people were young once, too. They
_remember_ being young. They _remember_ being absolutely certain that they
understood how the world worked, and how to solve all the problems, and they
_remember_ knowing that the main impediment to saving the planet was all the
old people who were running everything not listening to them. The reason the
Boomer masters of the universe don't take Millenials seriously is because
they've been around long enough to know just how naive kids are, and that
there's no wisdom in being naive.

But I rant. Anyway, this is BS. Nobody is going to solve any problems by
getting the stupid old people to listen to the brilliant young people.

------
stepvhen
Silicon Valley on HBO did just have its Season 3 premier yesterday. Could this
(hopefully) be some huge fake marketing stunt?

------
mirkules
This reminds me of Better Off Ted's Jabberwocky Project:
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=spyJ5yxTfas](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=spyJ5yxTfas)

Which, of course, is a parody of the late '90s tech boom and some of the
useless, fluffy companies that were spawned.

~~~
surlyadopter
It's a game-changer.

------
exelius
This sounds like DONDA 2.0. [1]

[1] [http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/15/inside-
dond...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/15/inside-donda-kanye-
west-s-plan-to-rule-the-world-and-save-his-bank-account.html)

------
UniZero
Helen: an influential think group that answers to the highest bidder.

It doesn't seem as complicating as the article suggests.

~~~
hooo
Completely agree... nicely worded. They should have that on slide 1!

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traviswingo
To me, this looks like they are attempting to gather people, who have a
"voice" in the world, in order to speak out about issues that affect the
masses. It's a company whose sole purpose is to accelerate and "change" the
human race. Pretty cool if you ask me.

We're a self-destructing group of selfish individuals who, more often than
not, cannot see further than the tip of our nose. I'm glad there's a group who
is trying to shine light on that.

~~~
southclaw
I feel like they will "speak out" about promotions more than anything to be
honest... maybe I'm just pessimistic!

------
macawfish
"Debord also draws an equivalence between the role of mass media marketing in
the present and the role of religions in the past." \- Wikipedia,
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Society_of_the_Spectacle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Society_of_the_Spectacle)

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fs111
funny how this "suddenly" drops off the frontpage...

~~~
pak
The gawker domain might have triggered a few genuine flags, but I found that
odd too.

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coldcode
This is really funny. Maybe not intentionally. It belongs on Comedy Central as
a series.

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bko
Helena reminds me of George Constanza's The Human Fund: Money for People

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mozumder
It's a networking/social/party group, like ivy.com.

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jrnichols
If anything, it reminds me of the Better Off Ted episode with "Jabberwocky."

Nobody knew what it did or what it was, but everyone wanted in on it...
somehow.

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CPLX
If my chin was as advanced as those of Henry, Noah, or Benjamin, I would
certainly try to leverage that competitive advantage as well.

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cat-dev-null
Some folks just haven't heard of stealth mode and formation.

It's hard to call something BS when they're not yet ready or publicly-
launched.

PS: Gawker is bankrupt, content quality on Gizmodo is also suffering terribly.

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debrice
They're still missing Jonathan Goldsmith

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slantaclaus
Google "bespoke" you plebe!

------
Kristine1975
_> and Nobody Will Tell Me_

Possibly because you're Gawker, a tabloid that's disgusting even for tabloids.

~~~
minimaxir
TechCrunch tried to find out more information about Helena in response to the
Gawker article: [http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/19/unboxing-helena-a-new-
non-p...](http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/19/unboxing-helena-a-new-non-profit-
aimed-at-giving-the-under-25-set-a-seat-at-the-ted-talks-table/)

They hit the exact same roadblocks.

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jordache
maybe the kid just created it for his web design/ecommerce 201 class?

way to freak out Gawker.. what do they want you to do? If they are simply
trolling you, then it's your job to filter the shit out, instead of freaking
out and making a headline article about it...

~~~
mejari
He hired a world-class PR firm for his web design class?

