

Startup School 2009 Notes & Summary - markbao
http://journal.markbao.com/2009/10/startup-school-2009-summary/

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pclark
am I the only one that really dislikes when people flaunt their age?

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markbao
Well--I only have another ~6 months where I can, so better take advantage of
it, no? (The press loves it.) If I can get a great connection from someone
that is impressed by my work _and_ age, I would take it. Founders like to take
whatever advantages they have, right?

But oy! Yell at me in private. mark[at]markbao[dot]com. I'd rather this thread
be a discussion about Startup School than other issues such as this.

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pclark
I suppose. I found the _eight_ startups more surprising if you're a founder.
I've found one startup [full time] takes over 150% of my capacity. How do you
know you're executing that well if you're thinly spread?

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markbao
Oh, yeah, certainly. I've been trying to figure out how to maximize efficiency
in all the stuff that's going on. Part of it is doing a _lot_ of strategy
planning beforehand. It's true that I'm thinly spread, but I do work with co-
founders, developers and sales agents that help, you know, share the work of
the startup. I don't try to say that I'm a single founder in all those
startups. That, along with a fairly intense work ethic (80 hours a week ish
not including school) it works out.

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staunch
One of the wisest things I've hard _anyone_ say about running a company,
wasn't in there.

"We're fine with making mistakes and looking stupid. Eventually you get judged
not by how you look, but by the value you provide to people. There's a lot of
pressures inside companies where people want to optimize for how things
_look_." -- Mark Zuckerberg

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patrickryan
I met Mark at the Startup School reception at YCombinator the night before
Startup School. He is a very knowledgeable and genuine person. I wish I would
of had the same passion as he does at his young age.

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richardburton
Great summary of what went on. I'll definitely apply for #SUS 2010. Jason
Fried delivers once again:

\- The bootstrapped company starts off thinking: we need to make money.

\- The funded company starts of thinking: we need to spend money. these
investors have given us x million dollars—we should spend it!

I speak to so many aspiring web entrepreneurs who are spending way too much
time searching for money when they should be using their skills to improve
their products. If you want to start manufacturing widgets in a huge factory,
that is a huge cap-ex. However, if you're building a web-service you can get a
rough prototype out of the door - I'd say get it done.

IDEO's motto: "Prototype early & often"

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endergen
These notes are great. Can't believe how young you are. Very impressive. Your
companies have similar aspirations to my work.

I'll be following your work, interested to see how it goes for you.

