
Lessons Learned from the rise and fall of Sonar - christophe971
https://medium.com/p/72c6f8bec7df
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ternaryoperator
I'm surprised that after learning all those lessons, he still writes: "We
started Sonar with a belief that everyone has the potential to be amazing and
that technology can unlock that potential." And doesn't take away any lesson
from that.

Building your business on making everyone amazing through technology is a
conceit. Most people I know have no desire to become "amazing." They want to
make ends meet, they want to be good parents to their children, they want to
make the world a little bit better. Being amazing is nowhere on their list of
priorities.

Maybe he should focus on a start-up that solves problems people face in
everyday life and do _that_ with technology.

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calinet6
On an initial read this sounds like a lot of hot air, but it has some good
points.

"*Hint: If you did, you would already have traction." \-- what does that even
mean? You're trying to sound cool but you just sound ambiguous.

"If you build it, they will come (and pay)." Um, no, not always.

"Growth is the only thing that matters if you are building a social network.
Period." \-- there was a better HN post today, that was completely solid.
Read, compare, take what you will. [http://insideintercom.io/if-its-important-
dont-hack-it/](http://insideintercom.io/if-its-important-dont-hack-it/)

"Media and social networking companies should double down on analytics to
find, observe, and build for actual user behavior." \- Analytics, eh? Sure,
you can dive through numbers all you want, but how about user research that's
designed to actually tell you this? All you need is 10 people trying to solve
the same problem and a well-made survey. Once you have a product, do the same
thing and see how well it solves it. This will tell you more than numbers.

"Avoid bad relationships like the plague but when you inevitably find yourself
in a difficult partnership, don’t waste precious energy wailing against it."
\-- Couldn't agree more. If the partnership is too volatile (you'll know), fix
it fast or jump ship.

"We started Sonar with a belief that everyone has the potential to be amazing
and that technology can unlock that potential." Well, I think I see your
problem. How about starting with something more concrete? (I kid, I kid.)

Lots of good takeaways. Most of them are very specific to your case, and a lot
of it is emotionally charged. It's an interesting read as a case study, but I
think you're too close to it for the experience to bear real wisdom yet.
Revisit in 6 months, a year, two years, and see how you look back on it. Your
perspective will constantly evolve and change. Never ceases to amaze me.

It's like a bad relationship—you can't see it from close up. While you're in
deep it seems like you belong there and have to keep working through it, but
when you leave you just can't believe how many signs there were early on and
throughout the experience that should have led you to do something
differently, or just start fresh. But if you find the right person (or start
with them) then it's a whole new world—it becomes easy, and the problems you
worry about are the right ones. I think that's the main factor of success.
Finding the right people, having the right idea, and (perhaps most
importantly) knowing yourself—all at the same time.

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JoeDoyle23
There was a lot of good take aways from this. I have to say the one thing that
I didn't really see was how they actually planned to make money. I know
there's the hope of being the next Facebook or Twitter, but couldn't much of
that been pushed through if you were turning a profit or generating any
revenue?

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wellboy
This is why social discovery doesn't work the way it is right now. How to make
it work?

1\. Solve a problem to be a pain killer

2\. Leverage an existing community to reduce critical mass and make your users
fall in love with your app

3\. Lazzer focus

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leggo2m
I thought it was a frank and useful post-mortem. I learned something.

