

Niklas Zennstrom: What I’ve Learned - lnguyen
http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/11/what-ive-learned-by-skypes-niklas-zennstrom/

======
holdenc
A couple interesting recurring themes from advice lists like these is that
failure is ok, and that often times no one buys into a project that will later
become successful. This is consistent with my experience as well. I've had
probably 10 businesses fail. When I started the one that supports myself and
my family no one was interested in helping, possibly in light of past
failures. Many people passed on partnership opportunities. As a result I had
to learn a lot of sys admin stuff and figure out how to promote my product
alone. Six years later, I am the sole owner and employee. No dilution, I know
how everything works and it pays for a comfortable life in Southeast Asia. (I
am an American.) Launched a couple business since that one -- both failures.
But all you really need is one good one to change your life.

------
felipe
What's most fascinating about Niklas is his recurring theme of P2P on Kazaa,
Skype and Joost. At the first sight it seems that these companies are
disconnected (different markets) but his true accomplishment was to leverage
the P2P technology for different use cases (file sharing, voice and video) and
at the same time making it transparent from the user experience.

I also find fascinating that even Skype's business model seems to be
P2P-driven: Skype seems to charge only for services that use the company's
infrastructure, while P2P services (those that do not directly use Skype's
servers) are free.

------
earl
Also, maybe, Meg Whitman is a moron? Purchasing skype w/o also purchasing the
backing tech has to be one of the dumbest acquisitions in a long time in the
valley, rivaling the acquisitions of bebo and myspace.

~~~
tomjen3
Myspace used to make money, actually - so that is not so dumb an acquisition
as you might think.

Really the others where just money loosers - and if you run a big company, you
risk loosing a large amount of money.

IBM licensing DOS, that was stupid.

