

Amy Hoy: Fuck glory, startups are one long con - jlangenauer
http://unicornfree.com/2011/fuck-glory-startups-are-one-long-con/

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_dps
Er. Well. Ok. So who's going to build Intel? Lockheed? IBM? Apple? Google?
These all started as startups. There is real value to society to having people
trying to do this. "Value to society while doing something risky" is actually
not a bad heuristic for "glory".

There's no clear alternative to "startups" for solving these problems. You
simply can't be a happy-go-lucky bootstrapped search engine _unless_ you're
piggybacking on someone else (I love DDG, but there are probably 3-4 orders of
magnitude more complexity in Google than there are in DDG). The situation is
even worse if your goals are those of Tesla or SpaceX. No one is going to do
that in a casual way.

I'm all for recognizing the inherent incentive mis-alignment between the
startup cheerleader economy (VC, TechCrunch, Wannabe entrepreneurs etc.) and
the people on the front lines doing the work. But you can't just dismiss the
startup concept outright as a con unless you're prepared to explain how you're
going to give up or replace your CPUs, web search engines, and commercial
aerospace. There is no evidence that small bootstrapped "non-glory" entities
have much meaningful impact on this aspect of the world (with all due respect
to all parties involved, consider the net impact of 37 signals vs Salesforce
on modern business apps as used by actual large businesses).

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Anderkent
_Questioning a speaker’s motives is not only not a fallacy, it is a sign of
healthy debate._

No. If someone is wrong, you should point out how he is wrong, not question
his motives for presenting the statement.

His motives might be corrupt. Who cares? The only important thing is whether
what he says is true or not.

~~~
qzio
I think it might help to understand the arguments if you know the motives
behind the argument. The more information you have, the more accurate analysis
can be made.

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da_dude4242
Her account of glory is consistent with sociological perspectives I've ran
across but it's not particular to startups.

Historically, social costs are externalized to men in exchange for "glory" or
"power". This isn't some explicit tactic though.

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itmag
I'm the one who's quoted in her blog post.

See here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3283401>

Ask me anything :)

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slowernet
The takeaway here is not "Startups bad", it's "Life-hostile startups without
meaningful equity and reasonable liquidation preferences bad".

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JoeAltmaier
Wow. Ranting like that begs to be labelled, but I'll resist. I'll just say
this: also ignore rants from cowards who have never been in the trenches, who
have never known glory nor freedom.

~~~
thinkingeric
I would label it as "essentially correct". The odds are very slim that you
will

a) Find gold in California b) Become a rock star c) Win a lottery d) Strike it
rich and famous as an 'entrepreneur' e) Achieve above average, long-term gains
by trading tulips

Yet, the selection bias that promotes these dreams doesn't deter anyone who is
going to go that route.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Hyperbole at least? It is not 'death' to fail at a startup, its part of life.
An interesting life anyway.

And you cannot simply choose to stay out of the 'fight'. You have to work
somewhere - may as well be for yourself.

So the metaphors are weak and chosen to stir passions. She's pissing on
entrepreneurship for whatever reason, and has little meaningful to say.

~~~
itmag
This.

I am the guy who is quoted in her blog post, and I don't really recognize
myself in what she writes.

I want to be my own boss, do interesting/meaningful work, and at least have a
shot at recognition and wealth. To me, starting my own company is the surest
way there. Staying in TPS-land is a sure way to never get there.

