

Doing business without "doing a startup" (Suster/Ingram followup) - dools
http://www.workingsoftware.com.au/page/Doing_business_without_doing_a_startup

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jasonkester
Well said. Frankly I can't figure out why anybody would want to jump onto the
80-hour week insanity mill that is the Silicon Vally definition of "Startup".
It just doesn't seem like a good use of your time. Either you burn yourself
out with nothing to show, or you oversucceed to the point where you have to
figure out how to work your life around owning a private jet. There's got to
be some middle ground.

How about instead I work 20 hour weeks building something that will pay my
rent initially, pay for my winter house on that nice point break in Oz after 5
years, then spoil my kids rotten in 20. That's a payoff more in line with my
lifestyle, and I get to keep living my life in the meantime.

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agentultra
_Don't get lured in by the bright lights of VC-Vegas - instead focus on
building a profitable business where you get money because people buy what you
have to sell._

I think a lot of tech startups tend to miss this point and go straight for
funding. They think that they'll just get big first and worry about
"monetization" later. That's a crap-shoot! Such high risk is a tax for fools.

If you're really thinking about being in business for yourself, just start an
honest business. Start with the nuts and bolts. Collect some invoices and sell
some product. If your demand begins to out-pace your ability to deliver, then
you have a good indication that you should go get funding.

It's just a perspective. The "funding first, revenue later" idea has worked.
It's just not for everyone. You don't have to quit your job out-right to start
a business. I know people who work at a part-time job while they work on their
business. One day they hope to quit that too and let their business take them
where ever it may. It's a viable alternative to the nerve-wracking pain of
selling out to the VC merry-go-round.

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wccrawford
"Because anyone who says they want to "become an entrepreneur" is completely
misguided."

Thank you! Being an entrepreneur is not an end, it's a means. I've seen so
many articles lately about how you should quit your job and do a startup, even
if you don't have a good idea or business sense.

I feel really bad for any customers those businesses draw in, because they are
in for some trouble. Even if the business survives (and it's not likely to)
then the customers will have to deal with the fact that the business isn't
focused on them, it's about 'being an entrepreneur.' Totally wrong.

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toadi
Sometimes we need to put some perspective on our little online world. There is
a whole world of entrepreneurs out there that are starting businesses that are
not yet another social network or even an online business.

Getting a bit tired of the narrow mindesness of the community about how heroic
they are ,what great opninions they have, how cool they are. But they actually
are just a big bag of hot air.

Think the whole Quora discussion is a bit more of the same: Look at me I have
an opinion. I'm changing the world, I'm blah blah.

There are still children dying of hunger, even in America a lot of people are
hungry, unemployed or don't receive decent medical care. So maybe in your
little eco-sphere you are changing the world. But are you changing it for the
better?

What's your opinion about this?

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brudgers
As far as founders go I don't see much psychological difference between "doing
a startup" in the VC/Angel sense and "doing a startup" in the "I am a business
owner" sense. The personal and financial risks are similar, worries about
money, long hours, the fear of failure, etc. Yes, a startup in the Silicon
Valley sense is structurally organized in a more ambitious way, but three guys
in an office trying to figure out how not to run out of money is going to
produce the same stresses whether they are programmers or plumbers.

Hiring and firing suck just the same for both groups. Borrowing money offers
the same temptations and one's family doesn't stop whispering,"when will he
get a real job," just because it's a startup.

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wheels
These faux rebuttals seem to intentionally miss the point Mark was making:

Doing a startup, the kind that Mark means, the kind that he sees --
specifically those with a story about how they're going to become billion
dollar company -- works best with some specific personality traits. Is that
really that hard to swallow?

Does it mean people without those can't start businesses? Heavens no.

These arguments are effectively a straw-man -- the point of contention is on
the definition of a startup, not on who's fit to do one. They seem to redefine
"startup" as "business doing something with the internet" and then proceed to
debunk Mark's argument about who's well suited for those. But again, that's
completely (intentionally?) missing the point.

Also the "lottery" hooky from DHH is dumb. Nobody compares getting to the top
of other fields as pure chance -- why would it be different with startups? Did
Michael Jordan and Zuck have a string of lucky breaks along the way? No doubt.
But do you really think hard work had no more to do with it than it did for
the person scratching the foil off of a lotto scratch-card? Do you really
think there aren't recognizable personality patterns in top athletes? Really?

~~~
brudgers
> _"These faux rebuttals seem to intentionally miss the point Mark was
> making"_

I think much of it is a reaction to the way in which Suster has appropriated
the term "entrepreneur." All entrepreneurs are not in startups and all
entrepreneurs do not swing for the fences every time (just as Tiger Woods
doesn't fire every shot at the pin). Most serial entrepreneurs do their deals
with a _pro forma_ not a prototype. Ted Turner built his media empire on sure
things not with lottery tickets.

The startup model creates a somewhat false impression of a radical division
between entrepreneurs and investors. The damping effect for VC's in Suster's
graphs is more a function of wealth than role. The short stack will always
have more highs and lows at the final table than the chip leader.

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stcredzero
_Designers aren't programmers - but who owns the client relationships? There's
nothing to stop a programmer from offering design services but more often than
not it's the designer who owns the client relationship and shops out work to
programmers._

Is this part of the dynamic behind restaurant websites so often sucking badly?
(Because the requirements are mainly hashed out between people who mainly
relate to how a site looks.)

~~~
Swizec
Let me venture an explanation as to why this might be so: for any project a
designer spends a week on, a programmer must then spend 2+ weeks on.

This leads to an interesting mechanic where designers have a much greater
project throughput than programmers and subsequently have more time to nurture
the all important client relationships.

It also means it takes more than one programmer to service one designer.

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kayoone
All this startup world is funny anyway. If i tell my friends i regularly work
50-60 hour weeks they call me crazy, tell me i have no life and whatsoever.
Then you come here to hear that under 80hours of working you cant get anything
done until the people working 100 hours/week share their stories... I bet you
can even find people claiming 120 hours/week, hell why not, after all the week
has 168hours so theres plenty left!

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fedd
i wonder, how many people would confess that they want to be someone (i.e.,
businessmen, or a vc) to have a boatload of money, a home on tropical island
and fly business class / private jet?

if i were a vc, i probably would not like this confession. i'd better
encourage young people to value the startup life itself.

~~~
qq66
You're right, and that's because VC is a hits-driven business and none of the
founders of major companies (MS/Google/Facebook/Oracle sized companies) have
ever been in it for the money. If they had, they would have sold their
companies when they were worth $100M and sailed off into the sunset.

However, on Wall Street, this type of attitude is highly valued -- you want to
find the young kid with massive insecurities who wants to have $1 billion and
when he gets it will want $10 billion. You give him a desk and tax his
earnings.

