

The Startup Myth - inglorian
http://www.sixmonthmba.com/2009/03/the-startup-myth.html

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blackguardx
I thought it was a great article.

The author is basically telling people not to create bubble startups. If you
want to create a business, create one that has value. Don't just create a
startup for some romanticized ideal.

It is sound advice, even if it cuts a little too close to the bone for some.

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noodle
i feel like it would be a great article if it weren't playing totally on
semantics to write a sensationalist article.

he's basically labeling startups and startup culture as the "bad business"
subset of entrepreneurs. it is not the case that all startups are bad
businesses, nor is it the case that all entrepreneurs are running good
businesses.

he could totally skip all of that labeling and write an article on running
good business.

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PonyGumbo
I took an eighteen month detour from my own business to go work for another
startup. I was broke from trying to get my company to break-even, and they
were boomer-aged Microsoft millionaires who told great stories about their
product and the funding that was right around the corner. That was in 2006,
and they're still telling the same story today. The difference now is that
they no longer have any employees, and the CEO is essentially living out of
his car.

They obviously didn't eat Ramen (although it's possible they might now), and
they weren't 60 days late on the power bill, but they were just as absorbed
with the idea of the startup. For them it was about telling the story of their
imminent success, and more importantly, getting other people to believe it.

You obviously have to believe in what you're doing, and of course the startup
atmosphere can be incredibly thrilling, but the author's note that "we need
more people wanting to build companies, not startups" rings particularly true
for me. I don't think he's saying that every startup should plan to become a
staid, monolithic corporate giant. I think he's saying that you should have a
credible plan for organic growth. Even if your end goal is to get funded so
you can get out, this will be a thousand times more likely if you can
demonstrate multiple consecutive quarters of growth. Then even if you don't
get funded, you've at least created a viable business.

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timbowen
Is there really a huge faction in our community who isn't in business to make
money? When I left my middle class desk jockey job to work for trailbehind.com
the chance (however small) to create and own a valuable business was the main
motivator.

I think that the author has a fundamental misconception about what a "badge of
honor" is. Soldiers don't spend months or years in the trenches with the
purpose of earning "badges of honor" they go into the trenches because they
have to. The badges are awarded after the fact to recognize the accomplishment
of putting everything on the line for some greater purpose.

While we are not soldiers, we do risk big chunks of our life because we
believe in our products and businesses. We eat Ramen Noodles and scrimp by
because the pursuit of our goals require us to, not because we like it.

I also think that the author has misconstrued the "badges of honor" concept.
People get badges of honor as a reward for being in the trenches, they don't
go down into the trenches with the main intent of earning a badge of honor.
You are in the trenches because you have to be. While

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trapper
There is a difference between being in it to make money and having no plan to
make that money. Those that have a plan find it very easy, even in todays
climate to make money. Those who don't won't. The future is clear, make money
or perish.

I often have to point out to entrepreneurs the difference between an idea,
project and a business, regardless of how many "eyeballs" they have.

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10ren
_Entrepreneurship is about turning every dollar of resources spent into
something worth more than a dollar._

Including your time. Even if you can live on $100 per week, your time is still
worth $100 per hour, so that's how much value you need to create with every
hour.

But it doesn't need to be $100 cash, but of value. Warren Buffett doesn't
evaluate companies by their current price, but by their likely future worth. A
key factor in evaluating worth is their economic moat - their enduring
advantage over competing companies. Therefore, creating more than $100 of
economic moat in an hour is a good use of your time.

Of course, Buffett doesn't invest in startups or even tech companies like IBM.
Tech is too unpredictable: a product that is good + a market that actually
wants it. Your success or failure is not predictable from data points - it
pretty much _is_ the first data point.

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swombat
Umm, considering the hard attitude the article presents, the actual content is
really rather fluffy.

I can think of a word in response to this article: straw-man.

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noodle
i think it might be hasty generalization or slippery slope instead of straw
man.

there are plenty of people who do live the life as described. however, there
are plenty more who don't. he's attacking a fraction like its the whole.

~~~
swombat
You may well be right.

Regardless, the article is clearly less than great.

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johnrob
... get a billion or die trying!

I don't buy the "create big companies to create many jobs" mantra. A one man
company creates one job, and leaves one more job available in the market for
someone else. That's a contribution in my book.

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v3rt
The job market is hardly a zero-sum game, though. By growing from a startup to
a major player in an industry you helped found, you can do a lot more economic
good than you would by creating one job and leaving one available in the
existing market.

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xiaoma
> _"The world would be a much better place if less people tried to build
> startups."_

fewer people

I really don't want to be a grammar nazi, but starting off with an error in
the very first sentence made me less interested in reading the rest of the
article.

Yes, I realize that English grammar is changing, that countable/uncountable
distinctions are less important than they used to be, and that "less + a
countable noun" doesn't sound bad to everyone anymore. But to some of us, it
looks like it was written by a struggling high school student. There are so,
so many things to read on the internet that readers can be driven off by minor
blemishes at the beginning of a piece.

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keltecp11
Well done. I love what I do... I hope that is what it means to run a start-up.

