
Why It's Safe for Founders to Be Nice - taylorwc
http://paulgraham.com/safe.html
======
rgbrenner
I think this depends on the industry (as PG speculated). It works in software
and other industries with healthy margins. But in industries with slim
margins, you see more cutthroat behavior.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Amazon (for ex) has poor working
conditions. Retail has always been a slim-margin business, and most of the
companies in it are accused of very similar poor behavior. (I don't mean to
pick on Amazon, but it's a recent example. And I know some will say AWS is
ok.. but AWS likely has much higher margins than the retail side.. so it
does't really change my point.)

Take any industry.. and the chances are the profit margin is a good indicator
of the working conditions.

This isn't to mean that those who start retail (or similar low margin)
business are mean people.. but I think the lack of profits necessitates cost
control and a focus on efficiency... which leads to poor working conditions
(since good working conditions cost money) and decisions people will interpret
as mean.

~~~
SomeCallMeTim
>I don't think it's a coincidence that Amazon (for ex) has poor working
conditions.

I just spent a year and a half working for Amazon, and the recent reports
about working conditions were, as far as I could tell, either fabrications, or
things that hadn't happened for years.

Working there was great. Yes, I was in the AWS tree, but I also had contact
with people in the Retail tree, and didn't perceive any differences there.

Low-wage jobs like fulfillment...I don't know. I'm a developer.

Oh, and did I mention the pay was great? Hard to complain, really.

~~~
HelloMcFly
I personally know three people whose stories are much closer to the NYT pieces
than your comments, and they've all only left within the past three years,
with the most recent exit being about five months ago. I know two others (in
Seattle, it's easy to know many people with an Amazon work history) who had a
fine experience, one of whom that still works there. I've interviewed for two
positions there myself, one that I declined and one that I did not receive an
offer for; one was presented as exceptionally competitive, with the HR rep
dancing around a few of the NYT-style topics, and one that seemed much more
typical and collaborative.

No, I've not worked there, but all of the evidence at my disposal (your
comment included), leads me to believe your Amazon experience is highly
dependent on where your work group sits in the Amazon network. To shrug off
the stories as potential fabrications seems as intellectually dishonest as
assuming the stories of extreme treatment are commonplace.

~~~
hitekker
People who are treated well by systems will generally defend those systems,
even if it means rationalizing acts of injustice or cruelty happening just
next door.

At the very least, how much a person is willing to question the hand that
feeds them can reveal the strength of their character to others.

~~~
proveanegative
>how much a person is willing to question the hand that feeds them can reveal
the strength of their character to others.

Careful! You are straying into fundamental attribution error territory. Those
who bite the hand that feeds them may be in a better position to do so or feel
more encouraged by the people they know.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error)

~~~
hitekker
True. I did not mean to say there is a direct correlation (thus the "can
reveal") more that criticizing what one perceives as unjust, despite whatever
benefits they receive from it, is often noble (strong character). Or at least
noble if that person is fully aware of the consequences of speaking out in
what they view as the truth.

Note, I believe that Noble does not always equal smart, where smart equals
maximizing good, corporeal outcomes for one's self.

------
tokenadult
I like to read pg's essays (they are what drew me to HN), but this one needs
more examination of whether the statement "Obviously one case where it would
help to be rapacious is when growth depends on that. What makes startups
different is that usually it doesn't" is really true or not. Some of what I
have read in news articles linked to from HN suggests that, say, Groupon or
Uber or Airbnb or a variety of other startup businesses may all have done
things that look rather rapacious to me to raise their growth rate. Some of
those companies are still doing well, and some less so, but the companies we
hear about here are all doing better than the companies started the same year
that we never hear about, so we need to test pg's proposition by looking at
startups that fizzle out soon after they are founded. Perhaps the highest
level of niceness is found among companies that never gain high growth rate at
all.

~~~
GCA10
Good point. Airbnb, Uber, etc. certainly didn't go out of their way to be
"nice" to taxi commissioners, hotel lobbyists, etc. The new guys felt they had
a better way of doing business and rushed it into new markets as fast as they
could, tolerating lawsuits and injunctions along the way.

------
louprado
My company budgets a small amount for customer appeasement each month. The
funds can be used toward discounts, expedited shipping, upgrades, etc. We can
usually start every support response with empathy as opposed to protecting
ourselves from loss. The result is a focused work environment, happy
customers, no burn-out, no venting, no therapy bills, and a reminder to keep
things this way by continuously improving the product(s).

~~~
JoeAltmaier
This makes so much sense, especially for growing companies. You want viral
growth - your next customer is massively more valuable than dollars now.

------
rdl
This doesn't apply completely, IMO, to startups with early enterprise deals.
If you negotiate those in ways which are "too un-rapacious", you can be
starved for capital, be ignored by the customer (because it's insignificant as
an expense...), and turn into a consultancy by necessity.

It's not exactly being power-mad, but definitely putting the interests of your
company (which, at the time, might just be you!) first in negotiations. Not
being a dick, but being assertive, and having a decent BATNA in negotiations
(i.e. being willing to walk away).

I'd totally agree with what pg said here for consumer or low-marginal-cost
products. Absolutely disagree for professional services. Disagree moderately
for the somewhat-marginal-cost world of enterprise deals (or hardware).

I think there's something more to this which has to do with marginal cost, not
just growth curve.

~~~
randall
Fwiw I was doing an enterprisish biz before and am now doing consumer. Maybe
matching personality types with these is worth doing.

Also I was stressing about the enterprise side of the biz when I sent this
email. The enterprise biz has no chance of growing hyperlinearly because the
market is too small and the customers are very hard to reach. (TV stations)

~~~
rdl
My personal sweet spot is well-resourced people with hard problems (but not
unique-to-them, or self-created problems), either individuals or large
organizations. "Professionals" might be better than Enterprise, since they
purchase products themselves rather than through purchasing departments, at
least for initial buyers as a startup.

My dream business would be the software/service equivalent of Snap-On Tools.
Not Craftsman (home/high-end value), shitty cheap shit from the dollar store,
free stuff included with furniture, and also not NASA custom $30k
screwdrivers.

~~~
itchyouch
Sounds like github/gitlab would be a close to what you are describing. Hosted
quickbooks. Hosted turbotax for accountants. Payment processing like square
for small businesses.

~~~
rdl
None of those are really hard tech problems, though. They can be hard at scale
(like FB has hard infrastructure problems at scale), but they are more about
domain expertise, initial sales, and having the right mvp and a path to small
number of initial sales, IMO.

------
brianstorms
If only most venture capitalists were nice, or were looking for nice founders.
In my experience, and I've met probably 250 VCs over 20 years, it's not the
case. Especially if they've had a few drinks, when the truth is revealed.

There are exceptions, always. But too many are not really that nice. They'll
put on an act to pretend they're nice, but they're not.

~~~
mistermann
I would agree with this, people who's primary responsibility is shuffling
money around, making deals, and dealing with people who actually produce
something as if they are game pieces on a board tend to be a bit different. I
wonder if this personality type is drawn to that role, or if it is learned.

------
kylec
It seems to be a fairly common pattern for a startup to offer a bunch of stuff
for free, or to ask for very little in return. This startup then attracts a
bunch of users, and for a while everything's good.

Then the growth starts to slow down. The company needs to continue growing
financially, to appease investors and so on, so they start to ratchet up their
monetization. User experience and product quality begin to suffer.

By this time the company is usually pretty entrenched, with some combination
of having driven all their competitors out of business or by having a strong
network effect. Users will want to leave, but they don't have any other viable
options.

~~~
minimaxir
> _It seems to be a fairly common pattern for a startup to offer a bunch of
> stuff for free, or to ask for very little in return. This startup then
> attracts a bunch of users, and for a while everything 's good._

That's less about being nice and more about business development in a time
where people are very hesitant to spend money.

If a startup offers something for _completely_ free, it's never out of
altruism.

------
spitfire
> Maybe successful people in other industries are; I don't know; but not
> startup founders. [1]

I don't understand, "startups" are an industry in their own?

Would a food delivery startup not be in the food service industry? A logistics
startup not be in the logistics industry?

~~~
larrys
The startup scene has it's own definition of startup.

Some, but not necessarily all of the following apply:

1) Younger people

2) Educated (can be self taught)

3) College grads or dropped out of college to do a startup

4) Have more to gain than to lose by participating in a startup. (Little
assets, [1] not leaving a traditional job but perhaps going from another
"startup")

5) Working primarily with other people's money

6) Has the interest and/or money of "angels" "Vc's" or "incubators".

7) Doing something that could get big and stands a high chance of failure. (In
other words, not starting an Italian restaurant that's going to be a single
location sauce and cheese place)

8) Located or able to travel and possibly relocate to a place that startups
are typically. (Silicon Valley, NYC or the other hubs..)

What am I missing? (Please fill in the other things I am almost certainly
forgetting).

[1] Unless they have family money or have done a previous startup where they
hit the pay window.

~~~
onewaystreet
Those are aspects of startups but not a definition. The best definition I
think is Paul Graham's: "Startup = Growth"
[[http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html)].
There are many food delivery services that are just local businesses, not
startups. The difference is growth, a startup looks to expand to multiple
cities, states, and countries.

~~~
larrys
I don't disagree with what you are saying and I probably should have not used
the word "definition" in that sentence.

However the reason I used "definition" was because what comes to mind with
SCOTUS and porn,[1] that is "we know it when we see it" in a sense that it
can't really be defined in the traditional sense and probably never will be.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it)

~~~
emmett
Paul would strongly disagree with the idea that a startup is defined by a
random list of traits and that you "know it when you see it". He very clearly
defines a startup as a company aiming for (and potentially capable of
achieving) a very high rate of growth.

Team composition is literally irrelevant.

------
larrys
"As I've written before, one of the things that has surprised me most about
startups is how few of the most successful founders are like that. Maybe
successful people in other industries are; I don't know; but not startup
founders."

I know that "old school" world quite well and have for a long long time. There
is a big difference between being, in general, fresh out of school working
with your peers of highly motivated and typically educated and skilled people
(that you additionally socialize with) vs. being in an environment where you
have your own money on the line, no margin for error, and people are
constantly doing stupid shit that threatens your livelihood. [1] With all due
respect to PG afaik he has never operated in this world. But it is a world
that does exist and there is a reason for it as well.

[1] Note I am not talking about the corporate world and obviously goes without
saying that there are many people running entrepreneurial companies that
aren't like the caricature which PG describes.

------
luckydata
Maybe founders are nice to Paul Graham but many of them are total douches to
their employees. I don't recognize the industry I work in by his description.

~~~
gargarplex
ummmm basically

the winners are basically amazing to their employees.

non-douchey.

because they're winning.

leading.

making their employees rich

------
aaronbrethorst

        So if you're a founder, here's a deal you can make
        with yourself that will both make you happy and
        make your company successful. Tell yourself you
        can be as nice as you want, so long as you work
        hard on your growth rate to compensate.
    

Doesn't this imply that if you have less than a "hyperlinear growth curve" you
should be a raging sociopath[1]? Fuck that.

[1] Or, to be precise, "a rapacious, cigar-smoking, table-thumping guy in his
fifties who wins by exercising power"

~~~
brlewis
Paul's definition of a startup is centered on hyperlinear growth rate. Since
his area of expertise is startups, he limited his hypothesis to this group.
"Maybe" in other situations niceness doesn't work.

A conversation I had with an institutional investor makes me think niceness
works elsewhere too.

------
rdlecler1
This seems like an over simplification. Growth is not just the product, but
the people executing. A founder who is giving away too much equity and money
early may not have the equity and capital to attract all the talent she needs.
Maybe she is more understanding about work life balance and doesn't push the
team hard enough. But somebody else does, and this is often winner takes all.

------
__Joker
Generally, people will be nice where they can afford to. I have been to
cultures and regions, the developed or more well to do, or having enough
resources tend to be more "nicer" toward each other. Competition seems to be
get better off peoples niceness. Then seems the meta hacking, when people
figure niceness can be a advantage and use it for personal, professional
gains.

------
jallmann
Okay, so "being nice" equates to "offer good value at a fair price", eg don't
suck your customers dry. That makes perfect sense.

I do think a little bit of ruthlessness is called for, especially when your
most important metric (growth) is coming at the expense of your competitors.
Examples abound of this -- and I think that it can be enormously beneficial to
study companies that have operated in moral "gray areas", both in how it
helped them establish their position in the market, and how it hurt them.
(More often than not, the "damage" is a rather superficial PR dent...) Look at
Microsoft crushing Netscape, Apple playing hardball with everybody (including
their supply chain), AirBNB with Craigslist, then skirting hotel regs, Uber in
everything they do. For all these companies, from a consumer perspective, it's
hard to argue they don't provide "good value for a fair price," even though
their business practices often lead to nerd outrage here on HN.

That being said, a singular strategy of "being nice" (eg, offering good value
at a fair price) could be enough for winning customers. Often this seems to
happen if your product is so far superior that customers (or users) naturally
gravitate towards you. That is how Google got big, and seems to be the modus
operandi for social businesses (Facebook, Twitter, etc).

In fact, I think the only place where you can get away with not "being nice"
is in extremely bureaucratic customer environments where success is dictated
by the skill of your sales team -- the realm of Oracle, government
contractors, etc. Those are also very interesting to study, but for different
reasons.

------
verelo
Being nice is difficult even when you try to remind yourself every day, like i
do with a post-it that has been on my desk for a year now "Be smart, honest
and thoughtful". As a "startup founder" I do honestly try to be nice through
considering those three items as often as possible. Having said that, there
are lots of examples I can think of where I have not been nice and need to do
better.

Lets face it: Founders are often young, trying to move quickly, less
experienced managing stress, and regularly making mistakes due to all of these
things. Some of the biggest mistakes you make are under pressure, and its
often as simple as saying the wrong thing.

Personally don't know startups are any nicer than the rest of the world, but
they are certainly smaller groups of people, which means you tend to form a
tighter relationship with your co-workers / employees (like it or not). In my
experienced that is what creates the accountability to be nice, provides
people with context and understanding when something doesn't go to plan and
ultimately gives others the ability to say things like "Yeah they're nice
guys/girls, but pretty stressed out most of the time", which if you took away
the "nice guys/girls" part of that sentence when referencing the founders you
would just be left with someone who you would probably not describe as all
that nice.

Relationships can truly make up for a lot and there are benefits for everyone
involved. Advice i often give to founder is: If you can, invest in becoming as
real of friend to the people who you work with as you possibly can. It really
does pay back, especially when things do not go as you had planned.

Edit: Spelling.

------
sytelus
I think we need to look at this from economic theory point of view. Being nice
and being asshole - both have its own cost and ultimately how you should
behave depends on what gives you the most gain. The general theory that being
nice always works and has zero cost is probably an emotional view.

Sometime back it was in believed that founders ruthless and openly asshole
personality often won the business wars. Everyone wanted to be CEOs like
Gates, Grove, Bozos, Ellison and Jobs. And it actually worked for them.
Despite of them being assholes (as per various well documented anecdotes) they
attracted great talents and they pushed people to do seemingly impossible. But
surprisingly it didn't worked for vast majority of other founders. I have
often thought about this and my theory is that successful "asshole" CEOs had
accumulated lots of credit in fame and money. They would frequently be
features on covers with giant headline praising them as super humans. This is
the credit that shielded them from consequences of being an asshole. Being
always nice has a price: You might end up creating environment where mediocre
is perceived as being tolerated, transparency gets some hit, the cultural
values you want to push doesn't get as much traction as you hoped and you must
constantly find creative ways to wordsmith your statements as opposed to just
be honest with plain language. As a CEO you want to reduce this price and
shortest path to that is just say and do what you think is the right thing
regardless of how other person will feel. Obviously doing this has its own
cost. The bottom line is that you can pay the cost of being an asshole if you
have accumulated tons of media credit by getting featured on cover stories and
tons of PR behind you. But otherwise this can sink you.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
My understanding is that it's considered absolutely fine to be an asshole as
long as you keep the money coming in. PR helps, but not as much as
profitability and net worth.

If you're an asshole and the wheels come off - see e.g. Ashley Madison, and
arguably Jobs Mk 1 - you're shark meat.

~~~
itchyouch
There was an article back that furthher validated the asshole theory that
being an asshole was okay for the greater good of the team. Be nice tobyour
employees/team but mean to the enemies. The teams would rally behind the
leader attacking the antagonist. Asshole managers brought on the loss of
respect from the team and eventual demise.

------
somberi
Quoting from Hesse's Siddhartha about a merchant chiding Siddhartha for a
rice-deal he did not complete.

"That's all very nice," exclaimed Kamaswami indignantly, "but in fact, you are
a merchant after all, one ought to think! Or might you have only travelled for
your amusement?"

"Surely," Siddhartha laughed, "surely I have travelled for my amusement. For
what else? I have gotten to know people and places, I have received kindness
and trust, I have found friendship. Look, my dear, if I had been Kamaswami, I
would have travelled back, being annoyed and in a hurry, as soon as I had seen
that my purchase had been rendered impossible, and time and money would indeed
have been lost. But like this, I've had a few good days, I've learned, had
joy, I've neither harmed myself nor others by annoyance and hastiness. And if
I'll ever return there again, perhaps to buy an upcoming harvest, or for
whatever purpose it might be, friendly people will receive me in a friendly
and happy manner, and I will praise myself for not showing any hurry and
displeasure at that time."

------
boxcardavin
Nothing groundbreaking here, just reframing (yet again) how to think about
success so that founders focus hard on growth rate. Good stuff.

Sometimes I wonder if PG is targeting/excluding audiences by speaking in a
mathy way.

"If he was bad at extracting money from people, at worst this curve would be
some constant multiple less than 1 of what it might have been. But a constant
multiple of any curve is exactly the same shape."

This makes perfect sense to a native math speaker but takes some effort for
others to digest. I wonder if that is deliberate or just the way he talks.

~~~
baristaGeek
It's a way of writing that targets rational-types, or even nerds.

That's why Hacker News is so good. If you want to discuss business in a more
mundane way, there are lots of other spaces for that.

------
adamzerner
It's always been a pet peeve of mine that people depend on the medium of text
so much. My impression is that much of this information could have been better
communicated with graphs. Better yet - interactive graphs!

The only real reason why someone would stick to text that I would think of is
that they don't have the time, skills or resources to use something else.
Maybe pg doesn't _personally_ have these things, but I'm sure that there are
tons of designers who would love to help him out.

------
johnrob
I think this math also explains why equity disputes, often caused by someone
wanting 10-50% more, are a waste of effort. Again, it's case of optimizing the
weaker multiplier.

------
eddd
As much as I enjoy reading Paul Graham's work, this post is quite derivative.
This is a specific case of "karma" or general rule "what goes around come
around". Not being a douchebag is a virtue in all aspects of life. As some
might say, it is practically newtonian.

Of course for a company which has a monopoly in the market these laws don't
apply - you don't to have carry about the users nor workers because they have
no other place to go.

------
chacham15
Paul seems to be missing one key factor: that profit can be reinvested into
the company to increase growth. The converse is also true: the lack of profit
might cause the founders to slow growth because they cant pay the bills. An
example of the former was a talk at startup school IIRC where a founder of
Stack Overflow stated how they used a lot of money to scale out their servers
into different verticals (and conquer new markets before competitors).

------
fezz
It's all to easy for nice founders to turn into full blown sociopaths.
Maintaining empathy, integrity, and balance takes alot of work once things
grow (or fail).

------
FreeHugs
Isn't that just "Be user centric first, be profit centric later"?

I often see companies that once felt "nice" become "un-nice" later on. For
example, I recently tried to use AirBnB again after some years of absence. It
was horrible. In the old days, it felt like a well spirited user centric
place. Now they act like a power-drunk, arrogant and dismissive bully.

------
mathattack
_The reason startup founders can safely be nice is that making great things is
compounded, and rapacity isn 't.

So if you're a founder, here's a deal you can make with yourself that will
both make you happy and make your company successful. Tell yourself you can be
as nice as you want, so long as you work hard on your growth rate to
compensate. Most successful startups make that tradeoff unconsciously. Maybe
if you do it consciously you'll do it even better._

This captures why I prefer Silicon Valley to Wall Street. In Wall Street the
assumption is zero sum - one dollar either goes to me or you, but not both. In
Silicon Valley there is the illusion that you, your employees and your
customer can all win. Whether this is true or not, it makes for a healthier
work environment, and PG helps explain why it is true for startups. (Nobody at
Wall Street grows 5% a week)

------
drhayes9
I don't know, this feels like confirmation bias. When PG talks about founders
being "nice", nice to whom? Their VC and advisor? Sure. Customers? Sure,
hopefully.

But as we go down the line I'd argue that startups demonstrably aren't "nice":
what does Uber pay drivers again? In fact, what startup in the task economy is
"nice" to their workers?

When your startup holds meetups at bars, you're not being nice to marginalized
groups that don't do well in these settings. When you haven't examined your
hiring practices you're not being nice to the people you've "culture-fitted"
out of your organization.

I like this vision, and I like the math. I'd just hope founders cast a wider
net of niceness.

~~~
merpnderp
Isn't Uber a bad example? Their drivers have zero leverage because they
require very little training and there is a high probability they'll be
replaced in 5 years with self driving cars.

But take the IT industry. I just saw a startup offering unlimited Amazon
books, unlimited Starbucks coffee, half day Fridays, zero cost health care,
and remote work, all in an attempt to attract employees.

I'm not saying the Uber drivers should all go into IT, but there is a shortage
of business administrators, educators, and health care workers in this country
(and I'm sure lots of other fields).

~~~
mattmanser
Why is that a bad example? I think it's the perfect example of where you'd
have to be nice to pay well.

There's no competitive advantage to paying your drivers well, there's no legal
compulsion to pay drivers well, the only reason to pay your drivers well is to
be nice.

Your example is bad because the reason all those incentives are offered is
because IT workers are in demand and so market forces are forcing employers to
offer lots of benefits. Not because they're nice.

~~~
blackoil
Under isn't doing it for niceness, but to entice drivers into system ensuring
the customers quick service, and driver's a minimum lucrative compensation
during the time they are building customer base. It is same as first ride
free, to attract people into system. Once you have critical mass of driver's
and customers, they'll optimize for profit.

------
codingdave
I'm glad the math works... but to me, the reasons to be a "nice" founder are
not financial. Instead, I believe it to be good because it will guide your
decisions in ways that build a positive work environment in which creative,
intelligent people want to work. That, in turn, will support the growth that
is desired for the business.

Not-nice founders will likely build less friendly work environments, which
will build poor performing teams, and slow down growth.

Although I cannot prove this, I have to believe that the added growth from a
good working environment will at least balance, if not surpass, growth forced
out of non-optimal work environments.

------
lukego
Is Linus Torvalds a founder who was too nice by pg's critera?

He created something that people want, made it grow, etc, but he let other
people capture the value and did not focus on securing a superlinear financial
return for himself.

Just musing that "growth" we are talking about is really the growth of the
slice of the pie owned by the equity holders in the startup. Being so nice
that you let your users or employees capture the value created by the product
and don't get your superlinear return would seem to be too nice as a startup
founder.

------
JDDunn9
This formula does not take into consideration game theory. How fast you grow
also depends on how fast your competitors are growing. Being #1 in an
industry, ends up being a massive difference from being #2.

------
ngoel36
_But the foundation of convincing investors is to seem formidable, and since
this isn 't a word most people use in conversation much, I should explain what
it means. A formidable person is one who seems like they'll get what they
want, regardless of whatever obstacles are in the way. Formidable is close to
confident, except that someone could be confident and mistaken. Formidable is
roughly justifiably confident._

Does Formidable = Nice?

[http://paulgraham.com/convince.html](http://paulgraham.com/convince.html)

------
brudgers
Even if PG is wrong about the effects of behavior, every startup is still
likely to fail. So being mean just means odds are a mean person is likey to
wind up failing _and_ an asshole.

------
augustl
Meta: Does anyone know more about the "read more" you get on mobile?

[http://imgur.com/ULhi9O2](http://imgur.com/ULhi9O2)

It seems to be JavaScript only so the text is all there ready and downloaded,
and hidden with JavaScript.

Is it a page load time thing? Has testing shown that a button like this causes
people to be more likely to read the article om mobile? Or something else?

------
bambang150
Yup, we have to motivated to change the world if it is. Otherwise when we all
think about the money, the driver of excellence will become less and less.
Same thing happened on me when I am driven to make something to get money. I
don't want money so I quit. Now I am creating something that people want, not
just creating money

------
wkcamp
If someone could answer, when a startup starts to exponentially gain traffic
(and the server costs start going up), how does the startup maintain their
servers and purchase new instances (say the startup is running EC2 ones)? Will
the startup start taking on debt or will it look for funding or both?

------
treve
It's safe to be nice if your start-up has an exponential growth rate. How many
start-ups have an exponential growth rate?

Considering that most start-ups are actually not successful, based on his
logic it's better to not be nice.

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justbrowsing01
Human nature is selfish by default.

If you want to get it right, before a startup gets successful, predetermine a
fixed % of free equity pool to be shared amongst all employees,and include
that as a condition when fund raising.

~~~
tinbad
Isn't that how most start already? Until every investor and advisor you meet
will tell you to stop being stupid and reverse that.

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help_everyone
I suppose the leadership team at Uber would be the outlier (at least the media
would have us believe)? But then again, perhaps most of them aren't "founders"
but hired guns.

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GCA10
It's a fascinating essay, but being "nice" isn't exactly the same as under-
pricing your product early on to gain traction. In the enterprise space, being
cheap may not win you much love at all. Being faster/better/easier is the key.

Even early customers will pay more if you've got a genuinely better solution
to their problem. Nice may translate into A+ customer service or features. But
saying "I'm cheaper" is often seen as the hallmark of the weaker product,
masking later costs and inefficiencies down the road.

------
abbasmehdi
"to Randall Bennett for being such a nice guy."

Not surprised. The guy is a really that nice.

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minimaxir
The logic seems chicken-and-egg to me.

> _because so long as he built something good enough to spread by word of
> mouth, he 'd have a hyperlinear growth curve._

Startups are not a meritocracy. The marketplace is too crowded, so any startup
founder who has an edge will take it. How do you get word of mouth? By "growth
hacking" and leveraging privileged personal connections, both of which I've
seen happen time and time again from even YC companies.

~~~
nostrademons
> The marketplace is too crowded, so any startup founder who has an edge will
> take it.

That also seems like a good reason to be nice. If you are nice to someone, it
puts both you and that person ahead; in a crowded market, that adds up to
being the leader of the pack. If you are nasty to someone, it puts both you
and your target behind (there is an opportunity cost to being nasty; you're
not spending that time being nice). You'll take your target down, but you'll
also end up at a disadvantage relative to someone who just stayed out of it.

If you've ever played multiplayer strategy games like FFA Starcraft or Civ 5,
you'll notice that the optimal strategy is usually to sit back, turtle up, and
work on your infrastructure while everybody else kills each other off. Then
when you have an overwhelming force, crush everyone who's left. Players who
come out of the gate aggressive usually get taken out or weakened enough that
one of the turtles can finish them off, even if they are very skilled.

~~~
minimaxir
> _You 'll take your target down, but you'll also end up at a disadvantage
> relative to someone who just stayed out of it._

This is touching more on game theory and behavioral economics. And we know how
the Prisoner's Dilemma is solved. :P

~~~
nostrademons
The iterated prisoner's dilemma's optimal solution is tit-for-tat, which is a
"nice" strategy in that it never defects first. In game-theory tournaments
where bots play off an iterated prisoner's dilemma against multiple opponents,
the "naughty" strategies get crushed because they eventually encounter a
provocable strategy and get caught in a defect loop, running themselves into
the ground while the "nice" strategies dominated. This is the situation
closest to the startup ecosystem. See eg. _The Evolution of Cooperation_ :

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evolution_of_Cooperation#A...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evolution_of_Cooperation#Axelrod.27s_tournaments)

------
martin1975
Bezos is nice...to himself.

------
andyl
As an venture investor, I would prefer my startup CEO's to be nice. Easier to
manipulate nice.

As an entrepreneur, I've seen many situations where investors dump the
founder, all nice and reasonable while they stick the knife.

    
    
        There's room at the top they're telling you still
        But first you must learn how to smile as you kill
        If you want to be like the folks on the hill
        - Working Class Hero, John Lennon
    

In my experience, most people are nice. But be on guard, and remember that
execution and results trump everything.

~~~
foobar2020
_> As an venture investor, I would prefer my startup CEO's to be nice. Easier
to manipulate nice._

I doubt it. You don't think you are the only person manipulating such a CEO,
do you?

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paulhauggis
Nice people give up more equity than they should and trust the people with the
money.

If you really want personal success, you need to show strength, not be 'nice'.
Otherwise, the only person you will be making successful are the venture
capitalists.

I've seen this time and time again: many venture capitalists feel that new
founders haven't paid their 'dues' and don't deserve to have a share larger
than essentially an employee.

There should be statistics on YC companies: What percentage of founders
actually end up making a significant amount of any buyout.

I'm guessing it's a very small percentage...

------
sjg007
Just be nice in general as a human.

------
roneesh
Leave it to PG to dismantle the myth of founder as psychopath with clear,
succinct reasoning and basic math.

