

Beyond Oblivion: How a Promising Music Startup Imploded - masonhensley
http://evolver.fm/2012/03/02/beyond-oblivion-how-a-promising-music-startup-imploded/

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rckclmbr
So, I was a (low-ranking) employee at Beyond Oblivion. This is the first I've
heard about most of those numbers and many of the extravagances. We built a
killer product, that was ready for prime time, but unfortunately didn't end up
selling to anyone. That's all I really knew -- we had a product, we ran out of
money. It wasn't until after that we heard about all the crazy stuff that was
going on. I still try to stay out of it, because it doesn't really matter
anymore, but it's still interesting reading articles like this.

I read things like this all the time, but it's a completely different thing
when it's actually you (or relating so closely to you). I put a lot of time
and effort into the product, and my piece was something I was personally
really proud of. It's really unfortunately to see it fail in such a big way. I
still debate putting my involvement on my resume, even though its demise had
nothing to do with me. I interviewed at a Y-Combinator company I was really
interested in, and didn't get the job... I still wonder if that had anything
to do with it. Anyway, nothing to say or learn from the experience really,
just thought I'd say that.

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ootachi
Why would you debate putting it on your CV? It'd look a lot worse to look like
you were out of work for that time.

Besides, a startup that wouldn't hire you because you worked as an engineer at
a failed startup would be insane. I'd be more afraid to hire engineers from
startups that did succeed, because I doubt they'd be as motivated the second
time around after the big windfall.

~~~
rckclmbr
> Why would you debate putting it on your CV? It'd look a lot worse to look
> like you were out of work for that time

Yea, that's why I haven't removed it yet. But the thought crosses my mind all
the time.

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ww520
$500,000 for branding the name BOINC and everyone outside hate it. That
marketing firm has done a heck of sales job.

Burned through $20 million of its $33.2 million in the final ten months, less
than $1 million of which was paid to employees. I wonder what's the
justification for such spending ratio.

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Eliezer
This article is oddly cheering. I wouldn't have thought it would take _that_
much incompetence, or even close to it, to fail.

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ricardobeat
> Burned through $20 million of its $33.2 million in the final ten months,
> less than $1 million of which was paid to employees.

At 90 employees, that averages U$1.111,11 / head. How is that possible?

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Danieru
I mean this as advice: all english speaking countries use the dot for the
decimal place(
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_mark#Countries_using_A...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_mark#Countries_using_Arabic_numerals_with_decimal_point)
)

As such it is rather confusing for native english speakers when commas and
dots are swapped. Which makes sense since it is essentially like speaking a
different 言語 halfway through your sentence.

~~~
ricardobeat
Oops. I actually thought I was using the opposite of what I learned... usually
I just skip the thousands separators. I te entendo completely.

Interestingly, your sentence is perfectly understandable because of context,
doesn't the same happen with the swapped marks?

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JumpCrisscross
Don't worry, I am Swiss and do 1 000,00 or, when I feel really creative,
1'000,000. Try being a trader where THAT slips into your compliance emails
every so often :).

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mirsadm
My first job out of university was for a failed start up. When I joined it was
fantastic. There were only a handful employees and the company was making good
profit. Then somebody decided to expand as quickly as possible. They hired a
new CEO that just didnt understand small businesses. She came from a massive
company and her first reaction was to hire insane amounts of people (mostly
middle level management) from her old job.

They never managed to score another contract and ran out of money within a
year. It was shameful how much money these guys grabbed for themselves and
drove the company into the ground.

It seems to me that certain people think that they can pay themselves whatever
they want once they get investment money. Its like free money.

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pbreit
Nothing in that article makes me think "promising" was ever an accurate
description for Beyond Oblivion. The idea itself sounds completely horrendous
from every angle.

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moe
_The idea itself sounds completely horrendous from every angle._

The business model for pretty much _every_ music-related startup sounds
horrendous from every angle. Mostly due to the ridiculous fees and constraints
imposed by the labels and partly due to relatively high infrastructure costs.

Most of the products in the space operate on the premise of reaching "exit
velocity" as fast as they can. The goal is to either get bought by an
established player, or to make ends meet on the razor things margins by the
virtue of mass market scale (which in turn gives you leverage to negotiate
slightly less ridiculous deals with the labels. _slightly_.).

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majani
This sounds like the story of a non technical founder. In my experience they
are the ones most susceptible to faffing around with branding nonsense in a
desperate attempt to contribute something meaningful to the startup

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drivebyacct2
Am I crazy for thinking these sorts of things are absurd and in 10 years we'll
look back and wonder what the hell we were thinking?

I want music. I want a phone. I want cell phone service. I don't want Verizon
selling me a phone. I don't want them selling me music. Or ringtones. I want
them to provide me with quality, economical cell phone service. These multi-
tier one-off annoying-to-negotiate media deals boggle my mind. It's the reason
that despite having Amazon Prime, Netflix and more, I still can't watch half
of what I want to, let alone where I want, when I want (actually, I'm on
Linux, so I'm screwed either way).

It just reeks of absurdity and politics. Maybe I'm just naive.

~~~
ilamont
Verizon and the other carriers/telcos/broadband providers are desperate to
avoid becoming dumb pipes or a simple commodity. They lose pricing power,
brand power, control, and profit. In that sense, it's easy to understand why
they are doing this.

Unfortunately, by Verizon (and lots of other players with their own interests)
inserting themselves into all of these deals and processes and platforms, it
creates an absurd burden on consumers who just want to watch the damn
movie/transfer media files between devices/get a phone or computer that's not
preloaded with crap.

It's no wonder that consumers gravitate toward companies that minimize these
pain points (Apple, Spotify) or continue to download pirated media content.

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chris123
Amazing story. Truth really is stranger than fiction.

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juliennakache
It sounds like a fake story to me... Like a story made up for entertaining
readers. I mean it seriously... Just to much BS to be true :)

