

   Super Angel Ron Conway To Would-Be Startups: Don't Quit Your Day Jobs - vascoos01
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/10/super-angel-ron-conway-to-would-be-startups-don-t-quit-your-day-jobs

======
wheels
Read more carefully what he says, and I agree 100%:

Keep working _until_ you've saved enough money to live for a year. If you've
got a decent IT salary and really learn to tighten your belt, you can do that
in 6 months.

    
    
      - Quit driving and use public transit.
      - Never buy anything but generic stuff.  Shop at Aldi or somewhere that only sells cheap stuff.
      - Get a roommate.
      - Eat at home.
      - Pack your lunch.
      - One beer at the bar instead of three.
      - No new toys.  No, you don't need an iPhone.
      - No impulse purchases.  If you didn't go out to get it, you don't buy it.
      - No hotels.  Need to travel to pitch?  Find a friend's couch.
    

Once you've got that down, it's amazing how far you can go on a little bit of
cash and how fast you can save it up if you need to. Learning to keep an eye
on your cash also pays dividends on managing the burn-rate in your company.

~~~
MicahWedemeyer
Is a year really long enough to grow a business to the point where it can
support you? I think a lot of startup types don't realize that sometimes the
hockey stick is a little less vertical than you planned for, and there may be
_nothing_ you can do to speed it up.

It's disheartening to have a business that's growing, but not fast enough to
stop you from hitting the brick wall one year out where you're out of money.

~~~
wheels
I've not been there yet, but I'm pretty sure the answer is, "It depends."

I think you also have to have some real idea for how you're going to make
money on the stuff. Even if you don't write a real business plan, sitting down
and saying, "Our costs will be about this much. We'll make this much per user.
So, we'll need to have this many users in a year of it's a no-go." -- doing
that can give you an idea of if your ideas sound really nutty or not.

The brick wall is an important construct; it's an important idea to have there
to keep you scared of what happens when the cash runs out ... but in reality,
if you've got a stupidly low burn rate, you just do one week of consulting and
then live for the next two months off of that.

------
jcromartie
I love how there are both "a recession is a great time to join a startup" and
"it's a recession, don't quit your day job" stories on the front page at the
same time.

I know the advice isn't mutually exclusive; but that was a confusing front
page the first time I saw it.

------
steveplace
But you don't understand. I don't _like_ my dayjob.

------
MicahWedemeyer
The worst case scenario for a startup entrepreneur is failing out and having
to get another day job. Skilled software engineers are still in high demand,
and a recession will not change that. Therefore, the safety net (corporate
America) is still there for anyone who quits.

However, if you like your current day job, it might not be a bad idea to hold
on to it for a while.

------
liuliu
I think the "cut cost" idea is correct. Startups who survived from series A
fund should be really careful about its cash flow statement. Especially in the
economic winter, who can last longer who will be able to see the spring
sunrise.

------
prakash
Now would be a good time to apply to YC, or start startups in the
FogCreek/37Signals way.

~~~
maxklein
prakash, all due respect, but are those really the companies you want to
quote? FogCreek and 37Signals are not the best or most profitable companies
making money off these intranet, and they are not a 'way' of starting
companies. They are just the loudest. Many, many companies started off like
those two and are now pretty (Symantec, ZoneAlarm, Winzip). Those are the real
success stories, not people who make their money by giving talks on how to
make money.

~~~
jonny_noog
I think you're missing one point that I get from 37Signals, which is the "be
happy baking good bread" angle that DHH has espoused on at least one occasion
I can remember. What he means by this is that not everyone feels like they
have to crush Google to call themselves a success. Some people would be happy
to be doing a (likely self determined) job they enjoy that provides what they
need to maintain their chosen lifestyle. There's a lot of niches out there
waiting to be found.

Granted, not everyone is happy just to "bake good bread" and that's cool, I'll
be the first to cheer you on as you enter the area with
Google/MS/Symantec/Digg/Facebook/whoever but on the flip side, don't assume
that no one is.

This may be a hard concept for a lot of people to grok in a world addicted to
"more" and possibly an unrealistic concept to entertain if you have a big VC
expecting X return on their investment in Y amount of time.

But to write off companies that obviously have their own idea of how to
proceed and seem to be doing just fine from their point of view is overly
myopic on your part.

~~~
maxklein
You don't get my point. There are many many successful software companies that
start off as small shareware companies and grow to make lots of money and have
20 employees. I respect those companies. 37signals used to be that way, but
right now they make their money from telling people how to make money. They
are no longer a product company, they are a talking company.

I am against VC and against big growth, but I am also against continuously
boasting about how good you are, as 37signals seems to constantly be doing.

I believe in product companies - they let the quality of their product speak.
37signals product is stagnant and really not that great.

~~~
jonny_noog
Actually I did get your point (although you have made it a bit clearer re: you
view on big growth, which I didn't get before), I just don't agree with you
re: these companies in particular. I have to say I've gotten some good
information from 37Signals' ideas. I don't follow their advice like an
unquestioning lemming, I just take what works for me and leave it at that.

I can see how 37Signals' marketing might rub some people the wrong way,
there's a fine line between productive self promotion and "boasting", a line
that I think many people who are good at the former may cross from time to
time (hasn't everyone felt like smashing DHH square in that pretty boy face of
his at one time or another? :P). But however you feel about their approach,
you can't deny that they have created a pretty good lifestyle supporting
business for themselves and this should be commended IMO.

I use Backpack almost every day and it serves my particular needs very well.
So I also don't agree with you that their products are not that great. I think
Backpack is awesome, it does what I need it to do and doesn't get in my way.
Their products are simple and straight forward for sure, but that's what I
like.

I just think it just sounds like you're throwing the baby out with the
bathwater a bit here. But each to their own I guess.

~~~
nostrademons
His point was that there're many _other_ companies that started out as simple
shareware product companies and got much more successful than 37signals. He
listed Symantec, ZoneAlarm, and Winzip, to which I'd add Winamp, Microsoft,
and Aladdin. These were not huge bet-the-farm VC successes like Google or
Netscape. They grew slowly & organically by building (or buying, in
Microsoft's case) good products for large markets. And there results have been
much more impressive than FogCreek or 37signals.

~~~
jonny_noog
All I'm saying is don't assume that all people/businesses have the same goals,
and don't assume that everyone has the same definition of success.

