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Yeah the cognitive dissonance of startup advice can sometimes be jarring. In this case though I think you could say that fail fast refers to iterating on a prod

by epberry 10y ago

Yeah the cognitive dissonance of startup advice can sometimes be jarring. In this case though I think you could say that fail fast refers to iterating on a product and changing it until people love it. Then the growth starts. The poster child for not doing this in my mind is Adora Cheung. I remember watching her "growth at all costs" lecture from Startup School shortly after Homejoy shut down and thinking well, there you have it folks. Seems they suffered from exactly the leaky bucket problem Sam talks about here. Two caveats: 1) I'm sure there are many other examples of leaky bucket companies, Homejoy just came to mind first 2) I still think Adora is brilliant and am really excited about her new cities project.

codingdave 10y ago
Part of the reason there is so much dissonance is the conflicting goals -- startup founders want THEIR product to succeed. VCs just need SOME products to succeed. So the advice that is tossed to cohorts of founders is designed to help some succeed, not to ensure the personal success of each individual founder.
- relyio 10y ago
  Distinct actors and players have interests that are sometimes aligned or disjointed, but often contradictory. Though it may sound obvious, it clearly has not been fully internalized by plenty of folks. And when it has, few dare to draw the necessary conclusions that follow from it: always take everything you are told with a massive grain of salt. To be clear, I am not arguing that you should be a complete cynic, only that you ought to recognize that there can be a healthy dose of it. In particular when the stakes are high. Listen, but do not take everything at face value. I am in an environment that has a particularly high density of genuinely enthusiastic, but naive, people; I am inclined to think that it is a mindset that's also predominant in other circles, besides University campuses. Indeed, there seem to be quantities of people who are looking for silver-bullet secret sauces that will let them reach Steve Jobs status. Perhaps that's precisely because of the various personality cults that our industry subscribes to. I can't know for sure. And while I am sure there are some good anecdotes showing the contrary, it seems that, all in all, this is overall hurtful both to innovation and to the ones that try to accelerate it. If you are going to be captain of a ship, you better not embrace any gust of wind that comes your way. Otherwise, you are more drifting away than going anywhere. And like Paris, you would rather be tossed by the waves than sink.

by epberry 10y ago

codingdave 10y ago

Part of the reason there is so much dissonance is the conflicting goals -- startup founders want THEIR product to succeed. VCs just need SOME products to succeed. So the advice that is tossed to cohorts of founders is designed to help some succeed, not to ensure the personal success of each individual founder.

relyio 10y ago
Distinct actors and players have interests that are sometimes aligned or disjointed, but often contradictory. Though it may sound obvious, it clearly has not been fully internalized by plenty of folks. And when it has, few dare to draw the necessary conclusions that follow from it: always take everything you are told with a massive grain of salt. To be clear, I am not arguing that you should be a complete cynic, only that you ought to recognize that there can be a healthy dose of it. In particular when the stakes are high. Listen, but do not take everything at face value. I am in an environment that has a particularly high density of genuinely enthusiastic, but naive, people; I am inclined to think that it is a mindset that's also predominant in other circles, besides University campuses. Indeed, there seem to be quantities of people who are looking for silver-bullet secret sauces that will let them reach Steve Jobs status. Perhaps that's precisely because of the various personality cults that our industry subscribes to. I can't know for sure. And while I am sure there are some good anecdotes showing the contrary, it seems that, all in all, this is overall hurtful both to innovation and to the ones that try to accelerate it. If you are going to be captain of a ship, you better not embrace any gust of wind that comes your way. Otherwise, you are more drifting away than going anywhere. And like Paris, you would rather be tossed by the waves than sink.