5 ms·

German entrepreneurs celebrating their mistakes

58 points by bogle 9y ago

mtmail 9y ago
> at the core of a worldwide movement - with an unprintable name that loosely correlates with "Failure Nights" The name is FuckUp Nights if anybody is wondering
Tepix 9y ago
Yes, Fuck Up Nights are not specific to Berlin or Germany, are they?
- kkleindev 9y ago
  Their website claims that they're in 80 countries. Iirc it started in Mexico.
- coolg54321 9y ago
  I am not german but I have observed a general trend with british media/BBC is they amplify anything that devalues germany/germans in general, not sure why.
- teddythetwig 9y ago
  We've done them before in Amsterdam.
lnsru 9y ago
One man's trash is another man's treasure. I wish I knew more earlier about possible startup failure modes. Sadly only great successes are well communicated. Nobody writes about failure when partner got cold feet or development effort was greatly underestimated or product/market fit was miserable without room for pivoting.
- lkrubner 9y ago
  This was talked about on Hacker News yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16561764 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16561764 And the book: How to Destroy a Tech Startup in 3 Easy Steps https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/0998997617/ https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/09...
- adventured 9y ago
  Ben Horowitz wrote a decent book about the endless difficulties of start-ups and business in general [1]. It's not so much strictly failure-learn focused (eg learning from the results of a failed start-up), as it is challenge-overcome focused (eg working your way through the never ending beating that is doing a start-up). [1] https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0062273205/ https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0...
antirez 9y ago
Yet I think that while we europeans can learn a great deal of lessons from US entrepreneurs, the "failing is ok" is one of the wrong ones, together with the extreme optimism. In Europe there is a tradition of small businesses that succeeded because of wise moves and organic slow growing. Also if failing becomes less of a problem I've the feeling that many startups may start with ideas that are ways too risky. For sure less optimism and being failure-adverse will make us having less unicorns than the United States. However if you think it in different terms, this will also lead to having less ruined companies and bad moments for the people working there, because for every unicorn there are a huge number of companies failing, and it is not fun when it happens. After all the need for unicorns is because of investors, while people can be ok with small or medium sized companies that make them a good few million dollars to have happy lives.
- m_fayer 9y ago
  The EU needs all of the above. I value its capacity for producing sane sustainable companies. But it also needs a healthy dose of the SV ethos. Yeah, that ethos is nuts, high risk and high reward, can chew people up. But it also produces rapid innovative change, rewrites the rules, and produces incredible cultural/intellectual/financial wealth. Europe needs its own version of this, or it will be perpetually playing by American/SV rules. And in a few years, Chinese rules.
  - gerikson 9y ago
    Do you think Chinese companies work under SV rules?
    - m_fayer 9y ago
      There's a new batch of SVish companies coming from China. SVish in the sense that they move fast, spend large amounts of investor money, worry about profitability/sustainability/legality later, and leverage unproven technologies and business models. So in that sense, I think so yes. In the sense that some Chinese VCs are more motivated by the Communist party's strategic concerns than by profits or idealism, and likewise for some of the resulting startups, in that sense the answer is no.
throwaway2016a 9y ago
I prefer the term "embrace"... turning it into "celebration" risks making failure the goal. It is absolutely critical that people be allowed to fail. If people can't fail they won't take risk, and risk is where real innovation happens. But we should be careful not to turn failure into the new success. Respect people who took a chance and failed. Learn from them. Embrace them. But I'd stop short at celebrating them. Save the celebration for next time (or 5th time) when you finally succeed and accomplish something amazing.
afarrell 9y ago
During SXSW 2016, The Irish (specifically IDA Ireland) held an Irish Wake for Dead Startups. It was to hear people talk about failure and the lessons learned thereby.
- s_dev 9y ago
  https://thenextweb.com/insider/2016/03/15/irish-startup-wake/ https://thenextweb.com/insider/2016/03/15/irish-startup-wake... I thought it was a clever idea as well. Some of the Tech Ireland things can be hit and miss but I thought it was good.
drpgq 9y ago
As Canadian who spends a fair amount of time in Germany, I've always found German bankruptcy laws somewhat horrific. Although to be fair the idiots I've known that went bankrupt personally in Canada wouldn't have been able to do the same things in Germany they did in Canada.
- gsnedders 9y ago
  Can you give an example of what you find horrific?
BjoernKW 9y ago
Since when has the BBC become squeamish about "unprintable" (which itself is a strange choice of word on the web, by a non-print publisher like the BBC no less) words like 'fuck'? It's not like the haven't been using it before: https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=fuck https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=fuck
NumberCruncher 9y ago
German startups are like American beer.
- mmjaa 9y ago
  Flat as hell, mostly tasteless, and bound to leave you feeling like you did something really, really wrong last night?

58 points by bogle 9y ago

> at the core of a worldwide movement - with an unprintable name that loosely correlates with "Failure Nights" The name is FuckUp Nights if anybody is wondering

Tepix 9y ago

Yes, Fuck Up Nights are not specific to Berlin or Germany, are they?

kkleindev 9y ago
Their website claims that they're in 80 countries. Iirc it started in Mexico.
coolg54321 9y ago
I am not german but I have observed a general trend with british media/BBC is they amplify anything that devalues germany/germans in general, not sure why.
teddythetwig 9y ago
We've done them before in Amsterdam.

lnsru 9y ago

One man's trash is another man's treasure. I wish I knew more earlier about possible startup failure modes. Sadly only great successes are well communicated. Nobody writes about failure when partner got cold feet or development effort was greatly underestimated or product/market fit was miserable without room for pivoting.

lkrubner 9y ago
This was talked about on Hacker News yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16561764 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16561764 And the book: How to Destroy a Tech Startup in 3 Easy Steps https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/0998997617/ https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/09...
adventured 9y ago
Ben Horowitz wrote a decent book about the endless difficulties of start-ups and business in general [1]. It's not so much strictly failure-learn focused (eg learning from the results of a failed start-up), as it is challenge-overcome focused (eg working your way through the never ending beating that is doing a start-up). [1] https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0062273205/ https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0...

antirez 9y ago

Yet I think that while we europeans can learn a great deal of lessons from US entrepreneurs, the "failing is ok" is one of the wrong ones, together with the extreme optimism. In Europe there is a tradition of small businesses that succeeded because of wise moves and organic slow growing. Also if failing becomes less of a problem I've the feeling that many startups may start with ideas that are ways too risky. For sure less optimism and being failure-adverse will make us having less unicorns than the United States. However if you think it in different terms, this will also lead to having less ruined companies and bad moments for the people working there, because for every unicorn there are a huge number of companies failing, and it is not fun when it happens. After all the need for unicorns is because of investors, while people can be ok with small or medium sized companies that make them a good few million dollars to have happy lives.

m_fayer 9y ago
The EU needs all of the above. I value its capacity for producing sane sustainable companies. But it also needs a healthy dose of the SV ethos. Yeah, that ethos is nuts, high risk and high reward, can chew people up. But it also produces rapid innovative change, rewrites the rules, and produces incredible cultural/intellectual/financial wealth. Europe needs its own version of this, or it will be perpetually playing by American/SV rules. And in a few years, Chinese rules.
- gerikson 9y ago
  Do you think Chinese companies work under SV rules?
  - m_fayer 9y ago
    There's a new batch of SVish companies coming from China. SVish in the sense that they move fast, spend large amounts of investor money, worry about profitability/sustainability/legality later, and leverage unproven technologies and business models. So in that sense, I think so yes. In the sense that some Chinese VCs are more motivated by the Communist party's strategic concerns than by profits or idealism, and likewise for some of the resulting startups, in that sense the answer is no.

throwaway2016a 9y ago

I prefer the term "embrace"... turning it into "celebration" risks making failure the goal. It is absolutely critical that people be allowed to fail. If people can't fail they won't take risk, and risk is where real innovation happens. But we should be careful not to turn failure into the new success. Respect people who took a chance and failed. Learn from them. Embrace them. But I'd stop short at celebrating them. Save the celebration for next time (or 5th time) when you finally succeed and accomplish something amazing.

afarrell 9y ago

During SXSW 2016, The Irish (specifically IDA Ireland) held an Irish Wake for Dead Startups. It was to hear people talk about failure and the lessons learned thereby.

s_dev 9y ago
https://thenextweb.com/insider/2016/03/15/irish-startup-wake/ https://thenextweb.com/insider/2016/03/15/irish-startup-wake... I thought it was a clever idea as well. Some of the Tech Ireland things can be hit and miss but I thought it was good.

drpgq 9y ago

As Canadian who spends a fair amount of time in Germany, I've always found German bankruptcy laws somewhat horrific. Although to be fair the idiots I've known that went bankrupt personally in Canada wouldn't have been able to do the same things in Germany they did in Canada.

gsnedders 9y ago
Can you give an example of what you find horrific?

BjoernKW 9y ago

Since when has the BBC become squeamish about "unprintable" (which itself is a strange choice of word on the web, by a non-print publisher like the BBC no less) words like 'fuck'? It's not like the haven't been using it before: https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=fuck https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=fuck

NumberCruncher 9y ago

German startups are like American beer.

mmjaa 9y ago
Flat as hell, mostly tasteless, and bound to leave you feeling like you did something really, really wrong last night?