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I can't shake the huckster vibe I get from the "The Lean Startup movement" that Eric Ries so often reminds people he started. He seems determined to profit (th

by staunch 15y ago

I can't shake the huckster vibe I get from the "The Lean Startup movement" that Eric Ries so often reminds people he started. He seems determined to profit (through this book and his conference) by rebranding some principles that have been popular in the valley for a long time. I can't think of anyone I respect on entrepreneurship that doesn't practice it themselves. Writing books and doing conferences doesn't count in my book. Sorry, I think I have a bit off an allergic reaction to things that feel even vaguely like Tony Robbins.

rmason 15y ago
You're welcome to your opinion but Eric has helped a lot of people like me that he has never even met. Reading the four steps to the epiphany helped me knit together what I'd learned and helped me understand why my last startup didn't succeed. But it was the lean startup movement (along with Ash Maurya's book) that gave me a game plan to go forward. As a result of the lean startup movement fewer startups will fail and that's a pretty fine legacy.
- eries 15y ago
  Thanks for the kind words. It takes courage to admit that we don't know everything. (For the record, I certainly don't). I look forward to learning from you, when you're ready to share your story.
mechanical_fish 15y ago
I can't think of anyone I respect on entrepreneurship that doesn't practice it themselves. Me neither, but perhaps you were asleep during the part of the program where Eric Ries: A) worked at at least one startup that exploded on impact with the market in spectacular fashion, B) learned some lessons from that, C) co-founded IMVU and made a bunch of money? Ries may have faults, but a complete lack of practice does not appear to be among them. As for your allergy to salesmanship: Reticence sells nothing. I wish Ries luck in leveraging the awesome psychological powers of branding and the publishing hype cycle to get his ideas in front of more people. I know I've lost years of my time to management who had apparently never heard of these ideas.
- staunch 15y ago
  IIRC he was at IMVU for only the first few years. Mostly before the company grew. Regardless I don't see how that single historical piece of entrepreneurial experience translates into a three item list. I don't think it's his relative lack of experience that I have a problem with so much as the conscious effort he's making to become a "guru" that sells picks to the miners.
  - patio11 15y ago
    For what it's worth: I don't live in Silicon Valley. My routine dinner company does not include investors or people working on startups. Eric Ries has over the last several years demonstrated his credibility to me on his blog by teaching me things which, on multiple occasions, I was able to implement to dramatic effect in my own business. Want a concrete example? He had a post, years ago, on why A/B testing needs to be a one-liner or you will never do it. That resonated with me, strongly, and that became the design brief for A/Bingo. I prioritized that feature over pretty much everything else in my implementation, and it is a major part of the reason why it works for me. Some years later I'm considered somewhat of an authority on the subject (funny how that works), and when I go in to companies to work with them on A/B testing, the best single process improvement we get -- and we get it virtually without fail -- is going from "A/B testing takes a bunch of work with logging into a product from a large multinational advertising agency, filling out a few forms, and copy/pasting up the wazoo -- and as a consequence we did three A/B tests a year ago and haven't done anything since" to "our engineers put in the A/B tests themselves automatically because it is easier than not doing it." By the way, as it regards picks and miners: it takes a special kind of mind to see publishing a book as a route to fame and fortune on the backs of the little guy if one is also capable of, say, consulting on A/B testing.
    - staunch 15y ago
      Some people say Tim Ferris helps them in similar ways. Little tips that push you into doing things you already knew you should doing. They probably both offer some value by packaging existing ideas in more palatable ways. If you don't mind the motivations and style (like I do) you can probably extract some benefit. It's just not for me. Reply to your edit: You must not be aware of how much money conferences can make to not see the profit motive there. Even moderately successful tech conferences can generate millions per year. Far better than a consulting business. It takes time to build up to that of course. Publishing a book is Conference Building 101.
jayzee 15y ago
Isn't good entrepreneurship all about profiting from doing good? I don't see anything wrong with that. Besides Eric and Steve have been expounding on this idea for a while and while it now seems like second-nature, it wasn't obvious back when. I think that it is remarkable what they have done. Encapsulating that in a book so that people who are not in SV but are instead in Beijing and Bangalore can read and apply can only be a good thing.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
- staunch 15y ago
  Just call me an asshole, man. No need to hide behind the meaningless "hipster" label.
davidw 15y ago
Business books can be kind fun to read, but I have the same doubt. I think there are a couple metrics one can use to judge a bit more concretely: * How compressible is it? In other words, how succinctly can the main ideas be summed up? Even some quite interesting books such as The Innovator's Dilemma, are fairly easy to sum up in a few pages. This is because there is one core idea and a lot of stories, statistics, and other extra supporting material. * How much actionable advice is there? For instance, one thing I liked a lot about Rob Walling's "Start Small, Stay Small" is that he comes out and suggests some price numbers for online products, rather than a wishy-washy "figure out what your market will pay" or something equally non-committal. As another example, "do less" is sort of a handwavy guideline that is harder to do anything with, although we do live by it at http://73primenumbers.com/ http://73primenumbers.com/ .
- nateberkopec 15y ago
  Speaking of self-promotion... EDIT: Just fell out of my chair laughing, nevermind.
stevenp 15y ago
Speaking as someone who worked closely with Eric at IMVU in those early days, his message is simple but it's not always obvious to the people who start companies. How many times have you heard about entrepreneurs that think they have some grand vision for something that they're certain will change the world, so they go away and spend tons of VC money building something, and then it fails because no one actually wants it? It happens a LOT. Vision clouds judgment VERY often. Eric taught me that ego gets in the way of finding out what will actually work as a viable business, and that I should question all of my assumptions (and those of the people working around me) about what's right and what's not. The metrics speak for themselves. It doesn't matter how good I think my landing page headline is -- the market will validate that through A/B testing. The trick to figuring out what will be successful is first realizing that your idea is only a hypothesis and has no merit until you validate it with customers. Eric's and the IMVU team's willingness to let go of assumptions and try different things is the reason why IMVU today isn't a plugin that runs on top of AIM. Even though that was the original idea, it became clear really quickly that it wasn't going to work. Where many entrepreneurs would cling to an unworkable idea until the company burns through all its capital, the team decided that the idea was a failure and moved on to build something that has turned into a business that now makes more than $50mm per year. I can totally understand the uncomfortable reaction you have, but that's kind of the point. When someone comes around and says "Hey, maybe the way that the establishment thinks things should be done is actually completely wrong," some people are excited and intrigued by the possibilities, and some have an visceral, negative response. Tim Ferriss and Dr. Atkins have both sold a ton of books exploring ideas that sound new and "out there". I think it's unfair to classify Eric as someone who only has a reputation for "writing books and doing conferences". The "Lean Startup movement" is about keeping companies alive through the perils of infancy that usually lead to early destruction. Ask anyone who worked with Eric at IMVU and they will tell you that his passion for experimentation and validation of ideas, and his framework for building a scalable continuous deployment shop are still very much alive even after his departure. If you want to know more about the culture at IMVU, I'd be happy to comment on it.
- davidw 15y ago
  > When someone comes around and says "Hey, maybe the way that the establishment thinks things should be done is actually completely wrong," some people are excited and intrigued by the possibilities, and some have an visceral, negative response. He (staunch) is not 'scared of the new ideas' - quite the contrary, he says they're pretty standard for anyone with a clue. Perhaps the point of this book, if you read all the way down, where he talks about why he went the traditional publishing route, is that it's to spread his message to people outside sites like this, to people who are not so attuned to the latest goings on in the world of startups. Which, paradoxically, might mean that it's not a good buy for most of us in that perhaps he's just repeating stuff we've already read?

by staunch 15y ago

rmason 15y ago

You're welcome to your opinion but Eric has helped a lot of people like me that he has never even met. Reading the four steps to the epiphany helped me knit together what I'd learned and helped me understand why my last startup didn't succeed. But it was the lean startup movement (along with Ash Maurya's book) that gave me a game plan to go forward. As a result of the lean startup movement fewer startups will fail and that's a pretty fine legacy.

eries 15y ago
Thanks for the kind words. It takes courage to admit that we don't know everything. (For the record, I certainly don't). I look forward to learning from you, when you're ready to share your story.

mechanical_fish 15y ago

I can't think of anyone I respect on entrepreneurship that doesn't practice it themselves. Me neither, but perhaps you were asleep during the part of the program where Eric Ries: A) worked at at least one startup that exploded on impact with the market in spectacular fashion, B) learned some lessons from that, C) co-founded IMVU and made a bunch of money? Ries may have faults, but a complete lack of practice does not appear to be among them. As for your allergy to salesmanship: Reticence sells nothing. I wish Ries luck in leveraging the awesome psychological powers of branding and the publishing hype cycle to get his ideas in front of more people. I know I've lost years of my time to management who had apparently never heard of these ideas.

staunch 15y ago
IIRC he was at IMVU for only the first few years. Mostly before the company grew. Regardless I don't see how that single historical piece of entrepreneurial experience translates into a three item list. I don't think it's his relative lack of experience that I have a problem with so much as the conscious effort he's making to become a "guru" that sells picks to the miners.
- patio11 15y ago
  For what it's worth: I don't live in Silicon Valley. My routine dinner company does not include investors or people working on startups. Eric Ries has over the last several years demonstrated his credibility to me on his blog by teaching me things which, on multiple occasions, I was able to implement to dramatic effect in my own business. Want a concrete example? He had a post, years ago, on why A/B testing needs to be a one-liner or you will never do it. That resonated with me, strongly, and that became the design brief for A/Bingo. I prioritized that feature over pretty much everything else in my implementation, and it is a major part of the reason why it works for me. Some years later I'm considered somewhat of an authority on the subject (funny how that works), and when I go in to companies to work with them on A/B testing, the best single process improvement we get -- and we get it virtually without fail -- is going from "A/B testing takes a bunch of work with logging into a product from a large multinational advertising agency, filling out a few forms, and copy/pasting up the wazoo -- and as a consequence we did three A/B tests a year ago and haven't done anything since" to "our engineers put in the A/B tests themselves automatically because it is easier than not doing it." By the way, as it regards picks and miners: it takes a special kind of mind to see publishing a book as a route to fame and fortune on the backs of the little guy if one is also capable of, say, consulting on A/B testing.
  - staunch 15y ago
    Some people say Tim Ferris helps them in similar ways. Little tips that push you into doing things you already knew you should doing. They probably both offer some value by packaging existing ideas in more palatable ways. If you don't mind the motivations and style (like I do) you can probably extract some benefit. It's just not for me. Reply to your edit: You must not be aware of how much money conferences can make to not see the profit motive there. Even moderately successful tech conferences can generate millions per year. Far better than a consulting business. It takes time to build up to that of course. Publishing a book is Conference Building 101.

jayzee 15y ago

Isn't good entrepreneurship all about profiting from doing good? I don't see anything wrong with that. Besides Eric and Steve have been expounding on this idea for a while and while it now seems like second-nature, it wasn't obvious back when. I think that it is remarkable what they have done. Encapsulating that in a book so that people who are not in SV but are instead in Beijing and Bangalore can read and apply can only be a good thing.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

staunch 15y ago
Just call me an asshole, man. No need to hide behind the meaningless "hipster" label.

davidw 15y ago

Business books can be kind fun to read, but I have the same doubt. I think there are a couple metrics one can use to judge a bit more concretely: * How compressible is it? In other words, how succinctly can the main ideas be summed up? Even some quite interesting books such as The Innovator's Dilemma, are fairly easy to sum up in a few pages. This is because there is one core idea and a lot of stories, statistics, and other extra supporting material. * How much actionable advice is there? For instance, one thing I liked a lot about Rob Walling's "Start Small, Stay Small" is that he comes out and suggests some price numbers for online products, rather than a wishy-washy "figure out what your market will pay" or something equally non-committal. As another example, "do less" is sort of a handwavy guideline that is harder to do anything with, although we do live by it at http://73primenumbers.com/ http://73primenumbers.com/ .

nateberkopec 15y ago
Speaking of self-promotion... EDIT: Just fell out of my chair laughing, nevermind.

stevenp 15y ago

Speaking as someone who worked closely with Eric at IMVU in those early days, his message is simple but it's not always obvious to the people who start companies. How many times have you heard about entrepreneurs that think they have some grand vision for something that they're certain will change the world, so they go away and spend tons of VC money building something, and then it fails because no one actually wants it? It happens a LOT. Vision clouds judgment VERY often. Eric taught me that ego gets in the way of finding out what will actually work as a viable business, and that I should question all of my assumptions (and those of the people working around me) about what's right and what's not. The metrics speak for themselves. It doesn't matter how good I think my landing page headline is -- the market will validate that through A/B testing. The trick to figuring out what will be successful is first realizing that your idea is only a hypothesis and has no merit until you validate it with customers. Eric's and the IMVU team's willingness to let go of assumptions and try different things is the reason why IMVU today isn't a plugin that runs on top of AIM. Even though that was the original idea, it became clear really quickly that it wasn't going to work. Where many entrepreneurs would cling to an unworkable idea until the company burns through all its capital, the team decided that the idea was a failure and moved on to build something that has turned into a business that now makes more than $50mm per year. I can totally understand the uncomfortable reaction you have, but that's kind of the point. When someone comes around and says "Hey, maybe the way that the establishment thinks things should be done is actually completely wrong," some people are excited and intrigued by the possibilities, and some have an visceral, negative response. Tim Ferriss and Dr. Atkins have both sold a ton of books exploring ideas that sound new and "out there". I think it's unfair to classify Eric as someone who only has a reputation for "writing books and doing conferences". The "Lean Startup movement" is about keeping companies alive through the perils of infancy that usually lead to early destruction. Ask anyone who worked with Eric at IMVU and they will tell you that his passion for experimentation and validation of ideas, and his framework for building a scalable continuous deployment shop are still very much alive even after his departure. If you want to know more about the culture at IMVU, I'd be happy to comment on it.

davidw 15y ago
> When someone comes around and says "Hey, maybe the way that the establishment thinks things should be done is actually completely wrong," some people are excited and intrigued by the possibilities, and some have an visceral, negative response. He (staunch) is not 'scared of the new ideas' - quite the contrary, he says they're pretty standard for anyone with a clue. Perhaps the point of this book, if you read all the way down, where he talks about why he went the traditional publishing route, is that it's to spread his message to people outside sites like this, to people who are not so attuned to the latest goings on in the world of startups. Which, paradoxically, might mean that it's not a good buy for most of us in that perhaps he's just repeating stuff we've already read?