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> Not everything needs to be a damn unicorn. More people needs to understand this. It's fine being a small(ish) business that turns a profit and provides a ser

> Not everything needs to be a damn unicorn. More people needs to understand this. It's fine being a small(ish) business that turns a profit and provides a service that's beneficial to society. You don't need to be a billion dollar company to be important or do great work. DHH talked about this 15 years ago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CDXJ6bMkMY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CDXJ6bMkMY

dmvdoug 3y ago
I’ll preach it again: people need to learn that satisficing is a good and valuable end-state!
- aleph_minus_one 3y ago
  It is a startup wisdom that stagnation (i.e. no growth) means death. The often stated reason why C-level executives are paid so well is that they have to be able to solve the insanely hard problem of finding new growth opportunities for the company over a long(er) period of time; something few people are capable of. Well: by this criterion, many CxOs fail to deserve this huge pay (more precisely: they build Potemkin villages to pretend growth where in reality they burn the company's substance).
  - dmvdoug 3y ago
    They should bring me to Startup Bootcamp or whatever it is, so I can preach the satisficing gospel.
palata 3y ago
> You don't need to be a billion dollar company to be important or do great work. And importantly: because you are a billion dollar company doesn't mean you bring good to the world. At all.
- lvncelot 3y ago
  I'd even argue that the burden of proof is reversed. There might be billion dollar companies which bring good, but I'll be skeptical of that fact at first.
  - Ekaros 3y ago
    I would argue that there is plenty of large(above billion dollars) companies that bring net good to world. Manufacturing is good field. Producing things like machinery improves quality of live and productivity. Not that these often doesn't have negative aspects when they strive for even higher value extraction, looking at something like John Deere. Still it does allow massive efficiency gains in farming.
  - BoxOfRain 3y ago
    I wonder if there's a general rule that the larger an organisation the more pronounced the diffusion of responsibility and the higher the likelihood of shady behaviour? It would be interesting to see some studies into this either way.
- rpastuszak 3y ago
  I would imagine this gets progressively harder the bigger you get.
  - layer8 3y ago
    Thus why one should rather prefer slow growth. Fast growth only means you’ll be more likely to reach the shitty state faster.
    - palata 3y ago
      But slow growth brings less money to top management, and top management decides if they want to go for slow or fast growth, right?
- agentgumshoe 3y ago
  I think the simplest way to measure that is by asking 'what would we truly lose if this company disappeared tomorrow?'. With one follow-up question of 'how easily could the important bits actually be replaced?'
pydry 3y ago
"People" understand this just fine the problem is that the economy is structurally geared towards creating unicorn monstrosities that extract value rather than SMEs that create value. If there were legal and regulatory pressure that crushed and broke down these behemoths (e.g. a FTC and judges that believed that predatory pricing was real and prosecuted accordingly) the VC model would break and this stuff would stop happening.
mrtksn 3y ago
But the whole "Tech" economy is based on the premise that everything must grow indefinitely and indefinitely means that at some point will be a unicorn. Europe is considered economical failure because there are not enough unicorns, there are lists on Twitter with list of unicorns per country that are supposed to show the decline of Europe. No matter if Europe has some of the best living condition for large group of people. IMHO this thing is ideological, I even feel uneasy mentioning this because it is something we are not supposed to talk since it can start a flamewar and flamewars are how you get your account restricted.
- janalsncm 3y ago
  Between 2009 and today, the US doubled GDP while life expectancies fell. In the EU, GDP is stagnant but life expectancy went up. Those who say Europe’s economy is a failure should at least consider what the purpose of an economy should even be.
  - dustedcodes 3y ago
    wow that is super interesting (although not very surprising). Do you have any sources for this?
    - mrtksn 3y ago
      Europe: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/eur/europe/life-expectancy https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/eur/europe/life-expect... USA: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/life-expectancy https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/life... I'm sure there are nuances but according to this particular source European life expectancy went from 75 to 79, US life expectancy went from 78 to 79 with a period of a decline between 2013 and 2018.
      - imglorp 3y ago
        What's the biggest impact on life expectancy in the first world that shows up at this level? Healthcare, walking culture, food options, other?
sgarland 3y ago
God, I wish more companies realized this. Doing one thing, and doing it well, is admirable.
- mrguyorama 3y ago
  But how can I build a company to send rich people to space for dick measuring contests with only $1m a year in salary?!
mschuster91 3y ago
The problem is ambitious management on all levels. When you're running a billion dollar business, you can extract far better compensation (base, bonus, stock options) than if you're running a hundred million dollar business. The obvious solution is a compensation cap, not just because CEO comp has exploded while lower rung compensation has virtually stagnated, but also because it might put an end to the constant drive of companies to just gobble up competitors. [1] https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-in-2020/ https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-in-2020/
bunga-bunga 3y ago
> > Not everything needs to be a damn unicorn. > More people needs to understand this. I sounds more like neither one of you has had that choice. Most people, given the chance, would rather add a zero to their savings rather than “doing the right thing for society”
- geysersam 3y ago
  Then we should not depend on people making the right choice. We should limit the opportunities people have to choose between "more for me" and "do something useful for society". One idea here is more progressive taxation.
  - chasd00 3y ago
    > We should limit the opportunities people have Riiight. See you at the voting booth.
    - geysersam 3y ago
      Opposite. We should empower people by having a system where you don't become homeless because of random medical expenses.
  - gottorf 3y ago
    > Then we should not depend on people making the right choice. Broadly speaking, any system that depends on an unbroken chain of good people who do the right things out of the goodness of their hearts is bound to fail much sooner rather than later. So I agree. The system should be designed so that people taking action out of their own interests nevertheless advances society as a whole. As Adam Smith put it: "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest." The system that was designed this way is capitalism, warts and all. > One idea here is more progressive taxation. I'm not sure how that conclusion follows from your premise. If you want to set up incentive structures such that people chasing their own interests also ends up being useful for society, then you want to make sure that people voluntarily pay money for goods and services that they value. The supplier of that value makes money, the consumer of that value is better off, and society as a whole is enriched as a result. This also means that the state takes action to break trusts and monopolies, and (more difficultly) guards against regulatory capture, all of which end up making it so that people involuntarily pay for goods and services that they don't necessarily value. Rent-seeking behavior such as this is one of the highest economic ills. "More progressive taxation" does many things, but it is also exceptionally good at enriching the politically well-connected, often in the form of rent-seeking behavior I described above. Look at world government spending as a fraction of GDP[0] as a good proxy for "more progressive taxation", and tell me between France (58.5%), the US (38.5%) and Singapore (15.4%), which you consider a well-run country where people do more useful things for society. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_spending_as_percentage_of_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...
cornholio 3y ago
> It's fine being a small(ish) business that turns a profit and provides a service that's beneficial to society. It's fine, but it's no unicorn. And having such a business might be the closest and only chance the people involved have at real wealth and impact - they are 90% there, and only need a little scale, or so they think. If you were in their shoes, you would do the same.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
dreen 3y ago
You can't talk people into not being greedy. Definietely not while living in an economic system that is built on it.
pmontra 3y ago
But each CEO of those businesses would like to be the next billionaire. Furthermore if the business doesn't turn out to be as good as they hope they can leave and try to get lucky at another company. They care about the company only up to a (small?) point.
SkyPuncher 3y ago
More people do understand this, but aren't in a situation to follow it. Many tech companies are only plausible with VC funding. In order to get VC funding, you generally have to have a path towards being a unicorn.
refurb 3y ago
You shouldn’t take VC money if you’re not going to try and be a unicorn. VC’s aren’t interested in your “smallish business that turns a profit” and neither are the LPs that invest in the fund.
scarface_74 3y ago
Once you take VC money, you don’t really have a choice but to grow large. That’s their entire business model. I can’t find it now. But Spolsky himself wrote about how Fogs Creek Software could be what we now call a “lifestyle company” that could grow slowly. But he felt he needed outside investment so Stack Exchange could grow fast since it was only useful if it had network effects.
wnc3141 3y ago
On the contrary, it's difficult to sustain the lifestyle of a unicorn founder unless you have a unicorn valuation. In less sarcastic terms, the ecosystem (VCs, founders etc) often is drawn to or selected for those who whish to get rich and get out. A hundred and fifty years ago people risked incredible suffering in order to strike gold. All when slow and steady profit could be made by owning a farm.
ahartman00 3y ago
> Despite growing revenue, it lost $84 million over the year ending on March 31, 2023 Its not possible to run a business that loses $84 million. You will run out of money.

dmvdoug 3y ago

I’ll preach it again: people need to learn that satisficing is a good and valuable end-state!

aleph_minus_one 3y ago
It is a startup wisdom that stagnation (i.e. no growth) means death. The often stated reason why C-level executives are paid so well is that they have to be able to solve the insanely hard problem of finding new growth opportunities for the company over a long(er) period of time; something few people are capable of. Well: by this criterion, many CxOs fail to deserve this huge pay (more precisely: they build Potemkin villages to pretend growth where in reality they burn the company's substance).
- dmvdoug 3y ago
  They should bring me to Startup Bootcamp or whatever it is, so I can preach the satisficing gospel.

palata 3y ago

> You don't need to be a billion dollar company to be important or do great work. And importantly: because you are a billion dollar company doesn't mean you bring good to the world. At all.

lvncelot 3y ago
I'd even argue that the burden of proof is reversed. There might be billion dollar companies which bring good, but I'll be skeptical of that fact at first.
- Ekaros 3y ago
  I would argue that there is plenty of large(above billion dollars) companies that bring net good to world. Manufacturing is good field. Producing things like machinery improves quality of live and productivity. Not that these often doesn't have negative aspects when they strive for even higher value extraction, looking at something like John Deere. Still it does allow massive efficiency gains in farming.
- BoxOfRain 3y ago
  I wonder if there's a general rule that the larger an organisation the more pronounced the diffusion of responsibility and the higher the likelihood of shady behaviour? It would be interesting to see some studies into this either way.
rpastuszak 3y ago
I would imagine this gets progressively harder the bigger you get.
- layer8 3y ago
  Thus why one should rather prefer slow growth. Fast growth only means you’ll be more likely to reach the shitty state faster.
  - palata 3y ago
    But slow growth brings less money to top management, and top management decides if they want to go for slow or fast growth, right?
agentgumshoe 3y ago
I think the simplest way to measure that is by asking 'what would we truly lose if this company disappeared tomorrow?'. With one follow-up question of 'how easily could the important bits actually be replaced?'

pydry 3y ago

"People" understand this just fine the problem is that the economy is structurally geared towards creating unicorn monstrosities that extract value rather than SMEs that create value. If there were legal and regulatory pressure that crushed and broke down these behemoths (e.g. a FTC and judges that believed that predatory pricing was real and prosecuted accordingly) the VC model would break and this stuff would stop happening.

mrtksn 3y ago

But the whole "Tech" economy is based on the premise that everything must grow indefinitely and indefinitely means that at some point will be a unicorn. Europe is considered economical failure because there are not enough unicorns, there are lists on Twitter with list of unicorns per country that are supposed to show the decline of Europe. No matter if Europe has some of the best living condition for large group of people. IMHO this thing is ideological, I even feel uneasy mentioning this because it is something we are not supposed to talk since it can start a flamewar and flamewars are how you get your account restricted.

janalsncm 3y ago
Between 2009 and today, the US doubled GDP while life expectancies fell. In the EU, GDP is stagnant but life expectancy went up. Those who say Europe’s economy is a failure should at least consider what the purpose of an economy should even be.
- dustedcodes 3y ago
  wow that is super interesting (although not very surprising). Do you have any sources for this?
  - mrtksn 3y ago
    Europe: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/eur/europe/life-expectancy https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/eur/europe/life-expect... USA: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/life-expectancy https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/life... I'm sure there are nuances but according to this particular source European life expectancy went from 75 to 79, US life expectancy went from 78 to 79 with a period of a decline between 2013 and 2018.
    - imglorp 3y ago
      What's the biggest impact on life expectancy in the first world that shows up at this level? Healthcare, walking culture, food options, other?

sgarland 3y ago

God, I wish more companies realized this. Doing one thing, and doing it well, is admirable.

mrguyorama 3y ago
But how can I build a company to send rich people to space for dick measuring contests with only $1m a year in salary?!

mschuster91 3y ago

The problem is ambitious management on all levels. When you're running a billion dollar business, you can extract far better compensation (base, bonus, stock options) than if you're running a hundred million dollar business. The obvious solution is a compensation cap, not just because CEO comp has exploded while lower rung compensation has virtually stagnated, but also because it might put an end to the constant drive of companies to just gobble up competitors. [1] https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-in-2020/ https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-in-2020/

bunga-bunga 3y ago

> > Not everything needs to be a damn unicorn. > More people needs to understand this. I sounds more like neither one of you has had that choice. Most people, given the chance, would rather add a zero to their savings rather than “doing the right thing for society”

geysersam 3y ago
Then we should not depend on people making the right choice. We should limit the opportunities people have to choose between "more for me" and "do something useful for society". One idea here is more progressive taxation.
- chasd00 3y ago
  > We should limit the opportunities people have Riiight. See you at the voting booth.
  - geysersam 3y ago
    Opposite. We should empower people by having a system where you don't become homeless because of random medical expenses.
- gottorf 3y ago
  > Then we should not depend on people making the right choice. Broadly speaking, any system that depends on an unbroken chain of good people who do the right things out of the goodness of their hearts is bound to fail much sooner rather than later. So I agree. The system should be designed so that people taking action out of their own interests nevertheless advances society as a whole. As Adam Smith put it: "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest." The system that was designed this way is capitalism, warts and all. > One idea here is more progressive taxation. I'm not sure how that conclusion follows from your premise. If you want to set up incentive structures such that people chasing their own interests also ends up being useful for society, then you want to make sure that people voluntarily pay money for goods and services that they value. The supplier of that value makes money, the consumer of that value is better off, and society as a whole is enriched as a result. This also means that the state takes action to break trusts and monopolies, and (more difficultly) guards against regulatory capture, all of which end up making it so that people involuntarily pay for goods and services that they don't necessarily value. Rent-seeking behavior such as this is one of the highest economic ills. "More progressive taxation" does many things, but it is also exceptionally good at enriching the politically well-connected, often in the form of rent-seeking behavior I described above. Look at world government spending as a fraction of GDP[0] as a good proxy for "more progressive taxation", and tell me between France (58.5%), the US (38.5%) and Singapore (15.4%), which you consider a well-run country where people do more useful things for society. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_spending_as_percentage_of_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...

cornholio 3y ago

> It's fine being a small(ish) business that turns a profit and provides a service that's beneficial to society. It's fine, but it's no unicorn. And having such a business might be the closest and only chance the people involved have at real wealth and impact - they are 90% there, and only need a little scale, or so they think. If you were in their shoes, you would do the same.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

dreen 3y ago

You can't talk people into not being greedy. Definietely not while living in an economic system that is built on it.

pmontra 3y ago

But each CEO of those businesses would like to be the next billionaire. Furthermore if the business doesn't turn out to be as good as they hope they can leave and try to get lucky at another company. They care about the company only up to a (small?) point.

SkyPuncher 3y ago

More people do understand this, but aren't in a situation to follow it. Many tech companies are only plausible with VC funding. In order to get VC funding, you generally have to have a path towards being a unicorn.

refurb 3y ago

You shouldn’t take VC money if you’re not going to try and be a unicorn. VC’s aren’t interested in your “smallish business that turns a profit” and neither are the LPs that invest in the fund.

scarface_74 3y ago

Once you take VC money, you don’t really have a choice but to grow large. That’s their entire business model. I can’t find it now. But Spolsky himself wrote about how Fogs Creek Software could be what we now call a “lifestyle company” that could grow slowly. But he felt he needed outside investment so Stack Exchange could grow fast since it was only useful if it had network effects.

wnc3141 3y ago

On the contrary, it's difficult to sustain the lifestyle of a unicorn founder unless you have a unicorn valuation. In less sarcastic terms, the ecosystem (VCs, founders etc) often is drawn to or selected for those who whish to get rich and get out. A hundred and fifty years ago people risked incredible suffering in order to strike gold. All when slow and steady profit could be made by owning a farm.

ahartman00 3y ago

> Despite growing revenue, it lost $84 million over the year ending on March 31, 2023 Its not possible to run a business that loses $84 million. You will run out of money.