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I visited Kai in the castle he bought after moving back to Germany and renamed to the 'Byteburg'. I think this was around 2001. Kai was hosting pitch nights fo

I visited Kai in the castle he bought after moving back to Germany and renamed to the 'Byteburg'. I think this was around 2001. Kai was hosting pitch nights for startup ideas for young people; but really anyone was welcome. Apart from Kai there was his buddy, Uwe Maurer, and two 'staff' guys who were kinda running things in the castle. I.e. upkeep, cooking/food and beverages. Kai was just all over everyone, running around with a little tablet serving nibbles and making sure everyone always had a fresh beer. A kind, humble and deeply interesting person. There was chit-chat and board games (mostly strategy stuff like Go & co) before the night deteriorated and we went to the castle's cellar for pool and foosball; until the early morning hours. An untold story relayed to me first hand, that night, is how KPT got so popular. No one knew what a Photoshop plugin to make fancy procedural patterns etc. was useful for. Certainly there was the crowd of people doing flyers for techno clubs/parties; but that was a tiny minority. Sales were meh. The story goes that Uwe hired a bunch of students that phone-bombed all major US department stores and chains that were selling software at the time. They pretended they were all studying graphic design and needed KPT "for their assignments". After that sales started rolling in. This was relayed to me as more or less the "founding myth" of what later became Meta Creations.

sen 3y ago
> No one knew what a Photoshop plugin to make fancy procedural patterns etc. was useful for. Certainly there was the crowd of people doing flyers for techno clubs/parties; but that was a tiny minority. That was me. Kai's tools were invaluable to me learning graphic design (via doing flyers/posters for local raves), which then got me proper graphic/web design jobs and kickstarted my career. I look back on Kai's plugins/tools as iconic as Winamp, mIRC, etc for the era.
- spacecadet 3y ago
  The same. Now its all overpriced trade schools.
b20000 3y ago
i am surprised you could meet him and people could pitch … his website made it seem like he did not want anyone to email him or talk to him???
- weinzierl 3y ago
  This might have changed. There was a time when he wanted to create a startup hub in Germany and invited people. I remember an interview with him, which I cannot find anymore, where he expressed his frustration with German banks and their lack of openness to new ideas. I've never heard about his startup project and neither the software project he was working on back then (TimeDoubler IIRC) again, so I assume they didn't materialize and he retreated from public life. I also once read in a thread that his home castle and the one he was receiving guests for the startup hup where separate ones. I could not find reliable source for this, so it may or may not be true. EDIT: I just found that his website has something to say about it: "This is not a case of Luddite but Peace'nQuiet." http://kai.sub.blue http://kai.sub.blue
  - solarkraft 3y ago
    How sad, maybe he was ahead of his time. Nowadays it seems like the institutions (mainly governments at all levels) are slowly but intently waking up to the idea of supporting new companies being valuable for society. Somewhat relatedly there's the german federal SPRIND initiative (https://www.sprind.org/en/ https://www.sprind.org/en/) with a great podcast (https://pca.st/podcast/4c1e6440-67ad-0139-341a-0acc26574db2 https://pca.st/podcast/4c1e6440-67ad-0139-341a-0acc26574db2), which Kai would be great to hear on.
    - Propelloni 3y ago
      Agreed. At least in Germany it is totally feasible by now to get your seed funding from local community banks, e.g. Sparkassen. Federal and country banks are covering up to 80% of the lender's risk nowadays, so getting a 100k EUR to get started has become rather easy and fast. You need a business plan and a pitch and off you go. (For perspective, we are still talking a few months of paperwork, but it is a marked improvement over the get-out-of-my-office of only a decade ago.) Sure, not all of the money is in grants, but you don't have to sign over half your company to some investor either just to get started.
b20000 3y ago
i wonder what happened when the stores told the students to pay for the software after / before having it ordered.
- solarkraft 3y ago
  Presumably they actually bought it and were reimbursed. It's a tiny price to get yourself on shelves everywhere!
  - ninkendo 3y ago
    That’s actually super illegal, at least in America. There’s a lot of very tight restrictions against buying your own product, as it can lead to false sales numbers, etc. Something tells me that if this story were true, it would be very much something he’d want to keep hidden at the time.
    - the-dude 3y ago
      Are you sure about that? Presenting false sales numbers sounds like a regular false statement to me, which may be subject to SEC rules etc if you are listed. But actually buying your own product ... I can't find any sources yet on the web.
      - ElevenLathe 3y ago
        IANAL (though I do read Matt Levine, and I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night) but my understanding is that yeah it's securities fraud if you are a public company because you are reporting sales numbers that are essentially fake, thereby defrauding the investing public. Is it just regular fraud if you're not a public company? Or if you are a public company and do juke your sales stats this way, but are open about it in your public filings? Not sure.
        dragonwriter 3y ago
        > Is it just regular fraud if you're not a public company? I don't think it is regular fraud in and of itself. I think it is likely to become fraud when you use sales figures including undisclosed self-dealing to support any financial transaction or anything else from which you receive something of value from someone else, and where those sales figures are a material factor.

sen 3y ago

> No one knew what a Photoshop plugin to make fancy procedural patterns etc. was useful for. Certainly there was the crowd of people doing flyers for techno clubs/parties; but that was a tiny minority. That was me. Kai's tools were invaluable to me learning graphic design (via doing flyers/posters for local raves), which then got me proper graphic/web design jobs and kickstarted my career. I look back on Kai's plugins/tools as iconic as Winamp, mIRC, etc for the era.

spacecadet 3y ago
The same. Now its all overpriced trade schools.

b20000 3y ago

i am surprised you could meet him and people could pitch … his website made it seem like he did not want anyone to email him or talk to him???

weinzierl 3y ago
This might have changed. There was a time when he wanted to create a startup hub in Germany and invited people. I remember an interview with him, which I cannot find anymore, where he expressed his frustration with German banks and their lack of openness to new ideas. I've never heard about his startup project and neither the software project he was working on back then (TimeDoubler IIRC) again, so I assume they didn't materialize and he retreated from public life. I also once read in a thread that his home castle and the one he was receiving guests for the startup hup where separate ones. I could not find reliable source for this, so it may or may not be true. EDIT: I just found that his website has something to say about it: "This is not a case of Luddite but Peace'nQuiet." http://kai.sub.blue http://kai.sub.blue
- solarkraft 3y ago
  How sad, maybe he was ahead of his time. Nowadays it seems like the institutions (mainly governments at all levels) are slowly but intently waking up to the idea of supporting new companies being valuable for society. Somewhat relatedly there's the german federal SPRIND initiative (https://www.sprind.org/en/ https://www.sprind.org/en/) with a great podcast (https://pca.st/podcast/4c1e6440-67ad-0139-341a-0acc26574db2 https://pca.st/podcast/4c1e6440-67ad-0139-341a-0acc26574db2), which Kai would be great to hear on.
  - Propelloni 3y ago
    Agreed. At least in Germany it is totally feasible by now to get your seed funding from local community banks, e.g. Sparkassen. Federal and country banks are covering up to 80% of the lender's risk nowadays, so getting a 100k EUR to get started has become rather easy and fast. You need a business plan and a pitch and off you go. (For perspective, we are still talking a few months of paperwork, but it is a marked improvement over the get-out-of-my-office of only a decade ago.) Sure, not all of the money is in grants, but you don't have to sign over half your company to some investor either just to get started.

b20000 3y ago

i wonder what happened when the stores told the students to pay for the software after / before having it ordered.

solarkraft 3y ago
Presumably they actually bought it and were reimbursed. It's a tiny price to get yourself on shelves everywhere!
- ninkendo 3y ago
  That’s actually super illegal, at least in America. There’s a lot of very tight restrictions against buying your own product, as it can lead to false sales numbers, etc. Something tells me that if this story were true, it would be very much something he’d want to keep hidden at the time.
  - the-dude 3y ago
    Are you sure about that? Presenting false sales numbers sounds like a regular false statement to me, which may be subject to SEC rules etc if you are listed. But actually buying your own product ... I can't find any sources yet on the web.
    - ElevenLathe 3y ago
      IANAL (though I do read Matt Levine, and I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night) but my understanding is that yeah it's securities fraud if you are a public company because you are reporting sales numbers that are essentially fake, thereby defrauding the investing public. Is it just regular fraud if you're not a public company? Or if you are a public company and do juke your sales stats this way, but are open about it in your public filings? Not sure.
      - dragonwriter 3y ago
        > Is it just regular fraud if you're not a public company? I don't think it is regular fraud in and of itself. I think it is likely to become fraud when you use sales figures including undisclosed self-dealing to support any financial transaction or anything else from which you receive something of value from someone else, and where those sales figures are a material factor.