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Startups Are Bands for Hackers
- kushagrawal 14y agoI love the title! :D
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- unimpressive 14y agoI was once given a somewhat peculiar reason by a biologist for not learning computer programming: "Computer programming is overrated, it's the 'learning to play guitar' of the geek world." This article reminded me of it.
- marvin 14y agoI think that's too narrow, it should be the "learning to play a musical instrument" of the geek world. With music theory overlapping Computer Science theory, and with various technical skills (mixing, rigging, mastering) corresponding to domain knowledge in various fields. So these skills would be a prerequisite for doing anything that has to do with computers and computation. Definitely not overrated.
- r00fus 14y agoThat biologist is foolish - not unlike a biologist friend I had in college. All about numbers and "physical reality" when the psychological, mental and spiritual reality can be far more determinate for a person's behaviors and outcomes than pure biological data. Mastery of music gives you keys to people's emotions. Likewise, code gives you the keys to the world of information. They are both powerful and profitable if you know how to use them.
- SwellJoe 14y agoConversely, bands are startups for musicians. There's probably some awesome business models that recognize that fact, rather than forcing musicians into sharecropper deals.
- willvarfar 14y agoI think the lesson goes the other way; startups will get increasingly share-cropped.
- mattmanser 14y agoI doubt it, a lot of startups could survive on a few hundred clients. Well B2B ones can anyway. That's never the case with musicians.
- hessenwolf 14y agoVC's seem to operate on a milk-the-founders principle, like record labels of yore, and the lead singer will be fired and replaced with a better looking CEO once the songs are written.
- kokey 14y agoYou'll be surprised, I know music artists that survive fairly well by just having regular bookings for gigs around their area. Enough to pay the bills and save for retirement. They can afford to turn down record deals on bad terms.
- j2labs 14y agoWhat brand do you play in?
- raldi 14y agoSo what's the musical analogy for a hacker leaving the startup world and going to work for Apple, Google, Twitter, etc?
- andrewacove 14y agoGiving up the band and getting a real job.
- waterlesscloud 14y agoBecoming a session musician. An anonymous if proficient cog in the machine.
- raverbashing 14y agoGood analogy There are several very competent musicians working 'as the band' for famous names or just playing in recording sessions. There's good money on that. Of course, most of them have their own band, do their gigs at night, usually just for fun (it most certainly does not pay the bills).
- WiseWeasel 14y agoBussing tables.
- initself 14y agoIs it true that being in bands is now less popular because kids are now hacking rather than practicing their instruments? Or is it just that certain kids who didn't feel like bands were for them now have a "band" to join?
- paulitex 14y agoPeople seem to realize this once a year... http://www.televisionsky.org/2010/04/tech-startups-vs-rock-bands/ http://www.televisionsky.org/2010/04/tech-startups-vs-rock-b... http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/04/nice-analogy.html http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/04/nice-analogy.html
- jcn 14y agoTrue. Another take on it from an Ignite talk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5UrlKl8l1M http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5UrlKl8l1M
- doktrin 14y agoI'm not sure I agree with his final conclusion that the best startups are somehow profit-agnostic. It sounds like he is romanticizing both successful startups as well as bands. It's reasonable to assert that founders who truly care about their product may, on average, fare better than those who don't. However, it feels a little presumptuous to interpret the motivations and ambitions of all successful and admired musicians / artists / founders, en masse and from afar. Would anyone argue that Amazon was not founded with profit as (at least) a prime motivator? How about Apple or Microsoft? Moreover, even if not chasing monetary fortune, people can still be motivated by a multitude externalities such as recognition or fame - both of which != passion for the product. TLDR; The conclusion the author draws is hand-wavy at best and paints a decidedly black-and-white picture of the musical scene and startup ecosystem.
- sparknlaunch12 14y agoNothing is ever black and white. I think the author was trying to imply that any venture (band or startup) should be built on passion rather than money. Profit and wealth is a serendipitous reward for hardwork and passion.
- sparknlaunch12 14y agoSo startups are like bands without drugs and girls? Agree with the similarities. Another one is disruptors. Think about successful bands and how they disrupted the music scene.
- geoffschmidt 14y agoIt's like you haven't even seen The Social Network.
- sparknlaunch12 14y agoFair comment. I was poking fun at the old image of the tech scene. There is a fitting comic that has a geek looking character threatening a school yard bully - "if you don't give me your lunch money I will hack your Facebook account." Times have changed.
- Aftershock21 14y agoHacker Hacker Hacker.I am sick of this word. Whats wrong with simple words like techie. There are far more people considering themselves as Hackers nowadays even though they are simply an average engineer. Please stop abusing this word. Was Einstein a Hacker ? How about Leonardo Da Vinci ? By the way, startups are for people who are interested in business. If you are interested in business, YOU ARE NOT A HACKER. Hackers are interested in technology for the technology's sake. They don't do UI, they don't do A/B testing. Please stop.
- jacobolus 14y agoYou’re at a site called “hacker news”. The word isn’t going anywhere, so I think you’re gonna just have to get over it. Anyhow, Leonardo da Vinci was certainly a “hacker”: misfit who spent all his time cutting things open and taking things apart, doodling new inventions, etc.
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- personlurking 14y agoI guess that makes me a bit of a groupie, and HN, Rolling Stone (mag). I read on The Verge that the boombox had the highest adoption rate for any gadget in history. Now we don't need it, we have our computers and we don't need to drive to someone's house to connect with them either. http://i.imgur.com/d29b0.png http://i.imgur.com/d29b0.png
- SlackerRouse 14y agoThen I'm the annoying guy who plays hits from the 90s on his guitar at small parties, amazes his drunk friends who exclaim "You should totally make an album! I have a great idea for a song!" And I answer "No, no - I couldn't do that. Also, I'm not that kind of person", while secretly, in the evening, I spend about an hour writing short, simple, crappy songs for fun - sometimes thinking "maybe I could, if only .." and a thousand different reasons hammer my mind "if I were younger / had a clue / had the skills / had an education / had the time / didn't have a family to support" and so forth. (Dedicated to all the scriptoldies out there - for keeping the passion alive.)
- scelerat 14y agoI've played in many bands and worked for a few startups. The gist of this article is dead on.
- novalis 14y ago"Music reviewers devote their attention to those who care about their work, and it’s rare to see a “classic” or universally-adored piece of music that was written for hire." Let's not forget how european classical music came to be a form of work for hire where patrons, for variable amounts of time, sometimes decades, payed for musical art creation. Hope I am not reading that wrong but the op is lacking historical reference and concentrating on a very specific contemporary frame.
- perlgeek 14y agoAlso most movie soundtracks are written "for hire", and some of them are pretty successful too.
- gizzlon 14y agomy thoughts exactly.. Wasn't most of what we today see as great works of classical music paid for by the church or a king? His statement is simply false..
- fromhet 14y agoAlso, most successful music today is made by songwrites hired for the job. By this I mean 'commercial' artists such as Rihanna, Lady Gaga and Beyonce-like ones songwriters. OP sees this too black and white. With passion comes devotion, with devotion comes practice, with practice comes performance, with performance comes sucess. Kinda.
- guard-of-terra 14y agoIt is successful but it's not universally-adored. It is targeted on a pretty narrow demographics and has no meaning outside it.
- fromhet 14y agoI'm sorry, but most of the most commercially successful music is written by songwriters as RedOne and Max Martin (well, I'm not so sure about just them, but people such as them). The music industry produces art that millions of people all over the planet love and enjoy.
- JCordeiro 14y agoStarting A Tech Company And Starting A Band Are Pretty Much The Same Thing http://goo.gl/hNoZK http://goo.gl/hNoZK
- SudarshanP 14y agoI have no idea why the guys at Planetary Resources do not redirect curious people to the KISS studies they talk about in their press conference. http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/20120307_IEEE_Presentation.pdf http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/20120307_IEEE_Pre... http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/asteroid_final_report.pdf http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/asteroid_final_re... http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/20120314_ESA_ESTEC.pdf http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/20120314_ESA_ESTE... I had to dig around for sometime and I thought these papers must be behind some pay-wall. I was surprised to find them on the KISS website. It is not that they are clueless about how to bring back an asteroid and extract resources from it. They just want their MVP to the be the act of prospecting itself. Also I was really surprised to learn that Ion Engines have been routinely used before for asteroid missions like Dawn(http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/ion_prop.asp http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/ion_prop.asp). The scaling they need to achieve for these missions is much smaller than the average non space geek would expect. Does anyone here know if the scalability requirements of solar ion propulsion systems they need for the mission of tugging an asteroid into lunar orbit is realistically achievable by 2020?
- abeh 14y agoThere is one really important shared aspect: the point at which all the members of the band/startup decide to go for it - make a serious commitment.
- colindoc84 14y agoThis is written by a guy who has never been in a band. You would think that fact would be a lightbulb moment that maybe you shouldn't write this blog post. Apparently not.
- lifeisstillgood 14y agoIt has the ring of a deep truth. But, Michael Arrington == Casey Kasem. There is an interesting analogy.
- jiakeliu 14y agoThe part about pivoting is interesting. For a musician, changing the genre of the band has to be quite difficult, because an style is likely developed and the soul to the art will have to be changed. I wonder if it's the same for entrepreneurs, who likely have an affinity to a particular field due to passion or expertise. Pivoting, by definition, shouldn't be a complete redo, but I'd imagine it's as hard of a choice for a startup to pivot drastically as it is for a band to change genre.
- freshhawk 14y agoBands change genres all the time in order to make it big. Most of the time to a more mainstream and marketable genre and style to get more listeners and make more money. That fits pretty well to me. The problem everyone seems to be having, author of the piece included, is to spin this analogy so that commercial music sellouts == bad, commercial hacker sellouts == good. Accept the fact that an investor funded startup trying to get a big exit by getting a huge number of users and pivoting as necessary isn't were people with "passion" or who would object to having to change the "soul of the[ir] art" would end up and it's a great analogy. As they are both hit based businesses where the market is heavily influenced by hype from big market makers and there's a lot of money to be made it's not surprising that similar patterns emerge.
- airnomad 14y agoStarting a bend is (still) better for getting laid, but things are improving there, too.
- naithemilkman 14y agoNice post! I wrote something similar whilst observing my brother in academia through my startup lenses. http://pragmaticstartup.wordpress.com/2011/02/21/similarities-between-an-entrepreneur-and-an-academic/ http://pragmaticstartup.wordpress.com/2011/02/21/similaritie...
- xefer 14y agoVCs have effectively the same business model as Record Companies; i.e., cast a wide net and hope that at least one big fish is landed.
- DrorY 14y agoWell, take a look at interlude, it's an Israeli startup that was formally a band (and a very successful one in Israel, vocalist is Yoni Bloch). http://interlude.fm/team.php http://interlude.fm/team.php
- MicahWedemeyer 14y agoSlight correction to this statement: Startups that set out to make a great product are, on the whole, adored for their work, and often enjoy success as a side-effect. Startups that set out to make a great product are, when they get anywhere at all, adored for their work, and rarely, but sometimes with a lot of hard work and luck enjoy success as a side-effect. Just like bands, most startups (esp. the "built in a weekend" kinds) will probably end up being more of a labor of love than a true money-making venture. That's fine, but don't pretend otherwise.
- ssharp 14y agoThis analogy is a huge leap. Aside from the fact that both endeavors are largely entrepreneurial in nature, the two things are mostly distinct. If you are actually trying to succeed as a musician, "success", you are going to make a lot of sacrifices. The opportunity costs are huge. If you're touring as a fledgling band, you are most likely giving up the formative years of your career. The time you're spending with music isn't going to be particularly helpful in other arenas. If you're hacking at a startup, you're acquiring desirable skills in the process. If your startup fails, you can still go get a really good job in SV. If your band fails, you're hitting the reset button. You could be chasing a career in the music industry for 10+ years and be no better off than you were a decade ago. I also don't think the analogy between VCs and record companies really hold up either. Because of the low returns of signed bands, as compared to funded companies, the models work differently. Additionally, as a musician, you're ultimately selling a piece of art. It's designed by you, and while it may be influenced by the market, the product is largely determined by your own creativity. A business operates in the exact opposite way. Business as art rarely work. I can give someone a copy of "Kid A", have them say "this sucks", reply back "give it a few listens", and the person may ultimately end up really liking the album. I'm not doing that with a company. If I think a product, say Basecamp, sucks, and I have to pay $20 a month for it, I'm not going to give it much thought after my "it sucks" reaction. We consume art differently than we use other products, because they are radically different things. Market demands are simply too important for businesses. They have to listen to the customers to succeed. The path to success is to take customer problems and figure out a creative solution to them. The customer is driving the most substantial part of the company.
- freshhawk 14y ago"They have to listen to the customers to succeed. The path to success is to take customer problems and figure out a creative solution to them. The customer is driving the most substantial part of the company." I think the analogy is pretty good actually. You seem to have a bit of a naive view of how music is made a produced. This is a decent description of how music is made, perhaps with the Apple-ish addition of them frequently telling the customer what they like rather than always listening. It's completely treated as a product.
- ssharp 14y agoThis would mean YCombinator ~ American Idol.
- raverbashing 14y agoYou jest, but there are a lot of similarities Of course, YC doesn't profit from very bad contestants, so there's one difference But if you see the progression of the candidates through the competition you can certainly draw several parallels. YC doesn't have a 'clear cut' winner as AI, still you know that there is a slight mismatch between 'winning the competition' and be 'market successful'. One rarely matches the other. And of course, the issues of focus, strategy, pressure are very similar among AI and YC. Some contestants start shining early on in the competition, some have perfect technique, but in the end, it only goes so far if it isn't a balance of competences.
- ssharp 14y agoThe analogy I was going for was that American Idol gives people without outlets to a record label a path to a record deal. YC gives teams a path to become an investment-worthy company (or maybe even company successful enough to not need further investments). However, this ends up supporting the VC = Record Label analogy that I don't think is strong.
- raverbashing 14y agoMakes sense, but yeah, VC as a Record Label is not really a good analogy Record Labels give much more support to their protégés, and "charge a higher fee" as well (VCs don't ask for 'creative control' of their startups as an example)
- zach 14y agoI noted five years back that YC in its early years seemed like School of Rock: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5954 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5954 Now that the tech and investing world has changed, YC seems more like Motown Records. It's worth pointing out that in its early days, Motown used to release records on Chess and other labels, but at some point it naturally just made sense for Motown to become its own label.
- BrainInAJar 14y agoAnd just like most bands, the vast majority of startups fail. And just like most musicians, people who found startups have delusions of grandeur. And just like most bands, even the ones that succeed are screwed by early-round investors (record companies/VC).
- angersock 14y agoi have yet to pick up members of the preferred sex at bars talking about my startup where are the groupies, the sex, the drugs what am i doing wrong ( More seriously: While there are certainly some similarities between the lifecycle of a band and a startup, the author seems to put forth a very structured form of the startup lifestyle--I think that claiming there is one true trajectory does any favors to us. Also, something to muse on: "The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band." What do you think would be a reasonable mapping of this onto tech/startups/CS/engineering? )
- kokey 14y agoThis analogy can also be extended to writers and the publishing industry.
- outside1234 14y agoi was with you until you threw profitability under the bus. the best bands don't tour just to show their work off, they do it as part of building an audience for their business, which is selling tickets, selling albums, selling songs...
- MartinCron 14y agoWhen Zappos was sold to Amazon and Mint was sold to Intuit, I had the same pathetic angst as when I started hearing Nirvana and Pearl Jam on commercial radio. I liked those guys before everyone else did!
- pdmccormick 14y agoAhh, the hipsters dilemma: your sensibilities are offended when something you cherish sell out and go mainstream, yet you wear the hard earned "I liked them _before_ they were popular" badge with honour. It's hard growing up and having your sense of identity and place in the world challenged when you peer behind the curtain. There is something real to be mourned there, yet we are better for it.
- sopooneo 14y agoI am not a musician, but I used to hang out occasionally with a large circle of traditional Irish fiddlers around Boston. I have never heard anyone talk about money more outside the financial sector. They talk about it they way a man dying of thirst might talk about water.