3 ms·
The filters are self-fulfilling. For twenty-somethings ideas are easy and all opportunity is in front. Might as well swing for the fences and yes people do hit
by apsurd 2y ago
The filters are self-fulfilling.
For twenty-somethings ideas are easy and all opportunity is in front. Might as well swing for the fences and yes people do hit home runs. At this stage, debating the actual statistics is misguided use of energy. Because justifying a reason not to play still means you're not playing.
And the older you get the more gray this calculus is. There's more reasons not to do something. We put the filters on ourselves.
This isn't a moral argument. No one really knows how the statistics will land, we can only back analyze them. Yes it's statistically very unlikely you're going to get funded. So you stopped trying. Maybe your ideas really weren't very good. That's ok, you've got a lifetime.
edit: fwwiw I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur and now decades later when I'm more financially secure and the reality is here, I really really really question if I am cut out to be an entrepreneur. I don't think I care all that much. Not really.
- 999900000999 2y agoIt's more like I don't think cold calling ( tweeting) VCs yields results. It's the equivalent of singing with a guitar outside of Columbia records. It's not like Paul McCartney is going to just tell you to step into his office and record a demo. I do plan on taking some time off to work on my side projects though. Maybe I'll try again...
- grepfru_it 2y agoI’m in the same boat, except now actively planning to take off to work on a side project. Rather than spend another year building a prototype for a potential $100M idea (last two landed me really nice jobs) I have my eyes set on ideas that will generate $3-6M/year that I can realize on my own with minimal/no outside funding. I may apply to this YC round for giggles, but totally get the same feeling as you that I’m probably not good enough in their eyes. As Paul Graham said, if you are out chasing VC funding, you are not building your product. So just going to focus on making my life comfortable and launching another successful product or service. Good luck!
- 999900000999 2y agoWhat market are you targeting 3 to 6 mil a year is amazing for a solo startup. I'm basically a hobbyist game dev outside of work and games are just so risky as a business.
- all2 2y agoI figured solo game devs were more in it for passion rather than anything else. The Choo Choo Charles guy has an interesting YT video on his dev/launch procedure. He basically spent 4 months full time advertising his game after he finished developing it.
- grepfru_it 2y ago- AI (sell them shovels) - Hospice Games should be developed for fun. I would totally fund game development with profits from another venture.
- danenania 2y agoCold emailing or tweeting investors only works if you have eye-popping results to point to or credentials that stand out. Otherwise the way to get to them is via accelerators like YC. And the way to get into accelerators with no credentials is to launch something and get some traction. It doesn’t even need to be a lot of traction. Just having users who use your product regularly puts you near the top of the pile.
- skeeter2020 2y agoI turned 50 this year and have one moderately successful startup experience as a co-founder about 8-10 years ago, but if I do another (which I'm considering) it will either be bootstrapped or I'll look for funding out of my personal network vs. the VC path. This is probably aligned with YC as well; far more than the education expectations in their signalling is (generous interpretation) that they'll trade experience for youthful ambition.