10 ms·

Why I Gave Up A Million Dollar Consultancy

137 points by bdunn 14y ago

cityzen 14y ago
As many others have stated, I appreciate the honesty and am inspired by the success. My question is how much of these revenues from products (info and SAAS) are paid out to affiliates? I would guess the numbers are significant.
- bdunn 14y ago
  $0 - unless AppSumo counts.
  - cityzen 14y ago
    Wow, that is impressive and thanks for the quick reply. Also, how did appsumo work out? Lots of sales?
charlieirish 14y ago
There have been lots of negative comments on 'year in review' or 'launch result' posts like this (see [1], [2] and [3]). However there are a few reasons why I believe HN should respect these as valid, interesting and "On Topic" : 'Anything that good hackers would find interesting'. - Of Interest. It's hard to disagree that posts like this are of interest to hackers and HN readers. The four posts mentioned (linked, [1], [2] and [3]) are scientific and analytical. They go in to detail about how four technically/graphically minded gentlemen have failed or succeeded in their various startups and ideas. They offer an honest appraisal of their own decisions. - Honesty not Arrogance. Many self-absorbed posts are arrogant in their success stories. I see each of these as being honest and humble. This is certainly subjective but I believe them to be modest in their writings. - Education. HN can certainly learn from all three of these posts. I think patio11 put it well when he said: "I would hope that the six-thousand odd words of narrative in the post and copious linked material contains non-obvious useful tidbits such as "You can increase the sales of a mature, six-year old software company by over 60% solely by A/B testing while keeping all other factors constant." - Democratic(ish) Voting. Let's not forget that HN is largely driven by its readers. - Inspirational. I know that many people have taken great inspiration from these posts, particularly those wishing to move in to their own products or to write eBooks. One of those is http://brianfran.co/wroteabook/ http://brianfran.co/wroteabook/ who dedicated his book to Sacha Greif (sgdesign). If HN serves as an inspiration resource to encourage creativity and success, isn't that enough. Whilst not all agree, I would like to say A Very Well Done bdunn, patio11, sgdesign and nathanbarry and thank you for being honest, humble, educational and inspirational. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982416 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982416 [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982649 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982649 [3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4974121 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4974121
- larrys 14y ago
  "Let's not forget that HN is largely driven by its readers." I would add that HN is also driven by the admins. The admins can decide what gets on the front page and what stays there. They are the gatekeeper to being able to gain votes to stay on that page (unless an admin decides to remove something?).
- nikcub 14y ago
  The negative reaction is more to do with the old community being invaded by these new types of posts - a lot of which focus on money (how I made $x in y days doing z), some sort of secret to being wealthy (top x tips on quitting your job and making your first million) or some sort of life shortcut. There are many sub communities within the broader startups and entrepreneurial fields, but what HN used to be was a group of people who were hackers first with interests in stories about other startups, new technology, implementing technology etc. There is an entire other subculture around working from home, the 4 hour work week, SEO, affiliate marketing, how to ship product online, how to write an ebook that can sell for $40 in 24 hours, the micro-ISV space etc. That later group, who would prefer to talk about how they sold $50k worth of software or ebooks, is much larger than the group of hacker entrepreneurs who would much rather read about the latest Javascript library, security exploit or scientific breakthrough. Business of Software, the forum that Joel Spolsky ran for micro-ISV's shut down and it seems everybody came flooding over to HN (or were coming over steadily over the past few years). This means more of that type of content. There can't be more than a few thousand technical (or want to be technical) entrepreneurs, while the group who are interested in breaking away from their career and becoming an ebook affiliate likely numbers in the millions. A lot of those negative comments are, I feel, from frustrated hacker entrepreneurs who know you can make $100k a year online and who don't want to hear that story again. I didn't click on any of those links when I saw the headlines (no offense to the authors, but it just doesn't interest me) and the only reason I clicked on this thread is because I couldn't believe that another thread that mentions an amount of money in the title had again made it to the top of HN. I have gone from clicking on 60-80% of HN headlines to now hitting 10%, on a good day. I bet that if I did click on one of those headlines, that I too would have left a smart-ass cynical comment as well, but i'm passed that stage of protesting submissions that I feel don't belong here and now just move on (except this thread). edit: I realize that I made some sweeping generalizations, I don't mean that people interested in SEO aren't hacker entrepreneurs, I just needed a way to define what are different groups of people in the audience here.
senthilnayagam 14y ago
I know how stressful working for clients can be. Good story for a year of transition, good for you. But not everybody can be a author or a trainer/instructor. but what I feel is, it is more like celebrities making more money by endorsement. Every president who leaves office can get a multi million dollar book deal not the other way round. I converted my niche consultancy into an outsourced product development company, after 6 1/2 years I employ over 150 people, and still believe there is lot of scope for growth in my line of business. If I were you I would spend more time with the product, if needed would create variants or complimentary products. if your company or the product is the brand your business is scalable, but if it is "YOU" then potentially it is a bottleneck. All the best.
antidaily 14y ago
Kudos! To clarify, you still have the consultancy but someone else runs it? Because that should be every consultant's goal. Read the E-Myth.
- bdunn 14y ago
  Correct. We're no longer as large as we once were, but I've taken myself out of operations and get a phone call once a week with a status update.
  - krmmalik 14y ago
    i don't understand why decent comments are being downvoted.
DennisP 14y ago
I recently got the book Million Dollar Consulting and it takes a somewhat different approach to it, starting with "charge weekly for business value delivered, not by the hour." Weiss puts a strong emphasis on having plenty of free time, and is skeptical of hiring employees at all. Probably doesn't work for all types of consultancy though.
- krmmalik 14y ago
  I have that book on my reading list. Would you mind giving me an exec summary in the interim? I would be very grateful.
  - cityzen 14y ago
    The author does a great job of telling you the types of questions to ask to set the stage for value based billing (how will you measure success) but also how to write proposals. I highly recommend this book if you are wasting your life on hourly billing.
    - krmmalik 14y ago
      Thanks for the input. I'm definitely not charging by the hour but I feel I could learn a lot more from the book so I'm definitely going to get to it soon. Did you derive more success from it as a result?
      - cityzen 14y ago
        Honestly, it's hard to say because I have had more success lately but it could be attributed to many things. I would say it has played a role in that but wasn't the single contributing factor. Either way, it is definitely one of the more useful business books I've read and I have recommended it and gifted it to several people.
  - nthj 14y ago
    Basically, charge for the value you provide, not for your time. There's a lot of other interesting tips & strategies in there, but that was my main takeaway.
nathanbarry 14y ago
Such a great story. Glad to see you making these changes. My favorite part of the article is your income graph (though it needs a legend). Two things are completely fascinating to me about your story: - The consistent, predictable growth of Planscope month over month. Even when you have roller coaster revenue from other projects, Planscope provides a solid base. - How you are using multiple products to feed off of each other. Selling the book to Planscope customers, then using the book as a gateway drug to get more Planscope customers and finally selling the class. Very well done. Thanks for teaching me so much!
- bdunn 14y ago
  Duh! * Blue line - Planscope * Yellow line - Books * Green line - Workshop Thanks Nathan!
  - adambenayoun 14y ago
    Out of all the lines you have there - the blue line is the more interesting (hopefully you'll be able to accelerate that growth).
    - nathanbarry 14y ago
      If growth continues at those percentages revenue will start to look more like a hockey stick.
jere 14y ago
I'm a really big fan of Brennan, Patrick, and Amy. But there's a pattern here that makes me very nervous: * Huge success with consulting and it seems quite reliable * Huge success on information products, which are sold exclusively to developers/freelancers * Impressive, but somewhat less success on actual apps (often sold to developers/freelancers) So the disturbing part is products seem really fricking hard, unless you include information products in which case they are gold. I've been following (and rooting for) some of these people for a while and even after years it's a bit depressing that they couldn't make a decent salary off their best web applications. And what's worse is it feels like the only people we hear about finding success are those that are selling to us.
- uezr 14y ago
  I really have to echo this sentiment. Let me preface this by saying I have the utmost respect for all of these people. They're doing exactly what I want to do (SaaS products), and I follow each of their stories closely. However, it can be disheartening when I see Product X owner posting "I made 6 figures this year!", only to open the post and see 10% of their income is from Product X, and the other 90% is selling information to people on how to create their own product X (often accompanied by doing consulting gigs for other people). I know the info products are high quality, but it still feels a little 'spammy'. One of the reasons I'm getting into SaaS and not employment/consulting is because I want to work on my own schedule, on my own products, while traveling the world, without having to answer to anybody else, while still making more money than I could working as a developer in the Valley. Regardless of this, I still fully believe it can be done. As a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation, if Planscope's growth stays on the exact same linear growth path for 2013, it will make over $110k for the year. But I predict it will make a whole lot more than that as Brennan increases marketing and develops reliable customer acquisition channels resulting in exponential growth. Looking forward to the end of 2013 reports!
  - ahoyhere 14y ago
    Yeah, it's definitely disheartening that success takes time and the willingness to do different things to make it work. Really disappointing how life isn't like a movie. Also, hate to disappoint you again, but when it comes to a paying product, "exponential growth" is a unicorn. Just cuz Github can make it work doesn't mean anyone else can.
lucian303 14y ago
Thank you for writing such an honest post. Your courage is great and your view of work to live rather than live to work which has obviously changed quickly is inspiring. I too had this revelation a couple of years ago, but have always thought it too risky. Which is funny. Riskier than a 4 person startup at 1/3 of my rate? Hardly. I wish you the best for this upcoming new year and look forward to reading more about personal achievements.
gavingmiller 14y ago
To counter some of the negative sentiment around "selling to developers" I'd like to share a bit of what Brennan's advice has done for my consultancy business. One of my partners took Brennan's Consultancy Masterclass and here are some of the outcomes: * Took two of our "do work once a year" clients into a monthly retainer relationships which will bring in an additional $20,000+ revenue annually. * Changed our estimating process to value-based, fixed bids. Projects previously estimated at $5,000ish are now closer to $8,000ish, and prospect clients are biting just as hard... harder actually. * Hard data: two new clients are in the door grossing an additional $6,200 above what we originally would have grossed... and are both interested in ongoing retainers :) Brennan knows his stuff. His advice has moved the needle on my business. And we've only implemented a fraction of that advice.
- StavrosK 14y ago
  How does a retainer work? Fixed hours for fixed pay per month?
  - gavingmiller 14y ago
    In a nutshell yes. We also bundled in some additional value added services to that retainer.
    - StavrosK 14y ago
      Interesting, thank you. I should think about doing that with a few small clients as well.
- lscott3 14y ago
  Those are some good numbers! It's key to have an open mind about learning new things to help improve your business or anything else for that matter. I think what happens to most people following advice from others is that they are not "dumb enough" to go with it. They just look for reasons on why tactics can't work instead of really giving them a shot.
  - 14y ago
photorized 14y ago
What struck me is that $1M in revenue from 10 people is low.
- bdunn 14y ago
  It was closer to 2 million, but it could have been much higher. It helps to also be in a lower cost of living area, and included in that count were support people.
  - photorized 14y ago
    Thanks for clarifying. With 2M, and if support folks were included, you were getting nice output, actually. What turned me off consulting eventually (even though the money was good), was the concept of wasting my life bringing other people's ideas to fruition, while neglecting my own. From the moment I realized that, it became an easy decision for me.
smallegan 14y ago
When someone says Million Dollar Consultancy I'm guessing that means over 1 Million Gross? If that is the case I'd be more interested in how profitable the consultancy was. 10 employees alone could eat up most of $1 million.
- lostlogin 14y ago
  Good point - your answer is what I was looking for. I was wondering how on earth he could have little in the way of savings when earning a million a year. This might be how.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
- ky3 14y ago
  Numbers coming out of America are always revenue. It's a lower bound of value delivered. So with a Million Dollar Consultancy, the value unlocked is upside of a million dollars. All that value goes into a global account called Civilizational Progress.
a1n1o1n 14y ago
When discussing this recent HN phenomenon, consider this: Seniors in high school often have to be very conscientious when posting their college acceptances. In the age of Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, students have developed a tacit moral code. That is, anyone who posts "I got into Princeton!" comes off as inconsiderate and oblivious to other peoples' rejections. That is not to say that they are those things; just that they appear that way. Fortunately, I've seen a promising trend where students will refrain from posting these self-lauding statuses. If anything, they'll wait it out before announcing their college decision. With HN, the situation is more difficult. Entrepreneurs are constantly failing. The holidays are an especially difficult time for many of us, as we reflect on the previous year and everything that went wrong. HN needs to develop some sort of a moral code. Many of us are incredibly sensitive to subject matters like these. I'm not suggesting that people refrain entirely from posting their 'year in review.' Rather, I suggest people deeply consider the others on HN before they go ahead posting their earnings to the penny or submitting their own blog posts to HN, boasting their million dollars. Evidently, it comes off as rude to many users. Rather than complaining that people are so intensely jealous, maybe we should find a way to convey the same messages without evoking such jealousy. Believe it or not, it is possible.

137 points by bdunn 14y ago

As many others have stated, I appreciate the honesty and am inspired by the success. My question is how much of these revenues from products (info and SAAS) are paid out to affiliates? I would guess the numbers are significant.

bdunn 14y ago
$0 - unless AppSumo counts.
- cityzen 14y ago
  Wow, that is impressive and thanks for the quick reply. Also, how did appsumo work out? Lots of sales?

charlieirish 14y ago

There have been lots of negative comments on 'year in review' or 'launch result' posts like this (see [1], [2] and [3]). However there are a few reasons why I believe HN should respect these as valid, interesting and "On Topic" : 'Anything that good hackers would find interesting'. - Of Interest. It's hard to disagree that posts like this are of interest to hackers and HN readers. The four posts mentioned (linked, [1], [2] and [3]) are scientific and analytical. They go in to detail about how four technically/graphically minded gentlemen have failed or succeeded in their various startups and ideas. They offer an honest appraisal of their own decisions. - Honesty not Arrogance. Many self-absorbed posts are arrogant in their success stories. I see each of these as being honest and humble. This is certainly subjective but I believe them to be modest in their writings. - Education. HN can certainly learn from all three of these posts. I think patio11 put it well when he said: "I would hope that the six-thousand odd words of narrative in the post and copious linked material contains non-obvious useful tidbits such as "You can increase the sales of a mature, six-year old software company by over 60% solely by A/B testing while keeping all other factors constant." - Democratic(ish) Voting. Let's not forget that HN is largely driven by its readers. - Inspirational. I know that many people have taken great inspiration from these posts, particularly those wishing to move in to their own products or to write eBooks. One of those is http://brianfran.co/wroteabook/ http://brianfran.co/wroteabook/ who dedicated his book to Sacha Greif (sgdesign). If HN serves as an inspiration resource to encourage creativity and success, isn't that enough. Whilst not all agree, I would like to say A Very Well Done bdunn, patio11, sgdesign and nathanbarry and thank you for being honest, humble, educational and inspirational. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982416 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982416 [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982649 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4982649 [3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4974121 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4974121

larrys 14y ago
"Let's not forget that HN is largely driven by its readers." I would add that HN is also driven by the admins. The admins can decide what gets on the front page and what stays there. They are the gatekeeper to being able to gain votes to stay on that page (unless an admin decides to remove something?).
nikcub 14y ago
The negative reaction is more to do with the old community being invaded by these new types of posts - a lot of which focus on money (how I made $x in y days doing z), some sort of secret to being wealthy (top x tips on quitting your job and making your first million) or some sort of life shortcut. There are many sub communities within the broader startups and entrepreneurial fields, but what HN used to be was a group of people who were hackers first with interests in stories about other startups, new technology, implementing technology etc. There is an entire other subculture around working from home, the 4 hour work week, SEO, affiliate marketing, how to ship product online, how to write an ebook that can sell for $40 in 24 hours, the micro-ISV space etc. That later group, who would prefer to talk about how they sold $50k worth of software or ebooks, is much larger than the group of hacker entrepreneurs who would much rather read about the latest Javascript library, security exploit or scientific breakthrough. Business of Software, the forum that Joel Spolsky ran for micro-ISV's shut down and it seems everybody came flooding over to HN (or were coming over steadily over the past few years). This means more of that type of content. There can't be more than a few thousand technical (or want to be technical) entrepreneurs, while the group who are interested in breaking away from their career and becoming an ebook affiliate likely numbers in the millions. A lot of those negative comments are, I feel, from frustrated hacker entrepreneurs who know you can make $100k a year online and who don't want to hear that story again. I didn't click on any of those links when I saw the headlines (no offense to the authors, but it just doesn't interest me) and the only reason I clicked on this thread is because I couldn't believe that another thread that mentions an amount of money in the title had again made it to the top of HN. I have gone from clicking on 60-80% of HN headlines to now hitting 10%, on a good day. I bet that if I did click on one of those headlines, that I too would have left a smart-ass cynical comment as well, but i'm passed that stage of protesting submissions that I feel don't belong here and now just move on (except this thread). edit: I realize that I made some sweeping generalizations, I don't mean that people interested in SEO aren't hacker entrepreneurs, I just needed a way to define what are different groups of people in the audience here.

senthilnayagam 14y ago

I know how stressful working for clients can be. Good story for a year of transition, good for you. But not everybody can be a author or a trainer/instructor. but what I feel is, it is more like celebrities making more money by endorsement. Every president who leaves office can get a multi million dollar book deal not the other way round. I converted my niche consultancy into an outsourced product development company, after 6 1/2 years I employ over 150 people, and still believe there is lot of scope for growth in my line of business. If I were you I would spend more time with the product, if needed would create variants or complimentary products. if your company or the product is the brand your business is scalable, but if it is "YOU" then potentially it is a bottleneck. All the best.

antidaily 14y ago

Kudos! To clarify, you still have the consultancy but someone else runs it? Because that should be every consultant's goal. Read the E-Myth.

bdunn 14y ago
Correct. We're no longer as large as we once were, but I've taken myself out of operations and get a phone call once a week with a status update.
- krmmalik 14y ago
  i don't understand why decent comments are being downvoted.

DennisP 14y ago

I recently got the book Million Dollar Consulting and it takes a somewhat different approach to it, starting with "charge weekly for business value delivered, not by the hour." Weiss puts a strong emphasis on having plenty of free time, and is skeptical of hiring employees at all. Probably doesn't work for all types of consultancy though.

krmmalik 14y ago
I have that book on my reading list. Would you mind giving me an exec summary in the interim? I would be very grateful.
- cityzen 14y ago
  The author does a great job of telling you the types of questions to ask to set the stage for value based billing (how will you measure success) but also how to write proposals. I highly recommend this book if you are wasting your life on hourly billing.
  - krmmalik 14y ago
    Thanks for the input. I'm definitely not charging by the hour but I feel I could learn a lot more from the book so I'm definitely going to get to it soon. Did you derive more success from it as a result?
    - cityzen 14y ago
      Honestly, it's hard to say because I have had more success lately but it could be attributed to many things. I would say it has played a role in that but wasn't the single contributing factor. Either way, it is definitely one of the more useful business books I've read and I have recommended it and gifted it to several people.
- nthj 14y ago
  Basically, charge for the value you provide, not for your time. There's a lot of other interesting tips & strategies in there, but that was my main takeaway.

nathanbarry 14y ago

Such a great story. Glad to see you making these changes. My favorite part of the article is your income graph (though it needs a legend). Two things are completely fascinating to me about your story: - The consistent, predictable growth of Planscope month over month. Even when you have roller coaster revenue from other projects, Planscope provides a solid base. - How you are using multiple products to feed off of each other. Selling the book to Planscope customers, then using the book as a gateway drug to get more Planscope customers and finally selling the class. Very well done. Thanks for teaching me so much!

bdunn 14y ago
Duh! * Blue line - Planscope * Yellow line - Books * Green line - Workshop Thanks Nathan!
- adambenayoun 14y ago
  Out of all the lines you have there - the blue line is the more interesting (hopefully you'll be able to accelerate that growth).
  - nathanbarry 14y ago
    If growth continues at those percentages revenue will start to look more like a hockey stick.

jere 14y ago

I'm a really big fan of Brennan, Patrick, and Amy. But there's a pattern here that makes me very nervous: * Huge success with consulting and it seems quite reliable * Huge success on information products, which are sold exclusively to developers/freelancers * Impressive, but somewhat less success on actual apps (often sold to developers/freelancers) So the disturbing part is products seem really fricking hard, unless you include information products in which case they are gold. I've been following (and rooting for) some of these people for a while and even after years it's a bit depressing that they couldn't make a decent salary off their best web applications. And what's worse is it feels like the only people we hear about finding success are those that are selling to us.

uezr 14y ago
I really have to echo this sentiment. Let me preface this by saying I have the utmost respect for all of these people. They're doing exactly what I want to do (SaaS products), and I follow each of their stories closely. However, it can be disheartening when I see Product X owner posting "I made 6 figures this year!", only to open the post and see 10% of their income is from Product X, and the other 90% is selling information to people on how to create their own product X (often accompanied by doing consulting gigs for other people). I know the info products are high quality, but it still feels a little 'spammy'. One of the reasons I'm getting into SaaS and not employment/consulting is because I want to work on my own schedule, on my own products, while traveling the world, without having to answer to anybody else, while still making more money than I could working as a developer in the Valley. Regardless of this, I still fully believe it can be done. As a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation, if Planscope's growth stays on the exact same linear growth path for 2013, it will make over $110k for the year. But I predict it will make a whole lot more than that as Brennan increases marketing and develops reliable customer acquisition channels resulting in exponential growth. Looking forward to the end of 2013 reports!
- ahoyhere 14y ago
  Yeah, it's definitely disheartening that success takes time and the willingness to do different things to make it work. Really disappointing how life isn't like a movie. Also, hate to disappoint you again, but when it comes to a paying product, "exponential growth" is a unicorn. Just cuz Github can make it work doesn't mean anyone else can.

lucian303 14y ago

Thank you for writing such an honest post. Your courage is great and your view of work to live rather than live to work which has obviously changed quickly is inspiring. I too had this revelation a couple of years ago, but have always thought it too risky. Which is funny. Riskier than a 4 person startup at 1/3 of my rate? Hardly. I wish you the best for this upcoming new year and look forward to reading more about personal achievements.

gavingmiller 14y ago

To counter some of the negative sentiment around "selling to developers" I'd like to share a bit of what Brennan's advice has done for my consultancy business. One of my partners took Brennan's Consultancy Masterclass and here are some of the outcomes: * Took two of our "do work once a year" clients into a monthly retainer relationships which will bring in an additional $20,000+ revenue annually. * Changed our estimating process to value-based, fixed bids. Projects previously estimated at $5,000ish are now closer to $8,000ish, and prospect clients are biting just as hard... harder actually. * Hard data: two new clients are in the door grossing an additional $6,200 above what we originally would have grossed... and are both interested in ongoing retainers :) Brennan knows his stuff. His advice has moved the needle on my business. And we've only implemented a fraction of that advice.

StavrosK 14y ago
How does a retainer work? Fixed hours for fixed pay per month?
- gavingmiller 14y ago
  In a nutshell yes. We also bundled in some additional value added services to that retainer.
  - StavrosK 14y ago
    Interesting, thank you. I should think about doing that with a few small clients as well.
lscott3 14y ago
Those are some good numbers! It's key to have an open mind about learning new things to help improve your business or anything else for that matter. I think what happens to most people following advice from others is that they are not "dumb enough" to go with it. They just look for reasons on why tactics can't work instead of really giving them a shot.
- 14y ago

photorized 14y ago

What struck me is that $1M in revenue from 10 people is low.

bdunn 14y ago
It was closer to 2 million, but it could have been much higher. It helps to also be in a lower cost of living area, and included in that count were support people.
- photorized 14y ago
  Thanks for clarifying. With 2M, and if support folks were included, you were getting nice output, actually. What turned me off consulting eventually (even though the money was good), was the concept of wasting my life bringing other people's ideas to fruition, while neglecting my own. From the moment I realized that, it became an easy decision for me.

smallegan 14y ago

When someone says Million Dollar Consultancy I'm guessing that means over 1 Million Gross? If that is the case I'd be more interested in how profitable the consultancy was. 10 employees alone could eat up most of $1 million.

lostlogin 14y ago
Good point - your answer is what I was looking for. I was wondering how on earth he could have little in the way of savings when earning a million a year. This might be how.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
ky3 14y ago
Numbers coming out of America are always revenue. It's a lower bound of value delivered. So with a Million Dollar Consultancy, the value unlocked is upside of a million dollars. All that value goes into a global account called Civilizational Progress.

a1n1o1n 14y ago

When discussing this recent HN phenomenon, consider this: Seniors in high school often have to be very conscientious when posting their college acceptances. In the age of Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, students have developed a tacit moral code. That is, anyone who posts "I got into Princeton!" comes off as inconsiderate and oblivious to other peoples' rejections. That is not to say that they are those things; just that they appear that way. Fortunately, I've seen a promising trend where students will refrain from posting these self-lauding statuses. If anything, they'll wait it out before announcing their college decision. With HN, the situation is more difficult. Entrepreneurs are constantly failing. The holidays are an especially difficult time for many of us, as we reflect on the previous year and everything that went wrong. HN needs to develop some sort of a moral code. Many of us are incredibly sensitive to subject matters like these. I'm not suggesting that people refrain entirely from posting their 'year in review.' Rather, I suggest people deeply consider the others on HN before they go ahead posting their earnings to the penny or submitting their own blog posts to HN, boasting their million dollars. Evidently, it comes off as rude to many users. Rather than complaining that people are so intensely jealous, maybe we should find a way to convey the same messages without evoking such jealousy. Believe it or not, it is possible.