6 ms·

Dangerous pieces of startup advice

100 points by adityar 13y ago

struppi 13y ago
A very nice article, although I do not agree with everything in there. I guess you just can not be successful just by copying what others did. Especially not when you do not understand why you should do it or how it contributed to their success. Somewhat offtopic: I do not work in the startup scene, but I have experience something similar a couple of times when traditional companies try to do agile. They see something that works very well for somebody, bring in a consultant (hopefully!) and start doing everything she says. Without really understanding it. But it's just rituals then, and the rituals alone don't work. That's called "cargo cult" or "scrum but" sometimes, though I have my problems with those words too (http://davidtanzer.net/scrum_but http://davidtanzer.net/scrum_but)...
DoubleMalt 13y ago
I think the author misunderstood "Fake it till you make it". The point of this (as I understand it) is, that very often the most efficient method for small numbers is different from the method you need to scale up. For example it might be easier to manually provision servers for your first 100 customers if you have a aaS business than starting out with a bullet proof automatic provisioning system before you even know that more than 3 people will want to use it. Or it might initially be easier to manually check registrations for a market place before moving over to a more streamlined process. So you "fake" scalability. Of course you should never fake services.
- arkitaip 13y ago
  I've never heard fake in being used in the fashion you're suggesting, which is by far the most generous interpretation of the term I've heard.
  - DoubleMalt 13y ago
    Well, one instance that might partly support my interpretation of the phrase is here: http://www.inc.com/karl-and-bill/best-advice-fake-it-until-you-make-it.html http://www.inc.com/karl-and-bill/best-advice-fake-it-until-y... Admittedly my interpretation is even more generous, maybe because I tend always to see the good in people ;)
  - jonathanjaeger 13y ago
    I've heard it used in a similar context, but more so on faking your seemingly automated features by manually doing them yourself (and only building in automation once you've proven the concept). More generally, I think "fake it 'till you make it" is better reserved for selling the vision of where you want to go even if it's not completed yet. You don't have to lie, you just have to inspire.
- mgkimsal 13y ago
  As the other poster said, I've never heard your interpretation, and you're being too diplomatic/optimistic in your interpretation (or perhaps too geek/tech focused). I first heard "fake it till you make it" 20+ years ago in MLM/Amway circles. Never joined, but had known some people involved, and that was part of the schtick in motivational presentations (much like "you gotta be in it to win it" is used for lottery ticket sales). The gist in MLM was you need to present an image of success to your downline, whether you're actually successful (yet) or not. Drive a bigger car, get fancier clothes, talk about your vacations, etc., to give the impression that 'the business' is already providing those things. In turn, people will be impressed, join up, and then you'll 'make it'. Sick and twisted. Perhaps there are legitimate other uses of the phrase, but many people have heard it used in that context, and it's the primary one I associate it with. That doesn't mean you can't do what you're suggesting, but I agree with the other poster, I think you're being too generous. I think the 'fake it' crowd know who they are, and sometimes it's easy to spot them - going to too many conferences, talking/blogging about how great everything is, vs just doing stuff to progress a business.
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    Perhaps there are legitimate other uses of the phrase, but many people have heard it used in that context, and it's the primary one I associate it with. I first heard the expression in the PUA community. Guys who are too shy to talk to women, and who struggle to get dates, are taught "routines" and "openers" and other "canned" conversational gambits to use, with the idea being that you can go out, "open" women using some stock opener, and have a good conversation (even if it doesn't ultimately lead anywhere). Over time, your confidence improves because you realize that there isn't actually any reason to be scared to talking to women, and you graduate from needing the "canned" material to just being your natural self. "Received wisdom" says that confidence is very important to women as a criteria that they judge men on, so you "fake" the confidence until you "make it" and have the confidence for real.
  - yajoe 13y ago
    For those who aren't aware or understand the reference, Amway is commonly understood and used as a metonym for pyramid schemes in the US. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amway#Controversy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amway#Controversy (Thanks for your post)
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
glurgh 13y ago
Social is not a feature, nor is it a differentiator and it‘s not a topping that can be added like salami for a pizza. We‘re humans so pretty much everything we do is social. But it is a feature, it might be an important feature, a popular feature, a feature with a currently eager and responsive market/investment climate. Then again plenty of useful software has been written in the last few decades that is not 'social'. Neither Unix nor Photoshop are social. Going to the bathroom or balancing your checkbook is not social. Meta-advice might be any advice that rationalizes itself by using the word 'humans' is probably wrong.
- marcosdumay 13y ago
  Unix is social. Where do you think the Internet comes from? It started as a social network of people sharing data in tapes.
danso 13y ago
Some of this advice is appallingly facile: for instance: > 7. “Turn your passion into a business” If, like me, your passion is laying around on the couch in your underwear and eating chocolate then I wouldn’t assume there’s anything profitable in that. Problems are profitable. Passions, not so much Hello, if your main passions in life are laying around on the couch in your underwear, then maybe you shouldn't launch a startup. Second, it's hard to think of a successful startup that isn't rooted in at least one of its cowfounder's passions. The founders of Google and Facebook, respectively, really did want to organize the world's information and get laid. The OP links to this article, also by the OP: http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet In it, the OP slams the stupidity of music startups, including such, I guess, loser startups as Spotify and SoundCloud...seems like the OP has a standard for immediate return on investment that most startups would never meet. Certainly, we wouldn't have Google or Facebook if their founders followed this advice.
- calinet6 13y ago
  > Hello, if your main passions in life are laying around on the couch in your underwear, then maybe you shouldn't launch a startup. This is appallingly haughty. There are dozens of reasons to lay around on the couch in your underwear, the important thing is that you find a reason not to also.
  - danso 13y ago
    I thought about expounding on this but figured the main OP's error of conflation was so obvious that it wasn't worth it. "Lying on the couch" is not really a passion, it's a way to rest/recuperate/replenish your emotional reserve, insert-something-from-Daniel-Kahneman-here, etc. So when the OP uses it as an example of a passion to argue that making businesses from passions is a stupid, dangerous idea...sorry, isn't the logical fallacy here pretty obvious?
    - calinet6 13y ago
      Of course it is, but apparently the joke isn't very obvious. Yeah he's making fun of passion; he's using a hyperbole to illustrate the anti-passion he's talking about. He's not using a perfect logical argument to say that having passion is a bad thing; he's making a joke about people who are overtly passionate about their startup to the point where it blinds them to the forces outside themselves to which they should also be paying attention. I've struggled with this as well. My passions first and foremost are science, art, design, photography, literature, philosophy. I am not passionate about sitting behind a computer screen for 12 hours a day. I do it anyway because I want to build something of value and use my full potential to do so. Following my passion is not what I'm always doing with my time; sometimes I have to put my passions aside and get down to digging. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-be-of-use/ http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-be-of-use/ It is fun and illogical to joke about this: if I had my way I might be a nature photographer, following in the footsteps of David Muench, Galen Rowell, and Ansel Adams. I could make a modest living maybe, but it would be a hard path and it wouldn't scale—basically it wouldn't have the large impact I believe I have the potential to contribute using technology. Could I integrate all of this into my work? Of course. And I do. But if I was to follow that passion alone like a Ahab's whale, I may not reach something of true value: there's not a big problem to solve in the nature photography space. Or heck maybe there is, but probably not a good one, or maybe the market is already too crowded, or maybe that's too much of a niche. The point being: simply going after my passion isn't going to net me something of real value to the world. I have to widen my perspective a bit. In other words, I have to get off the couch and get dressed. That's the sarcastic joke. In fact, he linked to an article about the subject: http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet -- It's pretty good. He's not saying "passion is always bad"—he's saying that passion is an inward pulling force, it blinds you to an outside perspective, and that you should be aware of that and balance your passion with the world at large. Excellent advice.
calinet6 13y ago
This is one of the most downright realistic, insightful, and well-balanced articles on startups I've read in a long time. Don't overthink it folks: it's not like he's saying that every bit of critique he throws out is correct. I mean, look at him, he's basically saying "take all that constantly regurgitated advice with a grain of salt." If you don't think it's a little tongue-in-cheek then you're missing the point. And the point is: have some perspective. Don't take any of this advice as dogma, and don't take any of this stuff too seriously. Take your work seriously instead.
skizm 13y ago
> Passion is no longer a differentiator, it’s a prerequisite. It’s why you’re at the race, but it’s not the reason you’ll win. This is just great life advice. If you want to be the best (or even really good) at something, you can't just want it the most. Everyone wants it.
usaar333 13y ago
> 8. “If we build it, they will come” > " For every minute you spend building it, for every dollar you spend building it, you need to do the same marketing it." I'd love to see a discussion on this tip. I certainly agree that they might not come if you build it, but I tend to think that is mainly because they (the customers) don't exist - that is, the market the early stage start-up's product serves is not large enough. Other materials I've read actually argue that early stage start-ups (pre-product/market fit) often spend too much time and money on marketing. e.g. this post by Andreesen: http://web.archive.org/web/20070701074943/http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/06/the-pmarca-gu-2.html http://web.archive.org/web/20070701074943/http://blog.pmarca....
- rpedela 13y ago
  Link doesn't work for me?
  - usaar333 13y ago
    Sorry, fixed
ArekDymalski 13y ago
Actually "Build it and they'll come" used to be a good motto,when technical side was the biggest challenge. I guess it was pretty motivating then. Today when it's much easier thanks to many frameworks,APIs and generally available technologies it's a myth indeed. It was replaced by "Hack the growth and they'll come" which soon will also turn in deceptive myth I believe.

100 points by adityar 13y ago

A very nice article, although I do not agree with everything in there. I guess you just can not be successful just by copying what others did. Especially not when you do not understand why you should do it or how it contributed to their success. Somewhat offtopic: I do not work in the startup scene, but I have experience something similar a couple of times when traditional companies try to do agile. They see something that works very well for somebody, bring in a consultant (hopefully!) and start doing everything she says. Without really understanding it. But it's just rituals then, and the rituals alone don't work. That's called "cargo cult" or "scrum but" sometimes, though I have my problems with those words too (http://davidtanzer.net/scrum_but http://davidtanzer.net/scrum_but)...

DoubleMalt 13y ago

I think the author misunderstood "Fake it till you make it". The point of this (as I understand it) is, that very often the most efficient method for small numbers is different from the method you need to scale up. For example it might be easier to manually provision servers for your first 100 customers if you have a aaS business than starting out with a bullet proof automatic provisioning system before you even know that more than 3 people will want to use it. Or it might initially be easier to manually check registrations for a market place before moving over to a more streamlined process. So you "fake" scalability. Of course you should never fake services.

arkitaip 13y ago
I've never heard fake in being used in the fashion you're suggesting, which is by far the most generous interpretation of the term I've heard.
- DoubleMalt 13y ago
  Well, one instance that might partly support my interpretation of the phrase is here: http://www.inc.com/karl-and-bill/best-advice-fake-it-until-you-make-it.html http://www.inc.com/karl-and-bill/best-advice-fake-it-until-y... Admittedly my interpretation is even more generous, maybe because I tend always to see the good in people ;)
- jonathanjaeger 13y ago
  I've heard it used in a similar context, but more so on faking your seemingly automated features by manually doing them yourself (and only building in automation once you've proven the concept). More generally, I think "fake it 'till you make it" is better reserved for selling the vision of where you want to go even if it's not completed yet. You don't have to lie, you just have to inspire.
mgkimsal 13y ago
As the other poster said, I've never heard your interpretation, and you're being too diplomatic/optimistic in your interpretation (or perhaps too geek/tech focused). I first heard "fake it till you make it" 20+ years ago in MLM/Amway circles. Never joined, but had known some people involved, and that was part of the schtick in motivational presentations (much like "you gotta be in it to win it" is used for lottery ticket sales). The gist in MLM was you need to present an image of success to your downline, whether you're actually successful (yet) or not. Drive a bigger car, get fancier clothes, talk about your vacations, etc., to give the impression that 'the business' is already providing those things. In turn, people will be impressed, join up, and then you'll 'make it'. Sick and twisted. Perhaps there are legitimate other uses of the phrase, but many people have heard it used in that context, and it's the primary one I associate it with. That doesn't mean you can't do what you're suggesting, but I agree with the other poster, I think you're being too generous. I think the 'fake it' crowd know who they are, and sometimes it's easy to spot them - going to too many conferences, talking/blogging about how great everything is, vs just doing stuff to progress a business.
- mindcrime 13y ago
  Perhaps there are legitimate other uses of the phrase, but many people have heard it used in that context, and it's the primary one I associate it with. I first heard the expression in the PUA community. Guys who are too shy to talk to women, and who struggle to get dates, are taught "routines" and "openers" and other "canned" conversational gambits to use, with the idea being that you can go out, "open" women using some stock opener, and have a good conversation (even if it doesn't ultimately lead anywhere). Over time, your confidence improves because you realize that there isn't actually any reason to be scared to talking to women, and you graduate from needing the "canned" material to just being your natural self. "Received wisdom" says that confidence is very important to women as a criteria that they judge men on, so you "fake" the confidence until you "make it" and have the confidence for real.
- yajoe 13y ago
  For those who aren't aware or understand the reference, Amway is commonly understood and used as a metonym for pyramid schemes in the US. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amway#Controversy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amway#Controversy (Thanks for your post)

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

glurgh 13y ago

Social is not a feature, nor is it a differentiator and it‘s not a topping that can be added like salami for a pizza. We‘re humans so pretty much everything we do is social. But it is a feature, it might be an important feature, a popular feature, a feature with a currently eager and responsive market/investment climate. Then again plenty of useful software has been written in the last few decades that is not 'social'. Neither Unix nor Photoshop are social. Going to the bathroom or balancing your checkbook is not social. Meta-advice might be any advice that rationalizes itself by using the word 'humans' is probably wrong.

marcosdumay 13y ago
Unix is social. Where do you think the Internet comes from? It started as a social network of people sharing data in tapes.

danso 13y ago

Some of this advice is appallingly facile: for instance: > 7. “Turn your passion into a business” If, like me, your passion is laying around on the couch in your underwear and eating chocolate then I wouldn’t assume there’s anything profitable in that. Problems are profitable. Passions, not so much Hello, if your main passions in life are laying around on the couch in your underwear, then maybe you shouldn't launch a startup. Second, it's hard to think of a successful startup that isn't rooted in at least one of its cowfounder's passions. The founders of Google and Facebook, respectively, really did want to organize the world's information and get laid. The OP links to this article, also by the OP: http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet In it, the OP slams the stupidity of music startups, including such, I guess, loser startups as Spotify and SoundCloud...seems like the OP has a standard for immediate return on investment that most startups would never meet. Certainly, we wouldn't have Google or Facebook if their founders followed this advice.

calinet6 13y ago
> Hello, if your main passions in life are laying around on the couch in your underwear, then maybe you shouldn't launch a startup. This is appallingly haughty. There are dozens of reasons to lay around on the couch in your underwear, the important thing is that you find a reason not to also.
- danso 13y ago
  I thought about expounding on this but figured the main OP's error of conflation was so obvious that it wasn't worth it. "Lying on the couch" is not really a passion, it's a way to rest/recuperate/replenish your emotional reserve, insert-something-from-Daniel-Kahneman-here, etc. So when the OP uses it as an example of a passion to argue that making businesses from passions is a stupid, dangerous idea...sorry, isn't the logical fallacy here pretty obvious?
  - calinet6 13y ago
    Of course it is, but apparently the joke isn't very obvious. Yeah he's making fun of passion; he's using a hyperbole to illustrate the anti-passion he's talking about. He's not using a perfect logical argument to say that having passion is a bad thing; he's making a joke about people who are overtly passionate about their startup to the point where it blinds them to the forces outside themselves to which they should also be paying attention. I've struggled with this as well. My passions first and foremost are science, art, design, photography, literature, philosophy. I am not passionate about sitting behind a computer screen for 12 hours a day. I do it anyway because I want to build something of value and use my full potential to do so. Following my passion is not what I'm always doing with my time; sometimes I have to put my passions aside and get down to digging. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-be-of-use/ http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-be-of-use/ It is fun and illogical to joke about this: if I had my way I might be a nature photographer, following in the footsteps of David Muench, Galen Rowell, and Ansel Adams. I could make a modest living maybe, but it would be a hard path and it wouldn't scale—basically it wouldn't have the large impact I believe I have the potential to contribute using technology. Could I integrate all of this into my work? Of course. And I do. But if I was to follow that passion alone like a Ahab's whale, I may not reach something of true value: there's not a big problem to solve in the nature photography space. Or heck maybe there is, but probably not a good one, or maybe the market is already too crowded, or maybe that's too much of a niche. The point being: simply going after my passion isn't going to net me something of real value to the world. I have to widen my perspective a bit. In other words, I have to get off the couch and get dressed. That's the sarcastic joke. In fact, he linked to an article about the subject: http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet http://venturevillage.eu/sweet-poison-of-the-internet -- It's pretty good. He's not saying "passion is always bad"—he's saying that passion is an inward pulling force, it blinds you to an outside perspective, and that you should be aware of that and balance your passion with the world at large. Excellent advice.

calinet6 13y ago

This is one of the most downright realistic, insightful, and well-balanced articles on startups I've read in a long time. Don't overthink it folks: it's not like he's saying that every bit of critique he throws out is correct. I mean, look at him, he's basically saying "take all that constantly regurgitated advice with a grain of salt." If you don't think it's a little tongue-in-cheek then you're missing the point. And the point is: have some perspective. Don't take any of this advice as dogma, and don't take any of this stuff too seriously. Take your work seriously instead.

skizm 13y ago

> Passion is no longer a differentiator, it’s a prerequisite. It’s why you’re at the race, but it’s not the reason you’ll win. This is just great life advice. If you want to be the best (or even really good) at something, you can't just want it the most. Everyone wants it.

usaar333 13y ago

> 8. “If we build it, they will come” > " For every minute you spend building it, for every dollar you spend building it, you need to do the same marketing it." I'd love to see a discussion on this tip. I certainly agree that they might not come if you build it, but I tend to think that is mainly because they (the customers) don't exist - that is, the market the early stage start-up's product serves is not large enough. Other materials I've read actually argue that early stage start-ups (pre-product/market fit) often spend too much time and money on marketing. e.g. this post by Andreesen: http://web.archive.org/web/20070701074943/http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/06/the-pmarca-gu-2.html http://web.archive.org/web/20070701074943/http://blog.pmarca....

rpedela 13y ago
Link doesn't work for me?
- usaar333 13y ago
  Sorry, fixed

ArekDymalski 13y ago

Actually "Build it and they'll come" used to be a good motto,when technical side was the biggest challenge. I guess it was pretty motivating then. Today when it's much easier thanks to many frameworks,APIs and generally available technologies it's a myth indeed. It was replaced by "Hack the growth and they'll come" which soon will also turn in deceptive myth I believe.