portman

32 ms·

271.
by portman 16y ago
That's a great question. The financial goal of a startup is (often) to generate a lifetime of wealth in 3-4 years of intense work. After 3-4 years, a startup will either succeed or fold. Because the timeframe is bounded , it's possible for
272.
by portman 16y ago
Of course. If revenues begin to cover our own salaries, then we'll increase to market rates. But until then, we're all committed to making our seed round last as long as humanly possible.
273.
by portman 16y ago
Wait until you hear the awesome propaganda music we play every morning.
274.
by portman 16y ago
A lot of people seem to be saying "market". But for us, it was based entirely on need. After talking to our families, each of us came up with the minimum salary required to maintain our current lifestyle. The idea is that a founder should n
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Poll HN: Do you dress up for board meetings?
1 points by portman 16y ago|0 comments
276.
by portman 16y ago
YES - I dress nicer for board meetings than I do for a typical day.
277.
by portman 16y ago
NO - I don't wear anything different than I usually do for board meetings.
278.
by portman 16y ago
For me, spending time with my kids (ages: 0, 2, 4) produces a similar results as exercise and meditation do for Alex: - "combats stress" - "always feel calmer than when I started" - "feel like I’ve got my head screwed on straight"
279.
by portman 16y ago
I had the same thought about First Round Capital. FRC is one of our company's VCs. I have no insight into their accounting methods (#9), but they seem to hit all of the others except "have far fewer meetings with startups" (#11).
280.
by portman 16y ago
Well, they sold NBC to Comcast/Kabletown last year.
281.
by portman 16y ago
Amazing timing - I returned my first ever item to Trader Joe's today, and the experience was memorable. My wife bought blackberries this morning. Tonight, after dinner, we realized they were moldy. I went to exchange them at about 8:30 pm,
282.
by portman 16y ago
"In the last 40 years (between 1967 and 2007), median wages have only gone up US$10000 (from 40k to 50k)." That figure that you're citing is IN CONSTANT 2003 DOLLARS. The nominal median household income in 1967, without adjusting for infl
283.
by portman 16y ago
The US inflation rate over the last 40 years is readily available from the US Department of Labor based on the Consumer Price Index. http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm $35,594 in 1970 got you the same as $200,000 today. So w
284.
by portman 16y ago
Agreed, but note that at high scale, stress-testing isn't as easy as it sounds. For example, at an ad-serving company I worked with, stress-testing the ad servers required a botnet of hundreds of machines in order to approximate the load
285.
by portman 16y ago
All three of us had worked together at a previous company. I think this is important. One time, I started a company with someone I had not previously worked with, and that was a mistake. People's professional working style can be very dif
286.
by portman 16y ago
"I've also had systems built for me personally. One of the more important is my archiving and searching system, which includes 25 years of email (and 20 years of keystroke data), as well as searchable scans of all my archived paper documen
287.
by portman 16y ago
"if you think of the astronomical economic gap between, say, a Malian subsistence farmer and a one-man economy like Rupert Murdoch, it’s really the only binary phase-change there on the sweep from $0 to $6.3 billion" This is clearly writt
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by portman 16y ago
The actual quote, from I, Candidate for Governor: And How I Got Licked : "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." A terrific read. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0520081986
289.
by portman 16y ago
Can I ask what city you're in? I've been refreshing System Information like a madman waiting for my 2.2 upgrade to come in.
290.
by portman 16y ago
I still keep around a 286 that is 25 years old and it's fine -- are you suggesting that it will cease to function sometime in the next 25 years?
291.
by portman 16y ago
Mine are a bunch of restaurants, again all through one primary connection. Considering that I am the ONLY person on Facebook with my firstname/lastname, and that my 522 Facebook friends are publicly accessible, how and why is Google not i
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by portman 16y ago
Are you aware of PayPal's Micropayments feature? $0.05 plus 5%, meaning a $0.99 purchase only costs 9 cents (they round down). https://micropayments.paypal-labs.com/ Note: this is the third time I've posted this link on HN in about 5 mont
293.
by portman 16y ago
Funny, I thought the exact opposite. He invested $7 million and five years of sweat to come out with $39 million. If he was a passive investor, a 5x return would be decent. But he also poured five years of his life into the company, earning
294.
by portman 16y ago
I think perhaps HN readers don't know that Sallie Mae is the quasi-private entity that originates a large portion of student loans in the US. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLM_Corporation The joke is that he is $50,000 in debt, so half his
295.
by portman 16y ago
I'm sorry, this is an unconfirmed rumor. If I could delete, I would.
296.
by portman 16y ago
I'm confused. If your city doesn't "equal Silicon Valley" then it is a "tech backwater"? As far as I know, nobody has claimed that NYC will eclipse the Bay Area - they're just saying that the tech scene in NYC is growing and maybe that NYC
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by portman 16y ago
The other credited actors play the VOICES of the children when Cobb calls home from the hotel room in Japan.
298.
by portman 16y ago
I remember, many years ago (mid-to-late 90s), being afraid that I had grown addicted to computer games. Between Command & Conquer (over peer-to-peer dial-up!), Quake Team Fortress, Civilization II, and a few others, I was playing 30-40
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by portman 16y ago
"edit a file, and then restart" Our of curiosity, what operating system do you use? On Windows, hosts entries take effect immediately. No need to restart.
300.
by portman 16y ago
I first heard it in Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis, 1989. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0140143459

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