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Well, I would have said from that rant that it is pretty clear why nobody invested in his ventures or purchased his products.
I thought I better step in here to say that I've had $25k, $50k, $300k, $1,000,000 and $2,000,000 investments so far. The last exit was $24m, the products and services continue to be purchased. Ewan (author of the post)
So why not mention that in the article to balance things a bit?
>> "This is a critical reason why most tech startups in the UK go absolutely nowhere. You can’t legislate against it. It’s built straight into the culture." [Citation needed] This piece is fairly short on evidence+numbers, and overloaded with sweeping generalizations. >> " If you’re starting a new tech business, the only place — the ONLY place — you should be is Silicon Valley." If you need to schmooze VC/need to wor…
In the UK, ~30-50 people do not get into a crowd and "cheer" a traffic warden doing their job unless the car belongs to someone they hate a lot more than traffic wardens.. and traffic wardens are vilified in the UK to ridiculous levels (there was a recent documentary about this - http://youtu.be/4TxxiXZHXD0).
If the US had universal healthcare I think it'd be more appealing.
Annual travel insurance is so cheap in the UK - even that covering the US - that using the US healthcare system isn't really an issue to most travellers.
> In the UK, entrepreneurs try too. The first thing that happens is they become social outcasts. They’re labeled, with a bit of a laugh, ‘delboys’ what is this nonsense. (If anything I find high correlation between entrepreneurs and getting laid.)
That's actually very accurate for certain segments of UK society
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I thought I better step in here to say that I've had $25k, $50k, $300k, $1,000,000 and $2,000,000 investments so far. The last exit was $24m, the products and services continue to be purchased. Ewan (author of the post)
Good for you! So why not mention that in the article to balance things a bit?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
(I thought you were plc on Twitter and hence British? I'll explain anyway for the benefit of the non-Brits!) Del Boy - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Del_Boy - is the lead character in, perhaps, Britain's best ever sitcom that ran in the early 1980s, Only Fools and Horses . Del Boy was a slightly shady trader-cum-entrepreneur who always had an eye out for some dodgy merchandise to shift. Calling some a "Del Boy" commun…
oh, heh, I simply meant "this doesn't actually happen" :) Lovely Jubbly!
I'm guessing it's a lot less common nowadays, though, simply because entrepreneurship and business have become "cool" thanks to the popularity of the Internet and TV shows like Dragon's Den (Shark Tank, to those of you in the US) and The Apprentice. In the last 90s, though, when I first became self employed, people did react a bit weirdly!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, spent all the article going on about how negative the British are ... kind of ironic really. Then this: "Meanwhile to all British entrepreneurs reading, your head can go back in the sand now." Oooh! Bitchy! I wonder what it's like being the only person in the UK with an ounce of entrepreneurial talent and ambition? He's got some points and undoubtedly the optimism the US is famous for is a bit lacking here, but…
I’ve worked out what annoys me about this article. It’s assuming that the point of a startup is to make you a ton of money rather than a ton of enjoyment. Sorry, but I’d go for the latter every day of the week. Maybe it’s the Britishness in me coming out :)
>> "This is a critical reason why most tech startups in the UK go absolutely nowhere. You can’t legislate against it. It’s built straight into the culture." [Citation needed] This piece is fairly short on evidence+numbers, and overloaded with sweeping generalizations. >> " If you’re starting a new tech business, the only place — the ONLY place — you should be is Silicon Valley." If you need to schmooze VC/need to wor…
They're cheering because the car is probably in the way. In the UK, ~30-50 people do not get into a crowd and "cheer" a traffic warden doing their job unless the car belongs to someone they hate a lot more than traffic wardens.. and traffic wardens are vilified in the UK to ridiculous levels (there was a recent documentary about this - http://youtu.be/4TxxiXZHXD0 ). If the US had universal healthcare I think it'd be…
One cultural difference is that in the UK, a lot of sitcoms are about lower/middle class people. In the US many sitcoms seem to be about insanely rich people. So perhaps that comes into play.
But in any event, the result would have been similar anywhere where supercars are a rarity.
* Crowd gather to see supercar
* Parking attendent give car a ticket
* Crowd cheer/laugh/etc because it's something you don't see often.
I don't think you can just cite this as evidence that people in the UK are jealous of wealth.
The author’s a bit bitter, isn’t (s)he?
That honestly to me seems to be a much larger problem in the London startup scene. I'm out there pretty often and it's not bad -- there are a lot of investors both VC and angel, a good smattering of startups and altogether a great environment for starting a company ... and all everybody does is complain about how bad it is. At the last TechCrunch meetup I went to there, there was a whole talk with completely bat-shit…
OMG, someone used that as an excuse? What was their excuse when Blair and Bush were in power?
>> "This is a critical reason why most tech startups in the UK go absolutely nowhere. You can’t legislate against it. It’s built straight into the culture." [Citation needed] This piece is fairly short on evidence+numbers, and overloaded with sweeping generalizations. >> " If you’re starting a new tech business, the only place — the ONLY place — you should be is Silicon Valley." If you need to schmooze VC/need to wor…
In the UK if I told a random person I was starting a company, I'd be met with a blank stare or maybe I'd be told "wow, you're brave" or just "you're crazy". Actually I don't think it's much different in most of the US. But in the Bay Area, there's barely anyone I can talk to (in the 'scene' or not) who won't have a word of encouragement or a useful contact. I'm not kidding - I've talked to people who, from their lifestyles and interests, I would assume would have no connection whatsoever with startups - but almost invariably that's nearly impossible in the Bay Area.
If the US had universal healthcare I think it'd be more appealing.
I couldn't agree more. The US healthcare system is cruel, unfair, arbitrary, random, and very wasteful. If Grayson's bill passed, I would buy into Medicare in a heartbeat. I could talk all day about how shitty the current situation is ;)
>> "This is a critical reason why most tech startups in the UK go absolutely nowhere. You can’t legislate against it. It’s built straight into the culture." [Citation needed] This piece is fairly short on evidence+numbers, and overloaded with sweeping generalizations. >> " If you’re starting a new tech business, the only place — the ONLY place — you should be is Silicon Valley." If you need to schmooze VC/need to wor…
Immigration will get very suspicious of you if you're spending almost all of your time in the States. The business visitor visas are supposed to be for you to conduct meetings and sales pitches, etc - not for you to actually do your day-to-day work.
Ultimately they'll just refuse entry to you.
I used to have a valid US work visa, and then I moved to Canada and let the US visa expire. Few weeks ago when I was transiting through the US I was sent to secondary screening because they assumed I was going to just stay in the States when I landed there.
US immigration has a really really hard time believing that you _wouldn't_ want to live the US, and assume that you'll do anything to stay there.