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Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

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Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#71

Post by javery »

joezydeco wrote: post #68
javery wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to solve that problem, work from home. I work 10-12 hours most days but I see my daughter all the time because I work from home and we get to eat three meals together and play after dinner.

I do the kitchen-table-coding-marathon as well, but how do you get any consulting work if the only time you're available is 8pm-2am? Rentacoder?

Never ever Rentacoder. Most people don't care that much at what time you work on something if you can show you deliver on time and make yourself available for the occasional call during the day.

People worry about moonlighting when you have a full-time job but if you are running a startup they usually understand you can make time for them when you need it.

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#72

Post by onwardly »

DrJokepu wrote: post #63
onwardly wrote: post #26

I have over $100k in student loan debt from undergrad, and have nearly run through savings for the startup I'm working on. My loan payments kick back in in two months. We're launching in 2-4 weeks, and the nature of the project is such that if it doesn't take off immediately then it may never take off. Talk about a fire under your ass! That said, I'm loving it. I'm actually living in India at the moment, working from…

Just out of curiosity, what kind of project "never takes of if it doesn't take off immediately"? What makes you think that? You don't need to be very specific though if you don't want to reveal secrets, don't get me wrong.

We're about to launch, so just about time to throw off the cloak anyways.

Its a videochat website, which if I described you'd immediately compare to Chatroulette. If we don't achieve critical mass early, everyone will leave.

To a degree it is like Chatroulette, though there are different types of rooms and a security mechanism that actually keeps perverts off (you sign in using FB connect, though we never reveal to anyone who you are. This is just to track you so we can block you permanently if reported. And no, you can't create a new FB account and get back on; you have to have 20+ friends to sign in).

If you show up and noone is on the site, you're going to leave and never come back. Thus, need a critical mass to keep it going.

Based on some calculations I've done, to keep a minimum of 50 people on the site at all times we'll need 15k visitors per day.

There are a few other features that I'd be thrilled to go on and on about, but I hope I answered your question. If you're curious and have more questions, you can find my email address in my profile.

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#73

Post by mattbee »

javery wrote: post #59
patio11 wrote: post #36

Can I recommend consulting for smoothing out cash flow issues? It has really helped me this summer -- the time it cost my development schedule has been worth the peace of mind gained by not having to either smash my piggy bank or borrow four paychecks worth of cash at consumer interest rates.

I did this a couple times last year and found it to be a huge distraction, sure it was great to get a good cash infusion but when I look back I realize that I lost probably 2 months of progress on my startup because of the distraction. I am no sure it was worth it. I was dealing with a pretty high maintenance client though, and dealt with scope creep and other consulting mainstays. If managed correctly this can be a…

...and I hired a couple of keen consultants 3 years ago who were working on a startup "on the side" (of course it was my work that was on the side). It took them nine months of doing very little before they admitted they weren't going to get the job done. If you're going to consult "on the side" of your startup, hide the fact that you've got a startup from your potential clients. If you can complete outside work satisfactorily, as well as keep motivation for your startup, well, that's a sign you're a hard worker :)

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#74

Post by DrJokepu »

onwardly wrote: post #72
DrJokepu wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just out of curiosity, what kind of project "never takes of if it doesn't take off immediately"? What makes you think that? You don't need to be very specific though if you don't want to reveal secrets, don't get me wrong.

We're about to launch, so just about time to throw off the cloak anyways. Its a videochat website, which if I described you'd immediately compare to Chatroulette. If we don't achieve critical mass early, everyone will leave. To a degree it is like Chatroulette, though there are different types of rooms and a security mechanism that actually keeps perverts off (you sign in using FB connect, though we never reveal to a…

Interesting stuff. Here's what I would do if I were you: I would try to get it popular in a smaller niche community. Try to find an existing community on the Internet that's currently looking for an alternative medium to communicate to what they currently have. There's always plenty of drama on the Internet so that shouldn't be to hard. Try to get them to use your site. This way, you could constantly have a number of users without achieving a critical mass. Later on, you can build on that by improvements and "marketing" and get more users.

TLDR: I think if you're clever, there's no reason your could not get traction later on even if it fails to be a ground-breaking success right after launch.

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#75

Post by AmberShah »

javery wrote: post #64
joezydeco wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you consulting on the side while married with a kid? Family starts to take up a significant amount of your time once you have kids. Sure, you can be the dad-thats-never-home, but is that why you had a family in the first place? I'm just saying that the equation becomes a lot more complex at this point.

It's easy to solve that problem, work from home. I work 10-12 hours most days but I see my daughter all the time because I work from home and we get to eat three meals together and play after dinner.

I don't think "easy" is the word that describes doing this, but it certainly can be done. I work full time and do my startup on the site. I work from home once or twice a week also and that definitely saves on commuting time, and I go see my kid once a week for swim class/lunch (in addition to after work, of course). Sure, it takes a zillion times longer to do your startup this way, but then again, it helps you focus on what's really important (both in life, and in your startup)

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#76

Post by AmberShah »

redorb wrote: post #35
fleitz wrote: post #34

May I ask why you are not cutting features to hit your launch date? I'm broke and in a startup, been at it 1 month to the day, planning a launch in early Sept. I actually need to be code complete for the 28th of Aug as I'm going to Burning Man. No I don't think it's going to be perfect and there are a lot more features I'd like to see going to launch but since I don't have a budget for a national media campaign I dou…

why are you broke and still going to burning man?

Uh... -because- he's going to burning man? No seriously, so long as he's not asking for a handout, who are you to judge where he spends his money?

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#77

Post by AmberShah »

lionhearted wrote: post #48
garrettgillas wrote: post #23

This post actually makes me feel kind of grateful. I have kept my day job while working on my startup and am still single. I'm 27 & I work from home. The upside is that I have a place to live and work comfortably, I'm not broke and I can support my "startup habit". The downside is that I never get much sleep, my girlfriend hates it, almost everyone I know says that I should quit my startup and get married like a norm…

> The downside is that I never get much sleep, my girlfriend hates it, almost everyone I know says that I should quit my startup and get married like a normal person Be careful in your long term thinking with your girlfriend. I've seen a lot of guys work like crazy while their girlfriend doesn't like it, and the guy thinks, "Well, if this pays off she'll understand." In my experience - not true. People have different…

I hate my husband's workaholic tendencies and I agree and disagree to this post. On the one hand, no it never does go away even if it pays off. On the other hand, that's not necessarily a sign that you shouldn't be with her. There may be other reasons, but wouldn't you rather be with someone who wants to spend more time with you rather than less? I've seen relationships like the latter and they were no spring picnic either.

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#78

Post by twidlit »

benologist wrote: post #66
twidlit wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How sure are you that itll make money? I mean what are you basing that on?

I have a lot of users that have known all along it'll cost at some point. That plus I'm widely acknowledged to be about 1000x better than the alternatives, and everyone's excited about the final features I'm putting in place.

Looking forward to trying it. in one of our upcoming release at CG then. :)

Re: Ask HN: Who is currently broke due to being in a startup?

#79

Post by mebassett »

retube wrote: post #57
mebassett wrote: post #52

I'm broke. but I'm a student and am pretty much use to it. I decided to do a startup (sneffel.com) over the summer instead of finding an internship, I was hoping it'd be profitable by the end of the summer. I tried selling to basic users/consumers with no real customer in mind. I really thought it would work at the time. As you might expect, it didn't happen. Now it all appears obviously silly. In any case, I'm broke…

I think there's huge opportunity around these academic/teaching collaboration tools. Your site looks sweet. Why hasn't it worked out?

I don't really know, but here's my guess: I didn't know who I was selling to. I tried selling directly to random users, which no one bought. But I realized recently I should be selling to schools and teachers, but have yet to put much effort into that. It could also be that I build something that no one wants. I really don't know.
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