“The mistake you will most likely make as a startup founder is coming up with your own vision of what your product should be instead of getting feedback from actual users.”
A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
11–20 of 159 posts
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#12It's bothering me that Geoff introduced Paul as "the founder" and Paul just kind of went with it. It was a small moment but these sorts of details matter because they can contribute to unintended historical revisionism. A YouTube annotation overlay might be appreciated by the other founders.
FWIW pg is clear here that YC had 4 founders: http://www.paulgraham.com/jessica.html
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#13Could someone please write a synopsis of this?
RTM is a hunk, and read the essays.
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WO5kJChg3w&feature=youtu.be... He doesn't sound sorry =p But if he really did "choose" the other guys, then maybe calling him the founder isn't so wrong.
He seems to be talking about Viaweb in the point you link to here?
ahh you are right. my mistake.
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
How much are you all willing to bid? I'll do it for $10. That's cheaper than any AI on the market.
I'll chip in $1 for this.
I'll give you a freebie: They originally built a clunky Netscape-based website builder because they wanted to see if they could bypass Windows entirely and use Netscape to allow users to send commands over HTTP to a server.
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#16“The mistake you will most likely make as a startup founder is coming up with your own vision of what your product should be instead of getting feedback from actual users.”
Also explained very well by Jessica Livingston in "Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing"
> "So why wouldn’t all founders start by engaging with users individually? Because it’s hard and demoralizing. Sales gives you a kind of harsh feedback that “marketing” doesn’t. You try to convince someone to use what you’ve built, and they won’t. These conversations are painful, but necessary. I suspect from my experience that founders who want to remain in denial about the inadequacy of their product and/or the difficulty of starting a startup subconsciously prefer the broad and shallow “marketing” approach precisely because they can’t face the work and unpleasant truths they’ll find if they talk to users."
https://www.google.com/search?q=jessica%20livingston%20you%2...
And posted here w/out the paywall: https://genius.com/Jessica-livingston-why-startups-need-to-f...
I don't see this essay on https://www.startupschool.org/library and it probably should be at the top.
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#17“The mistake you will most likely make as a startup founder is coming up with your own vision of what your product should be instead of getting feedback from actual users.”
You have to be a user of your own product to really make it good.
Look at Apple. Most of how they got where they are is by Jobs, Ive et al. making what they wanted to see, and nitpicking at everything until they were satisfied.
Also: "people don't know what they want until you show it to them."
Of course you have to address customers' frustrations, but relying on just "data" and marketing feedback all the time often results in an sterile, rigid product that will always be at risk of disruption by someone with more soul (unless you buy them out with the money you made by playing it safer :)
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#18They really needed a script to follow to make it more focused, and the questions were... not great. Some good advice though still, especially about truly listening to users and launching asap, probably the single biggest thing that startups have trouble with.
Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#19Re: A Conversation with Paul Graham [video]
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
How much are you all willing to bid? I'll do it for $10. That's cheaper than any AI on the market.
Startup idea: "Summarize it for me" - Upload any document/video/url and pay $x for the cliffsnotes.
For popular, public content, you could split the price amongst many buyers, like Kickstarter.