181–190 of 453 posts
Too early with a ML product back in '08, people were not ready to believe such a thing was possible: basically a working VFX pipeline for what are now called "deep fakes", but I targeted inserting consumers into brand advertising TV commercials and music videos. First people simply could not grasp the concept, then they did not believe it was possible, and then because I wrote it alone and had no team VCs and partner…
Q: Why did your startup fail? A: Brilliant beloved and trusting visionary founder just didn't have a functioning crazy person detector (which was fortunately why he hired me), but he also unfortunately hired a self-proclaimed " Serial Hacktreprenuer " (I shit you not) as a "game finance expert", who failed to do his job raising money, and whose bizarre behavior and "volatile and erratic work habits" led to battling l…
Too early with a ML product back in '08, people were not ready to believe such a thing was possible: basically a working VFX pipeline for what are now called "deep fakes", but I targeted inserting consumers into brand advertising TV commercials and music videos. First people simply could not grasp the concept, then they did not believe it was possible, and then because I wrote it alone and had no team VCs and partner…
Or did you have a different vision/market for it? Aside from, say, novelty photos.
My first startup failed because I had no idea what I was doing. I started an online vacation rental site, similar to vacationrentals.com vrbo, homeaway etc... I was getting traction and had people list their rentals on my site but I failed to collect any revenue. The thought was, build it, offer it for free to grow it and then charge. Well, I built it (wasting way too much money on an original solution when existing…
I feel like this is an incredibly common software developer turned entrepreneur mistake. Lack of confidence in asking for money leads to a reluctance to put a price tag on the thing you have built.
Our startup failed because my business partner wanted to just be the "idea guy" who designed the screens, while having me code it and do all the heavy work. Initially, this was going to be a 50/50 split, but after working on it almost full time for about 6 months, I ran out of money. He had a pretty big savings account and came from a well-off family, so he agreed to front me basically just enough to cover my rent wh…
10 years ago I built an almost amazing business that schools, universities, teachers and students could use to build elearning and web apps. Think Square Space + Moodle + Udemy. Heres a demo if you're interested https://vimeo.com/2221065 The demo doesn't show much of the learning management features but they were also complete. But the app had memory leaks and I didn't have the cash to pay expensive engineers to fix…
I think if you expand the scope of 'failure' to mean your life, as opposed to just the business, then you didn't fail. You were pursuing a strategy that would have led to the failure of your marriage, which is much worse than a failed business. I think you succeeded.
I started a consumer robotics company with no more than a software and hobbyist robotics background. The grand plan was to sell furry robot pets and we got as far as the prototype stage and a demo at Maker Faire. After that we hit a huge wall. There is essentially no path from hobbyist, off the shelf components to a real product. After that company died I joined a real robotics startup with some seriously talented fo…
I worked at a small robotics company in the Netherlands, technical university spinoff. We did tests in care homes for elderly and disabled people and we actually had clients that wanted to use our robots and were very positive about them. But we were just too early. The robot didn't even need to be very autonomous, shared autonomy was part of the plan (fake it till you make it and honest about it :-) ). I controlled…
Why it failed: Getting an office that can't be paid off with low income from startup. Learning: Don't get an office.