I once rode a motorbike drunk, with a stranger sitting behind me. We didn't die. Lesson learnt: I got lucky.
I don't drive drunk any more :-)
Fucking Sue Me
21–30 of 152 posts
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#22> Then there was the time I wanted to hire my first full time employee. I was apprehensive to do it because I only had enough money to pay him for 2 months, unless I got another client fast. > “Worry about that in 2 months,” Dad said. Speaking from the perspective of that employee, fuck you . OK, for the serious point: you may be not give a shit about risk. Good for you, you crazy risk taker! The world truly needs mo…
Then don't be employee #1. Ever.
I get your point, but if those things are true, then that would not be the proper job for you to take, no matter how risk prone or risk averse the founder is.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even if it were changed to that, the story wouldn't end with "I couldn't buy food, my macbook pro got repossessed, and I went to federal pound-you-in-the-ass prison." If you do get sued and your business collapses you can always start another one.
Personal liability would be a nasty thing to deal with after your business failed. And you may not get to start another company with a huge personal debt.
It's so easy to incorporate it should always be done. I assume when someone starts working with that kind of money and has knowledgeable lawyers advising them that they'll be told to do that.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#24Sounds like the opposite advice to: http://www.vimeo.com/22053820 (Fuck you, pay me).
Should have found a better lawyer.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#25> Then there was the time I wanted to hire my first full time employee. I was apprehensive to do it because I only had enough money to pay him for 2 months, unless I got another client fast. > “Worry about that in 2 months,” Dad said. This seems really dishonest. Yeah, everybody knows that startups are risky, but if you can't afford to pay more than 2 months of salary, then don't hire a full-timer. Either find a co-f…
Not many companies could afford to pay their entire payroll for a quarter, if sales were $0.00 for that quarter.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#26> Then there was the time I wanted to hire my first full time employee. I was apprehensive to do it because I only had enough money to pay him for 2 months, unless I got another client fast. > “Worry about that in 2 months,” Dad said. This seems really dishonest. Yeah, everybody knows that startups are risky, but if you can't afford to pay more than 2 months of salary, then don't hire a full-timer. Either find a co-f…
Not many companies could afford to pay their entire payroll for a quarter, if sales were $0.00 for that quarter.
Most companies also have steady revenue streams.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#27I wish someone would write an expert system that works like his dad. Something that had some validation of what was a worthwhile risk and what was a risk that even if you tried to mitigate the risk really would still be a risk. (For instance, even if you had enough work to presume you could employ that employee for more than 2 months, that's not a guarantee. What if the contract with a customer was for 12 months, but 2 months in, right after staffing up, they just cancelled it and said "fucking sue me"? Kinda hard for the small startup to sue... and if they did, and they won, that win would be years after they had to let the employees go.)
You can't mitigate all risk, and being able to ignore the ones that you can't' do anything about is an important skill.
This goes for technical risk as well. I try not to over-architect. I spend a lot of time trying to decide which things need to be handled now, and which things can just be added later.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#28> Then there was the time I wanted to hire my first full time employee. I was apprehensive to do it because I only had enough money to pay him for 2 months, unless I got another client fast. > “Worry about that in 2 months,” Dad said. Speaking from the perspective of that employee, fuck you . OK, for the serious point: you may be not give a shit about risk. Good for you, you crazy risk taker! The world truly needs mo…
Then don't be employee #1. Ever. I get your point, but if those things are true, then that would not be the proper job for you to take, no matter how risk prone or risk averse the founder is.
Being employee #1 is the worst of both worlds. You get the risk of a startup and you most likely will get very little payout if the startup is successful.
Most of the people I know that were employee #1 got nothing.
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#29> Then there was the time I wanted to hire my first full time employee. I was apprehensive to do it because I only had enough money to pay him for 2 months, unless I got another client fast. > “Worry about that in 2 months,” Dad said. Speaking from the perspective of that employee, fuck you . OK, for the serious point: you may be not give a shit about risk. Good for you, you crazy risk taker! The world truly needs mo…
Then don't be employee #1. Ever. I get your point, but if those things are true, then that would not be the proper job for you to take, no matter how risk prone or risk averse the founder is.
You should still be honest with employees. They'll prove better in the long run if you are. Not a lot of stories where withholding the truth from your employees ends up being something that a boss feels great about...
Re: Fucking Sue Me
#30Ugh. At one extreme: giving your counsel veto power over what contracts you sign, and allowing them to bill time ping-ponging contracts until prospects give up. At the other extreme: just signing everything and saying "fucking sue me" when things go sideways. You should be somewhere in the middle. Contracts more often than not have provisions that are silly for you to accept verbatim. And, contracts more often than n…
You need to be able to figure out what's negotiable and what isn't.
I work for one of those massive organizations that everyone hates doing business with, but sort of has to. I've watched dozens of vendors spin their wheels for months over boilerplate stuff that nobody is empowered to change. They ultimately lose the deal over something that ultimately didn't matter.