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Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

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Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#31

Post by MartinCron »

api wrote: post #19

I ran into a toxic mentality on the East Coast where there was a class division between "thinkers/leaders" and "doers," and doing automatically placed a person into a lower class. The idea was that execution is for little people and ideas and "leadership" are for big people. I met a bunch of over-stuffed narcissistic and ineffectual big people who could sell like crazy and drum up endless interest by way of their ivy…

I left a job a few years ago the moment that I realized that the people who were allowed to have ideas and the people who were allowed to implement ideas were always going to be, by deliberate design, different sets of people.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#32

Post by fleitz »

I don't have a problem working with non-technical people who are 'looking for a technical co-founder', usually they identify as 'business guys'.

Just like 90% of coders can't write fizzbuzz, 90% of biz guys can't close a deal. The issue is not the 90%, it's finding the 10%.

The east coast has no monopoly on useless people.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#33

Post by fleitz »

api wrote: post #19

I ran into a toxic mentality on the East Coast where there was a class division between "thinkers/leaders" and "doers," and doing automatically placed a person into a lower class. The idea was that execution is for little people and ideas and "leadership" are for big people. I met a bunch of over-stuffed narcissistic and ineffectual big people who could sell like crazy and drum up endless interest by way of their ivy…

The idea people quickly find out how useful having ideas are when the doer people start walking out the door.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#34

Post by GFKjunior »

rsingel wrote: post #24

I love that this showed up the same day as the post about how Alexis Ohanian built reddit. For those that don't know, Alexis doesn't code. And he and Steve are from the East Coast. But who am I to bash another good round of technical vs. non-technical Hacker News flaming?

Well Steve is a programmer, and from the udacity classes he teaches he seems like a damn good one.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#35

Post by brk »

MBlume wrote: post #23

I realize this is mostly irrelevant, but can anyone confirm/deny the Elfman claim? (It occurs to me that you'd have to be a fantastic whistler to manage some of, say, the spiderman score. Also, I'm pretty sure the guy invents percussion in his basement.)

Side note: I used to have relatively decent hooks into the music industry. A friend of mine is a well-known producer and while he was coming up in the 90's was working with a lot of then-popular artists. I heard multiple stories about name brand artists calling him up and leaving a message on his voicemail that went like 'Hey Mike! This is [Foo] I had this idea for a melody... It goes do doot doooooot dododooooot toooodoooooo. Or something like that. Can you put that down on an instrumental track? Maybe add a little bit of, you know, like cool drums and a keyboard? k thanks bye'

And then he would, and 6 months later you'd be hearing it on the radio or on an album.

Of course, in between the phone call, his prototype track and the release would be HOURS (I've been in 15 hour studio sessions) of mixing, remixing, tweaking, etc.

So, yeah, I'd guess Danny Elfman might write his 'pseudo-code' into a tape recorder that somebody then makes a first pass at. But that is not what you finally hear as the released song.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#37

Post by rickdangerous1 »

aaronblohowiak wrote: post #28
krschultz wrote: post #9

Is it just me or does the non-technical co-founder really get killed by most blogs? I have been approached a couple of times by friends with 'ideas', they just need a programmer to build it for them. I respectfully declined each time and remain friends with these people. None of them ever got anywhere with their ideas. They never quit their day jobs, they never read the right blogs and books (even if I suggested, and…

>Most aren't ready to be co-founders, technical or not. I think this is the crux of the matter. Most people aren't ready to be co-founders.

The only way you can get ready to do a start up is to do a startup?????

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#38

Post by dgreensp »

sudonim wrote: post #20
api wrote: post #19

I ran into a toxic mentality on the East Coast where there was a class division between "thinkers/leaders" and "doers," and doing automatically placed a person into a lower class. The idea was that execution is for little people and ideas and "leadership" are for big people. I met a bunch of over-stuffed narcissistic and ineffectual big people who could sell like crazy and drum up endless interest by way of their ivy…

That's a dangerous mentality and I hope it's on it's way out. The way I see things is that especially in tech, it used to be that doers couldn't just do. They needed to drum up cash / etc... to facilitate the doing. Now that's just not the case. There's a quote (I believe from reddit) "Pics or it didn't happen". The benchmark as I see it with very few exceptions is "Prototype or you're full of it". Doers will do and…

Preferably the doers are also leaders.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#39

Post by theorique »

vibrunazo wrote: post #10
boredguy8 wrote: post #4

[edit: content removed as the site is back up] HNed, it appears. Google's Cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...

> This is why it irks me when people try to sort others into "technical" and "non-technical". Being technical isn't about technology, it's about technique. Techné. Skill in something. This line should be taught and repeated many times in every startup book, school or accelerator. It's amazing how many people don't understand this. It's widely accepted that you probably shouldn't be trying to build a new food company…

I can't count how many times I've heard "but it's just not my area, I'm a business/marketing/idea guy".

Unfortunately, this kind of thing tends to be a code word for "I'm an empty suit, not good at anything in particular". And, often, "I'll come up with a half-baked idea, you'll do all the hard work of making it a reality. Obviously, those kind of people aren't going to be that useful.

The thing is, almost any great startup can really use a hard-hustling co-founder who tracks down deals and funding, pitches the company to potential investors and partners, sells product, manages the budget, and so forth. He will be the 'extrovert' to the coder's 'introvert' - and these are both complementary and valuable skill sets. In other words, we don't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater.

In one of his essays, pg described this kind of person as an "animal". For a tech firm to be successful, you need coding animals, sure, and you also need deal making, selling, product management, and PR animals.

(See: http://www.paulgraham.com/start.html )

The best non-technical "startup animals" that I know are fascinated by and respectful of coders, and often get drawn in to doing a little (or more) coding themselves.

Re: Whistling Into a Tape Recorder: What the East Coast Doesn't Get About Startups

#40

Post by juliangamble »

api wrote: post #19

I ran into a toxic mentality on the East Coast where there was a class division between "thinkers/leaders" and "doers," and doing automatically placed a person into a lower class. The idea was that execution is for little people and ideas and "leadership" are for big people. I met a bunch of over-stuffed narcissistic and ineffectual big people who could sell like crazy and drum up endless interest by way of their ivy…

When studying management theory - this behaviour is categorised as 'Taylorism' - you can read an examination of the false assumptions behind it here: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/06/the-mana...
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