Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

zaksa.zip

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 168 posts

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#121

Post by sneak »

egonschiele wrote: post #44

Real bummer of a story. > He approached me because he was really into startups and wanted to become a tech entrepreneur, and make the big bucks It's a shame that so much of tech culture has become about money. Money was always a part of it, but living in the Bay in 2010, there was more of a focus on building things. But once people started getting rich, especially off bitcoin, it brought in a whole host of people who…

A bummer? Jim, even whilst failing, is living a life better than 99.999% of humans that have ever lived, and surely better than 99% of humans alive today. He has access to SOTA medical care, pharmaceuticals, ideal human weather, healthy and nutritious food on demand at the push of a button, etc.

Let’s keep it in perspective.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#122

Post by [deleted] »

daishi55 wrote: post #22

I don’t trust anyone who has the general, abstract goal of being a “founder”. If there’s no great idea to go with it, it just seems like vanity. And sure it does work out really well anyway sometimes, but it’s just something I can’t get behind aesthetically.

[deleted]

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#123

Post by est31 »

bencarmin wrote: post #81
nilkn wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find people's view is based on how much they're personally "winning" financially. If they're making money, then daily life seems more about building. If they're not making money, then the oppressive cost of living makes money seem all-important in the culture (which, in fact, it is and has been for generations). SF and the Bay Area are constantly shuffling through and recombining ideas. What generated money relativ…

I think it is interesting how now, a lot of the selling to individuals regarding AI is the ability to do what was popular in 2010 (building apps, websites, games) is easy now due to AI. I know so many people who have made workout apps, CRMs, planners, etc. that are baffled by why their work isn't picking up traction (keep in mind, we aren't in SV). Makes me wonder how long we have before, "create your own ChatGPT" be…

You can still get traction for your workout apps, CRMs etc with the right market research (you need to find a niche) and the right marketing.

There are gazillions of candy crush remakes, but Royal Match, launched in 2021, still made it to the top in revenue. It was not thanks to some existing monopolist pushing it, but thanks to a) ginormous marketing budget and b) relentless execution and experience of making mobile games before, i.e. you know what works, what doesn't, how to extract maximum amount of revenue, etc.

https://naavik.co/digest/royal-match-finding-success-through...

https://naavik.co/digest/why-dream-games-success-is-a-challe...

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#124

Post by sneak »

yesimahuman wrote: post #29
Carrok wrote: post #5

Bit of an aside but I found it somewhat amusing that one example the author uses of Jim’s financial recklessness was getting into home brewing. Home brewing is one of the cheaper hobbies available (though like all hobbies you can spend as much as you want). The only real requirements are a bucket and a pot.

Same with a $10k tree slicer, when the actually expensive alternatives that really get people in trouble are day trading, real estate, car collecting, divorce, and starting new businesses that fail.

I think he meant a live edge wooden table, not a machine to slice trees.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#125

Post by antihipocrat »

bencarmin wrote: post #81
nilkn wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find people's view is based on how much they're personally "winning" financially. If they're making money, then daily life seems more about building. If they're not making money, then the oppressive cost of living makes money seem all-important in the culture (which, in fact, it is and has been for generations). SF and the Bay Area are constantly shuffling through and recombining ideas. What generated money relativ…

I think it is interesting how now, a lot of the selling to individuals regarding AI is the ability to do what was popular in 2010 (building apps, websites, games) is easy now due to AI. I know so many people who have made workout apps, CRMs, planners, etc. that are baffled by why their work isn't picking up traction (keep in mind, we aren't in SV). Makes me wonder how long we have before, "create your own ChatGPT" be…

An LLM can build novel things if guided by a human with a novel idea.

The issue is that simple and novel can also be copied easily (anyone can just point an LLM at the target and ask it to build a local personal version). The days of making money from this class of app are over.

Novel and very complex ideas will still make money, but outside of gaming are usually niche markets.

Novel and moderately complex apps will have to build their own moats to prevent copying - heavy server side rendering, server logic processing, and an idea that can't be re-implemented on simple CRUD architecture.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#126

Post by daishi55 »

Johanx64 wrote: post #69
daishi55 wrote: post #22

I don’t trust anyone who has the general, abstract goal of being a “founder”. If there’s no great idea to go with it, it just seems like vanity. And sure it does work out really well anyway sometimes, but it’s just something I can’t get behind aesthetically.

> I don’t trust anyone who has the general, abstract goal of being a “founder”. The goal isn't abstract - read it as - goal of "not being a wage-slave" and have a shot at being more. It's an ambition type of thing.

To what end though? If you want financial freedom, and you’re smart, you’re likely to be much better off just working in big tech vs trying and almost certainly failing to successfully found a company.

Of course some people win the lottery, but playing the lottery isn’t a sound strategy for a good life.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#127

Post by fnord77 »

Carrok wrote: post #5

Bit of an aside but I found it somewhat amusing that one example the author uses of Jim’s financial recklessness was getting into home brewing. Home brewing is one of the cheaper hobbies available (though like all hobbies you can spend as much as you want). The only real requirements are a bucket and a pot.

Not if you have a contract brewery make your "creations"

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#128

Post by landedgentry »

mc32 wrote: post #93
Aurornis wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Money was always a part of it, but living in the Bay in 2010, there was more of a focus on building things. But once people started getting rich, especially off bitcoin, it brought in a whole host of people whose primary passion seemed to be money. This is funny to read because I remember hearing someone complain about the exact same thing in the Bay Area, but their dates were shifted by about 10 years before yours…

I think there was a time when people who generally went for MBAs started going into CS and other majors angling to get into a tech company. There was also a coincidental proliferation of tech “bootcamps.” I think that’s when things tilted away from technology as a way to improve things to a vehicle to greater riches.

I think the 2008 recession and its aftermath redirected many "Wall Street people" to Silicon Valley.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#129

Post by bloodyplonker22 »

senorcrab wrote: post #46

Ultimately this comes down VCs who fund people like this. Can we really believe the established funds look for "independent thinkers" anymore?

Most VCs have a relatively short timeline to deploy money by or they will be berated by investors for sitting on it. Therein lies the problem.

Re: The Silicon Valley Founder Meat Grinder

#130

Post by Arainach »

Carrok wrote: post #61
fragmede wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though, after you've home brewed the beer, you've now got potentially gallons of beer in a giant pot that you have to bottle yourself. Or you could be lazy and just drink it yourself. True, you could just go down to the store and grab a 30-rack of mass produced beer if you wanted to be an alcoholic, but having a vat of beer in your kitchen that isn't going to drink itself and is gonna go bad if you don't, is a differ…

A standard home brewing batch is 5 gallons. Or 40 pints. While it is a crazy world and I don’t want to say no one has ever done what you described, it would be an outlier to say the least. Home brewed beer is generally bottled or put into a keg and tapped. (Almost) no one is just drinking warm uncarbonated beer from the fermenter.

Kegerators are easy and quite affordable to build.

I absolutely have friends who stopped home brewing because they realized that having a tap of readily available beer in their house wasn't a good idea.

Post reply on HN