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Making Startups Powerful

paulgraham.com

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Re: Making Startups Powerful

#101

Post by dififjfj37484 »

bambax wrote: post #61
raincole wrote: post #41

I wonder what the tipping point was where the general attitude towards PG and his essays changed. It's tempting to say AI, but I feel it was more like AirBnB era? When people saw how one of YC's golden goose affected the local communities, the rosy color on our glasses inevitably faded.

[flagged]

If I remember correctly, Paul talked a lot about things that are ‘unsayable’ but his support for those going further than he was prepared to suggested at the things that he would to be able to say without losing status or power

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#103

Post by earnesti »

iterance wrote: post #74
howunfortunate wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My sense is that it's context dependent. If you've got VC backing (or could soon) and are making deals in SF, the generosity path makes a lot of sense. Limited downside, infinite upside. You can afford generosity. If you're starting with $2000 and bootstrapping a textiles business out of Kolkata, it's a terrible idea, you're likely going to immediately get burned and never recover. (take with a grain of salt as I hav…

Generosity is not "giving stuff away for free when it hurts you badly to do so." Neither the giver nor the receiver are comfortable when generosity hurts the giver, and the dignity of both may be compromised as well. Generosity that is disrespectful of comfort and dignity is worth very little. A company with $2000 in its first few days need not give away $1000 to act generously.

So the generosity rule is more like "if you have lots of money you can make lots of money"

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#104

Post by Scoundreller »

CM30 wrote: post #79

There is some really good advice here. Honestly, I think this might be one of the most important takeaways you can have as a startup founder/CEO in general: > It's exciting when you notice users "misusing" your product to do something you hadn't intended. This means there's something they want so desperately that they'll not only use any solution you offer, but even use things that aren't meant to be solutions. When…

I miss the pre-https-by-default days where I could see what search terms people used to land on my blog. Have excellent topic ideas for unmet needs.

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#105

Post by Scoundreller »

CM30 wrote: post #79

There is some really good advice here. Honestly, I think this might be one of the most important takeaways you can have as a startup founder/CEO in general: > It's exciting when you notice users "misusing" your product to do something you hadn't intended. This means there's something they want so desperately that they'll not only use any solution you offer, but even use things that aren't meant to be solutions. When…

I miss the pre-https-by-default days where I could see what search terms people used to land on my blog. Gave excellent topic ideas for unmet needs.

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#106

Post by protocolture »

CM30 wrote: post #79

There is some really good advice here. Honestly, I think this might be one of the most important takeaways you can have as a startup founder/CEO in general: > It's exciting when you notice users "misusing" your product to do something you hadn't intended. This means there's something they want so desperately that they'll not only use any solution you offer, but even use things that aren't meant to be solutions. When…

>A lot of very specialist businesses seem to fail this test, and lose out on the potential for a huge market because of it. Like it sounds ridiculous as hell, but I remember when GoAnimate had a huge audience among kids and teens looking to make silly videos for sites like YouTube. I also remember the company feeling uncomfortable that they were getting known for that online, and trying to refocus their product/service towards business users instead.

I was testing ISP billing software a decade ago, and there was a product we had already committed to buy and it was 99% feature complete, there was just 1 little thing it wouldnt do. And they refused to implement it. Not only that but they told us "Actually we have been acquired and we aren't allowed to implement any new features anyway."

Anyway we went with our second choice, who are now very famous in the space, but at the time were still getting a foothold. And they were only 75% feature complete. But they brought themselves up to 100% over 3 sprints. Other than them using an old version of a single package, they never gave us any grief. They know that their customer needs are what they build software for.

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#107

Post by bambax »

dififjfj37484 wrote: post #101
bambax wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

If I remember correctly, Paul talked a lot about things that are ‘unsayable’ but his support for those going further than he was prepared to suggested at the things that he would to be able to say without losing status or power

Yes, he wrote a whole essay about it, in which he says:

> What can't we say? One way to find these ideas is simply to look at things people do say, and get in trouble for. (...) The statements that make people mad are the ones they worry might be believed. I suspect the statements that make people maddest are those they worry might be true.

https://paulgraham.com/say.html

What are those statements that "might be true"? It's hard to come up with better candidates than Cofnas' theories.

(As an aside, Graham likes to talk a lot about Galileo (in this essay and many others); he makes him a hero of truth. But Galileo didn't get into trouble because of his theories! But because of his attitude. He would ridicule the papacy, in writing, repeatedly. What you couldn't say wasn't that the earth moved, but that the Pope was a clown.)

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#108

Post by aslksadsa »

bambax wrote: post #61
raincole wrote: post #41

I wonder what the tipping point was where the general attitude towards PG and his essays changed. It's tempting to say AI, but I feel it was more like AirBnB era? When people saw how one of YC's golden goose affected the local communities, the rosy color on our glasses inevitably faded.

[flagged]

[dead]

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#109

Post by aslksadsa »

bambax wrote: post #107
dififjfj37484 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I remember correctly, Paul talked a lot about things that are ‘unsayable’ but his support for those going further than he was prepared to suggested at the things that he would to be able to say without losing status or power

Yes, he wrote a whole essay about it, in which he says: > What can't we say? One way to find these ideas is simply to look at things people do say, and get in trouble for. (...) The statements that make people mad are the ones they worry might be believed. I suspect the statements that make people maddest are those they worry might be true. https://paulgraham.com/say.html What are those statements that "might be true…

[dead]

Re: Making Startups Powerful

#110

Post by Ouman »

Graham says the constraint is that becoming more powerful has to make things better for the customer, but several of the strategies he recommends are exactly how companies eventually acquire the ability to stop caring quite so much about customers
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