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

On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

sorryhumans.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 47 posts

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#21

Post by derefr »

larrys wrote: post #20
derefr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I talk to my peers and I read posts about people who completely abandon their projects the moment they fail to get into YC or [name incubator]. Yeesh. As someone who's currently bootstrapping a lifestyle business, this point of view seems downright toxic to me. If you really believe in your company (and its product-market fit), then giving away equity (and control!) should be an absolute last resort, not something…

"then giving away equity (and control!) should be an absolute last resort" You are focusing on the down side and not the upside of taking money. As well as the upside to having to not give up any control or equity vs. the downside to trying to do it without that money. And totally underestimating what you can do with a shit load of money vs. what you can't do.

Note that I said "lifestyle business", not "startup." I can't think of anything outweighing the downside of losing the ability to have my business as an extension of my own life, perfectly meshing into my own desires. If I had fuck-you money[1], all I'd do with it is... start this business.

I hope to still be running it in 40 years--and imagining someone having the power to force me to do something I don't want to do with my own company, even after I've put in 40 years of effort into it... well. This is why I would recommend just taking on loans/debt first: when your company grows, you'll pay off debts (and when your company fails bankruptcy/liquidation will still make them go away), but equity is a loan that gets harder and harder to pay out the bigger your company gets.

Of course, this is all assuming you're taking investment from someone whose utility function doesn't match your own (usually in that you care more about the business, and they care more about the money.) I would gladly put in with some people--but those are cofounders, not investors.

---

[1] But really, I don't think I need fuck-you money--I've planned the business in stages (pre-set pivots), where each stage targets a market of appropriate size and entrenchment to fund the next stage (tackle B2B when small, B2C when huge, basically.) In effect, I'm just planning to be my own investor. :)

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#22

Post by larrys »

derefr wrote: post #21
larrys wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"then giving away equity (and control!) should be an absolute last resort" You are focusing on the down side and not the upside of taking money. As well as the upside to having to not give up any control or equity vs. the downside to trying to do it without that money. And totally underestimating what you can do with a shit load of money vs. what you can't do.

Note that I said "lifestyle business", not "startup." I can't think of anything outweighing the downside of losing the ability to have my business as an extension of my own life, perfectly meshing into my own desires. If I had fuck-you money[1], all I'd do with it is... start this business. I hope to still be running it in 40 years--and imagining someone having the power to force me to do something I don't want to do…

That's fine. Please keep in mind though that investors are only one of a group of many people that you have to bogu for ("bend over, grease up"). There are also customers (major and minor), employees, partners (if any) landlords, spouses, kids etc. Agree that not having investors is certainly one less to deal with though.

Even on the issues of "customers" that can be granular. Do you have a bunch of small customers who don't know about each other? Or a bunch of small customers that do know about each other (and can create a problem for you if you don't beat to their drum?). Do you have the type of business (not you but anyone reading this) that has a concentration of business with 3 large customers and if any of them left you'd have a big problem? Do you have someone who owes you money, won't pay (a big sum of money) and you have sleepless nights?

"and when your company fails bankruptcy/liquidation will still make them go away"

I come from a time and place where failure like that was viewed differently. It would not be as easy for me to do that and not have it bother me. That said it's not a bad mindset if it doesn't have the same impact on you (you're lucky it's really hard to un-ring that bell).

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#23

Post by reinhardt »

> It was 2010. I was 17 years old (...) and I had found the next Billion Dollar Idea.

> It was 2011. I was 18 years old (...) and I had found the next World Changing Idea.

> It is 2013. I am 20 years old (...) and I have found the Right Thing for Me.

IOW "this time it's different". Color me skeptical. Looking forward to the 2023 edition or whenever he gets over the Dunning–Kruger effect.

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#24

Post by theorique »

reinhardt wrote: post #23

> It was 2010. I was 17 years old (...) and I had found the next Billion Dollar Idea. > It was 2011. I was 18 years old (...) and I had found the next World Changing Idea. > It is 2013. I am 20 years old (...) and I have found the Right Thing for Me. IOW "this time it's different". Color me skeptical. Looking forward to the 2023 edition or whenever he gets over the Dunning–Kruger effect.

Agreed.

If he had written it as "I thought I had found [...]" I would be more inclined to trust the writer's judgment.

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#25

Post by seanlinehan »

reinhardt wrote: post #23

> It was 2010. I was 17 years old (...) and I had found the next Billion Dollar Idea. > It was 2011. I was 18 years old (...) and I had found the next World Changing Idea. > It is 2013. I am 20 years old (...) and I have found the Right Thing for Me. IOW "this time it's different". Color me skeptical. Looking forward to the 2023 edition or whenever he gets over the Dunning–Kruger effect.

Your skepticism is understandable, yet I feel as if you are missing the core message here. The message here is not about my own journey - my narrative is a trope for the culture of Silicon Valley. Whether or not I succeed in my venture is irrelevant to the main point - entrepreneurship is not about raising money or acquiring fame; it is about building a business.

As much as I appreciate constructive criticism, your implication that I am suffering from the Dunning-Kruger effect is unwelcome. You know nothing of my talents nor my mind-state and to infer that the small glimpse of my life I have provided is representative of my being is naive.

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#26

Post by npc »

seanlinehan wrote: post #25
reinhardt wrote: post #23

> It was 2010. I was 17 years old (...) and I had found the next Billion Dollar Idea. > It was 2011. I was 18 years old (...) and I had found the next World Changing Idea. > It is 2013. I am 20 years old (...) and I have found the Right Thing for Me. IOW "this time it's different". Color me skeptical. Looking forward to the 2023 edition or whenever he gets over the Dunning–Kruger effect.

Your skepticism is understandable, yet I feel as if you are missing the core message here. The message here is not about my own journey - my narrative is a trope for the culture of Silicon Valley. Whether or not I succeed in my venture is irrelevant to the main point - entrepreneurship is not about raising money or acquiring fame; it is about building a business. As much as I appreciate constructive criticism, your i…

I'm going to try to be nice and give you some advice: don't write like that. Constructing these overwrought sentences with the dashes and the semicolons and the vocabulary and whatnot just makes you look like an insecure sophomore trying to cover up inexperience with excessive verbiage. Which is probably accurate, but oh well. The purpose of writing isn't to make you look smart, it's to communicate your thoughts clearly and convincingly, and writing to show off all your fancy college-boy book lernin' is just going to antagonize your audience. You're still in school, my advice is to take a writing course and listen to what they say.

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#27

Post by seanlinehan »

npc wrote: post #26
seanlinehan wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your skepticism is understandable, yet I feel as if you are missing the core message here. The message here is not about my own journey - my narrative is a trope for the culture of Silicon Valley. Whether or not I succeed in my venture is irrelevant to the main point - entrepreneurship is not about raising money or acquiring fame; it is about building a business. As much as I appreciate constructive criticism, your i…

I'm going to try to be nice and give you some advice: don't write like that. Constructing these overwrought sentences with the dashes and the semicolons and the vocabulary and whatnot just makes you look like an insecure sophomore trying to cover up inexperience with excessive verbiage. Which is probably accurate, but oh well. The purpose of writing isn't to make you look smart, it's to communicate your thoughts clea…

Thanks. I switch between being overly concise and overly verbose. Today is an overly verbose day. I'm working on finding a cool median.

Re: On the Fetishism of Capital and Prestige

#29

Post by nnethercote »

Don't read TechCrunch. It's a cesspit of hype and sensationalism. Any plan which involves "get on the front page of TechCrunch" is a horrible plan, IMO.

I still occasionally look at TechCrunch, mostly because it's a good test site for browsers (because it's really memory-hungry). And every time I get sucked into reading an article, I inevitably end up feeling dirty. It's similar to how I feel after reading the covers of the gossip magazines when I'm waiting in line at the supermarket.

Post reply on HN