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Do Things that Don't Scale

paulgraham.com

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Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#121

Post by bennyg »

jeffasinger wrote: post #116
klibertp wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he was hired to do the job his employer want's him to do. If the founder says "stop thinking about stupid/unnecessary/other's things/jobs/responsibilities" then he HAS to do just that. It's not his role to tell the founder how bad a management this is. And yes , I saw such founders in action, it does happen... Quite often in my experience, though obviously YMMV.

I wouldn't ever want to work in a company, or run a company where it's unacceptable for an employee to say: "Hey, the company would be a lot better off if I spent some time on X, instead of my usual responsibility Y."

Exactly. A discussion between manager/employee needs to happen there. Either it's actually a good idea to do X and the employee can rationalize why or it's a better idea to do Y, and the manager can rationalize why.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#122

Post by forsaken »

peteforde wrote: post #119
forsaken wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for this comment. It led me to read the entire website that you linked. On a page I found a link to The Man Who Planted Trees. I was walking across the country recently on the Pacific Crest Trail, and I had to come off the trail because of an injury. I have been looking around listlessly at the world, and trying to figure out what to do. This video has struck me in an interesting way. It shows someone who is t…

I keep a short list of videos about inspiring creatives. I might be mis-reading your comment, but I will share them, anyhow: Painting Coconuts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQxOKtCWEGE The Knife Maker: https://vimeo.com/31455885 The Inverted Bike Shop: https://vimeo.com/36258512 Pins and Needles: https://vimeo.com/57247225 The New Wave of Barber Shops: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gpm54WIyZk

I think you read it correctly. The opening song in the Painting Coconuts video is one of my favorites currently. This bodes well :)

Thanks for more inspiring videos. The man who plants trees was amazingly apropos because of my recent departure from a promised life in the woods. However, inspiration is always valuable.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#123

Post by pixelmonkey »

Loved this essay, but I'm a little confused by this footnote.

"[5] If you're building something for which you can't easily get a small set of users to observe—e.g. enterprise software—and in a domain where you have no connections, you'll have to rely on cold calls and introductions. But should you even be working on such an idea?"

When pg says, "Should you even be working on such an idea?" -- is he saying that he questions any startup that is focusing on enterprise and which cannot be sold to fellow founders in a YC batch?

He once wrote "enterprise software companies sell bad software for huge amounts of money", so I suppose he doesn't love enterprise software that doesn't have a long tail customer base.

But, wouldn't this exclude a lot of interesting ideas in education, healthcare, government, finance, etc.?

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#124

Post by dmoney »

scribu wrote: post #33
Jd wrote: post #24

TLDR: Startups that try to focus on big launches are generally lazy. Success comes from putting in extraordinary effort to putting your customer first. This means you get super-enthusiastic users. This works by the principle of compound growth as users tell their friends. Somewhat ironically I am of the opinion that: (A) this is one of pg's best and most useful essays ever (B) it is partially more useful because it i…

I agree that it's one of his most useful essays ever. I didn't find it particularly long, though. It would be great if more top links on HN were as in-depth as this.

It's long, but at least PG gets to the point. So many articles have a title like "Why x is y", and then start like "The cool evening air smelled of honeysuckle in ", and are multiple pages long even though having a web page be more than one page long makes no sense.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#125

Post by davidcann »

pixelmonkey wrote: post #123

Loved this essay, but I'm a little confused by this footnote. "[5] If you're building something for which you can't easily get a small set of users to observe—e.g. enterprise software—and in a domain where you have no connections, you'll have to rely on cold calls and introductions. But should you even be working on such an idea?" When pg says, "Should you even be working on such an idea?" -- is he saying that he que…

Presumably, you enter YC with pre-existing domain knowledge and/or network or you have a way to gain those quickly.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#127

Post by mkeung »

pixelmonkey wrote: post #123

Loved this essay, but I'm a little confused by this footnote. "[5] If you're building something for which you can't easily get a small set of users to observe—e.g. enterprise software—and in a domain where you have no connections, you'll have to rely on cold calls and introductions. But should you even be working on such an idea?" When pg says, "Should you even be working on such an idea?" -- is he saying that he que…

My interpretation: this is just saying your success is likely to be higher if you work with what you are familiar with.

If you deal with enterprise problems and enterprise software, go for it. If you haven't ever dealt with enterprise problems, what are you doing making a start up for what you don't understand well.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#128

Post by andrewflnr »

mjmahone17 wrote: post #70
andrewflnr wrote: post #35

I've been thinking about this "narrow focus" idea, and I'm not sure how to or whether I should apply it to my own idea. I'm working on building a tool that's supposed to provide a free-form way to record and organize ideas. I think it could be especially useful to writers, and I use my prototype for task tracking. But if I target it to any specific group, I'm afraid it will get pigeon-holed as a "writer's tool" or "t…

From someone who's never actually done the startup thing: when you feel like your product is good enough to stand alone, outside of the specific domain you originally targeted for, you likely have to have a second round of "initial" user acquisition, where you cater to, and iterate on, the needs of more general users you recruit.

But if you try too hard to get that one domain, you may not reach a point where it's "good enough to stand alone, outside..." because, while your execution was good, you moved in the wrong direction.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#129

Post by soneca »

pixelmonkey wrote: post #123

Loved this essay, but I'm a little confused by this footnote. "[5] If you're building something for which you can't easily get a small set of users to observe—e.g. enterprise software—and in a domain where you have no connections, you'll have to rely on cold calls and introductions. But should you even be working on such an idea?" When pg says, "Should you even be working on such an idea?" -- is he saying that he que…

No, he questions founders of enterprise startups on a field they don't have deep knowledge.

If I found a startup that wants to improve how car dealers sell cars, but I never worked selling cars, nor I know car dealers, why I am founding this.

Re: Do Things that Don't Scale

#130

Post by andrewflnr »

wozniacki wrote: post #80
aw3c2 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both links say LSAT everywhere but I could not find any mention of what the acronym means! I had to check Wikipedia.

Give it a thought for a second. Does the degree of inconvenience caused to you - in requiring you to figure out what LSAT means - necessarily require that you record your disapproval here? The test for substance is a lot like it is for links. Does your comment teach us anything? There are two ways to do that: by pointing out some consideration that hadn't previously been mentioned, and by giving more information abou…

It is potentially useful to tell someone that there is information missing in something they have written. If they're smart, they don't want to inconvenience their readers. In this case, it didn't matter much because the target market already knows, but you don't know until you bring it up.
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