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Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

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Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#71

Post by M2Ys4U »

mbesto wrote: post #53
antr wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A US SaaS hasn't got tax, legal, culture issues when selling their products in Europe. So how can all of these be issues within the EU?

Have you ever tried to sell something in English to a French company? Have you ever tried to sell something in Russia without "having a connection" to someone? Why does Dropbox have a Irish HQ?[0] [0]- https://www.dropbox.com/dublin

>Why does Dropbox have a Irish HQ?

There are two main reasons why companies set up European HQs in Dublin/Ireland:

1. Avoiding tax. Ireland has a low rate of corporation tax and some fairly large loopholes. See the Double Irish arrangement and the Dutch Sandwich[0] set-ups.

2. Avoiding privacy protection. The data protection authority in Ireland is tiny[1] and severely under-resourced, so finds it hard to enforce European data protection standards which are significantly higher than in the US (which has pretty much zero regulation when it comes to privacy)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement

[1] http://i.imgur.com/IKHC2Ud.png - This is the office of the Data Protection Commissioner in Ireland. A tiny office next to a supermarket. This is the authority responsible for policing privacy for dozens of huge multinations in Europe, including Facebook.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#72

Post by vertasd »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #67
vertasd wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually he is 100% right. It's a different cultural behaviour in Europe. In the last 15 years I visited most of Europe and major cities of the world and the mentality is definitely different. Americans are more optimistic than Europeans and they see risk differently. Also, take into account the past, the living standards during the course of history. While americans were chilling in the 80s and 90s, many countries o…

I am European. It's a stereotype.

European from where?It matters...West? You obviously don't know what you're talking about.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#73

Post by mbesto »

antr wrote: post #65
mbesto wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can cherry pick all of you want (i.e. your own business). How about Spotify? Why did people in Germany and the UK have to wait years after Sweden already had it (when the technology already existed)? Whereas Rdio in the US was able to tap into 350 million people right off the bat.

Spotify's rollout has nothing to do with the country's laws nor regulation, but due to private commercial agreements between parent record labels and countries' OpCos. Blaming a country's laws and regulations, instead of the private commercial/licensing agreements that stifle content rollout is unheard of. You are mixing two very different topics.

> private commercial/licensing agreements

And who do you think enforces commercial licensing agreements?

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#74

Post by antr »

mbesto wrote: post #73
antr wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spotify's rollout has nothing to do with the country's laws nor regulation, but due to private commercial agreements between parent record labels and countries' OpCos. Blaming a country's laws and regulations, instead of the private commercial/licensing agreements that stifle content rollout is unheard of. You are mixing two very different topics.

> private commercial/licensing agreements And who do you think enforces commercial licensing agreements?

Why are you making this argument up? Which governments in the world care about Justin Bieber's latest album release dates, distribution and pricing strategy, etc.? There is NO evidence that governments make studios establish a release date, distribution strategy, pricing strategy, etc. This is a barrier created entirely and solely by the music record industry.

Wow!, Simply wow! You've tried to make an argument on an issue you have no data for, and now you need to make up stories to justify your believes. Wow!

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#75

Post by m0a0t0 »

vertasd wrote: post #72
k-mcgrady wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am European. It's a stereotype.

European from where?It matters...West? You obviously don't know what you're talking about.

I would trust him, someone from Europe, over a person who has "travelled" there. You really need to live in a place to get to know it's culture at anything more that a superficial level.

At a superficial level, for example, Americans seem to believe they are better (possibly due to genetics) than others. This kind of exceptionalism/patriotism is bad.

You've mentioned yourself why this whole article and comments are bollocks. Europe is is no way homogeneous and referring to startups in "Europe" is kind of pointless.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#76

Post by michaelfeathers »

Silhouette wrote: post #61
michaelfeathers wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the way to put it is - "failure is not something to be that scared of." I didn't like the article. It felt shallow. The real issue is that in the US we have a tendency to not second-guess people's decisions about how to invest their money. Yes, this means that some people will be ripped off, but it also means that they, and the society as a whole can be in rapid learning cycles about what makes a good investmen…

It's clear that the US has a very different take on acceptable risk and as a result they more big wins and big losses. Can't have one without the other. Is that really true? If you ever make a big loss, in the sense that backing something like Google or Facebook would have been a big win, you're probably doing investment wrong. The dominant US tech investment strategy today appears to be accepting many relatively sma…

What if we shift the discussion from investor risk and reward to founder risk and reward? In the US it's possible for founders to win big and I suspect that is the reason why startups gravitate to the US. On the risk side, yes you can lose your shirt and so can your investors, but the system considers it normal to get up and try again.

I don't like the fact that we don't have much of a social safety net in the US but that can be considered one of the larger risks founders face as well.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#77

Post by vertasd »

m0a0t0 wrote: post #75
vertasd wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

European from where?It matters...West? You obviously don't know what you're talking about.

I would trust him, someone from Europe, over a person who has "travelled" there. You really need to live in a place to get to know it's culture at anything more that a superficial level. At a superficial level, for example, Americans seem to believe they are better (possibly due to genetics) than others. This kind of exceptionalism/patriotism is bad. You've mentioned yourself why this whole article and comments are b…

I am from Europe, don't know why you're trying to be a smartass. I lived in most of them.Who said everything is crap in this article/comments?

You know what, forget about it. I'm not gonna argue with an arrogant dumbass.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#78

Post by ThomPete »

antr wrote: post #13
ThomPete wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is just a short list. a) Different cultures b) Different languages c) Different tax systems d) Different company types e) Different legality All these in combination creates a lot of friction that makes it harder. There are obviously exceptions (ex. skype) but in general it's just very hard to navigate compared to the US.

None of these are issues that European entrepreneurs I talk to have ever had.

they are those i know and projects i been involved with. But hey dont take my word for it. Try it out yourself.

Re: Why haven’t European investors fully accepted the failure is good mentality yet?

#79

Post by MrJimacks »

RivieraKid wrote: post #30

I would hypothesise that there are two reasons for this. 1. The size of the US market is a huge advantage. Startups targeting and operating in the US market can grow bigger. China has the same advantage. 2. Americans are less risk-averse because Americans are mostly descendants of immigrants. And immigrants are more likely to have a less risk-averse DNA.

> immigrants are more likely to have a less risk-averse DNA > less risk-averse DNA > risk-averse DNA

You're stupid

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