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

My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 273 posts

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#41

Post by shankysingh »

birken wrote: post #26

Well written. One thing I always find funny about the startup world is the idea that hardship is good. Hardship isn't good. Hardship sucks. Sometimes hardship is something you need to survive to accomplish your goals, but not always. While there are a lot of successful startups that went through a lot of hardship, there are a lot of them that didn't. It seems that based on a lot of factors that were outside of your c…

Gotta agree, startup is not some glorified zero sum game. Losing two co-founders nearly threw me into "depression". A special hell I created around myself of self-doubt and why-me.

Personally taking time off startup helped and made mentally more stronger. I can't even imagine what she went through with so many big ups and downs.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#42

Post by jakejake »

nikkidurkin wrote: post #22
andrewljohnson wrote: post #15

It struck me when she glossed over how/why her two co-founders left. There's got to be a deeper story to why two "co-founders" would leave right when 1.2M is secured. She said they decided to tell me they were leaving the company without even a hint of warning - my guess is there was no agreement in the first place or a lot of unnoticed warnings. To conclude she's just too trustful is almost certainly a flawed conclu…

Hey Andrew, I actually glossed over that out of respect for the 2 guys. My purpose was not to bitch about them, and many people who will read this post in my network will know who I'm talking about. There were mistakes made on both sides, but in the end I bent over backwards to accomodate them and as soon as YC was over and they could say they were YC founders they bailed. I'm not saying its entirely their fault - I…

I think it's great that you take the high road and don't resort to dragging other people through the mud. You definitely seem to place the responsibility all on yourself, which I imagine is not always the full truth. Not providing any reason at all, actually makes it sound as if the two co-founders just randomly and completely bailed on you. (Which may be exactly the truth)

I was trying to imagine a logical scenario, for example they had an even better opportunity. Or perhaps it was better to split before the stakes became to high. Maybe the salaries were not going to be what was expected, there were disagreements on responsibilities, etc. I can imagine a lot of scenarios.

Not to diminish your article, which I found extremely interesting. It was just a point that definitely seems like there was a greater story to be told.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#43

Post by BigChiefSmokem »

"...I was going to go big or go home"

Ms. Durkin I think you just need to go bigger next time. Don't just solve a small problem, solve a dire one that we all (man and woman, black or white) have in common.

Why disrupt a market when you can create a new one while simultaneously destroying four others? You know, that sort of thing.

Good luck!

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#44

Post by thomasfromcdnjs »

nikkidurkin wrote: post #29
thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #12

Bad luck. Though, where are all the expenses? Seems to just be an iPhone app with not much schelps, could your technical partner manage it part time?

I think it was a combination of bad luck, timing, and some bad decisions on my behalf. I learned a lot from the experience. Actually, we had a team of 5 working on this. Running operations is really intense and time consuming. There is lots of customer service, community management and making sure items arrive at their destination. Then I was there to work on product and I had 2 developers as well. I looked at the fi…

Makes sense. I actually stumbled upon 99dresses the other day after looking at Polenizer(I'm a Brisbanite). Hoping to grow a startup here, not because of some strict nationalism, just too lazy to go through the visa process =D

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#45

Post by harel »

I understand the frustration and outright sadness at a startup dying. Its your baby while its there, and sometimes, you wake one day and its not. But that is the nature of startups. Like you said - the odds are against you from day zero. But we do it regardless for that 10% chance of "not dying" and the even more anorexic chance of "making it big". I think ultimately we're doing it for the ride. And I think every person going into a startup should be given a little laminated fact sheet explaining that he's joining an enterprise which will try to fight this statistic and nothing is guaranteed in this rollercoaster. Same way the banks have to warn you before you invest in a portfolio, that your investment might be buggered to hell, people should be aware the same applies to tech startups. If nothing else, that might cut down on the disappointment of letting your staff know its over.

Keep at it Nikki. Well done for your first round. Level up now and go at it again.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#47

Post by GuiA »

I met Nikki while I lived at a Hacker House in Mountain View for a few weeks in January 2012, having recently moved to the Bay Area. I remember being impressed at the time by her intensity, and by the fact that she actually had a real product with real users that solved a real problem.

An audible "oh no" came out of my lips when I clicked this link and realized I was reading about someone I had shared a few dinners with.

It's important for little pieces of history such as this one to be recorded. For the founders, to whom it gives a sense of closure, and for the community. So that we don't forget our comrades who didn't make it to the other side, but still have insightful lessons to share.

The press likes to glorify the AirBnBs, the Googles, the Facebooks - but as founders, I think it's important for us to be realize that this is only a tiny visible part of the iceberg, and that at the end of the day, there are so many factors at play that it would be foolish for us to focus solely on the "how many millions did they make". Human stories are never boring, and experience is one of the most precious thing others can share.

Thanks for taking the time and effort to write this, Nikki. We're with you.

---

"Investing money, creating new products, and all the other things we do are wonderful games and can be a lot of fun, but it's important to remember that it's all just a game. What's most important is that we are good too each other, and ourselves."(http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2012/03/eight-years-today.h...)

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#49

Post by Agathos »

My TL;DR: a founder ran into some painful but survivable bumps along the road, plus one killer.

The latter being there are people in the US government who would rather burn down the whole economy than share any of it with a dirty immigrant. Even a white, English-speaking one!

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#50

Post by [deleted] »

[deleted] wrote: post #40
ixmatus wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I experienced a co-founder split not too long ago and I can definitely tell you from my personal introspection that you may need to look deeper than "it was my fault for not seeing the warning signs". It always takes two to tango and you're right to not bitch about them but then saying you were stabbed in the back is silly. Being a founder is tough, having co-founder problems is tougher, clearly understanding what yo…

[deleted]

[deleted]
Post reply on HN