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Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

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Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#11

Post by tesseract »

daveschappell wrote: post #6
stevenj wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think it's just more that people are focused on their own thing, by and large, vs. getting out with a small % of their time and building a community for the greater good. Ya, they're not enough "crazy" people. I think Seattle needs a big consumer-based (2.0 or 3.0) hit. It needs a Facebook, a Groupon, a Twitter, a Skype, a LinkedIn, an Etsy, a Dropbox.

you mean, like an Amazon? or a Starbucks? :-) or, if you want to be cynical that Amazon's a long time ago... how about like an AWS, or a Kindle? The innovation's here -- we just need to get more commingling going on it's going to happen -- if you're in town, reach out, please -- would love to have you help

For what it's worth, Lab126 (the Kindle-designing branch of Amazon) is in Cupertino, not Seattle.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#12

Post by potatolicious »

daveschappell wrote: post #6
stevenj wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think it's just more that people are focused on their own thing, by and large, vs. getting out with a small % of their time and building a community for the greater good. Ya, they're not enough "crazy" people. I think Seattle needs a big consumer-based (2.0 or 3.0) hit. It needs a Facebook, a Groupon, a Twitter, a Skype, a LinkedIn, an Etsy, a Dropbox.

you mean, like an Amazon? or a Starbucks? :-) or, if you want to be cynical that Amazon's a long time ago... how about like an AWS, or a Kindle? The innovation's here -- we just need to get more commingling going on it's going to happen -- if you're in town, reach out, please -- would love to have you help

Amazon was a long time ago, and AWS/Kindle, while being great products, did not contain really an element of risk the way a scrappy startup does.

I think parent poster has a point - there aren't a lot of recent examples of taking the risk and having it pay off, which may lead to some risk aversion in the community.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#13

Post by Irfaan »

Mongoose wrote: post #7

One thing that I think would help is if Seattle startups did more recruiting at UW's CSE department. There's a reason why Seattle startups tend to be founded by ex-MS and -Amazon folks instead of fresh college grads. Very few students here know anything about the local startup scene and end up being gobbled up by big companies (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe) or moving to greener pastures in the Bay Area. Suster di…

Alright - how do we go about this, then? Is there anyone driving anything like this already, or are we just waiting for some one to step in and just do this?

This sounds valuable enough that I'd be willing to plunk down some of my company's time to make this happen. That said, I suspect we'd be a rather poor choice to drive this as we're running pretty independent of the rest of the Seattle startup scene.

Given our community, though, there's gotta be someone whose a decent fit for this.

Anyone?

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#14

Post by kenjackson »

potatolicious wrote: post #12
daveschappell wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you mean, like an Amazon? or a Starbucks? :-) or, if you want to be cynical that Amazon's a long time ago... how about like an AWS, or a Kindle? The innovation's here -- we just need to get more commingling going on it's going to happen -- if you're in town, reach out, please -- would love to have you help

Amazon was a long time ago, and AWS/Kindle, while being great products, did not contain really an element of risk the way a scrappy startup does. I think parent poster has a point - there aren't a lot of recent examples of taking the risk and having it pay off, which may lead to some risk aversion in the community.

There are some.

For example Big Fish Games. There's also Tableau Software (although not consumer). Neither large compared to Skype, but both ~$100M revenue companies founded about the time of Skype.

UPDATE: After I wrote this I realized what is different about Seattle than the Bay Area, which is something a previous poster put in parentheticals... (web 2.0/3.0). Look at this list:

Facebook, a Groupon, a Twitter, a Skype, a LinkedIn, an Etsy, a Dropbox

These companies, except maybe Dropbox, are about connecting users together. Not about product. Seattle tends to be more focused on providing product. Is it the case that you are less likely to see a Tableau or Mathematica come out of the Bay Area?

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#15

Post by Mongoose »

Irfaan wrote: post #13
Mongoose wrote: post #7

One thing that I think would help is if Seattle startups did more recruiting at UW's CSE department. There's a reason why Seattle startups tend to be founded by ex-MS and -Amazon folks instead of fresh college grads. Very few students here know anything about the local startup scene and end up being gobbled up by big companies (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe) or moving to greener pastures in the Bay Area. Suster di…

Alright - how do we go about this, then? Is there anyone driving anything like this already, or are we just waiting for some one to step in and just do this? This sounds valuable enough that I'd be willing to plunk down some of my company's time to make this happen. That said, I suspect we'd be a rather poor choice to drive this as we're running pretty independent of the rest of the Seattle startup scene. Given our c…

Redfin's a good example. They're at every UW CSE career fair and Glenn Kelman (Redfin's CEO) gives talks on campus every now and then.

My original comment was a bit too focused on the companies' side of things. I think the main issue is a lack of awareness on the part of students. In my experience (as a current undergrad at UW), students simply don't know about the local startup scene and thus don't take the steps to capitalize on it. Given the decent number of organizations and meetups in the area that would provide good avenues for students to get involved (Seattle Tech Startups, Startup Weekend, Hops & Chops, TechCafe, etc), it's more a matter of connecting the dots than developing new social structures.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#16

Post by stevenj »

Mongoose wrote: post #7

One thing that I think would help is if Seattle startups did more recruiting at UW's CSE department. There's a reason why Seattle startups tend to be founded by ex-MS and -Amazon folks instead of fresh college grads. Very few students here know anything about the local startup scene and end up being gobbled up by big companies (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe) or moving to greener pastures in the Bay Area. Suster di…

In my experience, few good UW CSE graduates want to give up an $80,000+ job offer at a reputable company to work at a startup.

If you're a good engineer, who's also a recent graduate, deciding to do a startup comes at a cost (e.g. reduced salary) -- more so depending on how much debt you've accumulated.

With that said, I'm all for informing students about all the options that are available and allowing them to choose.

Though, I would love to see more engineering graduates of Seattle colleges join startups.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#17

Post by hazzen »

stevenj wrote: post #16
Mongoose wrote: post #7

One thing that I think would help is if Seattle startups did more recruiting at UW's CSE department. There's a reason why Seattle startups tend to be founded by ex-MS and -Amazon folks instead of fresh college grads. Very few students here know anything about the local startup scene and end up being gobbled up by big companies (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe) or moving to greener pastures in the Bay Area. Suster di…

In my experience, few good UW CSE graduates want to give up an $80,000+ job offer at a reputable company to work at a startup. If you're a good engineer, who's also a recent graduate, deciding to do a startup comes at a cost (e.g. reduced salary) -- more so depending on how much debt you've accumulated. With that said, I'm all for informing students about all the options that are available and allowing them to choose…

My observations as a (somewhat) recent graduate from UW CSE:

Many of the students that wanted to go into startups after graduation instead of a job either had started on some product during school and wanted to see that through to completion, or were of the mind that they could just work for a few years at {Amazon, Google, Microsoft, ...} and then do the risky thing.

There is also a lack of exposure in the curriculum. They are in the middle of re-designing it, but before that only one class let you create a small team, come up with a product, and build it. It was seen as a painful course (it was) and it was also taken by most everyone (including people who couldn't care less, so it was hard to find a group of 4-5 motivated people). I don't recall any hackathons when I was there aside from ACM programming competitions.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#18

Post by yakshaving »

daveschappell wrote: post #4
stevenj wrote: post #3

I may be wrong about this, but I sense that Seattle's startup scene is definitely lacking something important. I can't put my finger on it, but I think it's there. In my opinion, people here seem pretty risk-averse (ie few want to jump and do a startup, especially people in their twenties). It kind of seems like people lack the drive to "change the world". Instead, people seem pretty laid back here. It's almost as if…

No, I don't think that's it (having lived here for 13 years). I think it's just more that people are focused on their own thing, by and large, vs. getting out with a small % of their time and building a community for the greater good. This 'problem' is so fixable; we just need another catalyst (like what www.GeneralAssemb.ly and New Work City are doing in NYC... and what TechStars did in Boulder, Seattle, Boston and…

That's exactly what we're looking for -- Something like GeneralAssemb.ly in New York.

We're a startup working out of an architecture firm right now. The space is relatively inexpensive, it would be stellar if there were other startups around who are interested in putting together something similar with programming around design and technology.

If you're intersted, reach out to me via twitter (@ashbhoopathy) or email, ash@bettr.at. I'll also email Seattle Tech Startups about it.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#19

Post by TheIronYuppie »

daveschappell wrote: post #2

I'm fired up by Mark's idea, to much more deeply engage with our local leaders (Amazon, Microsoft, Starbucks, Costco, etc) -- think every geography has these, and presenting it how Mark does makes it so much more compelling. Everyone benefits from these relationships, and really, the Bay Area has crushed it in this area (think growth of Zynga and others on Facebook... the wave of startup involvement with iPhone/iPad…

Dave deserves a ton of credit for all he's doing in the community. I'll offer up my own time as well - if you have ANY questions, i'm happy to help - follow me at @aronchick or email me at aronchick (at) hark.com.

I think getting the patrons moving is a huge win - they all have stacks they want startups using and/or hiring problems. Getting a vibrant startup community makes things much better.

Re: Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

#20

Post by TheIronYuppie »

haberman wrote: post #10

I'm not active in the startup scene, but how could an article like this not mention Seattle Tech Startups? http://www.seattletechstartups.com/

My only problem with STS is the signal to noise ratio suffers - there's a lot of service providers and other folks on there that drown out the opportunity to make connections. It's a good start, but there are a ton more resources. If you really want to make a difference, or connect, my recommendation is attend one or all of the events here:

http://www.seattletechcalendar.com/

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