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Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

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Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#111

Post by Retric »

lozaning wrote: post #109
Retric wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. The mega millions jackpot is currently at $550 Million dollars in cash. That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to spend 2$ on a ticket. So sure, it’s possible to become a billionaire by writing books just look at J.K. Rawling. Hell someone got 10,000 bitcoins for the price of 2 pizza, which in theory are worth 366,790,000$ today. In the end the upside of being the founder i…

If you live in a state where you can play jackpot only, which is 2 picks for $3 and no eligibility for partial matches, there's a positive EV anytime the cash payout is more than $453,863,025.00 Accounting for taxes ruins it a bit, but once the jackpot gets high enough it's dumb not to buy a ticket.

That also assumes single winners, more interestingly it ignores the diminishing marginal utility of money.

Consider your personal utility function, at 70 what odds would you need to play double or nothing with your entire life’s savings. If it takes more than 50.1:49.9 odds then you like most people don’t have a linear view of money.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#112

Post by Retric »

dvt wrote: post #104
Retric wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. The mega millions jackpot is currently at $550 Million dollars in cash. That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to spend 2$ on a ticket. So sure, it’s possible to become a billionaire by writing books just look at J.K. Rawling. Hell someone got 10,000 bitcoins for the price of 2 pizza, which in theory are worth 366,790,000$ today. In the end the upside of being the founder i…

> Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. Which is why I've been mentioning "risks" in just about every post I've made. Which is why a big part of OP is how taxing and difficult it's been. Why is why we keep talking about how 9/10 businesses fail. There's no free lunch. But my original point was that we already know this . So it's not particularly insightful to point it out on a forum almost exclusively dedic…

“can be risky (see OP)” is vastly downplaying 1 in 10 odds of nominal success. Simply not failing doesn’t mean the bet paid off.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#113

Post by dminor »

dvt wrote: post #104
Retric wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. The mega millions jackpot is currently at $550 Million dollars in cash. That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to spend 2$ on a ticket. So sure, it’s possible to become a billionaire by writing books just look at J.K. Rawling. Hell someone got 10,000 bitcoins for the price of 2 pizza, which in theory are worth 366,790,000$ today. In the end the upside of being the founder i…

> Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. Which is why I've been mentioning "risks" in just about every post I've made. Which is why a big part of OP is how taxing and difficult it's been. Why is why we keep talking about how 9/10 businesses fail. There's no free lunch. But my original point was that we already know this . So it's not particularly insightful to point it out on a forum almost exclusively dedic…

I think the problem is you called it a "reliable" route to financial independence, when the variance is actually pretty high. Anyone who can get a job at a large tech company in SF/Seattle/NY has a much more reliable route to financial independence.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#114

Post by [deleted] »

aerosmile wrote: post #89
Techonomicon wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love this comment. I don't think this notion gets highlighted enough. This is definitively anecdotal, though I've been at / through approximately 5 startups across 12 years, and looking back, I believe each end everyone one (except for one) was definitely helped / started by a founder or set of founders who didn't have to worry about whether they went belly up or not due to family wealth. Hell, I still know some th…

If you don't come from wealth, please don't be deterred by this and similar narratives. The OP is not referring to any facts or data, just a personal experience, aka n=1. If you're looking for a more reliable guidance in life, look at YC which is n~3,000. If there's anyone who knows where to look for startup success, it's YC - and their search has increasingly shifted towards India, Nigeria and similar countries [1].…

[deleted]

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#115

Post by KerryJones »

dvt wrote: post #64
solidasparagus wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> still one of the most reliable ways of [...] becoming financially independent (if not outright wealthy) There's just no way this is true. For people with the skills needed by SV startups, working at one of the startups is almost certainly financially worse than using those skills at a large company.

I was specifically talking about founders (but even early stage engineers can do extremely well if the startup takes off). The upside is much higher doing your own thing rather than working at BigCorp (the two aren't even remotely comparable, but neither is the risk). Not to mention the end goals/QOL of working on what you want, commanding your own ship, being financially independent, etc. Virtually all self-made mil…

Sam Altman has argued against this in a number of places, here's the first one I found: https://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec01/

Looking at the potential upside is disastrous without looking at the downside. That's what the '00 tech bubble was -- we're prone to HUGE biases and it is important to have constant reminders to bring us back to reality.

The founders who have succeeded are known to be _irrationally_ optimistic, literally irrational. This means, statistically, it's a poor choice to do what they did. It means, in some sense of the word, they got lucky. Many founders publicly acknowledge this -- luck was a huge factor.

If you want money, being a founder _might_ get you there, but odds are, it won't.

Being a founder makes the most sense when you're obsessed with solving a problem and the money is a perk, not a motivator.

Transparency: ex-founder of Series B company

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#116

Post by ativzzz »

Scramblejams wrote: post #28

Amazing story, glad you made it. Potential customer here, and I have a question. I'm a programmer, very happy making backends, setting up the infra, maintaining it, and so on. I often want to make web pages, but I just hate dealing the web front-end stack. Is this product a good fit for me? I could visually design the website, avoid getting my hands dirty with HTML/CSS/JS, then have an easy way to connect it with a b…

From my experience with a different but similar tool, it follows the pareto principle. It will do 80% of the work very effectively, but as your business grows and you need more niche functionality, you will need a developer to figure out a way to make the platform behave in a way which it doesn't expect, which can be time consuming.

So great for MVPs or getting a business bootstrapped quickly and cheaply, but once you have enough money to afford developers without breaking the bank, your money may be better spent elsewhere.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#117

Post by dumbfounder »

cfontes wrote: post #106
baby wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s actually no “going back up” or digging yourself of your own grave once you hit a large medical expense. Lots of people become homeless and bankrupt for life due to these issues. Personally, my plan is to go back to Europe if I want to launch an American startup because there is no way I would do this without a good health insurance and good social safety nets. Interestingly, we see much more startups in the U…

try funding a startup in europe and you will understand why.

I hear about a lot of startups moving to Canada, the best of both worlds?

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#118

Post by TAForObvReasons »

Techonomicon wrote: post #55
TAForObvReasons wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

*younger people with family wealth. Some of my friends were unable to take risks because they needed to support their parents as well, and that puts a huge pressure to go with the safe money

I love this comment. I don't think this notion gets highlighted enough. This is definitively anecdotal, though I've been at / through approximately 5 startups across 12 years, and looking back, I believe each end everyone one (except for one) was definitely helped / started by a founder or set of founders who didn't have to worry about whether they went belly up or not due to family wealth. Hell, I still know some th…

To an extent it doesn't get highlighted enough because the community buries these comments. The comment you are replying to is sitting at -3 karma at the moment, and I wouldn't be surprised if similar comments were flagged and downvoted.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#119

Post by deedub »

notatrumper wrote: post #70
WD-42 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no surprise that the largest predictor of wealth is... wealth. Lots of founders might not be directly funded by family wealth, but the various safety nets and conveniences (even op said they sold 2 of their cars) are a major factor, if not the largest factor, of success. It's an ugly truth of life that I've come to accept: the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor.

Unless they bought Bitcoin for 1$ in 2009. Another tried and proven way is to marry somebody who is rich. Mostly just an option for women, though.

You have repeatedly brought up marrying someone rich in this thread saying it is "mostly an option for women". So, are you some how saying rich women only marry rich men, but rich men will consider poor women? So much so it's actually a thing? Sources, please? It sounds extremely out dated and kind of gross...especially because you keep saying it like it is some valid thing.

Re: Thanks HN: You helped save a company that now helps thousands make a living

#120

Post by dvt »

dminor wrote: post #113
dvt wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Looking at upsides on their own is meaningless. Which is why I've been mentioning "risks" in just about every post I've made. Which is why a big part of OP is how taxing and difficult it's been. Why is why we keep talking about how 9/10 businesses fail. There's no free lunch. But my original point was that we already know this . So it's not particularly insightful to point it out on a forum almost exclusively dedic…

I think the problem is you called it a "reliable" route to financial independence, when the variance is actually pretty high. Anyone who can get a job at a large tech company in SF/Seattle/NY has a much more reliable route to financial independence.

> I think the problem is you called it a "reliable" route to financial independence, when the variance is actually pretty high. Anyone who can get a job at a large tech company in SF/Seattle/NY has a much more reliable route to financial independence.

I feel like I argue this ad nauseum here on HN. No, being engineer #3489 won't ever make you financially "independent" (and by that, I mean having FU money). Financial comfort is something else entirely. Making 100-200k (even including stock bonuses) somewhere like SF/NY where rent for a 1 bed 1 bath is like 3k (and houses/condos start at $1 million) will never have the same upside as starting your own company. Let's ignore for now the very real chance of getting laid off, or otherwise fired in favor of a younger engineer that gets paid less than you do (when you hit your 40s).

But again, financial independence is just one aspect of "winning" at a startup. Everyone conveniently ignores doing your own thing, freedom, self-reliance, self-determination, etc. -- these are non-existent at BigCorp (where you're treated, at best, like a cog). I personally value freedom much more than I do money -- which is why I accept the risks of every few years throwing my hat in the ring and seeing what comes of idea X or Y.

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