Did anyone else notice a response tweet from Simon Leviev (the Tinder Swindler which was on Netflix)?
> have you read my business plan ?
https://twitter.com/3rd_layer/status/1492682875208146947?s=2...
I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
281–290 of 346 posts
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#282So, PG got lucky once, and now he has the luck to burn on numerous risky ventures until one pays off and he gets more luck. This is basically a humble brag.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#283Am I missing something? What's the point of the tweet other than to elicit a reaction? And then in the replies: 'I CAN'T BELIEVE I ELICITED A REACTION!.
To inform potential applicants to YC or other founders that business plans are not essential/important to raise investment?
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#284So, PG got lucky once, and now he has the luck to burn on numerous risky ventures until one pays off and he gets more luck. This is basically a humble brag.
Well, yes, that sums up technology VC in general. It is exceptionally rare for a person to truly have seen an opportunity with the clarity of vision to have any real confidence it will succeed. Almost of the successes in this world boil down to the luck of timing and, more importantly, social networking and connections.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#285Earlier quoted context omitted.
That business plans are a bad thing is becoming a meme. It's great to get some (many in PGs case) likes on twitter and that's about it. A business plan is great to have because it forces you to think through all the important pieces of the business. Many great companies had one, e.g. Apple (as mentioned by someone else in this thread). Amazon has detailed Word documents for anything they dive into. Of course, plannin…
The question is not about the general utility of business plans. It's about whether they're good for early stage startups. These kind of organisations need to move fast and try a lot of stuff in a short amount of time to see what works. A business plan then seems expedient because the future direction is not set in stone anyway. That's the logic behind the argument.
As I mentioned, amazon is doing those for any kind of business venture afaik.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Balance sheets or income statements as he knows they can be full of bullshit Agreed. However, I do have a question for you: what do you think can be more full of bullshit, an oral financial statement by the founder during a conversation, or his audited financial statements? Yes, the notion that balance sheets and income statements don't tell the whole story and can be misleading is a fact. It's also a fact that the…
I'm not sure how much you know about YC's history or PG's approach to investing, but in this and your other comment in this thread, you seem to be under a misapprehension. The types of companies PG has normally invested in were barely even companies yet. They were small teams with an idea. Maybe a prototype. Maybe a few users. Often they were not incorporated as companies when he agreed to invest, or if they were, th…
Sure, if you want to ignore the fact he was part of a C series funding round of $55 million, say just two months ago as an example, and believe he's solely done seed funding, be my guest.
If you want to ignore the fact he's been a director and has to sign off on balance sheets, also be my guest.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#287Viaweb's First Business Plan: http://paulgraham.com/vwplan.html
That was fun to read. It was a different time:
Secure server software ($5000). This does not seem to be an absolute necessity; there are a lot of sites on the web where you can send your credit card number unencrypted, and to date there have been no reports of the numbers being stolen. But catalog companies may believe that a secure link is necessary, and spending this $5000 would give Webgen a much more professional look.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#288Seems like a lot of people are missing the point of this one. PG/YC invest at the earliest stages. The information they need is pretty much: 1. What are you doing? 2. Do people like it? 3. How big is the market? 4. What are you/team like? Could you cover all of those in a formal business plan? Sure, but you can also do so in a short-form application that's 1/20 the length or in a 10-minute back-and-forth conversation…
> PG/YC invest at the earliest stages
Except when they don't.
Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#289Re: I have never read a business plan or balance sheet
#290His response to some of the reactions he's getting:
Even after all these years, Twitter still surprises me. This is the tweet that makes people accuse me of lying and announce that they're unfollowing me? People are that attached to business plans and balance sheets? How completely mystifying.
The reason I don't care about business plans is that I can learn more from 5 minutes of interrogating the founders than from 10 pages of fluff they've written.
The reason I don't care about balance sheets is the same reason I don't care who's leading 100 yards into a marathon.