Live data from Hacker News

Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

anothersb.blogspot.com

41–50 of 53 posts

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#41

On the flip side this post comes to mind http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2010/10/13/be-careful-not... How much value is being generated by the founder(s) being at events like this?

I would like to know too..

I have long ago stopped applying for awards rort.. took away so much of my time..

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#42
post #32
post #29

This reminds me a whole lot of those "modeling agencies" that charge reasonably attractive young women with no hope of making it as a model for photo shoots.

There are also writing "competitions" that accept everything and anything, put all entries into some crappy "anthology" and then try to sell copies to everyone who entered.

An elderly relative of mine fell for that. Oddly, it changed my opinion of them - the amount of pride he extracted from it was more than worth the couple of hundred dollars he paid.

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for taking the time to comment. As I make clear in the post, it's not the fact that you charge that is the problem. It's the misleading tactic of calling startups, making us present, asking us questions, then e-mailing us "Congratulations! Your company is great and we are selecting you after screening. You can now pay us $1,400." If you are not explicit when you reach out by e-mail in the first place about…

Thanks for your note. Paddy G here again. The team are really sorry that there was a misunderstanding between us and the author of the blog article Lenny Teytelman over the cost of coming to Collision and taking part in our Collide track for startups. We really try to be as transparent as possible about the costs of attending our events. We believe that we offer great value for money for all attendees, whether they a…

No Paddy, I did not "misunderstand" during the Skype call. That e-mail was just my polite way of telling you to go away. Here is a less polite but more direct response: http://anothersb.blogspot.com/2015/04/last-post-on-collision...

I am not going to engage in "he said, she said" with you. Instead, I encourage readers to look at the other comments in this thread to make up their mind about Collision. Plenty more of such concerns here http://www.reddit.com/r/startups/comments/2x8i04/weve_been_a....

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#45
From The Funded site comes this gem of a comment:

"Many years ago as a young entrepreneur I had a lunch meeting with an investor, at the end of which I tried to pay. He stopped me and said "any investor who lets you pay for lunch isn't a real investor". I sat in on a K forum, considering pitching them. When they told me they wanted $3000K for me to "join their community" and pitch I almost fell over."

http://www.thefunded.com/funds/show/Keiretsu+Forum

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#46

Although I tend to agree with this post, we had a good experience with the only conference we decided to attend. We at Codacy decided to attend the Web Summit last year and invested the amount they asked us to put in (I can't recall how much but was the standard for the BETA category). They upgraded us to the BETA category even though we actually should have been put in the lower ALPHA one. In any case we executed on…

My experience with the WebSummit is that it's valuable IF you participate in the pitch competition. If not, you can get a lot of value at the evening/night events.

Some of the talks are also very interesting and gives you the chance to see people that you usually don't see in Europe.

But the stands? The stands have been completely useless for us.

BTW, congratulations, we were finalists in 2013 and even that gave us a big push.

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#47

Hey guys, Paddy G (@thepadman) from Collision here. Probably best for me to chip in and clarify the situation. We do get thousands of applications and make time to hop on calls to make sure the companies are viable and have cool teams. We end up choosing around 10%-15% of those who apply. Regarding registration; Physical space at any conference would come at a premium. As advertised, we're removing this element of th…

Thank you for replying. I don't think it's reasonable for you to be downvoted here. Whether readers like your response or not, you are the one of the direct subjects of the article, so your responses (and certainly your initial response to the article) are extremely relevant here.

Moderators: downvoting the parent is perhaps the clearest abuse of downvotes I've ever seen. Please act.

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your note. Paddy G here again. The team are really sorry that there was a misunderstanding between us and the author of the blog article Lenny Teytelman over the cost of coming to Collision and taking part in our Collide track for startups. We really try to be as transparent as possible about the costs of attending our events. We believe that we offer great value for money for all attendees, whether they a…

No Paddy, I did not "misunderstand" during the Skype call. That e-mail was just my polite way of telling you to go away. Here is a less polite but more direct response: http://anothersb.blogspot.com/2015/04/last-post-on-collision... I am not going to engage in "he said, she said" with you. Instead, I encourage readers to look at the other comments in this thread to make up their mind about Collision. Plenty more of s…

Hey, I'm the author of that reddit post (knowhere). We decided to not go and are very happy about our decision now that that comes to light. We almost spend a lot of money for what felt like a big shot.

We decided against it because the deadline was so short. We got accepted on a tuesday and would have had to pay by friday the same week. We passed because that wasn't enough time to make a good decision.

We have the same problem with the phocuswright europe conference as well. They want us to pitch but spend 7500€ (we won't). It's hard to navigate that because as a startup you feel like you have to get out there and deciding between the really goot opportunities and the bad ones is harder then I thought.

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#49
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's weird to see you casually describing and justifying the deteriorating mental health of a person who was important to you. I don't think you'd do the same for, for example, RSI. "Hey, we survived a couple of years with a bad keyboard desk combination. Typing on that was a full time job for someone; they got RSI. But it kept us going".

I don't think it's a topic we need to tiptoe around. This is one of the few places where it should be normal to write about it casually. Describing it as 'deteriorating mental health' makes it sound like something to be ashamed of. Like burning out means you've gone bonkers. That attitude probably deters many founders from wanting to talk about it.

I agree that burnout is serious. That's why I think it's weird to see it so casually dismissed - this guy burntout but that's okay because we got some cash and we were able to keep going.

I don't think it's okay to allow people to burnout; and if their job is causing burnout something about the job needs to change.

It's odd that you call for people to discuss their mental health problems while simultaneously using deeply stigmatising language.

Re: Hey startup parasites: We don't have time for you

#50
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's a topic we need to tiptoe around. This is one of the few places where it should be normal to write about it casually. Describing it as 'deteriorating mental health' makes it sound like something to be ashamed of. Like burning out means you've gone bonkers. That attitude probably deters many founders from wanting to talk about it.

I agree that burnout is serious. That's why I think it's weird to see it so casually dismissed - this guy burntout but that's okay because we got some cash and we were able to keep going. I don't think it's okay to allow people to burnout; and if their job is causing burnout something about the job needs to change. It's odd that you call for people to discuss their mental health problems while simultaneously using de…

Wow you guys read a lot into a few words. Lets reset. He burned out on pitching several times a day, took a break of a few weeks, moved up the food chain to more qualified investors (> $200K) so he didn't have to pitch but once or twice a day. Doing fine now.

Lots of people burn out on lots of things. Its not always a complete mental meltdown. Sometimes its just "I can't do this any more; lets find a new way"

Post reply on HN