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How to Start Google

paulgraham.com

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Re: How to Start Google

#401

Post by volkk »

slimsag wrote: post #283
volkk wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i'd argue that's entirely up to the child to dream how they see fit, and up to the parent to support them, build them up and keep a pulse on what the thing is they're focusing on

Most kids want to be social media influencers. But I do not think most kids today, once adults, will be very happy with their parents if they just blindly support them in that dream, neglecting other realistic career possibilities in blind faith that their kid will be a star. I'm not saying you should tell your kid 'no! you can't be, I won't let you.' - but like, maybe nudge them in the right direction, have them mee…

i was hoping it's obvious that as a parent you should still keep guardrails around them but i also specifically mentioned

> and keep a pulse on what the thing is they're focusing on

Re: How to Start Google

#402

Post by difflens »

It's interesting that this piece mentions "to get really rich" as one of the primary motivators. Especially to high school students. I wonder if that's good advice or if society is better served by motivating students to start companies that make the world better.

Re: How to Start Google

#403

Post by volkk »

feedforward wrote: post #300
volkk wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Does anything good come from encouraging kids to think that they will manage to sail through life as a successful business founder rather than an employee? I would imagine dreaming big is pretty good for children. A big reason for why I'm optimistic in life is because I have hope for achieving something. I truly can't imagine a life where my father/mother would only hammer in the fact that I am just an average joe…

I find the level-headed realism and appreciation of those of us who work in OP's post refreshing, and the solipsism and wishful thinking of your post depressing.

what a weird comment. my entire drive to want to be a business owner is fueled by the desire to be free from inept senior leadership, bad managers and bloated hierarchy mixed with building something people love that stems from my own head. not sure how that translates to solopsism. also, optimism and desire to think big (even if i fail) is depressing to you? you should probably seek therapy, dude

Re: How to Start Google

#404

Post by lupire »

benzible wrote: post #20

> So Mark Zuckerberg shows up at Harvard in 2003, and the university still hasn't gotten the facebook online. [...] But Mark is a programmer. He looks at this situation and thinks "Well, this is stupid. I could write a program to fix this in one night. Just let people upload their own photos and then combine the data into a new site for the whole university." So he does. And almost literally overnight he has thousand…

You are too kind. It's a complete lie, or worse, utter BS fabricated to back up the OP argument. Zuckerberg stole photos (and the website name!) from the already existing online facebook.

Facebook was actually based on something he was hired by Winklevoss to create, and he decided to keep it for himself instead of delivering it. That's the "naughtiness" that YC seeks out in its Founder application process.

Note, by the way, in the recent "cancellation" of President Gay, the false claim that behavior like this would get a Harvard student expelled (although Zuck did end up "expelling" himself.)

Re: How to Start Google

#405

Post by gizmo »

antisthenes wrote: post #366
gizmo wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The belief that luck is the dominant factor in success is false and harmful to the extent that it keeps people from trying. I mean trying for real as opposed to giving up after a bunch of setbacks.

Yeah, those pesky setbacks like getting injured, working yourself to death and running out of money so you can't feed yourself. If only people tried for real. In my experience people most likely to write this are trust fund babies who neglect to mention they're getting essentially a stipend from their parents to take care of all their life necessities, so they can "try for real". Whatever that means.

What I have seen is that people who don't quit eventually become pretty successful. Some people have to quit because of health reasons or other unfortunate circumstances. But in the overwhelming majority of cases people just get demoralized.

20 years ago I would have agreed with you, but today I don't.

Re: How to Start Google

#406

Post by ijidak »

abhayhegde wrote: post #396

While I absolutely agree with PG here on identifying a missing link and solving it with technology as your own project is a good way to own a startup, I also feel most of his examples are reminiscent of survivorship bias. For every one of these giant trillion dollar companies, there are also thousands of companies that couldn't make it. Also, just by the distribution of it all, not every company can be a Google. Not…

Agree. Although, de does mention that a barber shop counts.

I think when someone like him shows up, kids want to hear about the extreme end of financial success.

Hopefully those kids get to hear from other types of business people as well -- those who can talk about more of the middle of the road.

Re: How to Start Google

#407

Post by mkoubaa »

gcr wrote: post #385
gizmo wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tone isn’t smug. pg simplified his language for a teenage audience. Simple arguments made simply can come across as smug because they lack caveats and polite hedging, but I don’t think the accusation of smugness sticks in this case. I also disagree about the incredible qualities entrepreneurs need and hardships they have to endure. Many incredible businesses are just good product + good distribution. Many kids th…

When I was a teen, I had a strong aversion for being talked down to, and was resistant to attempts to patronize even if they were well-intended and even if they benefited me. Paul's leaving a significant fraction of the intended audience on the table here IMO: teens who are resistant to being told what to do and how to do it. :)

That sounds like a disability to me

Re: How to Start Google

#408

Post by lupire »

dpflan wrote: post #183

I am curious how this ethos of the 3 things you need and playfulness/not-intended-to-be-a-startup startups project is in enacted per batch. Like YC's now numerous sales operations/software companies in the past batches: 19-22 years are making email-based-crms for their friends? (I guess a batch and other batches are "friends" so goalposts shift and magically appear). The growth in sales saas companies out of YC seems…

As a VC (purchaser of startup) pg's main interest is in driving up supply of premoney startups in order to drive down price.

Re: How to Start Google

#409

Post by holmesworcester »

eastbound wrote: post #391
neilv wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hopefully 2 Stanford CS PhD students hacking on their project would be funded by YC today :) Around the dawn of YC, IIRC, when PG did the "summer founders" or something like that, a group of 4 of us Lisp hackers applied as a team. No response. We were mostly in grad student-like lifestyle modes, and not tied down, were energetic, and already had various applicable experience. But I think PG was mostly looking for b…

I always wonder about the success rate of advice . Do we have any student from this talk of PG who succeeded later in life? Joined an ivy league school? Proceeded to create a startup? Had success with it? Don’t get me wrong. This folklore is extremely important, if not just to raise the grades of one student. But as a founder, when I give advice, out of inflated ego generally, I also have vertigo from the height of e…

I feel that worry too, but I can validate his advice, somewhat.

I'm 44 and spent most of my career working individually and with my closest friends on projects that felt interesting, and it went really well for us in all of the ways. I also met these friends at a selective school, though it was a state-funded high school (massacademy.org), not a university.

Also, someone once came to my very conventional elementary school in 5th grade on career day to talk about a very unconventional career path (being a full-time peace activist) and this had a huge impact on me, both because it validated activism as a career and perhaps more importantly because it validated not having a normal job.

Getting a very short lecture in school from an interesting non-teacher can be at least very memorable and perhaps life-changing.

Re: How to Start Google

#410

Post by cmrdporcupine »

theGnuMe wrote: post #266
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what is fundamentally missing from most talk about "tech" startups by VC types these days. They're not actually interested in the nerdy stuff, just in the "disruption" stuff. L&S were , and they hired other people who were. They didn't start with a business idea, but with a technical one. They filled in the blanks on the business side after they survived the .com crash. I didn't get to Google until 2011, but…

Maybe? YC seems to have an inconsistent view on things that are research vs product. But it’s probably more nuanced than that. Search was a market though at that time. If you pitched an AI LLM before chat-gpt what would the odds have been?

I dunno, I toyed with the starting phase of YC application a couple years ago, and started working my way through what was involved in their application process and reading their materials, even watching some YouTube content, etc.

I didn't really see how a business that was starting from a more R&D angle would make it through.

And a lot of it seemed really pitched to the bizdev "hustler" founder personality, not to engineers/nerds.

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