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An acquisition is always a failure

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Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#51

Post by sliverstorm »

mindcrime wrote: post #46
sliverstorm wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like HN's focus has changed in that regard. Call me crazy, but I feel like it was less "get-rich" focused a couple years ago.

I feel like HN's focus has changed in that regard. Call me crazy, but I feel like it was less "get-rich" focused a couple years ago. I dunno... considering that HN was originally "startup news" and that it's run by a company that funds / incubates startups, there's pretty much always been a certain segment of posters who are very into the financial side of things. What gets me is the people who come along and (seemin…

Absolutely nothing wrong with being rich. It's about goals.

When you learn to ride a motorcycle, there is a phrase: "Look where you want to go". At least to me, it seems like when you are looking only at your exit, you might make that exit, but you won't really make much else of value along the way.

In other words, when your goal is not to build a sustainable, profitable company with lasting value, but rather just to get out as fast as possible with as much money as possible... just how far away is such a person from "scam artist"?

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#52

Post by derefr »

integraton wrote: post #50
mindcrime wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like HN's focus has changed in that regard. Call me crazy, but I feel like it was less "get-rich" focused a couple years ago. I dunno... considering that HN was originally "startup news" and that it's run by a company that funds / incubates startups, there's pretty much always been a certain segment of posters who are very into the financial side of things. What gets me is the people who come along and (seemin…

There's nothing wrong with making money. The problem is that most tech companies focused from inception on high growth never earn their founders or employees anything remotely resembling "fuck you money." If you want "fuck you money," go into finance. If you want "fuck you money" and still want to be an entrepreneur, start a financial services or legal firm in one of the many niches in the financial industry. And if…

What if you've been doing software development, by all rights, since you were 10--it's in your bones and blood, as much as the feeling of wanting to be an entrepreneur is--but you would also like some fuck-you money anyway?

Is the answer, perhaps, "start a SaaS financial services firm"? ;)

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#53

Post by integraton »

derefr wrote: post #52
integraton wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's nothing wrong with making money. The problem is that most tech companies focused from inception on high growth never earn their founders or employees anything remotely resembling "fuck you money." If you want "fuck you money," go into finance. If you want "fuck you money" and still want to be an entrepreneur, start a financial services or legal firm in one of the many niches in the financial industry. And if…

What if you've been doing software development, by all rights, since you were 10--it's in your bones and blood, as much as the feeling of wanting to be an entrepreneur is--but you would also like some fuck-you money anyway? Is the answer, perhaps, "start a SaaS financial services firm"? ;)

Sure, but in that case you've decided to take a path that is less likely to get you "fuck you money," which means you must have overriding goals. This is assuming you are making rational, informed career decisions.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#54

Post by jlodwick »

crazygringo wrote: post #32

> With a fat bank account, I was pretty set to do whatever I wanted for a long time. ... But it didn’t take long to realize that my new life was a hell of a lot less exciting than running an independent company had been. Sorry, but this is completely self-contradictory. With your fat bank account, you can start a new, independent company. If what he wants is: > our way of thinking of a better approach to consumer tec…

> With your fat bank account, you can start a new, independent company.

It takes years to build a great company. Running a great company was better than having the potential to start a new one.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#55

Post by jlodwick »

jsherry wrote: post #11

I don't begrudge this author his wealth or his page views. But this piece isn't the least bit serious. Ten times out of ten, he'd take his buyout over again. The only thing that concerns me is that somebody might actually take this post to heart and destroy his or her chances of joining the ranks of the author should the right opportunity present itself.

> Ten times out of ten, he'd take his buyout over again.

How do you know that?

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#56

Post by jlodwick »

michaelwww wrote: post #31

The "older doofuses who didn’t understand the Web" seemed to have done pretty well with CollegeHumor and Vimeo without Jake. If they had run them into the ground, I imagine he'd write an article about how being acquired is always success.

The existing businesses were nurtured and optimized reasonably well. I was lamenting the loss of the creative spirit that generated those two businesses in the first place -- the larger, more valuable core of the company.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#58

Post by jlodwick »

zem wrote: post #18

even neglecting the money aspect entirely, this is bullshit. as a hacker, i want to build things. not "implement a vision", just build something that is useful to someone. if some larger company sees the thing i built and says "wow, this is exactly what we need to fill this gap in our product/service/lineup" and acquires my creation (with or without including me to continue developing it), i would consider that a res…

Maybe it wasn't clear from the article, but I was talking about the acquisition of a company, not a product. Hackers, and SV people in general, tend not to distinguish between the two, as many "startup companies" are actually just attempts to commercialize a single product idea. The potential for a company is orders of magnitude greater, because a company can create endless products. If you're talented enough to build things that are useful to people, why not found a single legal entity that creates many things, mitigating per-thing risk and exploiting countless economies of scale?

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#59

Post by jlodwick »

georgemcbay wrote: post #5

Pretty easy position to take once you've already earned your own "fuck you" money. I do sometimes wonder why these sorts of acquisitions remain so prevalent though when minus a few notable exceptions the life cycle tends to consist of a company paying many millions or even a cool billion for some tech in a stack they don't even use (only to kill it soon after) plus a handful of employees that tend to stick around bar…

> Pretty easy position to take once you've already earned your own "fuck you" money.

True, though I certainly wish I'd known this position before I earned mine.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#60

Post by jacquesm »

niggler wrote: post #34
DannoHung wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cuz he wants to get rich or die trying. To which I would say: Seriously dude, why didn't you go into iBanking if you're so shit hot and what you really care about is stacks on stacks on stacks.

This. Many people go into startups just for the profit motive, but I firmly believe that you should start a startup because it is something you want to do or because a side project became too large to continue as a side project (forced to do)

> Many people go into startups just for the profit motive

Do you feel that increases or decreases their chances of success?

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