A sustainable start-up
economist.com
A sustainable start-up
1–10 of 18 posts
Re: A sustainable start-up
#2> “The decision to buy back shares was really to keep our people on board”
So are these guys really still a startup? Once you hit profit and pay off your debts it's a little strange to continue calling yourself a startup.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#3Hmm... I wonder if there'd be people in the US willing to relocate to the middle of nowhere for a job that promised some good perks plus an extremely comfortable wage relative to cost of living (but not necessarily any larger than in San Fran or something).
I do kinda think that having a tech company set in the middle of some rustic mountains or something has a sort of crazy "code from an adirondack chair" appeal.
I'm not sure I would, personally though. I enjoy living in urban areas a little too much.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#4Hmm... I wonder if there'd be people in the US willing to relocate to the middle of nowhere for a job that promised some good perks plus an extremely comfortable wage relative to cost of living (but not necessarily any larger than in San Fran or something). I do kinda think that having a tech company set in the middle of some rustic mountains or something has a sort of crazy "code from an adirondack chair" appeal. I'…
Joey Hess, Rob Savoye, and Chuck Moore have done this as famous individuals. Vipul Ved Prakash used to go to "the middle of nowhere" to spend much of the year working on personal projects. So there are certainly those of us who find appeal in such a life.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#5Hmm... I wonder if there'd be people in the US willing to relocate to the middle of nowhere for a job that promised some good perks plus an extremely comfortable wage relative to cost of living (but not necessarily any larger than in San Fran or something). I do kinda think that having a tech company set in the middle of some rustic mountains or something has a sort of crazy "code from an adirondack chair" appeal. I'…
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Re: A sustainable start-up
#6Hmm... I wonder if there'd be people in the US willing to relocate to the middle of nowhere for a job that promised some good perks plus an extremely comfortable wage relative to cost of living (but not necessarily any larger than in San Fran or something). I do kinda think that having a tech company set in the middle of some rustic mountains or something has a sort of crazy "code from an adirondack chair" appeal. I'…
It's something I daydream about, but I think the reality would not be that great. For instance, it'd be difficult to get the kind of bandwidth you need out somewhere remote.
What might make for an interesting experiment is some sort of facility that group(s) could rotate through: say spend a month out in the wild hacking away. I don't think being that isolated would be good, long term, but for a month or something it might make a wonderful change of scenery and let you really concentrate.
It's a bit of a bitter pill for me (I prefer towns of about 100K-200K people), but a lot of evidence points to big cities being the best places for a lot of things: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008035HQQ/?tag=dedasys-20 for instance, talks about the returns to scale in terms of being around a lot of other bright, creative people.
Incidentally, if anyone has zillions of dollars, I think the Big Muddy Ranch in Oregon (currently a christian youth camp, and formerly the site of Rashneeshpuram!) would be a beautiful place to do that kind of thing. I accidentally drove through there a few years ago (long story), and it's a beautiful, and very remote area: https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Muddy+Road,+Antelope,+OR,+Uni...
Re: A sustainable start-up
#7excellent job!
Afaik United Internet / 1&1 — the company they had a bad marriage with — still uses the original code and makes a lot of money with it.
Personally, I would not approach 1&1 with any idea after reading that story.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#8I guess the european definition of a startup is different that the american one.
European startup : able to buy back shares, carefully select employees, refuse 8 digits funding because it doesn't want to go public, rent a country house so that the funders can keep working in this ambiance.
American east-cost startup : cries for funding, hires like crazy wishes to sell and go public ASAP so that the funders can no longer work.
I don't know, maybe it's partial, but these remark aside, I'd guess the european startup might be able to do this because it's profitable, which is the #1 thing. Everything else is eye candy.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#9I guess the european definition of a startup is different that the american one. European startup : able to buy back shares, carefully select employees, refuse 8 digits funding because it doesn't want to go public, rent a country house so that the funders can keep working in this ambiance. American east-cost startup : cries for funding, hires like crazy wishes to sell and go public ASAP so that the funders can no lon…
I guess making broad generalizations from one article is kind of useless.
Re: A sustainable start-up
#10Hmm... I wonder if there'd be people in the US willing to relocate to the middle of nowhere for a job that promised some good perks plus an extremely comfortable wage relative to cost of living (but not necessarily any larger than in San Fran or something). I do kinda think that having a tech company set in the middle of some rustic mountains or something has a sort of crazy "code from an adirondack chair" appeal. I'…
I did it for awhile, with some part time remote work to keep up a cashflow, while bootstrapping a startup.
In the end, the startup trumped the third-party work, and I focused on it exclusively. Still later, I moved to a city to continue. The city gave me better network infrastructure (not such an issue in Europe or parts of the US, but still a big issue in many places), plus - far more critically - access to a serious HR market and decisionmakers in partner organisations (telecommunications providers, government taxation bureaus, etc.).
Also, the clear "leave work and there is nobody who would have the foggiest about what it is you do all day" thing can promote a healthier work/life balance than inner-city cash-burning type startup environments, IMHO.