Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without being passionate?

Re:Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without bein... by nreece on Thursday August 20, 2009 @12:13AM (#774413)

Isn't failure an essential catalyst for eventual success? I want to succeed, but I also want to fail.

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Re:Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without bein... by pg on Thursday August 20, 2009 @12:25AM (#774428)

I don't think it's essential. When we invest in people's first startups, we're not doing it just to fund their personal growth. We hope the startups will actually succeed.

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Re:Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without bein... by nreece on Thursday August 20, 2009 @08:36AM (#774864)

I wasn't referring to YC, but your personal endeavour with Viaweb. When you say that you were/are passionate about not failing, I was wondering if you rationally consider failure to be an essential catalyst for eventual success?!

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Re:Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without bein... by andreyf on Thursday August 20, 2009 @06:39PM (#776525)

I was wondering if you rationally consider failure to be an essential catalyst for eventual success?!

I don't see any rational reason for failure to cause success. There might be a correlation, since failure might be correlated with experience, and experience with success.

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Re:Ask HN: Can you be a successful entrepreneur without bein... by Tawheed on Thursday August 20, 2009 @11:02AM (#775173)

I think this is a common misconception in the startup community right now. I'm not reallys sure why, because logically speaking, the longer you survive (i.e. succeed), the more scenarios and learning experiences you can go through.

Whereas, if you fail, it's GAME OVER. You're just going to to go through the same experience once again.

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