twmahna

Jessica (the author of this article) is too nice to give this article the clickbaity title it deserves: "The 3 things it takes to be a successful startup founder".

You seem to be refuting claims I never made. I'm simply perplexed that so many people don't know this market exists (as is indicated/suggested by the number of upvotes).

Welcome to the world of black hat services => https://www.blackhatworld.com/forums/seo-packages.206/

Some examples that come to mind: click fraud, phishing, malware.

Is this actually news to people? This has been happening for decades. The purpose is largely for SEO / sometimes for actual traffic.

Just go google "private blog networks" (pbn) or "link farm".

The person who was accused of "stealing customer data" was the other co-founder - not Adora (CEO & now YC partner).

If you actually look into the details of the matter, what happened was that the co-founder acquired the failed company as it was put through a bankruptcy process.

People who weren't privy to the process thought it was stealing when it really wasn't different from any other acquisition.

Worth noting that the proximate cause of death is often times largely uninformative as to why the startup actually failed.

Most failed startups fit into the following timeline: was burning more money than it was making => failed at raising more money => did a round of layoffs / cost cuts to get economics under control => couldn't right the ship and shut down / did a fire sale or acquihire

But, the above timeline doesn't teach you much about why the company really failed. The real answer almost always involves a multitude of contributing factors, and requires intimate knowledge of the startup's business.

For the most part, the only reliable source for this type of information is one of the founders, board members, or (sometimes but not always) c-level execs. And, even then, they have to be willing to be vulnerable (which is very rare).

If I could give some advice to Failory, it would be to think about how you can incentivize founders to share their stories. As it stands, they have little to gain and potentially a lot to lose (e.g. being labeled one of YC's "biggest failures")

Interesting take! Why does this perspective make you bullish on Uber/Lyft?

Isn't a large portion of their FCF tied to reducing labor costs by substituting drivers with self-driving tech?

AB5 and Democrats potentially gaining unified control of Washington don't bode well for their cost structure either.

> I don't think it can be understated how much saying 'no politics' is a political statement.

I disagree, and I think you're grossly overstating it.

I can see how you could characterize their stance as "supporting the status quo". But, there are varying degrees of "support", and this is pretty much the lowest degree of "support" imaginable.

Put another way, you're painting this as "with us or against us" when in reality there's a spectrum of support. Coinbase is standing just SLIGHTLY off center in one direction.

> And supporting the status quo in this political climate is a strange hill to plant your flag on.

Why do you think it's strange? The vast majority of employees prefer a work environment that is stripped of political conversation. And, such an environment is more conducive to focus and productivity.

Based on the precedent set by Uber, Waymo will be held financially responsible, but won't face criminal charges. I'd be interested in reading more about the liability insurance coverage Waymo has for its self-driving program, but can't find info anywhere.

Source: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/03/08/uber-got-off-the-hook...

Let's place skepticism aside for a second and assume that full driverless tech will be fully operating in major metros soon.

What does that mean for the rideshare business? Are Uber/Lyft basically dead if they are years behind Waymo?

Just a few months ago, I recall many skeptics on HN claiming that full driverless technology was 10-20 years away.

Do those people still think that it's going to take 10-20 years for this tech to reach say, New York, now that it's live in Phoenix?

>> I'm skeptical that driverless vehicles can factor in all the ways in which someone might maliciously cause accidents or damage to these vehicles

You're probably right, but as long as it doesn't happen frequently and there's no way to mislead sensors en masse, it's not a big deal.

There are malicious ways to cause accidents with current-day technologies also. e.g. Park a car in front of a train, fly a drone into a plane, etc.

I've never considered having a list of people I wouldn't work for, but now I do.

It's one thing to have a strong opinion on morality -- it's another to support violence against other moralities.

You bring up many good points, none of which I strongly disagree with.

My only point was that it's not "easy and obvious" to "buy his debt and use it as leverage to extract political gain". There are many "outs" he can take if such an event occurred.

> It doesn't work this way. Companies aren't valued based on how much cash they have on hand.

Uh, yea they are. A company’s valuation is based on both the cash they have on hand AND future discounted cash flows.

Once you correct your understanding of this, you will see that GP is explaining things correctly.

> There is no change in the value of the company. There are fewer shares outstanding though which means each existing share is worth more.

The company's value decreases by the buyback amount. Share price (ignoring positive signalling impact) remains unchanged.

E.g. Company has $100 market cap with 10 outstanding shares at $10/share. Company does $10 buyback. Afterwards, company has $90 market cap with 9 outstanding shares at $10/share.

> The opportunity to buy that debt and call it as leverage to extract political gain is so easy and obvious

If this happened, you don't think he'd be able to get another institution (or GOP constituent) to re-finance/backstop his debt for him?

2-300m in debt is a lot but his businesses pull in 4-500m in annual revenue. It's not a crazy debt-to-income ratio.

Huh, I don't know if I know one person who would honestly answer that question with a yes.

My guess is that this advice of "raise less money" is a result of hanging around too many successful founders.

That is, if you talk to successful founders, they will generally wish they raised less money (due to dilution).

And, if you talk to failed founders, they will generally wish they raised more money (to increase likelihood of true PMF).

Also, I think that fear is a useful mental state when there is real and imminent danger. In startup land, you are right to be fearful, because you are much more likely to die than stay alive.

If you don't have the luxury of unlimited shots at success (due to a lackluster safety net or other life goals), it makes sense to maximize the likelihood of success in your current venture. There is a lot of "startup cost" to working on a new idea, and in a lot of fields, you will eventually succeed if you just stay alive/don't die.

I agree.

Based on my reading of the study, the more accurate claim is: People no longer trust that their employers will take care of their long-term interests.

There's little doubt in my mind that this claim is true.

Thank you for posting your perspective. As someone who's contemplating having kids in the distant future, I'm wondering if there's a way to predict whether these chemical changes will occur for me or not. Do you have any insights here?

In particular, I'm curious about these questions pertaining to your life prior to having children:

- From 1 to 10, how much did you enjoy helping a friend out when it was a mild inconvenience to yourself?

- From 1 to 10, how positive of an emotional reaction do you get when you see a cute dog?

I have a completely unfounded hypothesis that the 'chemical' changes that PG describes are akin to how our brains react when we see cute pets.

To add onto this, I found it really constructive when I began to understand what was actually causing me to feel bad about being unhappy.

That is, we all have an ideal self that we aspire to, and when we don't live up to this ideal, we feel bad.

At first, I thought maybe it was NECESSARY to feel bad in order to motivate oneself to reach your ideals.

Then, I thought that it might be impossible to feel good when we reach our ideals without feeling bad when we don't. That is, maybe the two are dualistic, by nature, and inseparable.

But, as I thought more and more about my past and how children operate, I became convinced that it's not natural to judge/chastise yourself when you don't live up to your ideals. For me, it's primarily a trained behavior that resulted from judgmental parenting styles -- think, a parent making a child thinking they are a 'bad boy' when they've done something wrong.

It's entirely possible to feel good about yourself when you reach your ideals without feeling bad when you don't -- it just takes a bit of rewiring. If you have any doubt, spend some time around children and you'll see that humans are naturally incredibly resilient to failure -- this should include failure at being happy.

There's way too much money at stake here for this to be driven by grudges, emotions, or even reputations.

Benchmark's stake in Uber is worth $9.1b -- many, many times the size of their fund. They will do anything they can to protect this investment.

They very likely believe that the best way to protect their investment is to keep Travis out, and this is part of the process. Decisions like this aren't made at an individual partner level. The entire partnership decided to file this lawsuit, and that means it's a calculated decision.

This may be going against the grain, but I think the real question the OP needs to ask is whether he really cares whether what he's doing is ethical or not.

Evaluating decisions like this really comes down to understanding your values and owning them.

Values are the measuring sticks by which people quantify success in life. Whether or not we realize it, we constantly measure our actions against our values, and how we 'measure up' determines our self-worth.

In this specific example, there are two conflicting values: integrity and family. They are in direct conflict, which is putting the OP in a stressful situation -- acting in the most honest way here will lead to a worse life for the OP's family. Creating the best life for his family requires that he must lie.

So, the OP needs to ask himself: Do I value integrity? Do I value my family? If I value both, which do I value more?

Personally, I don't think there's really a right or wrong answer to these questions. There's no intrinsic value in the universe -- but assigning value is part of the human condition and we feel fulfilled when we lead a life of purpose (however arbitrary). When faced with difficult decisions like this, it's important to be aware of what your values are. The 'right' decision for you will be apparent.