[HN Gopher] Startup failure stories: 20 months in, 2K hours spen...
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Startup failure stories: 20 months in, 2K hours spent and 200K EUR
lost (2021)
Author : takiwatanga
Score : 40 points
Date : 2022-04-06 15:00 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (dsebastien.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (dsebastien.net)
| davidkuennen wrote:
| Reading this gave me the constant feeling he waisted way too much
| time on technical stuff. For an MVP with an uncertainty of
| success it's important to get it out of the door with minimal
| effort and time.
| fhrow4484 wrote:
| I missed the first time this post got on HN front page, but my
| main takeway is same comment from jiofih
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25630241):
|
| >> the project needed to be (almost) re-created from scratch
|
| >> the build system, Docker/docker-compose, continuous
| integration, authentication, internationalization, etc
|
| >> created a wiki, migrated the code to a monorepo,
| created/cleaned up the backlog, etc.
|
| >> created a story map, devised a roadmap, and clarified the
| scope of the MVP
|
| >> replaced Angular Material by Tailwind, created our own theme,
| refactored the data model
|
| > This is why. A year went by and no product work was done, none
| of this was necessary. The very first thing that should have been
| built is a MVP, that main screen that was only tackled 9 months
| in. Strongly recommend studying "The Lean Startup" and learning
| how to be stoic about tech. That's how people deliver working
| products in three months.
|
| in addition to that, the author mentions, still in a Startup/MVP
| context:
|
| "The focus on took care of release automation, created the
| production infrastructure (switched to Kubernetes)", "The NoSQL
| database was making us lose a ton of time".
|
| None of this should matter at MVP stage!
| jamil7 wrote:
| I completely agree and had the same thoughts reading that. K8s
| for an MVP?! Throw that thing on a PaaS and forget about ops
| altogether until it's too expensive.
|
| I think it's really good advice for developers wanting to
| launch their own project to do at least one or two tiny
| projects first and try to release and sell them. It makes you
| much more aggressive with cutting fat at an early stage.
|
| It was an enjoyable read though and I imagine the author
| learned a whole lot regardless of the outcome.
| fellowniusmonk wrote:
| There's a reason so many successful startups launched with some
| form of rails stack. Less time making decisions means more time
| to build customer value prop/interactions.
|
| An MVP for a web sass should be "core UI/UX value prop" for the
| main selling point (s) and what I call "marketing brutalism"
| for the rest.
|
| With the most boring and reduced use cases you can convince
| everyone else involved to agree to.
| adampk wrote:
| It seems like the author was hit with a terrible case of bike
| shedding that lasted 2 years.
|
| https://thedecisionlab.com/biases/bikeshedding
|
| Instead of tackling the hard problem (creating a "meeting
| screen" that actually delivers end user-value) the author
| tackled the easy problem (setting up infrastructure and
| documentation).
|
| The illusion of progress is hard to to give up.
| toss1 wrote:
| Yup, the distinction between keeping busy and making progress
| can be subtle or blatant, but it is critical.
| a1371 wrote:
| The thing that stands out to me the most is the sentiment. This
| reads like a big rant as in saying "I did all the things
| textbooks say, why didn't it work out?"
|
| That is as if to say "I've gone to the music school, why am I not
| a k-pop mega star yet?"
|
| A lot of people will not look at the 200k this person didn't make
| as "lost"; rather the cost of learning expensive lessons.
|
| The first lesson should have been that we're not in 2007 anymore.
| Sprinkling tech on random things has a small chance of working
| out. They did not have any domain knowledge or connections to
| schools nor restaurants. They were just users of them, like
| everybody else.
|
| Building a startup is a beautiful thing but it requires
| relentless optimism and actually feeling the problem. Enough to
| say that's how YC finds its cohort.
| fhrow4484 wrote:
| Previous discussion (Jan 2021 - 235 comments):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25627081
| ZetaZero wrote:
| 2k hours and 20 months later: "But we were still not there with
| the MVP. And we already trimmed it down to the bare essentials."
| mox1 wrote:
| Feels like the classic Developer wants to start a business but
| doesn't really understand marketing, traction, product-market
| fit, etc. etc.
|
| Granted I've done the same thing 5 times now, but never again.
|
| Should have mocked up a bare UI in a week, then tried to sell it
| for a month or two.....
| hu3 wrote:
| As a dev, I want to learn how to sell.
|
| How do you sell a mockup? Are you upfront with the potential
| clients about the product not existing and the timeline?
|
| I imagine people would have a hard time buying a promise but
| that's probably because my sales skills suck.
| mox1 wrote:
| I would start with "The Mom Test". Really helped me out.
|
| http://momtestbook.com/
| avgDev wrote:
| I have accepted that I need someone who can sell. I can do
| the tech but I'm just too honest and direct to be a good
| sales person.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _I 'm just too honest and direct to be a good sales
| person_
|
| You're going to have a tough time finding a good sales
| partner if you assume them to be dishonest. Liars aren't
| generally good salespeople.
| heelix wrote:
| Reminds me of a joke back in my Oracle days. What is the
| difference between a car and software sales people? The
| car sales person knows when they were lying.
| switz wrote:
| Make something people truly _need_ and you can be as honest
| and direct as you want. Solve a real problem and you don't
| have to utilize any nefarious or manipulative practices to
| get a sale.
|
| You can say you don't have the skills to sell something,
| but framing sales as something that is inherently dishonest
| or a misdirection shows you have a misconception of what
| sales ultimately is.
| withinboredom wrote:
| I think when people say "sales" they mean closing the
| sale. I've seen people fail to close when it was already
| "sold." The client was begging without outright saying to
| sign the contract. The dev just kept on trying to sell
| the guy, but he was already sold.
| avgDev wrote:
| Exactly this. By honesty I mean I will go above and
| beyond to make sure the client would be satisfied,
| instead of focusing on closing a sale. I get anxious and
| worried that the client won't be happy and will dislike
| what I have made. Therefore, a sales rep that can close
| and just smile would do wonders.
|
| Could have probably worded my initial comment better.
| TYPE_FASTER wrote:
| Start here: https://www.growthmentor.com/advice/startup-idea-
| validation/
| [deleted]
| avgDev wrote:
| I enjoyed the article as I'm planning on doing consulting and
| then pivoting into a SaaS project. However, the writer has not
| lost 200k and has gained a mountain of life experience, which
| doesn't seem to get enough attention.
| xwdv wrote:
| IMO startups aren't worth it anymore if you're not clearing at
| least twice the salary of two remote developer jobs (annualized).
|
| Reason being, it is easier to work two remote jobs simultaneously
| than it is to build a successful startup. It is also far more
| enjoyable and calls on your direct expertise instead of requiring
| many skills, some of which you may not do well at all.
|
| Given that two developer jobs will have you clearing at least
| $300-400k in income per year, this is a sobering heuristic of how
| successful you have to be at building a startup to consider it
| being worthwhile.
|
| If the author was working two jobs instead of doing this failed
| startup, after 20 months he would have roughly $600k+ in earned
| income to show for it, instead of a ~$200k loss.
| dgellow wrote:
| It might be a bit weird to say this but I love to read about that
| kind of "failure stories". Thanks to the author for sharing
| openly such a personal experience.
| blipvert wrote:
| Quits an otherwise great job because of frustration with meetings
| ...
|
| ... to do a start-up that's all about meetings <golf-clap>
| lnxg33k1 wrote:
| My take for this is:
|
| - if one wants to experiment and learn new tech or approaches one
| should not leave the job and create maybe some side experiments
|
| - I can see why people would just leave the fleet if there is not
| a steady path forward towards an mvp
|
| - we have project managers around with the capability to manage
| plan and prioritise projects of a chair? As a dev is frustrating
|
| One either win or learn
| slingnow wrote:
| This guy didn't lose 200K. He claims he lost 200K by "not doing
| something else". Putting opportunity cost as a hard loss is
| stretching it, and sure seems like it's just there to make the
| title more clickbaity.
|
| I guess I just lost something like $20 reading the article then.
| short_sells_poo wrote:
| If he has good certainty that he could've made 200k in the same
| period, I think it is useful to count it as money lost. People
| very often lose sight of the power of "money in hand". Had he
| done "something else", he'd have a nice and cool 200k in his
| pockets right now. 200k which can be put to further work, which
| will compound over time. Even more, while those 200k are
| working, the dude can be working too accumulating further
| wealth. Compound returns are truly the 8th wonder of the world,
| but many people just see the promise of 0 to billionaire
| through some unicorn startup, while there are countless people
| going 0 to millionaire even if they play it comparably safe.
|
| Don't scoff at the person who works a relatively ordinary
| corporate job but manages to accumulate a respectable wealth
| over a decade or two. There are countless startup bros who go
| through a dozen failed attempts in the mean time with nothing
| but experience to show for it. That experience may be useful at
| some point in the future, but it's entirely unrealized value.
| On the other hand, having 500k wealth to your name which is
| invested and growing is tangible value right now which itself
| can be used to fund future endeavors.
| ratsforhorses wrote:
| Pretty sure this has been posted before....
| biztos wrote:
| It's an interesting post-mortem and a reminder of the pitfalls of
| the "bootstrap" model if you don't have other income.
|
| But I take exception to the "200K EUR" part. Money you didn't
| make is not the same as money you spent. For starters, the former
| is infinite!
|
| That the author is so concerned with this opportunity cost -- a
| cost that is radically different for different people, dependent
| largely on circumstances that have nothing to do with their value
| to the startup -- is, I guess, part of the self-doubt he
| describes.
|
| I can relate, I did a failed startup when I was younger and many
| times I thought about whether I should just suck it up and get a
| job instead. Probably everybody does. But half the point of it
| was to _not_ be doing the thing that would have given you the
| 200K.
| [deleted]
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >Money you didn't make is not the same as money you spent. For
| starters, the former is infinite!
|
| Cost is short for opportunity cost. If you have a high
| probability of earning 200K EUR as your second best option,
| then what you choose to do does incur that cost.
|
| Young people not accounting for their costs properly is an
| especially big problem in the US when they decide to spend time
| in their valuable 20s going deep into debt pursuing higher
| education with low probabilities of ending up with high pay
| (assuming their goal is high pay and/or some sort of financial
| security). They should be adding up all the lost pay and
| compounded returns from their savings, because their eventual
| pay needs to be sufficiently high to make up for it.
|
| And it is not just money. Opportunity cost also includes
| quality of life, for example, slaving away the best years of
| your life working for someone else (or one's self) should have
| an acceptable probability of netting you something commensurate
| to the sacrifice.
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(page generated 2022-04-06 23:01 UTC)