[milge]

None of my projects went anywhere, and eventually, I gave up. I used to have the rosy view that with enough work you'll get there. That's largely untrue. You also need to know the right people (connections) and be very lucky. I hate to be a downer, but you don't often hear this side of the opinion.

[sean_patel]

> You also need to know the right people (connections) and be very lucky

Not sure about 'being lucky' but 'knowing the right people' is very true.

After Marissa Mayers took over the reins of Yahoo, she went on a 'buying spree'. Several of her acquisition were questionable, including an app called 'Summly' - a seemingly simple app that "summarized news" that she purchased for Yahoo, by paying 30 MILLION in ALL CASH deal.

Even the algorithm that it used to summarize wasn't his own. He outsourced that work (the core functionality) to http://www.sri.com/

It was later revealed in a Forbes or BI article that this '15 year old teen hacker genius''s family (either mom or dad) and Mayer's husband were buddies at Goldman Sachs or something of that nature.

Related reading:

Yahoo Paid $30 Million in Cash for 18 Months of Young Summly Entrepreneur’s Time => http://allthingsd.com/20130325/yahoo-paid-30-million-in-cash...

Here's What Happened To All 53 of Marissa Mayer's Yahoo Acquisitions => http://gizmodo.com/heres-what-happened-to-all-of-marissa-may...

[raarts]

Luck has a lot to do with it. Marissa knew the people who started Google and that was luck. She may be talented but there are many others just as talented, who weren't at the right place at the right time. The founders who succeed may attribute their success to their hard work and persistence, but many forget they were actually very lucky as well.

[serg_chernata]

Thanks for sharing. What I would like to add is that to a certain extent you just need to love what you do and tell others to f*ck off sometimes. Yes, it's nice when others praise your work but what should really matter is how happy you are.

[throw9322]

Thanks for the comment. I know that most projects don't work out. The world doesn't owe anyone anything. I'm 100% okay with that. I'm just tired of other people shitting on me while I try my hardest.

[milge]

I was always able to completely ignore the naysayers because it's a lot easier to judge than create. Still, it wasn't enough for success. I discovered it's the process of creation I really love, not creating technological things specifically like websites and apps. I recently started metalworking. I get the same satisfaction of creating, and at the end of the day, there's no button that will "delete" what I've created. But it's just something I do in my spare time. I'm also starting to believe that once you go from "hobby" to "job," you end up hating it because it's something you HAVE to do. Not something you WANT to do.