I'm not sure I agree with his final conclusion that the best startups are somehow profit-agnostic. It sounds like he is romanticizing both successful startups as well as bands.
It's reasonable to assert that founders who truly care about their product may, on average, fare better than those who don't. However, it feels a little presumptuous to interpret the motivations and ambitions of all successful and admired musicians / artists / founders, en masse and from afar.
Would anyone argue that Amazon was not founded with profit as (at least) a prime motivator? How about Apple or Microsoft?
Moreover, even if not chasing monetary fortune, people can still be motivated by a multitude externalities such as recognition or fame - both of which != passion for the product.
TLDR; The conclusion the author draws is hand-wavy at best and paints a decidedly black-and-white picture of the musical scene and startup ecosystem.
Nothing is ever black and white. I think the author was trying to imply that any venture (band or startup) should be built on passion rather than money. Profit and wealth is a serendipitous reward for hardwork and passion.
"Music reviewers devote their attention to those who care about their work, and it’s rare to see a “classic” or universally-adored piece of music that was written for hire."
Let's not forget how european classical music came to be a form of work for hire where patrons, for variable amounts of time, sometimes decades, payed for musical art creation. Hope I am not reading that wrong but the op is lacking historical reference and concentrating on a very specific contemporary frame.
Also, most successful music today is made by songwrites hired for the job. By this I mean 'commercial' artists such as Rihanna, Lady Gaga and Beyonce-like ones songwriters.
OP sees this too black and white. With passion comes devotion, with devotion comes practice, with practice comes performance, with performance comes sucess. Kinda.
Quite correct - I neglected to think back more than a century. Very good point.
I was merely trying to point out that modern pop music, while successful, has been very commodified. I'll stick in a quick footnote.
I don't think working for hire and working to produce a quality product are mutually exclusive. However, there surely are many people who focus on only one of the two. Even then, the situation usually isn't as bad as people make it out to be.
Conversely, bands are startups for musicians. There's probably some awesome business models that recognize that fact, rather than forcing musicians into sharecropper deals.
I think that's too narrow, it should be the "learning to play a musical instrument" of the geek world. With music theory overlapping Computer Science theory, and with various technical skills (mixing, rigging, mastering) corresponding to domain knowledge in various fields.
So these skills would be a prerequisite for doing anything that has to do with computers and computation. Definitely not overrated.
That biologist is foolish - not unlike a biologist friend I had in college. All about numbers and "physical reality" when the psychological, mental and spiritual reality can be far more determinate for a person's behaviors and outcomes than pure biological data.
Mastery of music gives you keys to people's emotions. Likewise, code gives you the keys to the world of information.
They are both powerful and profitable if you know how to use them.
Then I'm the annoying guy who plays hits from the 90s on his guitar at small parties, amazes his drunk friends who exclaim "You should totally make an album! I have a great idea for a song!"
And I answer "No, no - I couldn't do that. Also, I'm not that kind of person", while secretly, in the evening, I spend about an hour writing short, simple, crappy songs for fun - sometimes thinking "maybe I could, if only .." and a thousand different reasons hammer my mind "if I were younger / had a clue / had the skills / had an education / had the time / didn't have a family to support" and so forth.
(Dedicated to all the scriptoldies out there - for keeping the passion alive.)
Startups that set out to make a great product are, on the whole, adored for their work, and often enjoy success as a side-effect.
Startups that set out to make a great product are, when they get anywhere at all, adored for their work, and rarely, but sometimes with a lot of hard work and luck enjoy success as a side-effect.
Just like bands, most startups (esp. the "built in a weekend" kinds) will probably end up being more of a labor of love than a true money-making venture. That's fine, but don't pretend otherwise.
This is written by a guy who has never been in a band. You would think that fact would be a lightbulb moment that maybe you shouldn't write this blog post. Apparently not.
This analogy is a huge leap. Aside from the fact that both endeavors are largely entrepreneurial in nature, the two things are mostly distinct.
If you are actually trying to succeed as a musician, "success", you are going to make a lot of sacrifices. The opportunity costs are huge. If you're touring as a fledgling band, you are most likely giving up the formative years of your career. The time you're spending with music isn't going to be particularly helpful in other arenas. If you're hacking at a startup, you're acquiring desirable skills in the process. If your startup fails, you can still go get a really good job in SV. If your band fails, you're hitting the reset button. You could be chasing a career in the music industry for 10+ years and be no better off than you were a decade ago.
I also don't think the analogy between VCs and record companies really hold up either. Because of the low returns of signed bands, as compared to funded companies, the models work differently.
Additionally, as a musician, you're ultimately selling a piece of art. It's designed by you, and while it may be influenced by the market, the product is largely determined by your own creativity. A business operates in the exact opposite way. Business as art rarely work. I can give someone a copy of "Kid A", have them say "this sucks", reply back "give it a few listens", and the person may ultimately end up really liking the album. I'm not doing that with a company. If I think a product, say Basecamp, sucks, and I have to pay $20 a month for it, I'm not going to give it much thought after my "it sucks" reaction. We consume art differently than we use other products, because they are radically different things. Market demands are simply too important for businesses. They have to listen to the customers to succeed. The path to success is to take customer problems and figure out a creative solution to them. The customer is driving the most substantial part of the company.
"They have to listen to the customers to succeed. The path to success is to take customer problems and figure out a creative solution to them. The customer is driving the most substantial part of the company."
I think the analogy is pretty good actually. You seem to have a bit of a naive view of how music is made a produced. This is a decent description of how music is made, perhaps with the Apple-ish addition of them frequently telling the customer what they like rather than always listening. It's completely treated as a product.
When Zappos was sold to Amazon and Mint was sold to Intuit, I had the same pathetic angst as when I started hearing Nirvana and Pearl Jam on commercial radio.
Ahh, the hipsters dilemma: your sensibilities are offended when something you cherish sell out and go mainstream, yet you wear the hard earned "I liked them _before_ they were popular" badge with honour. It's hard growing up and having your sense of identity and place in the world challenged when you peer behind the curtain. There is something real to be mourned there, yet we are better for it.
I had to dig around for sometime and I thought these papers must be behind some pay-wall. I was surprised to find them on the KISS website. It is not that they are clueless about how to bring back an asteroid and extract resources from it. They just want their MVP to the be the act of prospecting itself. Also I was really surprised to learn that Ion Engines have been routinely used before for asteroid missions like Dawn(http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/ion_prop.asp). The scaling they need to achieve for these missions is much smaller than the average non space geek would expect.
Does anyone here know if the scalability requirements of solar ion propulsion systems they need for the mission of tugging an asteroid into lunar orbit is realistically achievable by 2020?
Hacker Hacker Hacker.I am sick of this word. Whats wrong with simple words like techie. There are far more people considering themselves as Hackers nowadays even though they are simply an average engineer. Please stop abusing this word. Was Einstein a Hacker ? How about Leonardo Da Vinci ?
By the way, startups are for people who are interested in business. If you are interested in business, YOU ARE NOT A HACKER. Hackers are interested in technology for the technology's sake. They don't do UI, they don't do A/B testing. Please stop.
>By the way, startups are for people who are interested in business. If you are interested in business, YOU ARE NOT A HACKER. Hackers are interested in technology for the technology's sake. They don't do UI, they don't do A/B testing. Please stop.
"Once a vague item of obscure student jargon, the word “hacker” has become a linguis-tic billiard ball, subject to political spin and ethical nuances. Perhaps this is why so
many hackers and journalists enjoy using it. Where that ball bounces next, however, is anybody's guess."
- Free as in Freedom, Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software
I find this particular usage especially amusing considering that the words "hacker" and "business" were about as diametrically opposed as words could be. (In the same way that "punk" and "policeman" don't go together.) And yet now it seems that many businesses are being overrun by people who like to rip things apart just to see how they work.
Theres a delicious irony in a world where the people who rejected the likes of IBM as disgusting went on to create businesses that do things like track you across the web for ad money, or lock you into an environment of rampant ADHD web posts with side offerings of 'social games' that exist solely to convince you to waste your time playing them.
You’re at a site called “hacker news”. The word isn’t going anywhere, so I think you’re gonna just have to get over it.
Anyhow, Leonardo da Vinci was certainly a “hacker”: misfit who spent all his time cutting things open and taking things apart, doodling new inventions, etc.
I'm not a big fan of the word either[1], but hackers are interested in more than just technology, if by technology you mean circuit boards and code and the like. Pretty much anything can be hacked, including UI and A/B testing[2].
1. It's a little too self-congratulatory, like people who call themselves poets. In the words of Louise Gluck: "'Poet' ['Hacker' for our purposes] must be used cautiously; it names an aspiration, not an occupation. In other words: not a noun for a passport."
I guess that makes me a bit of a groupie, and HN, Rolling Stone (mag).
I read on The Verge that the boombox had the highest adoption rate for any gadget in history. Now we don't need it, we have our computers and we don't need to drive to someone's house to connect with them either. http://i.imgur.com/d29b0.png
Of course, YC doesn't profit from very bad contestants, so there's one difference
But if you see the progression of the candidates through the competition you can certainly draw several parallels.
YC doesn't have a 'clear cut' winner as AI, still you know that there is a slight mismatch between 'winning the competition' and be 'market successful'. One rarely matches the other.
And of course, the issues of focus, strategy, pressure are very similar among AI and YC. Some contestants start shining early on in the competition, some have perfect technique, but in the end, it only goes so far if it isn't a balance of competences.
Now that the tech and investing world has changed, YC seems more like Motown Records. It's worth pointing out that in its early days, Motown used to release records on Chess and other labels, but at some point it naturally just made sense for Motown to become its own label.
[+] [-] doktrin|14 years ago|reply
It's reasonable to assert that founders who truly care about their product may, on average, fare better than those who don't. However, it feels a little presumptuous to interpret the motivations and ambitions of all successful and admired musicians / artists / founders, en masse and from afar.
Would anyone argue that Amazon was not founded with profit as (at least) a prime motivator? How about Apple or Microsoft?
Moreover, even if not chasing monetary fortune, people can still be motivated by a multitude externalities such as recognition or fame - both of which != passion for the product.
TLDR; The conclusion the author draws is hand-wavy at best and paints a decidedly black-and-white picture of the musical scene and startup ecosystem.
[+] [-] sparknlaunch12|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] novalis|14 years ago|reply
Let's not forget how european classical music came to be a form of work for hire where patrons, for variable amounts of time, sometimes decades, payed for musical art creation. Hope I am not reading that wrong but the op is lacking historical reference and concentrating on a very specific contemporary frame.
[+] [-] fromhet|14 years ago|reply
OP sees this too black and white. With passion comes devotion, with devotion comes practice, with practice comes performance, with performance comes sucess. Kinda.
[+] [-] perlgeek|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] psobot|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gizzlon|14 years ago|reply
His statement is simply false..
[+] [-] shawnz|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SwellJoe|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] willvarfar|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unimpressive|14 years ago|reply
"Computer programming is overrated, it's the 'learning to play guitar' of the geek world."
This article reminded me of it.
[+] [-] marvin|14 years ago|reply
So these skills would be a prerequisite for doing anything that has to do with computers and computation. Definitely not overrated.
[+] [-] r00fus|14 years ago|reply
Mastery of music gives you keys to people's emotions. Likewise, code gives you the keys to the world of information.
They are both powerful and profitable if you know how to use them.
[+] [-] paulitex|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcn|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SlackerRouse|14 years ago|reply
And I answer "No, no - I couldn't do that. Also, I'm not that kind of person", while secretly, in the evening, I spend about an hour writing short, simple, crappy songs for fun - sometimes thinking "maybe I could, if only .." and a thousand different reasons hammer my mind "if I were younger / had a clue / had the skills / had an education / had the time / didn't have a family to support" and so forth.
(Dedicated to all the scriptoldies out there - for keeping the passion alive.)
[+] [-] MicahWedemeyer|14 years ago|reply
Startups that set out to make a great product are, on the whole, adored for their work, and often enjoy success as a side-effect.
Startups that set out to make a great product are, when they get anywhere at all, adored for their work, and rarely, but sometimes with a lot of hard work and luck enjoy success as a side-effect.
Just like bands, most startups (esp. the "built in a weekend" kinds) will probably end up being more of a labor of love than a true money-making venture. That's fine, but don't pretend otherwise.
[+] [-] colindoc84|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ssharp|14 years ago|reply
If you are actually trying to succeed as a musician, "success", you are going to make a lot of sacrifices. The opportunity costs are huge. If you're touring as a fledgling band, you are most likely giving up the formative years of your career. The time you're spending with music isn't going to be particularly helpful in other arenas. If you're hacking at a startup, you're acquiring desirable skills in the process. If your startup fails, you can still go get a really good job in SV. If your band fails, you're hitting the reset button. You could be chasing a career in the music industry for 10+ years and be no better off than you were a decade ago.
I also don't think the analogy between VCs and record companies really hold up either. Because of the low returns of signed bands, as compared to funded companies, the models work differently.
Additionally, as a musician, you're ultimately selling a piece of art. It's designed by you, and while it may be influenced by the market, the product is largely determined by your own creativity. A business operates in the exact opposite way. Business as art rarely work. I can give someone a copy of "Kid A", have them say "this sucks", reply back "give it a few listens", and the person may ultimately end up really liking the album. I'm not doing that with a company. If I think a product, say Basecamp, sucks, and I have to pay $20 a month for it, I'm not going to give it much thought after my "it sucks" reaction. We consume art differently than we use other products, because they are radically different things. Market demands are simply too important for businesses. They have to listen to the customers to succeed. The path to success is to take customer problems and figure out a creative solution to them. The customer is driving the most substantial part of the company.
[+] [-] freshhawk|14 years ago|reply
I think the analogy is pretty good actually. You seem to have a bit of a naive view of how music is made a produced. This is a decent description of how music is made, perhaps with the Apple-ish addition of them frequently telling the customer what they like rather than always listening. It's completely treated as a product.
[+] [-] MartinCron|14 years ago|reply
I liked those guys before everyone else did!
[+] [-] pdmccormick|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] raldi|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] waterlesscloud|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] andrewacove|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WiseWeasel|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SudarshanP|14 years ago|reply
I had to dig around for sometime and I thought these papers must be behind some pay-wall. I was surprised to find them on the KISS website. It is not that they are clueless about how to bring back an asteroid and extract resources from it. They just want their MVP to the be the act of prospecting itself. Also I was really surprised to learn that Ion Engines have been routinely used before for asteroid missions like Dawn(http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/ion_prop.asp). The scaling they need to achieve for these missions is much smaller than the average non space geek would expect.
Does anyone here know if the scalability requirements of solar ion propulsion systems they need for the mission of tugging an asteroid into lunar orbit is realistically achievable by 2020?
[+] [-] Aftershock21|14 years ago|reply
By the way, startups are for people who are interested in business. If you are interested in business, YOU ARE NOT A HACKER. Hackers are interested in technology for the technology's sake. They don't do UI, they don't do A/B testing. Please stop.
[+] [-] unimpressive|14 years ago|reply
"Once a vague item of obscure student jargon, the word “hacker” has become a linguis-tic billiard ball, subject to political spin and ethical nuances. Perhaps this is why so many hackers and journalists enjoy using it. Where that ball bounces next, however, is anybody's guess." - Free as in Freedom, Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software
I find this particular usage especially amusing considering that the words "hacker" and "business" were about as diametrically opposed as words could be. (In the same way that "punk" and "policeman" don't go together.) And yet now it seems that many businesses are being overrun by people who like to rip things apart just to see how they work.
Theres a delicious irony in a world where the people who rejected the likes of IBM as disgusting went on to create businesses that do things like track you across the web for ad money, or lock you into an environment of rampant ADHD web posts with side offerings of 'social games' that exist solely to convince you to waste your time playing them.
[+] [-] jacobolus|14 years ago|reply
Anyhow, Leonardo da Vinci was certainly a “hacker”: misfit who spent all his time cutting things open and taking things apart, doodling new inventions, etc.
[+] [-] FreakLegion|14 years ago|reply
1. It's a little too self-congratulatory, like people who call themselves poets. In the words of Louise Gluck: "'Poet' ['Hacker' for our purposes] must be used cautiously; it names an aspiration, not an occupation. In other words: not a noun for a passport."
2. #7: http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/H/hacker.html
[+] [-] sparknlaunch12|14 years ago|reply
Agree with the similarities. Another one is disruptors. Think about successful bands and how they disrupted the music scene.
[+] [-] geoffschmidt|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] personlurking|14 years ago|reply
I read on The Verge that the boombox had the highest adoption rate for any gadget in history. Now we don't need it, we have our computers and we don't need to drive to someone's house to connect with them either. http://i.imgur.com/d29b0.png
[+] [-] BrainInAJar|14 years ago|reply
And just like most musicians, people who found startups have delusions of grandeur.
And just like most bands, even the ones that succeed are screwed by early-round investors (record companies/VC).
[+] [-] ssharp|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] raverbashing|14 years ago|reply
Of course, YC doesn't profit from very bad contestants, so there's one difference
But if you see the progression of the candidates through the competition you can certainly draw several parallels.
YC doesn't have a 'clear cut' winner as AI, still you know that there is a slight mismatch between 'winning the competition' and be 'market successful'. One rarely matches the other.
And of course, the issues of focus, strategy, pressure are very similar among AI and YC. Some contestants start shining early on in the competition, some have perfect technique, but in the end, it only goes so far if it isn't a balance of competences.
[+] [-] zach|14 years ago|reply
Now that the tech and investing world has changed, YC seems more like Motown Records. It's worth pointing out that in its early days, Motown used to release records on Chess and other labels, but at some point it naturally just made sense for Motown to become its own label.
[+] [-] xefer|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JCordeiro|14 years ago|reply
http://goo.gl/hNoZK
[+] [-] j2labs|14 years ago|reply