Comments on: How Startups Can Win Big With VCs

By: Ron

Ron — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 01:09:14 +0000

Well said. Exactly what I was thinking. Selling shoes online does NOTHING to change this world. In fact, most people still buy shoes online. Not every idea has to be earth shattering. This is the ridiculousness of “silicone Valley”. A simple idea that solves a problem and at the same time can lead to profit is a great idea. Amazing Tony can be so snooty! Please… zappos has done nothing to change the world. It’s a great business and that is all you need to know about it. Watch this video. So typical of VCs and so called ‘experts:

By: Gaël (Stribe)

Gaël (Stribe) — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 19:04:50 +0000

Stacey, we’ll definitely integrate with Facebook Connect, Twitter and Google accounts. We did not made it clear enough at TC50.

The value proposition of Stribe is a fully branded and customized social network, like Ning for instance, but on an existing website. It’s a B2B solution that allows companies to create and manage their own community, with community management and analytics tools, while providing a fun end-user experience.

To provide this value, we build on top of protocols like FB Connect.

By: powel

powel — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 02:06:18 +0000

As Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s put it after viewing demos, “I didn’t see anything where I thought ‘Oh wow, I think this will change the world.’” … ok, selling shoes online may have lined his pkt, but hasn’t changed a bit of the world ……

By: Stacey Higginbotham

Stacey Higginbotham — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 20:33:41 +0000

Jeffrey, she points out that the Stribe product is late to the game in terms of trying to make the web social and that Facebook already won that battle. That’s why she dismissed it.

By: Chirag Mehta

Chirag Mehta — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:37:32 +0000

I agree with your viewpoint about honing the pitch. However I have different take on some of the start-ups. It’s one thing not to know what the value proposition is but it is other thing to believe in a BHAG. Many start-ups had huge success when people initially thought that they could live without that. Twitter is one of those examples. Also, there is nothing wrong in duplicating what someone else is doing. Presence of similar companies signal that there is a market. It is now up to the new entrant to beat the competition by solving the problem well. When Google announced Gmail it was one of the last (as of now) web-based email that was introduced. Google would not have released Gmail or even the search engine if they would have thought that other people are already solving this problem.

I welcome the entrepreneurial spirit of the Silicon Valley. This innovation engine is amazing. I was watching the panelists beat up http://anyclip.com at Techcrunch 50 suggesting that the content deals are hard to come by. I liked the answer: “No one thought that we would have a black president one day”. The company acknowledges that it is an astronomic task but the reward is very high if they can pull that one off. We all know the story about Steve Jobs, iTunes, and the music industry. Let’s not forget that we can repeat the history only if we believe into these start-ups and give them an opportunity to succeed.

By: tarrysingh

tarrysingh — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 15:06:27 +0000

I don’t agree with this. Facebook is a bloated piece of software which has taken more investments that any start-up I’ve known.

What’s this obsession with the numbers? 300 M people = how many dollars?
I’d want to run a business where I cn hve multiple-financial schemes to make/rake billions out of a few million consumers. Facebook is a mere shadow of what a true cloud marketplace ought to be. Twitter seems to have a lot more potential because it has captured the minds of folks on two very simple basics: immediacy and brevity

Facebook is taking people away from work and is essentially a waste of time. I disagree. I am not convinced.

When you go to run a start-up you go from day one to not only change the world but also make a lot of money: that is the true aphrodisiacal soup that any entrepreneur should have drunk before getting there.

Tarry

By: JJJ

JJJ — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 06:22:53 +0000

I think that if the product is interesting enough, distribution comes second. The only reason why the panel were asking those questions is because they’re fairly standard questions with fairly standard answers.

The distribution channel for the types of products that were displayed at TC50 were fairly standard. they were either internet companies, B2B or retail products.

As some of these seasoned VCs, they should know better that there is no “magic bullet” to distribution. They just have to try hard to SEO (if web company), pay money for advertising, hire a sales staff or try to become distributed in a large national retail chain.

I’m fairly disappointed and quite jaded at these “experts” that gave vanilla questions and even more vanilla critiques. They couldn’t see the broader picture that some of these products could have.

By: Jeffrey

Jeffrey — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 04:22:23 +0000

C’mon, Snotty McSnarky. You could “happy live without” the entire web. But if you’re going to dismiss a product out of hand, you need to say why.