jmaskell · HackerTrans

jmaskell

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Submissions

Why my startup failed – three years of hindsight

medium.com

15 pointsby jmaskell10 years ago0 comments

DuckDuckGo is now my default search engine

medium.com

6 pointsby jmaskell11 years ago4 comments

Vodafone admits many governments have direct-access to user data

theverge.com

5 pointsby jmaskell12 years ago0 comments

Privacy not Prism – UK legal challenge

privacynotprism.org.uk

143 pointsby jmaskell13 years ago62 comments

How to get a job after your startup fails

jamesmaskell.co.uk

125 pointsby jmaskell13 years ago41 comments

Why my startup failed

jamesmaskell.co.uk

146 pointsby jmaskell13 years ago93 comments

Taking payments online in Europe in 2013

jamesmaskell.co.uk

264 pointsby jmaskell14 years ago181 comments

Things that I (as a startup founder) want to get better at in 2013

jamesmaskell.co.uk

2 pointsby jmaskell14 years ago0 comments

Startup Lessons Learned in 12 Months

jamesmaskell.co.uk

39 pointsby jmaskell14 years ago10 comments

comments

13 years agodiscuss

It's not about fear of failing. I wouldn't do it again unless I was convinced the venture would be successful (and I think there's a significantly increased chance of that, based on what I learnt during the failed startup and since).

What I'm saying is that having equal co-founders gives you the ability to share the workload, emotional strain and get through the pain barrier.

It's obviously not impossible to build a huge business as a single co-founder, but it's unlikely that I'd want to do it again!

13 years agodiscuss

I believe that being a solo founder contributed to the failure of my startup. In short, it puts a lot of pressure on yourself, that can't be split with other members of the team. If the ship is sinking, you have to go down with it. Other friends and mentors can offer support, but they're not in the same boat as you. When times are tough, founders can help pull each other through.

I think the reasons described in the OP are more about having the wrong founding team. This is also why we have things like vesting - if someone decides not to work full time, consult elsewhere then they should lose part of their shareholding.

13 years agodiscuss

This is probably skewed by finance and a small number of extremely well paid bankers, hedge fund traders etc.

13 years agodiscuss

I've been living here for a few years, and the main killer has always been rent. I've been able to get this down by sharing with others, learning about nice but cheaper neighbourhoods (I live in Putney now), and being prepared to commute 30-45 minutes in to central London.

Aside from travel (~£120/month), other costs are similar to elsewhere in the UK. There are decent, well priced (<£10-15 per head) places to eat, drink etc.

A salary in the £20-30k range would require careful money management, but you can live comfortably on £30k+.

13 years agodiscuss

The urgency to interview, followed by the abrupt halt in communication isn't something that is unique to Silicon Valley or engineering positions. I had it a lot in London a couple of months ago for mostly product jobs.

It's incredibly unprofessional / downright rude - especially when so much pressure is put on to get you through the interview process quickly. It also means that I now have a negative opinion of a number of companies - and advise friends against applying or interviewing there if approached.

I've been in a position of hiring before, and while it's not nice to tell someone that they haven't got the job, it's the polite thing to do. Most people are reasonable, and it increases the chances of them recommending your company to others.

13 years agodiscuss

    also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me

I had this problem - recruiters want a job title to pigeon hole you with. Their brains explode when they can't do this.

13 years agodiscuss

Unfortunately I'm not a programmer (I can write enough code to be dangerous) - but more of an ops/product/sales type person instead, so it was a bit harder for me to find something.

I was also surprised at how long it took our developer to find a new role - he was extremely good, got first interviews quickly but it took companies a long time to make a decision. And we're in London, where those skills are in very high demand.

13 years agodiscuss

It's definitely about having the right attitude. I was able to find a job that gives me a lot of autonomy, but also direction. At the moment, I quite enjoy letting someone else make the big decisions for me!

13 years agodiscuss

It didn't make enough to support the team. There was an argument for running it as a side project / one man business, but that wasn't something that I wanted to do (and investors supported/advised when making that decision).

13 years agodiscuss

The struggle was more around scaling the business. We had income, and raised some seed funding on the back of it (in order to go full time on the project). We didn't take further investment because we knew we couldn't scale and provide the return that investors would have wanted.

While running Vinetrade, I learnt a lot about testing ideas and getting validation with minimal effort. The MVP post was about some of these lessons. If I was starting again, I'd get that validation much more quickly (but it would likely be the same early validation again).

13 years agodiscuss

I got this a lot. I think it was the cause of me not getting a few job offers. It's good to pre-empt the concern and be clear about wanting to take what you learnt on to another project.

What I found hardest was trying to explain that I also didn't want the stress and emotional ride of running a company for a while - without coming across as lazy or unmotivated.

13 years agodiscuss

It's fine wine (£100 per bottle and up). Of which about 80% is Bordeaux.

I calculated those figures by looking at widely used market stats, and then the turnover of the UK's fine wine wholesalers.

13 years agodiscuss

  It seems to me that you are saying that if buyer and seller know each other then they would eschew the market for a more intimate trading arrangement.

This is exactly what I'm saying. E.g. Airbnb wouldn't work if hosts and guests already knew or could easily find each other some other way.

13 years agodiscuss

I hope so. I can definitely understand why investors prefer second or third time entrepreneurs so much!

13 years agodiscuss

Exactly. There's a wine trading company called Wine Networks - a branch of SK Group (huge South Korean conglomerate).

They're relatively successful, but are hugely inefficient (no tech).

13 years agodiscuss

It's a little more complex - a lot of our customers were trading wine to make a profit, and were far more price sensitive. They traded on the site in the early days.

Sadly, the novelty soon wore off, and it turns out the social element is one of the reasons why they enjoy their trading.

13 years agodiscuss

We did. I had a year of experience (on the operations side), our sales guy had several years of experience.

Many people in the industry were surprised when we closed - they fully expected us to do well. There are a lot of buyers who are very price sensitive (and happy to do things themselves / hunt around for bargains) - they assumed we'd scoop them all up in time.

13 years agodiscuss

That would have taken a lot of money (to buy stock), and expose us to a lot more risk. Investors were backing us for the disintermediation.

I quite strongly believe that someone with an understanding of tech, the ability to build something, and take a position on stock, could make a lot of money in this market.

13 years agodiscuss

Exactly. I'd have had to lie and mislead investors to get the money. That's fraud and something I wasn't prepared to do.

13 years agodiscuss

They were buying a lot for consumption too. Drinking (or gifting) a bottle of Lafite or Petrus is a good way to show how wealthy you are.