{"id":424,"date":"2008-10-29T08:12:22","date_gmt":"2008-10-29T15:12:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/?p=424"},"modified":"2008-10-29T08:21:46","modified_gmt":"2008-10-29T15:21:46","slug":"opportunity-from-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2008\/10\/29\/opportunity-from-failure\/","title":{"rendered":"Opportunity from failure"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"epic by <\/em><\/span>Dyl86<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/span>
\nFailure as an event<\/a>:
\n[Via Seth’s Blog<\/a>]<\/p>\n

I try hard not to keep a running tally of big-time failures in my head. It gets in the way of creating the next thing. On the other hand, when you see failure as a learning event, not a destination, it makes you smarter, faster.<\/p>\n

Some big ones from my past:
\n
\nThe Boston Bar Exam. <\/strong>My two partners and I spent a lot of time and money building this our last year of college. It was a coupon book filled with free drinks from various bars in Cambridge and Boston. The booklet would be sold at the bars, encouraging, I dunno, drunk driving. Lessons: Don’t spend a lot on startup costs, don’t sell to bar owners and don’t have three equal partners, since once person always feels outvoted.
\n
\nThe Internet White Pages. <\/strong>This was a 700 page book filled with nearly a million email addresses. It took months to create and IDG, the publisher, printed 80,000 copies. They shredded 79,000 of them. Lesson: If the Internet Yellow Pages is a huge hit (it was), that doesn’t mean the obvious counterpart will be. A directory that’s incomplete is almost always worthless.<\/p>\n

MaxFax.<\/strong> This was the first fax board for the Mac. It would allow any Mac user to hit ‘print’ and send what was on the screen to any fax machine. We raised seed money from a wealthy dentist, built a working prototype and worked to license it to a big computer hardware company. Lessons: Don’t raise money from amateurs, watch out for flaky engineering if you’re selling a prototype, think twice before you enter a market with one huge player (Apple knocked off the idea) and don’t build a business hoping to sell out unless you have a clear path to do that.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One of the important lessons is to fail as soon as possible and learn from it. Then move on. Today, the most rapid path to wisdom and success is to crank the innovation cycle as fast as possible. Here are a couple of other lessons from Seth:<\/em><\/p>\n

Prepare for the dip. Starting a business is far easier than making it successful. You need to see a path and have the resources to get through it.<\/p>\n

Cliff businesses<\/a> are glamorous but dangerous.<\/p>\n

Projects exist in an eco-system. Who are the other players? How do you fit in?<\/p>\n

Being the dumbest partner in a room of smart people is exactly where you want to be.<\/p>\n

And the biggest of all: persist. Do the next one.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There are lots of things failing around us everyday. Moving beyond that to success requires persistence and a vision. And a high threshold for dealing with failure.<\/p>\n

Besides, maybe one of your failures will be epic.<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Technorati Tags: Web 2.0<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Dyl86 Failure as an event: [Via Seth’s Blog] I try hard not to keep a running tally of big-time failures in my head. It gets in the way of creating the next thing. On the other hand, when you see failure as a learning event, not a destination, it makes you smarter, faster. Some … Continue reading Opportunity from failure<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[10,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-knowledge-creation","category-web-20"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe2yp-6Q","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":675,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2010\/08\/11\/dealing-with-failure-successfully\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":0},"title":"Dealing with failure successfully","date":"August 11, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by jurvetsonWhat Google Could Learn From Pixar [Via Daring Fireball] Peter Sims: Despite an unbroken string of 11 blockbuster films, Catmull regularly says, \u201cSuccess hides problems.\u201d It\u2019s an insight Google should acknowledge and act on. [More] One thing the article mentions is that Pixar is always working to find solutions\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Knowledge Creation"","img":{"alt_text":"intermediary metabolism","src":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/201008111142.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":660,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2010\/06\/27\/sometimes-failure-is-an-option\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":1},"title":"Sometimes failure is an option","date":"June 27, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"The Long of Coming Up Short[Via HarvardBusiness.org] I didn't take Calculus in high school, and I almost didn't take Advanced Placement (AP) American History for fear that I wouldn't get an A. In retrospect, given that I've pursued a career in finance, achieving a B in Calculus rather than knowing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Knowledge Creation"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":467,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2008\/12\/15\/pools-for-drugs\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":2},"title":"Pools for drugs","date":"December 15, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by seanmcgrath Goldman\u2019s pool for drug research: [Via business|bytes|genes|molecules] And while we are on the subject of blog posts by Derek Lowe, here's one where he points to news about Goldman Sachs funding a large pharma company and using a \"new\" business model(The model involves) a different approach, creating a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Science"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/pool.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":428,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2008\/11\/03\/seven-rules\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":3},"title":"Seven rules","date":"November 3, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by ThunderChild tm Seven rules for the KM-lords in their farm of cubes: [Via Knowledge Jolt with Jack] David Snowden has expanded his three rules to seven principles. Now I have to wonder if there are nine rules somewhere. And if there is One Rule to Bind them All. Rendering\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Knowledge Creation"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/11\/dice.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":433,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2008\/11\/06\/successful-failure\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":4},"title":"Successful failure","date":"November 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jordi Armengol (Xip)Clarity of vision: [Via business|bytes|genes|molecules] Be stubborn on vision and flexible on details \u2013 Jeff Bezos Those words, which I heard recently, have stuck in my head (or rather in Evernote, as I typed them on my iPhone furiously as I heard them). Over the years, I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Knowledge Creation"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/11\/vision.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":626,"url":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/2010\/03\/08\/the-difference-between-the-creative-and-the-commonplace\/","url_meta":{"origin":424,"position":5},"title":"The difference between the creative and the commonplace","date":"March 8, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by BruceTurner Edward Tufte Presidential Appointment [Via Daring Fireball] President Obama has appointed Edward Tufte to the Recovery Independent Advisory Panel, \u201cwhose job is to track and explain $787 billion in recovery stimulus funds\u201d. Outstanding. [More] This is pretty cool. Tufte is one of my favorite people, not only for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Knowledge Creation"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spreadingscience.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}