“Failure is not an option…it is a requirement…to future success. Failure gets a bad rap. It is actually an important element of success. When I speak at conferences around the world I say “In America we don’t use the word failure…we call it experience”. You learn far more from failure than you do from success. And those lessons from failure are what prepares you for future success.”

“Dropbox startup lessons learned 2011 3 days ago”

“Here’s that rare Steve Jobs story, one that’s never been told, about the company that got away. Jobs had been tracking a young software developer named Drew Houston, who blasted his way onto Apple’s radar screen when he reverse-engineered Apple’s file system so that his startup’s logo, an unfolding box, appeared elegantly tucked inside. Not even an Apple SWAT team had been able to do that.”

“How to pitch your company to investors, customers, and employees
I see about 400 startup pitches every year. This week at Techcrunch Disrupt and DEMO conference there will be over 200 companies pitching on stage and in the demo area. The good ones stand out immediately. How can you get noticed? Don’t expect to tell the whole story, just enough to get them curious and wanting to know more. You need several different pitches. The demo pit / exhibit area pitch is 1 minute. The on stage pitch to the audience is 6 minutes. The investor meeting pitch is about 30 minutes.”

“You hear people say “This is truly disruptive!”, “I’m looking for disruptive companies”, “We want to disrupt this market”, etc. Aside from the actual definition of “Disruption” the word received a turbo-shot of in-vogue-ness as the work of Clay Christensen became popularized. His seminal work, “The Innovators Dilemma”, talks about the concept of disruptive innovation. Christensen defines disruptive innovation as: “A process by which a product or service takes root initially in simple applications at the bottom of a market and then relentlessly moves ‘up market’, eventually displacing established competitors.”

“If you’re an experienced coder and user interface designer you think nothing is easier than diving into Ruby on Rails, Nodes.js and Balsamiq and throwing together a web site. (Heck, in Silicon Valley even the waiters can do it.)
But for the rest of us mortals whose eyes glaze over at the buzzwords, the questions are, “How do I get my great idea on the web? What are the steps in building a web site?” And the most important question is, “How do I use the business model canvas and Customer Development to test whether this is a real business?”
My first attempt at helping students answer these questions was by putting together the Startup Tools Page - a compilation of available web development tools. While it was a handy reference, it still didn’t help the novice.
So today, I offer my next attempt.”

“$250,000 is a lot of money. Venture investors might not think so, but for most of us it’s a lot of moolah. And for early stage startups it’s often the amount they ask for coming out of the gate (or $500,000 – which seems to be pretty standard as a first, seed ask). The problem is that $250,000 is a dangerous amount of money to invest in an early stage startup.”

“Statistics show that at least 50% of new startups fail within five years, and many of the survivors eventually fail. If you don’t want to be part of these statistics, consider all the alternatives to starting your own business, especially if you have one of the following perspectives:”

“My idea isn’t good enough yet” explained a friend who is thinking of starting his own company. He’s waiting for the idea to be completely fleshed out before taking the leap. Newsflash: Your idea probably sucks, and it doesn’t matter because your business will probably turn out to be something completely different.”