March 2011
23 posts
“When they train racecar drivers, one of the first lessons is when you are going...”
– Ben
Runkeeper and the Body API
A few weeks back our portfolio company, Runkeeper, quietly launched a store. Like most other starups, the store had Runkeeper branded appareal like performance Ts and hoodies. Unlike most startup stores, Runkeeper’s store gave a subtle hint to their future.
Today that hint becomes not so subtle.
With the addition of FitBit and Zeo devices to the Runkeeper store, the company is signaling...
AOL: Hand Over Crunchbase and Nobody Gets Hurt
Dear AOL,
Congrats on your recent acquisition of Techcrunch- there’s no better team reporting on tech these days. They’ve really come into their own over the last couple of years and are producing high quality articles and videos at scale and driving conversations forward that are important to all of us. I think you’re going to make a fortune selling ads against their content....
Declaring and Doing Are Two Different Things
One of my guilty pleasures is watching a sitcom TV show called The Office. Somethings been happening in startup land over the last year or so that’s been reminding me of a favorite scene of mine.
In one episode the lead character, Michael Scott, is dealing with a terrible financial situation. He’s spending far more money than he earns. After a consultation with one of his employers...
The Anatomy of a Y Combinator Demo Day Pitch
The other night I had an opportunity to attend Demo Day at Y Combinator. It was a fantastic full frontal assault of entrepreneurial energy. 43 pitches, 2 min each back to back for well over 2 hours. It was clear from the outset that these teams were trained to give a certain kind of pitch with their allotted time. For those who didn’t get the chance to attend, I thought a peek into the...
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt
A few weeks back an entrepreneur friend forwarded me a note they’d received from the Founder Institute. The email in question raised issues around the level of debt startups were taking on in the form of convertible notes and warned that 2011 will be the “Year of the Startup Default”. From the email:
There has been a convergence of trends where massive amounts of angel debt has...
Let's Try This Again Ladies: OATV is Hiring
Last week I posted an opening at OATV for our Associate position. It felt a little risky going with a process that required a personal introduction but the quality, quantity and context of the potential hires we’ve seen thus far has been nothing short of amazing. And, the hustle displayed by candidates finding clever ways to get connected to us has been inspiring.
On one dimension, the...
WatchThis video of Salman Khan’s TED talk has been making the rounds all week. Though I love the mission of his Khan Academy, I was most struck by its history.
For those unfamiliar the Khan Academy was born in 2006, not with a grand plan to change the face of education, but as a few math tutorials posted to YouTube by a hedge fund analyst in Boston for his cousins in New Orleans. His training...
Google at their best. Facebook at their best.
A few months ago I had lunch with an old friend. As is often the case we were talking technology and, specifically, what new apps we were using. He was especially excited about the release of the Google Translate iPhone app.
After having our collective minds blown by the possibilites of the app, which translates speech or text across multiple languages, he made a remark that I haven’t been...
“The thousands of startups today that are pitching themselves at app competitions...”
– Stacey Higginbotham, Have Startups Become a Fetish?
I wonder. With Startup weekends, Startup bootcamps, Startup schools, Startup incubators, Startup America, and on and on I wonder if the term “Startup” has officially become meaningless.
There was a time when “Startup”...
“Perhaps I’m old fashioned, but I still think investing involves more than...”
– Hornick
OATV is Hiring
OATV is our start up. Like most start ups we gather information, process feedback and iterate with eye an towards delivering a product our customers will love. And, like most start ups, we’ve built a small team committed to doing just that. Every two years, an opening on our team becomes available and we want to make those in our network aware of it.
OATV is hiring a new Associate.
The...
WatchIn 2008 I was running across NYC to meet up with Dennis Crowley. He had just left area/code and we were going to hang out later that night to talk about what was next. 30 min before we were to meet I got a call. It was Dennis. Vermont was getting hammered with snow and he didn’t want to miss a rare east coast snowboarding powder day. He cancelled on me in favor of a late night road trip....
What's your Leanback Mode?
Last week I was giving a friend grief for not using Twitter anymore. He explained that due to his new role at a very large company he had to be more careful about what he said on twitter. But, he confessed to still using the service multiple times a day to see what people he cared about were reading, thinking or doing. I’ve noticed a similar behavior with my wife. She only posts every few...
