Who me? Worry?

I decided about seven years ago during the dot-com boom that I wanted to run my own startup. I've wanted my own business since I was a kid (and I have one as a consultant), but a startup? That would be totally neat. Over the past years, I've worked for a year or two at my "day job", then took 6-9 months off to work on my dream. So I've been through a few cycles. Here's how they went:

• Personable
  • What it was - Uber-cool universal directory system and contact software that was integrated into the O/S. Users appeared as icons anywhere a regular file or folder could appear. The system maintained a list of all the points-of-access for a user and kept them all in sync in the background. Right-clicking on the icon gave you all the options for interacting with them. Want to send a file? Just drag a file onto the icon. The user icons worked both like files and folders. The system figured out where the user was currently and how you can reach them. This extended to folders. You could create a folder in windows, for instance, for everybody over 40 who liked turtles. When you opened the folder, voila! There were all the little people that matched your criteria, updated in real time. You could have animated icons, multiple points of contact for each user and Since they worked like files, you could just drag them into an email and send them to people.
  • What happened with the effort - I ran out of money. Living in the boonies, it was impossible to find funding. I had one potential investor I did a demo for. He didn't understand the technology, didn't understand the promise, and knew nothing about being a VC. So let's just say it was a bad match. Without money, I soon had to quit and go back to the salt mine.
  • LESSONS LEARNED - Can't do some startups without OPM: Other People's Money. Even in a high-performance, fast-paced development shop, you can outrun your savings.






• The MAT
  
  
  
  • What it was - Industrial process-analysis tool. It uses the web to interview all of your development team, from 10 to 10,000 people. From the interviews, it returns an analysis of where you have too much paperwork, where you could use some training, where you might use a little more attention to detail. It's Agile combined with Structure: a reproducible way to quickly adapt projects to needs, while building a knowledge-base of where your organizational process risks are. Since it does multiple processes and can be done so quickly, you can "try out" various standards to see how you might stack up. Thinking about CMM? Why not evaluate yourself next week to see how you might fare? Sure is cheaper than spending several hundred thousand for a professional evaluation, and you can re-do the evaluation any time for free.
  
  
  • What happened with the effort - It's what I like to call the "Living Dead". I have customers. They use it from time to time. But it never really got that momentum I thought it was going to get. I think the reason why is that I simply don't have the contacts I need to try out and integrate the tool into larger consulting shops. I'm still anticipating using it, however, and it easily pays for its server and bandwidth costs.
  
  
  • LESSONS LEARNED - Got to have the right location. Living in the country is killing me. There are no other high-tech businesses around, there are no VCs, there are no communities where I can compare notes and network. All I have is woods, grass, cows, mountains, trees, clouds. Sure, it's great for raising a family, and you can't beat it for peace and quiet to program, but it's hurting my startup efforts.
  
  
  
  






• batBack
  
  
  
  • What it was - Totally portable blog toolkit. Novice users could add one line of Javascript to their blog, MySpace, FaceBook, or whatever pages and it would bootstrap a complete toolkit into the browser on top of their existing page. It had its own language to define where things went. Would you like a voting button next to each article? Simply go to the batBack main page and select that option. How about a live chat widget where readers of your blog article could chat with other users on other blogs that were reading similar articles? Just check the box. Would you like to certain things to appear on any batBack enabled page you visit? Simply make your settings, select your tools -- heck add your GreaseMonkey-like scripts -- and no matter what blog you visit on whatever computer or whatever browser, your settings went with you.
  
  
  • What happened with the effort - It succeeded. That is, it started into production, users came, advertisers asked to start advertising. And then, suddenly, everything fell apart. It was simply too much to do! How could one person program, debug, do user support, advertising, business planning, and everything else that was needed? There were scaling problems and ad revenue wasn't going to cover operating expenses. We had growing pains. Add to that the recurring "piggy bank is empty" scenario, and it was time to put it on the back burner.
  
  
  • LESSONS LEARNED - About this time I read a few good startup books, like "A Good Hard Kick in the Ass", "Hackers and Painters", and "Founders at Work". Wow! I need a good team! Gee! I wish I had known that about, say, five years before.
  
  
  
  
• Finding Cofounders -
  
  
  
  • What it was - This last time, I decided I was going to form a team first, come heck or high water. So I did all kinds of things: I posted on Craigslist, I joined groups 100 miles from home, I emailed friends and asked them if they knew of anybody. I even responded to random blogs I read. I felt like a new kid in school. "Hey. Would you be my friend?"
  
  
  • What happened with the effort - It was a horrible failure. People love to think they want to be entrepreneurs, but when you get right down to it, they just as soon do easy stuff like sit around and BS about what cool ideas they have. Every programmer is Bill Gates in the back of his mind, but a sad girlie-man when it comes to taking risks, dealing with hard work and rejection, and pouring their heart into something.
  
  
  • LESSONS LEARNED - There's an old saw: people like to do what they like to do. This might sound stupid, but it's actually extremely wise. People get into patterns in their lives, and over time, they subconsciously find their way back to doing the same old things time and time again. By the time you're 30, for most people these patterns run their lives. So a guy who likes football might say he'd love to help out with that programming, but within a few weeks he's back to watching football every night. Likewise, a person who's used to following orders and taking direction will gravitate toward passive roles. A person who likes to sell will eventually put himself in a sales position. People like to do what they like to do, and it's very hard to change that.

    It's just going to take some time to find a good cofounder. It could happen within the next year, or it might be 5-10 years. That's just the way things are right now.

  
  
  
  

Running a startup is all about people, not ideas or opportunities. The people will generate the ideas and opportunities. Hey -- business opportunities are like buses: if you miss one there'll always be another one along in a bit. I'm the same guy I was back in the dot-com boom. If anything, I'm sharper and wiser. Sure, I've overclocked my brain and had to remove some hair to get extra cooling capacity, but I ain't playing checkers on AOL in the evenings. Great ideas and opportunities have already arrived for me -- there'll be lots more. I can't wait for the next one!

I decided about seven years ago during the dot-com boom that I wanted to run my own startup. Since then I've put in a lot of hours and blood, sweat and tears. I'm ready for more. My decision to have my own startup is not going to change anytime soon.