Disqus - Latest Comments for fredwilson

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

adelaidelancaster — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 17:05:36 -0000

Thanks for the shout out, Jill! And, Fred, we would love to have your speak at In Good Company anytime! I am a frequent reader of your blog (although I only occasionally comment) and we work hard to encourage our membership to read blogs like yours! In fact, your 10 Characteristics of Great Companies post is included in our new member packet. (I hope that doesn’t get me into reprint trouble.) I don’t think it is true that women “don’t like this stuff” but I would guess that many women business owners wouldn’t consider themselves as swimming in the same pool as your portfolio companies (given in part the average disparities in finding, size, scale, and revenue), and they may not feel that they are being spoken to on the blog – although that isn’t the case for me.

I believe that you can learn from any company and we make it part of our IGC mission both on our blog and in our classes to distill takeaways and lessons from larger, seemingly less similar companies so that our members can apply them to their own ventures. I also believe that when you work for yourself, you are entrepreneur first and something else (consultant, nutritionist, photographer, etc) second. Nothing makes us happier then when someone tells us that we have helped them change how they see themselves and that they are now identifying as a business owner.

So, please consider yourself invited to speak to the IGC membership! And in the meantime, I’ll continue to link and share A VC!

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

twitter-70369235 — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:56:40 -0000

Re: The AVC Reader Census

rosshill — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:28:01 -0000

You've inspired me to game my readers too :) http://www.rosshill.com.au/article/hunch-accuracy/

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

alexismichelle — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:19:12 -0000

LaunchBox Digital made a very concerted effort to reach out to female enterprenuers when accepting applications for its 2009 program, and even with that effort less than a handful actually applied. Ultimately they did end up accepting a company with female founders (Keen Guides, lead by two women, one of whom is deaf and recently featured in DC magazine!), but that was ultimately on the merits of the company and not on the fact that it was lead by women.

The same problem exists in VC to a large degree-- do you think its a cyclical problem? VC is hard enough to break into, but as a woman it seems even more daunting. Not to say that there are not fantastic female VCs (or fantastic female entrepreneurs), but the numbers are pretty skewed.

That said, I love this blog post by Christine Herron at First Round Capital. She put out a call on twitter for companies with female founders, and got a surprisingly large response: http://bit.ly/femalefounders

Re: "Audio Preview" Is A Bad User Experience

Prokofy — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:10:26 -0000

The essence of music is the listen. What is a non-listened music but a bit of stored data?!

Re: "Audio Preview" Is A Bad User Experience

Prokofy — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:06:17 -0000

Oh, but by flogging the *listens* Fred, you are flogging the idea -- by extension -- that downloads should be free, too, which of course they are, and have been, if no longer on Napster, on Youtube now. You've only clarified this now, and you've created a climate in which you imply that people should give things away for free, and that will automagically make their fans buy from them.

This is a riotously religious theory that has not been tested by any serious journalistic investigation, and in fact is just a say-so from copyleftist fanatics like Doctorow, Andersen and Jarvis. You're merely contributing to that enabling climate that begs belief with this post.

YOU started your claims here by saying only partial listens were annoying and counterproductive and musicians "must" have full listens. Why? Can you *prove* that they *still make a living* with real numbers and not just your-say so? with revealing the actual life stories and balance sheets, even in aggregate?

You're claiming that all these fans getting full freebies instead of a 1/4 or a 3/4 freebie in fact buy the song. Show me.

I continue not to believe you, and your threats, hurts, anger, claims that I've put words in your mouth, claims that I've "gotten it wrong" simple are beside the point.

Cut the poetry, Fred. Show me the numbers.

Re: The AVC Reader Census

Prokofy — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:01:49 -0000

Well, get pissed, Fred, but you're simply wrong.
I didn't call you a liar.
I said *I didn't believe what you were saying*.
and I don't. Throwing a fit and telling me you're pissed doesn't persuade me any further.
I need investigative journalism on your surprising claims that people who give everything away make a living. It really is an untested theory, realized by only a tiny handful of people who happen to make their living on the lecture circuit (Doctorow, Andersen) and I'd like to see how much truth there is for everybody else, even in this subset of people who are rock stars able to sign to a label.

It's very important to prove your claims by journalism, not by propaganda, and back them up by reason, not by telling people you are pissed.

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

hymanroth — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:58:26 -0000

No French genes then? :)

Joking apart, Hunch is going to have to work hard to keep this fresh. I was already bored taking IQ/personality/whatever tests in the last millennium.

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:51:28 -0000

Hmm. Need to think about that

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:48:08 -0000

I don't think I've ever worn any kind of scent ever

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

ShanaC — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:26:07 -0000

I would feel extraordinarily odd approaching you without at least two guys...If your idea seems macho, you want someone else to portray a macho image for you.

Re: The AVC Reader Census

ryangraves — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:20:00 -0000

Either way, it's very fascinating what they are building...

Ryan Graves
414.559.3924
Twitter: @ryangraves
http://thedreaminaction.com

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

jillstern — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:00:47 -0000

I read gg as well but it does not interest me as much as avc because I like the excitement of business and deals and money and new ideas.

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

hymanroth — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:59:45 -0000

What about the perfume? We *demand* an answer to the perfume question!

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:57:43 -0000

That's fine. Its worth working on

Re: Valuation and Option Pool

ccrystle — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:47:20 -0000

ok, thanks (that wasn't a statement on you, just the practice)

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:46:39 -0000

close

i drive a minivan but wish i could get rid of it and just walk and ride a
bike and a vespa

i do eat meat but am cutting way back on it, may be headed to partial
vegetarian, meaning i make exceptions for steak and ribs occasionally

i use a windows machine in the office and a mac everywhere else

and i don't know about "classically styled". i like to think of myself as
trendy, but my girls would laugh out loud at that characterization

Re: Glue: From Browser Plugin To Web Service

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:56:40 -0000

Kind of like marry glue and blogrollr

Re: Valuation and Option Pool

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:55:34 -0000

Yes. But the times they've not been are rare and you can always fix that in those cases

Re: The AVC Reader Census: A Day Later

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:52:08 -0000

Thank you

Re: Valuation and Option Pool

mokoyfman — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:50:13 -0000

agreed. wish everyone saw it that way...

Re: The AVC Reader Census

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:49:33 -0000

You call me a liar, I get pissed

Re: "Audio Preview" Is A Bad User Experience

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:49:00 -0000

I didn't say that. Don't put words in my mouth. I said they make a living by giving away listens for free

You keep mistaking listens for the music itself

Re: The AVC Reader Census

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:48:00 -0000

That's what I like about hunch. Its game like. Most surveys suck

Re: The AVC Reader Census

fredwilson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:47:26 -0000

Thank you!