mfieldhouse

I like how you slipped in the use of 'doodly squat' there - very fitting.

What benefit does having this law give? 'It also prohibits residents of certain buildings from renting their accommodations for under 30 days'

Disgusting how there's scumbags out there who jump at the chance to make some quick money, even if it means destroying the lives of others.

"... the consumer space and enterprise space are connected and become more so. Microsoft needs to be strong in the consumer space to remain strong in the enterprise."

Not at all true. Cisco, Juniper, Oracle, EMC, Netapp are strong in the enterprise with virtually zero consumer presence. Or am I missing something?

I've often seen the choice of having kids or getting married being used as a 'quick fix'. Usually for a failing relationship, insecurities or poor financial choices (benefits++). It's not always, but it can be.

It's all relative. Take a bunch of people of a similar background as Alex, education, opportunities. Then choosing the lifestyle he has is pretty rare. And if you can cope with the tradeoffs, it is awesome - especially the long term payoffs of freedom.

Often disease, disability and accidents are caused through poor lifestyle choices. Sometimes lots of little things add up and it's hard to see the true cause. I've not driven for 4 years so I'd say that's put me at a significantly less risk of car related accidents than someone that does.

Because HN isn't a politics site. In fact it's not even a tech news site. That's what the likes of mashable are for.

My objection is what's in this for me? How is this better than writing a CV? Try something like "Stand out from the hundreds of people applying for your next dream job by telling an authentic story with aufond.me"

Platforms for businesses to share real problems are already out there. Go sign up to forums for accountants, CPAs, real estate agents. What do they struggle with, what common themes are are there, what part of their job do they joke about loving (because they hate it so much)? Go sign up to student forums, teacher forums, landlord's forums. Buy their magazines, go to their meetups. It's all out there already.

Cool, thanks for being open about it

But if it made enough money to keep yourself and the others in a job then why ever declare it as a failure? Unless it didn't make enough money?

Just for fun and to hopefully one day avoid failing in a startup, I like to do post mortems. What I understood of Vinetrade is it struggled to make any income in a market which isn't comfortable right now trading online.

1. 2/12 Launches vinetrade

2. It manages wine portfolios

3. Raises funding

Getting funding so early is an indication that early profitability was probably not the main focus. Can give a false sense of success and idea validation.

4. People already trade wine but are not using an online service to do it yet

If this is your first startup, don't try and revolutionise an industry. Let someone else blow the money and make the mistakes first. Be a fast follower instead.

5. JM talks about building an MVP

Vinetrade should be your product? Another indication of not focusing on achieving profitability and a good revenue model and pricing structure early on.

6. 3/13 Closes vinetrade. Mentions it would have needed more funding.

Funding focus again an indication of lack of focus on early idea validation through profitability.

Right off the bat, it looks like the problem lies in 'we built a software product that simplified how nonprofits plan and measure their social and environmental impact.'. It just seems nothing was built that people wanted to pay for. The product wasn't marketed to people that have the money to pay for it and see the value in doing so. Also they got confused by thinking 'viable' is different to 'desirable'. It's the exact same thing. MVP doesn't mean what's the smallest piece of junk you can throw together and call it software. It means if you strip everything out of your idea and product, what is the one feature that customers would find useful and pay for.