Ask HN: Early bird still gets the worm? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Early bird still gets the worm?

16 pointsfjabre17 comments

Just wondering how many hackers believe in this old adage and if they think it applies to software startups in general or at all..

My personal belief is that it's just a matter of personal preference and it has no correlation to startup success for hackers.. I happen to be more nocturnal, always have been.. Of course having grown up in New England I've heard this puritanical proverb for most of my life and I can't help but feel a little guilty for 'staying up late' and 'sleeping in'.

I can see why it would apply to certain other industries like finance/banking..

So what do you think? Does this 'wisdom' apply to software startups and hackers?

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The early bird may get the worm. But the second mouse gets the cheese.

I don't think it simply meant that you had to get up early; more that it was good to be the first to do something. That seems to apply in most types of work, including startups.

The early worm gets eaten by the bird! First is great if you're first in the mind of the consumer but if you're not the first to gain traction (in the web world = users) in enough people's minds - there's no advantage to being first. It's quite possible your being first might pave the way for later arrivals to dominate the market you created.

Not exactly There is often a sustainable advantage in being the "first-mover" in the competitive marketplace. Combine that with a strong brand name, (for example: Twitter) and being the first to market can be a huge asset. After all, if you've "pave(d) the way for later arrivals," you'll at least know which paths led to dead ends. Your competitors won't. Besides, later arrivals will also be "behind" in the respect that they won't have had as much time to learn from mistakes. In the hyper-competitive world of the web, it's actually pretty easy to use the first-mover advantage to the detriment of potential future competitors.

For example, a business like eBay has fees which are ludicrous, an interface that is not at all intuitive, but because it was pretty much the first established brand in online auctions, it's what most people keep using.

You hit the nail on the head > first established brand...

An "established brand" did get into the mind first... - you might possibly gain ground on them (eBay) by focusing on a unique segment (Esty) or a host of other ways. Getting established is the hard part - being first is not a guarantee you'll end up being the "established brand". Was Facebook the first social site? And while a strong brand name is great to have - easier to remember and easier to market - its still nothing compared to getting critical mass.

First mover is a huge advantage if you manage to create a new segment and then spend all your time focusing on promoting how great the segment is - and hopefully at the same time gaining critical mass.

I'm not convinced. For every example you do cite of a first mover advantage, there are a dozen examples of first movers being killed by companies that followed them.

Yahoo-Google

Friendster-Myspace-Facebook

Blogger-Wordpress

Hotmail-Yahoo-Gmail

I can go on.

Somewhere in the world there is a time zone where you are the early bird.

Being an early bird in your own time zone is important when you have to physically stand in line for one thing or another. But now, for a software startup, most of those lines are virtual, and you can stand in an American line at 7am while sipping coffee in a cafe in Monaco at noon.

Obviously there are still many exceptions in the non-hacker world. If you want to run a bakery or a drive-time radio show you pretty much have to learn to love 3AM. And the problem for a software startup is that if you don't build your stuff right you might have to respond to emergencies at any random hour of the day or night, which is a much more serious problem than having to wake up consistently early or consistently late.

When I was extremely ill, I suffered horrible insomnia and often went to sleep at 7am. During that time, I was not able to be genuinely productive. A lot of what I did amounted to churn and time-filling. When I began working, I took an evening shift job because I knew that although I was healthier, I still wasn't healthy enough to cope with getting up early. I now work dayshift, and that correlates to an ability to get up earlier because of improved health.

So if there is any correlation generally (not just for me) between health and schedule, then I would say that being an early bird may be a proxy for health but real productivity is rooted in sound health and the ability it provides to think clearly and do sustained work, which isn't specifically related to the hours you keep.

Makes sense. I think most of the time your body should know what sleep schedule is best for your health better than you do. I tend to just wait until I feel ready to go to sleep, be it 10PM or 2AM, and get up when I feel well rested.

Hmm... put it this way, it is productive to put in three hours of work in your business before your opposition wakes up!

Why is that more productive than putting in those hours after the opposition has already gone to bed?

Which is technically 8 hours or more before they wake up.

Doing without sleep to put in more hours is never worth it. When you're well rested your brain functions much more effectively, you're better at dealing with people and it's easier to remain upbeat.

Also the notion of putting in more hours is a pernicious one. It's much better to focus on getting the most important things done. (You'll still have way too much work but at least you'll be getting the important stuff done).

Early morning is the most productive part of the day for me. There are no interruptions, no noise, and my brain is still well rested.

There are no absolutes. Sometimes early is good. Sometimes not. Next Question?

My adage is: "it's morning somewhere."

There's an inverse correlation to early rising and income, so I guess no. But that probably boils down to low wage people waking up to do shift work. Also, to my observation, less well off middle class people wake up early to commute in from the boonies.

Lots of high income deal maker types do business in the evenings.

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