Hacker News Reader

Comment by nxzero | Hacker News Reader

(That was a horrible experience trying to view the content; anyway.)

If you don't want to fail, don't try, but be sure you realize that no one else is going to try for you; that is, not trying results in 100% failure rate for you.

Next, new businesses based on an existing business model do not have the same types of risks and failure rates of startups in search of a business model that has never been done before; that is, this data includes not just startups, but new businesses, and as it relates to understanding startup failure rates is questionable.

View on HN

> Not trying results in 100% failure rate.

It is worth noting that you are comparing two failures with very different personal impacts.

While not trying to create a business certainly ensures that you fail to build a business, you do at least avoid the much greater failure of trying to build a business and it driving you to bankruptcy and depression.

I am sure there are many people that would happily swap a 90% chance of a high-impact failure for a 100% chance of a low-impact failure.

> Not trying results in 100% failure rate.

Depends on how you define failure. I define business failure as "losing my money in a failed business", and by that measurement, not trying results in a 100% success rate.

EDIT: Actually, if you want to be pedantic (this is HN after all), by this definition, not trying results in a 100% "non-failure" rate.

Wasting hours of your time could be another definition.

Actually, a lot of people will try for you. If you don't do something, someone else will. It's an interesting question as to why we humans want to be personally responsible for the major changes in the world. I think we want to leave our mark because we want our name to be remembered. We want to have made a difference because we are concerned about our biological death. There is a book called Denial of Death that explores this theme, I think.

After all, why does it matter toa particular person if they are the inventor or originator or driving force behind a new technology that would have come about anyway? If money wasn't an issue, say, like for Nicola Tesla.

Do we really think someone else won't do it? Actually we usually think the opposite.

I used to think this, but I am still waiting for a few things which I may need to just create. Ex: A friend wanted 'grade A human chow' for the better part of 30 years.

Some are just slow; 10 years ago I was thinking a turbine electric hybrid could work really well. Another is you can extract energy from hot air and turbines and gas engines have really hot exhaust, the issue seems to be how nasty cooling hot exhaust is. Just look inside a cars tailpipe.

Actually we don't. Because the likelihood of someone else executing as well as you depends entirely how far out towards the edge of the innovation bell curve you are.

Beyond a certain point you can't be copied because you're literally the only person or company in the world who can execute.

Obviously this depends on talent. Mediocre talent is much more widely available than exceptional talent. So if you're not exceptional, you'll be copied.

If you're talented you can be first to market, but you'll be copied sooner or later.

But if you're truly exceptional you can't be copied at all, because you'll be combining exceptional imagination, exceptional execution, and exceptional access to resources. If you happen to combine those and provide something enough people want, you win your niche.

At this point you can only be imitated poorly. Sometimes that's enough to for competitors to survive around you. But it's a precarious existence, and if you continue to innovate you'll always be ahead of the competition.

I don't follow this line of thinking.

Almost any idea in any industry can be copied. Facebook was copied (and the copiers executed well), despite FB having "exceptional talent". Groupon was copied. Most new products are just copies of past products.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com