Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community | Hacker News Reader

Mark Suster on Seattle and how a few key people can transform a community

techcrunch.com

78 pointsdaryn35 comments

One thing that I think would help is if Seattle startups did more recruiting at UW's CSE department. There's a reason why Seattle startups tend to be founded by ex-MS and -Amazon folks instead of fresh college grads. Very few students here know anything about the local startup scene and end up being gobbled up by big companies (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe) or moving to greener pastures in the Bay Area. Suster didn't mention connection with local education institutions as one of his 10 points, but I think taking advantage of the stream of talent coming out of UW would go a long way to providing good hires and fostering a greater sense of entrepreneurship among Seattle's young people.

In my experience, few good UW CSE graduates want to give up an $80,000+ job offer at a reputable company to work at a startup.

If you're a good engineer, who's also a recent graduate, deciding to do a startup comes at a cost (e.g. reduced salary) -- more so depending on how much debt you've accumulated.

With that said, I'm all for informing students about all the options that are available and allowing them to choose.

Though, I would love to see more engineering graduates of Seattle colleges join startups.

My observations as a (somewhat) recent graduate from UW CSE:

Many of the students that wanted to go into startups after graduation instead of a job either had started on some product during school and wanted to see that through to completion, or were of the mind that they could just work for a few years at {Amazon, Google, Microsoft, ...} and then do the risky thing.

There is also a lack of exposure in the curriculum. They are in the middle of re-designing it, but before that only one class let you create a small team, come up with a product, and build it. It was seen as a painful course (it was) and it was also taken by most everyone (including people who couldn't care less, so it was hard to find a group of 4-5 motivated people). I don't recall any hackathons when I was there aside from ACM programming competitions.

As a startup person, I had to seek out the opportunities to build a product as part of a small team each quarter at UW CSE. That said, you can do it if you have the motivation.

All the literature about the program mentions that you can optionally take 1 capstone course (which are the big project courses that let you have free creative reign over what you produce). My solution was to just do 3 capstones instead.

I ended up taking the Google/Hadoop project course, distributed systems capstone, and Dan Weld's web services capstone. Each quarter I had 3-4 people on a team, and we were able to build something awesome.

To me it always seemed like a problem of advertising the opportunity within the department, and encouraging big risky projects vs. focused, assigned classwork.

Fun that I can recognize you based on your user name, but you probably can't do the same matching for me (its Mikey).

You were actually one of the people I was thinking of when I originally put in an aside about the really motivated people still doing it. I then removed that aside, but I probably should not have. The really motivated people are going to go into startups; they caught the itch at some point and need to scratch it to remain happy.

The subset of people that could go either way (startup or corporate) don't quite have the opportunity to see what a startup would be like at UW. The capstones are good, but for most they are an afterthought to be done in the final quarter or two, when they have most likely landed a job already. Software Engineering (CSE 403) is more about satisfying a requirement than about building something, and that is all most students end up with.

I graduated from UW's CSE program, worked at Microsoft full-time, and then quit Microsoft to do YC. I don't think the students at UW are averse to startups, I think there is just a lack of presence and exposure to those types of options. It wasn't until I lived with someone who went to Berkeley that I even knew that hacker news existed.

Alright - how do we go about this, then? Is there anyone driving anything like this already, or are we just waiting for some one to step in and just do this?

This sounds valuable enough that I'd be willing to plunk down some of my company's time to make this happen. That said, I suspect we'd be a rather poor choice to drive this as we're running pretty independent of the rest of the Seattle startup scene.

Given our community, though, there's gotta be someone whose a decent fit for this.

Anyone?

Redfin's a good example. They're at every UW CSE career fair and Glenn Kelman (Redfin's CEO) gives talks on campus every now and then.

My original comment was a bit too focused on the companies' side of things. I think the main issue is a lack of awareness on the part of students. In my experience (as a current undergrad at UW), students simply don't know about the local startup scene and thus don't take the steps to capitalize on it. Given the decent number of organizations and meetups in the area that would provide good avenues for students to get involved (Seattle Tech Startups, Startup Weekend, Hops & Chops, TechCafe, etc), it's more a matter of connecting the dots than developing new social structures.

I'm a UW CSE graduate (Mar 2009), and technical co-founder at MediaPiston. I can give good insight on recruiting at UW CSE - what works, what doesn't. Email me at (my HN username) at gmail.

I may be wrong about this, but I sense that Seattle's startup scene is definitely lacking something important. I can't put my finger on it, but I think it's there.

In my opinion, people here seem pretty risk-averse (ie few want to jump and do a startup, especially people in their twenties).

It kind of seems like people lack the drive to "change the world". Instead, people seem pretty laid back here. It's almost as if they get too comfortable here.

No, I don't think that's it (having lived here for 13 years). I think it's just more that people are focused on their own thing, by and large, vs. getting out with a small % of their time and building a community for the greater good.

This 'problem' is so fixable; we just need another catalyst (like what www.GeneralAssemb.ly and New Work City are doing in NYC... and what TechStars did in Boulder, Seattle, Boston and NYC, and many other examples).

We're just a few nudges away, and there's no doubt we'll get there -- we just need to keep focusing on the good stuff, and it's going to happen.

That's exactly what we're looking for -- Something like GeneralAssemb.ly in New York.

We're a startup working out of an architecture firm right now. The space is relatively inexpensive, it would be stellar if there were other startups around who are interested in putting together something similar with programming around design and technology.

If you're intersted, reach out to me via twitter (@ashbhoopathy) or email, ash@bettr.at. I'll also email Seattle Tech Startups about it.

>I think it's just more that people are focused on their own thing, by and large, vs. getting out with a small % of their time and building a community for the greater good.

Ya, they're not enough "crazy" people.

I think Seattle needs a big consumer-based (2.0 or 3.0) hit. It needs a Facebook, a Groupon, a Twitter, a Skype, a LinkedIn, an Etsy, a Dropbox.

you mean, like an Amazon? or a Starbucks? :-)

or, if you want to be cynical that Amazon's a long time ago... how about like an AWS, or a Kindle? The innovation's here -- we just need to get more commingling going on

it's going to happen -- if you're in town, reach out, please -- would love to have you help

Amazon and Microsoft do not like startups - they prefer to build things internally. And when they do buy startups they tend to kill them. Yes, IMDB is a nice exception, and lately they tend to buy firms and let them run on their own (Zappos) but Amazon got too burned during the dot com runup buying firms that turned out to not be a good match, a la Junglee.

Amazon was a long time ago, and AWS/Kindle, while being great products, did not contain really an element of risk the way a scrappy startup does.

I think parent poster has a point - there aren't a lot of recent examples of taking the risk and having it pay off, which may lead to some risk aversion in the community.

There are some.

For example Big Fish Games. There's also Tableau Software (although not consumer). Neither large compared to Skype, but both ~$100M revenue companies founded about the time of Skype.

UPDATE: After I wrote this I realized what is different about Seattle than the Bay Area, which is something a previous poster put in parentheticals... (web 2.0/3.0). Look at this list:

Facebook, a Groupon, a Twitter, a Skype, a LinkedIn, an Etsy, a Dropbox

These companies, except maybe Dropbox, are about connecting users together. Not about product. Seattle tends to be more focused on providing product. Is it the case that you are less likely to see a Tableau or Mathematica come out of the Bay Area?

For what it's worth, Lab126 (the Kindle-designing branch of Amazon) is in Cupertino, not Seattle.

But many of the backend services powering Kindle are based in Seattle.

And there's the fastest selling consumer electronics product in history... the Kinect.

I wonder if the problem is that the music scene is so good here in Seattle that the recently graduated want to participate in that area, both as producers and consumers, and not so much in the tech area?

Possibly the Seattle Freeze? http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2005/0213/cover.h...

In the 5 years after college that I lived in the city proper, the only tech group I managed to hang around was Seattle.RB, and only a few meeting at that.

There is a ton of casual tech stuff going on in Seattle. check out http://www.seattletechcalendar.com, or (disclosure: my blog) http://fourthirtysix.com/tech-sci/

We're not lacking the meetups, the events (Seattle 2.0 awards tonight!) We're lacking the leadership and super-stars participation in the community. While I see Dave Schappell at Hops and Chops, I don't feel like others mingling with us casual masses without it being self promotional.

I want to go to some event (and Hops and Chops seems like a good venue), have a real conversation with the CTO of a startup about solving some tech or product challenge. Or I want to hear about how some CEO got started over a beer. And I want to meet another super-star who's actively looking for help.

I agree. The Seattle startup culture reflects the city's passive agressive and cold nature. CEO's and other execs stick to their small circles.

In my 31 years of Seattle I guess I've found that friendships here are made and kept by doing active stuff together. Like camping, or boating, or cycling. There's not a lot of interest in "hey, want to loaf around together for a couple hours?" A lot of folks I know seem to tolerate the Seattle weather only because the summers and activities are great; killing time as bumps on a log is kind of silly.

Or maybe I'm just a poster-child for Pemco ads. I am wearing sandals and gore-tex and typing this from a Starbucks...

But do you invite other people, or have some way of introducing others to it? That's kind of what I'm getting at: regardless of the activity, there's a social disconnect for getting people involved if they're not already in a circle of friends--and the few circles I was in didn't intersect at all.

It's not necessarily an insurmountable gap but it's enough to intimidate most people who aren't already outgoing, or who are accustomed to a friendlier town.

I grew up in Redmond, went to college at WSU, and moved into Seattle in 2002. For the longest time after that, when walking into a bar or show, I had to keep persuading myself that people were not going to point and scream at me like Donald Sutherland in the 70's Body Snatchers movie.

Indeed. Most of my friends I have met through work or church or other friends; some sort of pre-existing common cause. Cultivating friendships "from scratch", so to speak, is admittedly much more difficult.

On topic, that feature of Seattle may have some bearing on entrepreneurs in search of capital or employees or a support network. But it seems orthogonal to actually taking the plunge; you're either going to do it, or keep talking about it.

(Also, I think we may have been in some classes together at WSU! We must know some of the same people, you're 3 degrees away on LinkedIn.)

I definitely agree that entrepreneurs are going to take the plunge or not. I'm focused on the support network / employee angle, and harkening back to daveschappell's point that the circles don't really connect. There are communities, yes, but no sense of overall community that you can get a starting point in. It seemed like tribes all the way down: ex-[Amazon | MS | Google], UW clubs, etc. And if you didn't know where to begin, there wasn't an easy way to find someone to ask.

Case in point: if I'd known there were more startups looking for talent, I probably wouldn't have moved out to the eastern part of the state in 2007. At the time, my options after burnout+dismissal seemed to be 'work for another large company'(which I'm still wary of), 'pursue your own idea on your lonesome'(which I didn't have any of at the time) or 'don't work at all'.

(My best classes at WSU were with Hagemeister, Wang(CS460 FTW), and Biker Bob. Contributing to my slight-insecurity as a dev, I was also part of the Benson class that petitioned to have him removed: for tossing us a description of car/cdr and expecting us to build a complete Lisp in SML)

actually... as a perfect example ... seattle.rb is one of the most unfriendly tech groups i've ever visited - and I know a number of others who would say the same thing.

I'm fired up by Mark's idea, to much more deeply engage with our local leaders (Amazon, Microsoft, Starbucks, Costco, etc) -- think every geography has these, and presenting it how Mark does makes it so much more compelling. Everyone benefits from these relationships, and really, the Bay Area has crushed it in this area (think growth of Zynga and others on Facebook... the wave of startup involvement with iPhone/iPad Apps store launches...) -- I look forward to helping make that happen, more quickly

Dave deserves a ton of credit for all he's doing in the community. I'll offer up my own time as well - if you have ANY questions, i'm happy to help - follow me at @aronchick or email me at aronchick (at) hark.com.

I think getting the patrons moving is a huge win - they all have stacks they want startups using and/or hiring problems. Getting a vibrant startup community makes things much better.

Hi All-

I'd like to first introduce myself to everyone. My name is Rishi Talwar and I'm a senior majoring in Informatics at UW. I can't believe this is my first post on HN ever. I guess this topic really resonates with me because I've been passionate about the Seattle startup tech scene since the beginning of freshman year.

I too agree that there needs to be a more emphasis on startups at UW and building software that ultimately help others/create value. From my personal experience I have seen that there are a few people who feel as passionate and inspired about startups. I found this out when I was looking to work with a UW CSE student on a project I had in mind which is now up here: http://www.fratapps.com/. I'm not a CS major but I'm still up on different types of technologies. Mainly, I'm a front-end and product guy who loves building stuff. Therefore I was seeking someone who was majoring in cs.

After meeting with multiple students I finally found a friend who was willing to partner up and work with me who was a UW CSE student. But most of these students that I met didn't have any clue about the startup scene in Seattle or didn't care about building anything. This makes me feel that these students majoring in CSE are not passionate about their industry and ultimately get gobbled up by a big-co knowing that they will receive an $80,000+ salary. Maybe its not in their DNA or other factors drive them or its not in their curriculum. But there was definitely an utter lack of fire that is not money driven or by notoriety.

However, this past year I've been happy to know that these students are out there like Mongoose and a few others who has been a tremendous advocate for startups and do it purely out of passion. Also, I have had the honor to meet a freshman business student who is probably way more well connected in the Startup scene then me (twitter:@mikeytom) who has worked on FratApps.com.

When I read blog posts like this from Mark Suster it makes me want to hustle. Maybe there needs to be a startupWeekend for UW like StartupUW. Something that brings all facets of knowledge ie business, engineering, and Informatics or anyone else together on campus.

I appreciate you reading this and would like to hear your thoughts.

Thanks,

Rishi Talwar twitter: @rishtal

Oren Etzioni (http://www.cs.washington.edu/homes/etzioni/), a UW professor, and co-founder of the previous startup I worked at in Seattle is also involved with several other new startups including Decide.com that just raised a $6M round.

I'm not active in the startup scene, but how could an article like this not mention Seattle Tech Startups? http://www.seattletechstartups.com/

My only problem with STS is the signal to noise ratio suffers - there's a lot of service providers and other folks on there that drown out the opportunity to make connections. It's a good start, but there are a ton more resources. If you really want to make a difference, or connect, my recommendation is attend one or all of the events here:

http://www.seattletechcalendar.com/

Reply on news.ycombinator.com