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Comment by hi | Hacker News Reader

This begs the question: Would you take an investment from Vinod Khosla?

This is the time I need to pop up every so often. Vinod has a very negative reputation in the Valley. He used to be known as the biggest anti-founder VC when he was at Kleiner. He'd come in, use sharp elbows to push founders around and out, then companies would crumble. He's learned but not enough.

His new marketing of himself has helped (as has Rabois), but you can't change who he is. When given a chance, he'll take advantage of early stage startups. That's why you don't see many companies he's made. And he's been at it a long time - 27 years! He gets in the way because it's all about him and his huge, insatiable ego. He's much more old school VC in that way - but in the Tom Perkins vein, not Don Valentine. It's his way because it's his money.

The only way to keep Vinod honest is to get other investors. If he's your lead, the knife isn't far from your back.

Question for you: who do you think has the luxury to be able to choose who to take money from? In my view, not many people. We're all scrambling to put food on the plates of our children (if not our own). It's extremely difficult to be picky and choosy about where we take money from... because it's what we need to survive.

Startup founders surely do have the luxury to choose who to take money from. Really.

Startup is a high-risk project, most people who take high risks have some sort of acquired resources and/or social support. Also most of startup founders have skills that are in demand equally from SMBs and corporations. That is another advantage that founders have.

Also, survive? Doing on average better than 90-95% of people on this planet is quite far from having problems for securing food for the day and lodging for the night.

If you're having trouble paying for food, you should probably find something other than founding a startup to occupy your time.

Taking funding from a venture capitalist means giving them an ownership stake and a say in how your business operates. If you don't trust them, don't get along with them, and don't see eye to eye with them on basic fundamentals, then you should not take their investment.

I personally wouldn't take an investment from Vinod, but I'm not in the market either so he hasn't lost anything.

If Khosla is an option, I'm sure you have others.

Question for you: picture the most evil person you can think of, alive or dead. If they offered to fund you, would you accept it?

If you answer no, than you must admit that the character of the donor comes into play with choosing to accept venture capital. Therefor the parent's question is perfectly valid; everything else is just your tolerance for "evilness".

If you answer yes, than I daresay you are narcissistic at best.

Yes, a local beach access dispute would not way into the decision for funding from him.

It should. He pushes around the little people. That's first time founders and especially those not connected in the Valley.

> Yes, a local beach access dispute would not way into [sic] the decision for funding from him.

s/way/weigh/ ?

Feels like an eggcorn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggcorn)

You say that as if all venture capitalists are saints. And only Vinod is evil.

No one here is evil. VCs have a very important role to play in the startup ecosystem. Their job is to produce significant returns to their LPs. If you can't deliver that, then you shouldn't have taken their money.

I have a house not far from this debacle and I can see both sides of it, but what don't understand is that there's a million miles of coastline, well, miles and miles and miles of it, all equally good as Marin's beach. I'm sure it's the principle of thing, but one little stretch really inconveniences nobody and the vast majority of the coast from HMB to SC is completely open, undeveloped and fully accessible. If we really want to protect everyone's writes and access we should be pushing for wheelchair access and braille signage too.

Yes it is the "principle of [the] thing." That principle being, of course, that the circumstance of having immense wealth ought not imbue a person with the ability to restrict access to protected natural resources, like waterways and beaches.

Also, "one little stretch" may apply now, but "slippery slope" comes to mind. That isn't to say it's definitely a slippery slope to "completely privatized access," but any time another Vinod succeeds at challenging the law chips away at the above principle. I'm glad he lost.

He knew the terms of beach access when he bought his house, as did you.

It's exactly the principle. If VK won, many many others would push for the same and soon it's no longer one little beach but many, many miles.

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