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How To Build a $30M Startup Without Spending Any of Your Money
SpicyBrownMustard writes "Forbes has an article that follows up on the news/hype/buzz/hysteria surrounding the acquisitions of Summly and Wavii by Yahoo and Google, respectively. It's a rather comical write up with a rather sad ring of truth to it, especially that we now know that Summly was little more than a collection of existing technologies built by others. The article says, 'Stress that you have celebrity relationships, and that your app was built by a team that has several hundred successful apps in Google Play and IOS App Store. It doesn’t matter that those aren’t your team members, it is still true.' Summarization technologies are the 'big new thing' apparently. Don't miss out — make your summarization app today and hop onboard that gravy train!"
So far, the hype around Yahoo's new CEO has been just that. So far, she's made a teenager a millionaire, turned the website and mail monochrome, and now this.
As much as I'm unimpressed by her tenure so far is "CEO brought in by floundering corporation with dysfunctional management manages dysfunctionally, flounders, N=1" really useful data on "Female CEOs"?
So you're right, I'd say these things aren't likely to happen for most people. Unless your dad just happens to be a director at a major investment bank and just happens to know some of the most wealthy people around who also just happen to have strong media platforms to hype your product from that is.
Business has always worked that way. Why do you think CEOs get paid so much? Connections, leverage, wealth, politics -- once you're bigger than a small local company, those are the real differentiators, and behind virtually every "successful" startup is a similar story. Names and details may change, but the plot is the same.
And that's not new -- it was just as true 50, 100, 200, and 2000 years ago. Wealthy Babylonian merchants got so for the same reasons, as did ancient Greek, Roman, Chinese, etc ... you name it, that's how it has always worked.
Your post reminded me of this: http://xkcd.com/385/
But corporations are wonderful and Jesus will use capitalism and tax cuts to save us, right?
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."