Comments on: The Clueless Young Entrepreneur

By: Josh Chandler

Josh Chandler — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 18:37:25 +0000

Ha, love it!

It really shows that the more senior VC's are likely missing out on huge opportunities. It's unfortunate that they don't favor unproven teams, they should always be investing in people. Don't you think?

By: Mossop

Mossop — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 05:22:59 +0000

No, venture capitalists are smart. They take the option that gives the most reward with the least risk for their money. Sure they may miss out on big wins occasionally from risky young starters but why should they care? There are always more less risky ventures to invest in, and guaranteed there are way more young guys starting who fail than there are who succeed.

If you think venture capitalists are making such a mistake why not invest some of your own money in the risky ventures ;)

By: Havvy

Havvy — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 05:16:12 +0000

And the best part of this is that government is not funding any of these companies. Heck, some are actively harming them through taxation or censorship. This is capitalism at its finest.

By: John Lilly

John Lilly — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 03:44:06 +0000

Abi -- I agree with the premise that young entrepreneurs are, quite often, totally, fantastically awesome.

But you're missing a ton of counter-factual data points:

Adobe: Warnock was 42 when he started it
Intel: Gordon Moore was nearly 40 when he started it
Zynga: Mark Pincus was around 40 when he started it
LinkedIn: Reid Hoffman was around 40 when he started it
Wikipedia: Jimmy Wales was around 35 when he started it

Not to mention Mozilla itself, whose founders Mitchell and Brendan, were in their 40s.

There are a bunch more -- and I'm not arguing that many entrepreneurs are very young and awesome -- just that stating the positive examples to prove your point is not really telling anything like the whole story.

By: Abi Raja

Abi Raja — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 02:06:11 +0000

Bill Gates’ first company was really small and wasn’t really a company in many ways. It’s hard to classify him as a serial entrepreneur.

By: Sami Rageb

Sami Rageb — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 19:57:55 +0000

Interesting observation, but you should take Bill Gates off the list. Microsoft wasn’t his first company.

By: Blair McBride

Blair McBride — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 07:56:19 +0000

Clueless and young is the what I call the wildcard factor. Most will lose everything or give up, and end up in “normal” jobs. Some will continue to be entrepeneurs, becoming your “seasoned” entrepreneurs. Then there’s the very select few who will strike brilliance before they learn to know any better. And assuming they don’t sell-out too early, that brilliance will change the world as you describe.

By: N.P. Brandt

N.P. Brandt — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:55:21 +0000

Wow, I now feel depreciated and useless. Wonder if there are any clueless young entrepreneurs from my generation?

By: Morden

Morden — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:02:22 +0000

Great. I’m older than all of those guys and I haven’t gotten anywhere in my life yet. Haven’t gotten anywhere as in I haven’t yet started a successful, multinational company that works for my gazillions of dollars. And I don’t think it’s happening, either.

By: Yatrik

Yatrik — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 01:54:23 +0000

+1, very nice.