Congrats Brad Feld For Running 50 Miles

How did the guy do it? I am amazed. So impressed. This is so inspiring. Makes me wanna do it.

Brad Feld: American River 50 Mile Endurance Run

I had decided to break the race up into five segments of 10 miles each..... The first 10 miles were easy. I used an 8:2 run:walk pace and held myself back. ..... the “runner drift” settled in a little around mile 15 (where it’s impossible to stay focused on a straight line) and I remember looking up a few times and being startled by a bike heading right at me ...... I took a Gu gel every 30 minutes with water and a salt tablet every hour. At the aid stations I refilled my water, grabbed a few more Gu’s, and ate some pretzels, boiled potatoes and salt, and a dixie cup of coke (yum). ...... By mile 29 it hit me that I’d now run the furthest distance in my life. I went through mile 30 with the thought of “only 20 miles to go.” And this is when it started getting really hard. The segment between 30 and 40 was physically and mentally tough. ..... By the mid-30′s my pace had slowed from 12 minute miles to 18 – 20 minute miles, which became depressing. I only had one really dark mile where I started feeling sorry for myself, but during this mile I got a hilarious txt message from my friend Andy which jolted me out of my dark spot. ...... At mile 41 I met up with my assistant Kelly at an aid station where she joined me for the last nine miles. ...... Somewhere around mile 43 or 44 I started having trouble getting my feet to go where I wanted them to go. ...... There was a short downhill stretch – I took off running with a loud manic scream at the top of my lungs. ....... As we went through mile 48 I realized I might break 12 hours. At 49.25 it flattened out and I sprinted for the finish and came in two minutes and change under my goal. ...... my first non-Gu meal in 12 hours while Katherine and crew drove back to San Francisco to have some “excellent pizza” that they could only find in San Francisco. I called Amy and had a celebratory talk – she had done an awesome job of keeping track of things during the race (due to RunKeeper live) and being my communications director for the day. I dropped my coach Gary a note of thanks and then ate and ate and drank a beer and ate some more. ...... When I got back to my room, I discovered a very lonely second water bottle sitting just where I had left it 14 hours earlier. For the first time all day I had tears in my eyes, but of laughter – at myself.

Related articles

• 50 Miles Is Too Many (feld.com)
• The Acceleration Of TechStars (The Numbers) (women2.org)
• How to get into TechStars NYC? "Know somebody" (invantory.com)

Mike Arrington, Race, And HTML5

Image via WikipediaTalking about race is not negativity any more than talking about HTML5 is positivity. It is just plain objectivity. Group dynamics is more cutting edge a thing than anything we have seen in tech so far. (My Web Diagram) And race and gender are some of the most cutting edge topics in group dynamics, gender even more so.

Race, Gender, Tech
Race, Gender, Tech (2)
Tech, Women, Diversity
Mike Arrington Is A Sexist Pig: Say PeeeeG!

But right now the controversy is race. Months back it was gender, thanks to the same character Mike Arrington.

Mike Arrington: Idiot

Is Mike Arrington a racist? He is a character, that's for sure. As for if he is a racist, that question assumes the label racist is an easy one to pin. I don't think Mike Arrington is capable of hate crimes. But that does not mean he is not a racist. Racist behavior is a spectrum. Racist thinking is a spectrum. There is a relationship between the seemingly benign racist joke and hate crimes. And race is not a matter of individual opinion any more than medical research is a matter of individual opinion. Mitch Kapor touches upon that.

In this debate Mike Arrington comes across as clueless and defensive.

Online Dating Newsflash: Race And Religion Matter
The Need For A Race Gender Coalition
Black Cop Shot Down In Harlem By White Cops: The Race Angle
Race, A Few Different Angles

And then there is this old media, new media tension in this debate, but there Mike Arrington is no holy cow. As a former blogger he has been guilty of all that he now accuses of: sensationalism, playing gotcha, etc.

"Insuring" Angel Investors

Image via WikipediaThe idea behind insurance is that you pay for auto insurance, I pay for auto insurance, and so do a million other people. Not a million get into accidents. When a few do, it is paid for by all collectively.

Angel investors get screwed by established venture capitalists routinely. In the later rounds the VCs hog the negotiations in ways that people who believed in you early end up getting the short shift. You end up not making money even when the startup does well.

And then there is the no small matter of losing your money entirely because the startup you invested in went down.

It is a numbers game. Startups are known to go down. The best VCs expect at least one third of their startups to go down. And at the outset they have no idea which one third.

The Internet Week: The Thing To Do

Image via WikipediaI think you show up less to soak up the knowledge and more to meet people. And I just discovered something that makes Internet Week look like a better deal than Social Media Week. For the most part you stick to one location. Get a 15 dollar pass, and stick to one location.

125 W. 18th Street

The Internet Week Is Mumbojumbo

Monday

Where Social and Impact Intersect: Lessons for Brands
01:00 PM — 01:50 PM
Official IWNY Ford Opening Party with music by Noisey.com
07:00 PM — 10:00 PM
OMMA's Tablet Revolution
08:00 AM — 05:00 PM
Digital Archaeology
10:00 AM — 06:00 PM
ShareThis & SMG present: Social Media Sharing
11:00 AM — 11:20 AM
VICE Speed Interviewing
11:00 AM — 11:50 AM
The Rise of the Daily Email Newsletter
11:30 AM — 12:20 PM
Facebook Marketing Best Practices
12:00 PM — 12:20 PM
Mobile Engagement 101
01:00 PM — 01:45 PM
The Neighborhood Experience (Beyond Hyper-Localization)
02:00 PM — 02:45 PM
Your Startup's Technology: The First 60 Days in Examples
02:00 PM — 02:45 PM
Social Media & Hospitality: Driving Traffic, Boosting Sales & Upping Engagements
02:30 PM — 03:00 PM
Rallying to Restore Sanity in the Digital Age
03:00 PM — 03:45 PM
The Onion’s Team of Three
04:00 PM — 04:45 PM
How to Survive Internet Week: Using Social Media to Make Offline Connections
04:00 PM — 04:45 PM

The Internet Week Is Mumbojumbo

Image via CrunchBaseI was just at the Internet Week page. There's a lot going on. And looks like you have to pay for each event. It is not like Social Media Week which was mostly free events, or rather all free events.

First of all, there are soooo many events. You can't even browse through all just to get a glimpse.

One good option probably is to buy a pass for 15 dollars but that only covers events at one location for four days, June 6 to June 9.

I guess the arduous process is to go through all the events and be selective and go to a few events. This below is not a list of all events I am going to. These just caught my eye. And I might go to one or two that I might not mange to list today.

You read the lists of events and you realize there is so much knowledge in the blogosphere.

Monday, June 6
04:00 PM — 04:45 PM The Onion’s Team of Three
Metropolitan Pavilion
HQ Aol Broadcast Stage
125 W. 18th Street

Tuesday, June 7
06:00 PM — 09:00 PM wimlink: The Social Experience of Media: Personalized Apps, TV, ECommerce, what's next..
Samsung Experience
10 Columbus Circle
Time Warner Center
$15

A Moment Of Appreciating Disqus

Image via CrunchBaseFred Wilson put out this blog post earlier today: Social Media's Secret Weapon - Email. Brad Feld wrote a reply post within hours: Implementing Social Media’s Secret Weapon. Fred Wilson showed up in Brad Feld's comments section for the post like Brad Feld had showed up earlier in Fred Wilson's comments section for his post. I read the two posts and all their comments. The little back and forth the two had at Brad's blog is really something. I am like, thank you Disqus. How else could I have become privy to this?

These two dudes go way back. They are old friends. I once saw a picture of the two of them in a group photo. It is from way back. And these two also made it onto a list of the top 100 venture capitalists in the world a few weeks back, I don't know if it was Fortune, or Forbes, it was one of those. Long before I saw that list I have admired the excellence of their minds. Both of them also happen to have great blogs. They do a good job of giving you a front row seat to their action if you drop by often enough.

Born In The USA

Why The Donald Asked For Obama's Birth Certificate
Obama: Funny Fun
Donald Ratass Trump, And So, I Was Born In India
Image via WikipediaDonald Trump: Racist Bitch Motherfucker, Jackass, Punk
I Am Going To Act Like This Is 2007
Donald Jackass Trump

The Next Web: An Indian Entrepreneur visits New York: “I was born in the wrong country :)”

Aditya Sahay, co-founder of India based Radbox ..... his no-nonsense personality ..... He explains that most of his customer base is in the US. ..... “I visited TechStars in New York and worked out of their office for a couple of days as David Cohen’s guest. I spent good time with David discussing our idea, and attended some mentor talks – Fred Wilson, Gary Vaynerchuk, Brad Feld. It was an awesome experience to be in the same room as these people. It was like being a small time film maker in the same room as Spielberg!”, he exclaims. ..... “From very negative to very positive”, he replies. “I met some other startups who are now competitors; I did not get into TechStars, and could not make up my mind on how to proceed, and whether we could raise any money depending on where we were at that stage” ...... turned out Aditya and Radbox were not on a hockey stick curve. Since they were not based in the US, raising money was out of the question. Aditya goes on to explain why, “Investors have cities where they invest. They won’t give you a cheque to have you fly away half-way across the world, only to never meet again”. ....... “The thing with US is there’s a lot of noise too. They have all these happy hours, parties, events where everyone is talking a lot about making NY the next big tech scene. Then there’s this startup incubator bubble. Everyone and his dad wants to open a startup incubator.” ....... the highlight of the trip was demoing Radbox at the NY Tech Meetup ..... “Startup events (in India) are more PowerPoint (and) less demo. Most (events) don’t even have Wi-Fi to demo! Hell of a difference! I had to demo here using prerecorded videos most of the time.” ........ “Demos help filter out signal from noise – I can do a one hour presentation on any topic under the sun. But to do a 3 min demo in NYTM (New York Tech Meet-up) we worked non-stop for the previous 40 
Image via CrunchBasehours,because it was a tiny window, and nothing should go wrong.” ....... He realized that whatever they’re figuring out through first-hand experience in India, was already prior knowledge there. ...... “Also, I was working out of Dogpatch Labs; so I got to hang out with a lot of cool startups. And I met just about everyone in the tech scene. I would totally open a Dogpatch Labs here! Doing a startup is lonely and I think physical incubation (not just real estate, but co-working + mentorship + guests) is a great model worth replicating. I got opportunity to hear and even meet someone like Mark Suster thanks to Dogpatch Labs.” ....... At any point, did he feel he was doing stuff the wrong way, as an Indian startup? “Lots !”, he exclaims. “Not moving fast enough; trying to bootstrap without being very wealthy; Not building a team before building a product and not having the right advisors on board” ...... the primary mistakes they made while working on Radbox were not growing their user base fast enough, and not shipping mobile apps sooner ...... turned out that time was more valuable than money. They never factored funding in their plan, not thinking far enough ....... “If I had Rs. 50 Lakh today, I would’ve spent it on a team – hire great developers, designers and even a community manager – be a team of 4-5″ ....... “The goal should have been maximising opportunity, not minimising loss/risk – which had been our thought process.” He explains that in the US startup scene, funding is obvious like food, nobody thinks about it. Its not really a ‘decision’. Startup founders in the US think about their product and funding, whereas in India, people don’t really think about funding too much. There’s very little money in the early stage (pre-revenue) startup in India ....... while visiting US he went crazy asking himself, “Why the hell am I not here?” after he met all those awesome VCs/angels. He replies, “I was born in the wrong country ”. ...... “We don’t underestimate. We are culturally so different that we probably don’t give it much thought. Like an American will not think about arranged marriage which is so natural here. Its a cultural thing. Funding, advice is not a part of the culture, doing a startup in itself is not a part of the culture.” ...... the ‘bubble’ or whatever in US is not here (in India) which is good. ...... “Well, here’s the deal – Let’s take a typical profile – a guy who’s done 2-3 startups, one which was a big success, one a failure, one maybe moderate success. This guy has wealth, loves startups, has wealth of experience, strong network, knows what works and what goes wrong. We need a 100 of these guys right away. But i think we can’t even count 5, or if they exist then no one knows about them.” ...... “I don’t know if there are successful exits in India.” ..... “Startup events: should only allow real working demos. We need real entrepreneurs. Powerpointpreneurs and Excelpreneurs are not needed. They should also provide wi-fi to allow us to showcase products and demos !” ..... “VCs and angels: Call them angels or whatever – these guys can help push the startup scene and they’re not here. ” ..... “Indian startups: Don’t make the mistakes we made! If you’re too far from good revenue, explore funding opportunities, move fast, build a team ASAP and have advisors who can add outside perspective. “

A Day In The Life Of Amy Cao

Amy Cao's Political Incorrectness

Many of you might know Amy Cao does social media for FoodSpotting. This is a day in the life of Amy Cao.

Amy Cao wakes up to the chirps of birds that remind her to tweet, and she gets to tweeting right away, first thing in the morning. She often finds herself dealing with six hours worth of tweets from fans from Japan who all expect individual reply tweets. So far she has managed to meet those expectations, but she wonders for how long. She says she is looking for an intern/assistant. A look alike would be nice.

StartUp Week: Final Event: Biggest Event?

I started out thinking all events are created equal. But you get hints thrown in here and there. There is expectation in the air. The event tomorrow looks like will be the biggest event of the week. And I am looking forward to it.

Thursday, 4/14: Fundraising: VCs, Angels and Accelerators Chris Dixon (@cdixon), Albert Wenger (@albertwenger), Lawrence Lenihan (@lawrencelenihan), Firstmark Capital, Hilary Gosher (@hilbil175), Insite Venture Partners, David Tisch (@davetisch), TechStars

April 14, Thursday, 6-8 PM, NYU Tisch Hall, Paulson Auditorium (UC-50), 40 W. 4th Street

Dave McClure's Incubator

Dave McClure is a dude to watch, sure. The guy is a major mover and shaker in the early stage game. You might not do business with him, you might not agree with him, but his insights are hard to ignore.

FoodSpotting's Dish As Starting Point

Image via CrunchBaseOkay, so I am breaking my April Fool promise of restraining from blogging about FoodSpotting.

Yesterday, or the day before, I read that both inDinero and FoodSpotting are Dave McClure companies. I kind of, sort of knew that. But it was one of those flash moments. I also have known FoodSpotting is an Angel List company.

But then I expect FoodSpotting's next round of funding to come from one of the major VC firms in the range of 10 to 20 million dollars, whenever that might be. In a year or less perhaps?

This reinforces my point that it is not either or. Old school VCs still matter, actually they matter big. But The Angel List, Y Combinator, TechStars, 500 Startups, they have changed the early stage game fundamentally, irrevocably. In short, they have innovated.

And FoodSpotting is proof. (Twitter ---> Instagram ---> FoodSpotting)

Meeting Brad Feld

I got to meet Mark Suster yesterday, and Brad Feld today, and I get to meet Vin Vacanti next week. In Vacanti's case it will not be my first time, but still. What do you think is going on? StartUp Week, that's what.

TechStars' Geographical Advantage Over Y Combinator
Brad Feld
StartUp Week At NYU April 6-15
To: Brad Feld, Subject: Iran And Me (Digital Ninja/Commando)
Happy July 4 Fred Wilson, Brad Feld
An Immigrant Story For Brad Feld
Paul Graham, Brad Feld, Me, BBC
To Iran, With Love (3)
To Iran, With Love (1)
To Iran, With Love (2)

Both Mark and Brad recognized me right away. We have interacted online. I have interacted more with Brad than with Mark. At one point I was trying to get Brad to fund my work into Iran democracy.

"Oh, hey," Brad said when it was my turn to greet him.

Not Going Into Any Accelerator Program

Image via WikipediaThere is no accelerator program anywhere that will help me tackle the last mile in microfinance, the most important mile in my line of work. I have a FinTech startup, but it does not revolve around coding, it revolves around the last mile of microfinance.

Also, I can't think of one iconic tech company that came out of some accelerator program. You could argue accelerator programs are a new phenomenon, they have not had the time to spit out iconic companies yet, but accelerator programs are more for purely web tech companies. Mine is not one.

TechStars' Geographical Advantage Over Y Combinator

Image via CrunchBase

TechCrunch: TechStars Launches Ten New Startups In Seattle: six of the first twenty companies to go through the program have been acquired by larger companies, and about 70% of its companies have been funded and/or are now profitable.

Y Combinator is in the Valley. Y Combinator has done something remarkable. I think Y Combinator is the reason we have a new species in town: the super angel. But Y Combinator is in the Valley. Being in the Valley, in the Valley alone is a disadvantage. People don't buy servers anymore. They have Amazon web services. Times have changed. Some of the best programmers I know are self taught people. All the material you need to teach yourself programming is available online for free. And so the idea that you have to be in the Valley to be part of the action, well, that is passe.

Brad Feld

The Founders Visa Movement
An Angel Investor Group Move That Makes Me Vomit
Amazon Fires Its Affiliates in Colorado (Including Me) Because of Colorado HB 10-1193

Bummed Out About Bilski
Take the Time to Acknowledge Management’s Performance
Gearbox’s Smart Ball
Founders 2010 #6: We’re Not Alone
How MIT Could Help With A Different Approach to the BP Gulf Crisis
Risk Takers – Pogoplug and RedLaser
Discovering At Least One Awesome Thing A Day On My Mac


"We're Not Alone" The Founders | TechStars Boulder | Episode 6 from TechStars on Vimeo.


"Risk Takers" The Founders | TechStars Boulder | Episode 5 from TechStars on Vimeo.



Oblong is Hiring
The Magic of Email Conversations
eBay Acquires RedLaser
Startupbootcamp – TechStars Global Affiliate in Compenhagen
Fun and Games with BigDoor

The Wall Street Journal: Blogs: Venture Capital Dispatch:
A Summer Romance Between Founder And Venture Capitalist

a world where many entrepreneurs see venture capital as a necessary evil ..... the tale of meeting Foundry Group’s Feld and how the VC’s unorthodox approach to learning about the company ultimately cemented Smith’s desire to have him as an investor...... Brad intrigued me because he didn’t come across like any venture capitalist I had ever met ..... ‘I’m not going to conform’ persona, and are both passionate to their core about helping startups ........ “The mindset of a typical VC is geared more towards a later stage company that has crossed the chasm and the customer base is beyond early adopters,” Smith told us. “Finding someone that knows you still need to find out where to aim your rocket is very important.” ....... Feld’s process was simple: He wanted to get to know the founders and find that each interaction had been more interesting than the last. ....... When I told him that we didn’t have an investor presentation put together yet he quipped, ‘The last thing in the world I want to see is a f—ing presentation ....... Brad and I spent the next six months getting to know each other, during which Brad and his partners repeatedly drilled us on our thinking, our strategy, our technology and our market approach. We told him we would invite him into the “sausage making” process and he readily donned his hairnet and dove in. ....... Foundry never asked for projections or historical financials. “We talked about where we want to take the product and how we want to serve customers ..... “After we signed a term sheet, I finally asked Brad if he wanted to see our deck. I sent it to him and he said, ‘That scared me.’

BigDoor: Blog: Venture Capital: A Love Story

We quickly concluded that we needed to kill everything we had just spent six months building and go back to the drawing board. Given that we had only two months of cash in the bank at the time, this decision wasn’t an easy one but we felt strongly that it was necessary. ....... Andy has a favorite saying, “We know your plans are wrong, we just don’t yet know how wrong.” ...... changing direction like this meant he was willing to forget every one of those prior promises and start down a new path. ....... we went from 0 users to 8 million users in an afternoon. ....... he wasn’t your typical VC. Brad is an early investor in Zynga the undisputed king of social gaming. ....... we knew that having Brad as a partner would give us a huge amount of credibility with potential customers, so we began stalking him. ...... We mostly went back and forth via email, where niceties were commonly replaced with a raw curiosity of how best to build BigDoor and how we would meet the coming onslaught of demand for our platform. Brad was direct and often told me where he thought I was wrong, which laid the groundwork for me being able to do the same with him. We found some common ground and a fair amount of areas to disagree and challenge each other. We joked about 80’s bands, compared reading lists and shared paranoid rants about how machines will eventually take over the world (they will). But what’s most notable is what we didn’t discuss. Never once did anyone at Foundry ask us for projections or historical financials. We didn’t talk about the deal, valuation or board composition and we never talked about exit timing or how much money they needed to make. Product, customers and philosophy – that’s where we spent our time. ...... On two separate occasions Brad told me he was “out” and wasn’t going to invest. ..... “The word ‘no’ is simply a milestone on the path to ‘yes’.” This emboldened me to go back to Brad and tell him he was wrong and that he was the perfect partner for us. I made no attempt at all to posture or play hard to get .......... This wasn’t done out of desperation – we had multiple offers from other great VCs – we conducted ourselves in a completely transparent fashion because that’s how Foundry was toward us. ......... until one day Brad sent an email that said, “Ok – I’m ready (and psyched) to do a deal.” He then laid out deal terms in one very simple paragraph. I responded with a very long email that ultimately asked for just one change, and he simply responded with “Deal.” That was it, that email exchange was the extent of our term sheet. Instead of grinding us on terms, Brad spent the three weeks from our agreement to closing making introductions for us to potential customers. ....... we’ve never had a deal go this smooth nor have we ever had anyone who was so awesome to work with on the other side of the table. ......... Having great investors isn’t just about warm fuzzies, it should (and does) also result in real customers. ..... as we endeavor to weave the BigDoor platform into the very fabric of the Internet.

Video: Brad Feld On How To Get Funding

A Month of Mac
Rethinking The Laptop
I’ve Failed Over and Over and Over Again in My Life



Swimming At Night
Founders 2010 #4: Let’s Be Honest
Van Gogh’s Starry Night Updated



Who Wants To Be A Tech Star?
Learning Leadership From The Movie 13 Days
Mr. Feld Goes to DC To Talk About Innovation
Founders 2010 #3: Be Fearless. Today.

It is of great interest to me that Brad Feld's most popular blog post is this one: The Founders Visa Movement.

An Immigrant Story For Brad Feld
Paul Graham, Brad Feld, Me, BBC
Me @ BBC
To: Brad Feld, Subject: Iran And Me (Digital Ninja/Commando)

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