Notes from My Other Thing

I promised Rick I'd add the resources I mentioned in the room.

Here they are:

prosper.com - an E-bay plus aggregator for loans (it's like angel investor, meets credit union, meets e-Bay)

virginmoneyus.com - just launched in the US, in the UK people use it to help their kids buy houses after they get married (especially in London, since so many babyboomer-age Londoners are now quite wealthy on paper and their kids do not have a prayer of owning without help)

lendingclub.com - a lot like prosper, but they do "rounds" where lendees can apply until a certain time, at which point the round closes

globefunder.com - I think this originally targeted the international market, but as it turns out, an awful lot of folks in the US could use some cash, too

Great session all!
Kristin (kwolff@thinkers-and-doers.com)

Can't figure out where else to put this, so I'm putting it here!

My Other Thing ---- how to get your side project off the ground or something

9/10 of the ideas rick talks to people about have nothing to do with their day job. More and more people he talks to want to make the side project a FTJ but there are a number of reasons that keep them from that. What are the things that are preventing people from breaking out on their own.

- Dont want to give up control
- Dont want VCs
- Dont want to do marketing
- Dont want to hire people
- etc

It is a cultural thing? VCs in the Bay Area = win. VCs and Portland = not so much. Some people say "we need 50k" the VCs say "you need millions" etc. But we have a strong angel network and incubators to help people get off the ground with a little help and a little cash. Some people view taking cash as selling out. Not necessarily a Portland thing.

What are the support mechanisms that people need to get their ideas off the ground. 6mos to a year. Lots of resources. OTBC, incubator at PSU, incubator in Corvallis. OEN. Small biz dev centers. Alot of people aren't even willing to ask the question "how do I get my business idea off the ground" -- having to do the engineering, marketing, biz stuff, etc.

Jason saying one problem with Unthirsty, they didn't really feel that their idea was worth going to an incubator or etc, they were just having fun. That might be some of the problem, some people may not realize where these resources can help. Or that their idea is worth more than their own investment of time, money, etc.

People don't really get excited about doing the actual work. John mentioning six hour startup - a business sprint. Where they take an idea and in six hours have a functional business (web based) that can make money. His biggest barrier is that there aren't enough CEO types. He can find you coders, marketing, financial people, but not CEO leadership types. One guy saying that he's an ideas guy, but lost some money looking for coders, would be nice if there were some matchmaking (match a coder to an idea person, etc).

Sometimes the problem can be finding competent coders. If you're a coder, and you have an idea, and you just need a business person who can help make it work (but not tell you what to do), --

Portland has lots of user groups, etc. But there's a paradox of choice sometimes. Many tools, many languages, that can all do the same thing. OTBC talks to a lot of coders, marketers, etc. But there's no place where people can get together who are interested in startups. What if there were a blog or something to talk about this stuff.

You have a biz idea, but it's difficult to want to shell out the cash to hire a coder. Sometimes the coder doesn't even want equity or to be involved in the biz, but to get paid. Easier to find someone with an idea and build the idea, than to hire a coder and get them to build it.

There are a lot of people who have worked together, who have the diverse talents necessary, but nobody is coming together to form these small companies. It's also a matter of formation and reformation and having the environment necessary.

John spending a lot of time in Seattle where a lot of startup activity is also happening (the early stages). POSSE is open now though. There needs to be a central source for this type of activity (mailing list, blog, whatever). John would like to start a NW Tech Startup list (Corvallis-Portland-Seattle, etc). Seattle has an event called Feedback 2.0, which is like speed dating for your idea/project/etc.

Part of the problem with mailing lists is email overload. Maybe alternate methods for communication (RSS, Forums, etc).

Y Combinator has their site as well (news.ycombinator.com). Akshay doesn't see the point of a site like this specific to Portland, because this isn't just a Portland discussion, it's a global thing.

Rick sees a problem, how many people in the room have a side project that they don't think is ready for prime time? That they don't want to show to the public. There's a group starting called PDX Critique (meets 2nd monday of the month) that is meant to get together to discuss ideas.

What about nuts and bolts issues. Health insurance. (In NY there's a Freelancers Union who buy group insurance). SAO has something similar. They've been studing the issue for over a year. They just decided on a carrier, etc. Coming in six months.

There are a lot of projects, to bring them from the early stages to gaining traction, needs in some cases just a small, small amount of funding. There's a normal progression (friends and family, angels, and VCs). If you're not putting up 10% of your own, John's experience is that you're not ready to 'play' in that game. It's going to take you time to raise the money. Reid's point is that as a coder you don't want to spend time doing that.

Another problem is scaling a project. Rick talking about starting a side project with one dev, and scaling that beyond one dev becomes difficult. Because they're also doing it on the side. It becomes a funding issue. Buying back your time so that you can focus on your project.

A lot of time you can get help with surplus help from friends or various places. Like a business that might have spare space. There are certain things that you can't get. It also takes a lot of time to find that stuff.

There's also the haves and have nots. Rick says, he can imagine that there are more than enough people out of Intel who would be happy to help fund a project for 20k. What John sees is a shortage of good businesses. There's 200 million in managed funds ready for investment. But what he sees a shortage of are good teams with a good plan. But Rick says most of the people in Portland don't want to play that game. It's counter-productive to try and become the next Silicon Valley or the next Seattle.

John's point is that you can be successful with the right team.

Wim's a serial entrepreneur. If you want to do somethign fun, you work on free software and make no money. If you want to make money, you work on soul sucking work. There's got to be a middle ground. The problem is that the law around corporations is really restrictive. What about a co-op model? Where if the thing makes money, the people working on it are rewarded. Also residuals like in the movies. Zat is trying to work to make something that rewards them, but doesn't want to make millions of dollars. What typically happens in Oregon is you start a company, build it up, sell to a larger company, and they destroy it. That gets old. But can we setup a legal framework that works this way is the question. Someone said a Chapter S corporation would work. Wim disagrees. Many people do.

Sometimes people want to build a project into something that turns a profit, but want it to remain a sideproject, without having to make it a full time thing.

You have to run as fast as it takes for the market that you are in. It depends on your business. Depending on your business and the market you can have a small business that makes enough money. This guy is saying to become big either you become Google or you're non-existent. He had a contract business with the govt. The govt said they only do work with big businesses. So they did growth through merger and it was painful. He says it's nice to think you can be a small mom & pop biz, but it's hard to do that.

Rick says we need an Etsy for this type of thing. Maybe not the best example. There's something before the seed stage, like validation (bootstrapping). Microlending. Aggregating money. There are at least 10 or 11 of this type of services. There's almost two different tracks to this (money and kindred spirits).

Audrey says we need a Y Combinator type of place. With the money, training, etc.