[Patents] consultation questions

[lsjbjt@ozemail.com.au (Lachlan S. James)]

I don't disagree.

At 12:17 PM 8/05/01 +0200, you wrote:
>On Tue, May 08, 2001 at 07:52:37PM +1000, Lachlan S. James wrote:
>
> > As a VC, I agree.  A startup has absolutely everything running against it:
> > low/no sales, low/no money in the bank, low/no market reputation, etc. ...
> > EXCEPT (hopefully!) innovative, energetic people capable of thinking
> > differently.
>
>Sorry, like plenty of people you have a very wrong view of the
>software industry. Joel Spolsky (former program manager of Microsoft
>Excel), can explain it much better than me.  If you are a venture
>capitalist you *must* read his essays.
>
>"I'm convinced that most people think about software companies in an
>upside-down way. The common belief is that when you're building a
>software company, the goal is to find a neat idea that solves some
>problem which hasn't been solved before, implement it, and make a
>fortune. We'll call this the build-a-better-mousetrap belief. But the
>real goal for software companies should be converting capital into
>software that works. If you understand this, it's easier to make the
>right strategic decisions.
>
>[...]
>
>There's a different way to think of software development.  Imagine
>that the goal of your software company is not to solve some specific
>problem, but to be able to convert money to code through
>programmers. That's a little bit strange, but bear with me. A software
>company has to think of recruiting the right people as its number one
>problem. If you are successful, this can solve any other problem. Hire
>smart people, and they will produce good stuff that you can sell and
>make money off. Then everything else follows.
>
>[...]"
>
>The complete essay is at
>http://joel.editthispage.com/stories/storyReader$17 ;.
>
>The table of contents of Joel's essays is at
>http://joel.editthispage.com/stories/storyReader$94 ;.
>
>
>Ramon