I Am a Nobleman in England

For many founders of startups, obtaining high valuations is only half of their goals. An extraordinary motivation that motivates many entrepreneurs to establish startups is to change the way they view and interact with the world.

Although every startup can teach people something, the most disruptive ones often teach people the most profound lessons.

In a villa in San Francisco's Silicon Valley, Arthur looked at the workplaces of Kevin Strom and Krieger. This is where their dreams began.

Arthur is really full of emotion. You must know that without his appearance, Ins, without a marketing budget, completely relied on the almost fanatical fan community to spread the word to the world, and then it would cost nearly 1 billion US dollars. Sell ​​itself to Facebook.

Unfortunately, they ran into themselves!

"... When I got the idea of ​​starting a business, I wanted to build a location-based website that combines photo sharing and social networking, similar to that of Fu Skuai and the game company Zynga. I also named this idea. Burbn.

This idea caught the interest of Baseline Venture Partners Steve Anderson, who provided Strom with $250,000 in start-up capital, but asked me to find a co-founder. . . "

With a bitter smile, Kevin recalled the situation when he started his business a year ago, and introduced to Arthur. Arthur looked at the expression on Kevin's face and could understand the other party's mood at this time.

"At the beginning, I used to prepare for the perfection of Burbn in a cafe not far away. There he met Mike, my younger brother. I spent a month persuading him to leave the chat software company Meebo. Finally, I succeeded. Yes, Krieger has joined, and our team has been built.

On the first day Mike joined, I said that the team had to change direction because the previous model could not grow, and the competitor Fu Sikuai had already gained too much first-mover advantage.

I want to reposition the product as a mobile app that focuses on photo sharing, codenamed Codename. We spent a few weeks refactoring the product prototype, I was responsible for the back-end code, and Mike focused on the iOS front-end. This app has a camera function and can also be applied to social media, but we are still not satisfied with the results developed.

In order to get rid of my frustration, I went to an artist’s manor in Mexico to rest and look for inspiration, where my girlfriend asked me how to take beautiful photos with my phone. I answered two words, filter.

Suddenly, I recalled the photography course I took when I exchanged in Florence at Stanford, and the experience of using cheap film cameras to take artistic photos. So in the rest of the vacation time, I designed the first filter, which is X-ProII. . . "

With that said, Kevin sat in front of the computer and began to show and explain one by one. Even if he is a technical idiot, he can see that the foundation of the INS developed by the other party is indeed better than his photo wall APP. Perfect and meticulous.

"Huh? This is Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook?" Arthur could not help but ask when he saw a photo of several people in a group photo with a familiar face.

"Yes, we are all members of the Stanford Sigmanu Brotherhood. At the beginning, he wanted to ask me to join Facebook to help develop image services, and he offered options worth tens of millions of dollars.

However, I still choose to continue my studies. To be honest, it is not easy to reject this kind of youhuo. You must know that the valuation of Facebook at that time has reached 500 million US dollars. . . "

Kevin shook his head and explained with a laugh.

Arthur smiled and nodded, a flash of brilliance flashed in his eyes, and Krieger smiled and said, "Speaking of which, the popular Twitter now has Kevin's creativity in it?"

"Oh?" Arthur was interested again, and asked curiously: "Tell me, what's the matter?"

"Haha, I can't say that it was my creativity..." Kevin shook his head and laughed, seeing the interested look of Arthur, so he explained with a smile: "During my studies at Stanford University, I joined the Mayfield Researcher Project of Stanford University. .

This is a project in cooperation with Mayfield Venture Capital, so that project members can gain experience in the venture capital industry. In this project, I learned the knowledge and experience of financing and trading, which is why I chose to start a business.

In this project, I also met Jack Dorsey, the founder of Twitter, and we jointly researched how to develop applications. Among these applications, there is the prototype of Twitter. However, the birth of Ins was also affected by Jack's subtle influence. "

"So that's it!" After hearing this, Arthur nodded and said with a daze.

Hearing these origins, Arthur was relieved, there is no so-called self-made Silicon Valley myth!

You know, if there is no appearance of Arthur, when the INS development is completed, Kevin will use his extensive contacts in Silicon Valley for promotion. These Silicon Valley big cows have become seed users of Ins and will be published on the social jiao website. Images with Ins filter. These users include the founder of Twitter, and currently, Twitter users have reached 175 million.

So soon, the reputation of Ins spread in the technology circle. In fact, this is also an alternative celebrity effect.

This also makes sense. Why is Xiao Mazi from Facebook able to complete the acquisition of INS? After all, they are friends in the first place, and they belong to a fraternity. Naturally, everything is easy to discuss!

So, if you hear the legendary stories of "starting from scratch", just listen to it. As everyone knows, there are many little-known secrets after the so-called "build from scratch".

However, I have to say that when the founders of many companies have succeeded, they will declare that they are starting from scratch, how hard it is to start a business, how many days without sleep, and eating buns for several weeks. . . But those who are familiar with these founders know that the so-called self-made is a lie.

Obviously he is a second-generation entrepreneurship, and he has to make a self-made news. This is completely fooling the public, fooling those unknowing young people, thinking that starting a business is simple, and these successful entrepreneurs are starting from scratch.

In fact, these people all have some years of experience accumulation. Then what is the old man? Dad invested several million and started his own business. Think about this kind of people who are rich, quan and experienced. , How can it be impossible.

But there are too many people who don't know the inside story, so they are inspired by the so-called inspirational stories, and they have to start from scratch like a doping.

The so-called self-made wealth of the rich is just to give everyone a thought, so that everyone has hope. Don't start a business with enthusiasm. For ordinary people, it is very easy for ordinary people to fail to get up after a fall, so be careful.

Therefore, always believe that there is no pie in the sky!

It must be admitted that ~www.readwn.com~ everyone’s starting point is different. The starting point of some people’s struggle is the ceiling of the struggle of others. Different births determine the degree of hardship you struggle and what you can achieve. height.

"Hehe, everyone who knows me knows that I am not a stingy person. If my power plant goes public, dozens of millionaires will be generated, and all employees of the plant will receive a listing dividend. In the future, I will give a part of it. Equity to establish an equity incentive plan.

You two are great talents, and I will never waste it. I have already called the London side, and the studio over there will soon be divided into some people.

Moreover, you may not know that the person in charge of the photo wall studio is the CEO of my game company concurrently, which means that the photo wall studio currently lacks the CEO and CTO. If possible, I hope you two Someone can help me support the photo wall studio! "

Since he is a real talent, Arthur will naturally not let go. Isn't it just money and decentralization?

As long as he can work hard, earn money, reward and delegate power, that's all right!