I found this video of a talk a gave at Kauffman’s 1M Cups in Tampa a while back. It is a short riff on my BarCamp talk “Stupid Shit Startups Say,” which I toned down a bit for a more generic crowd. The theme was the same; emerging tech ecosystems are full of misinformation and well-meaning but poorly qualified advice on what startup founders need to know and do when building a new tech venture.
Fighting the urge to “fake it until you make it” and focusing on solving real problems with scalable products produces real companies with honest, mature founders. As a tech community fighting for credibility on the global stage, we should expect and support nothing less.
Sorry, the audio isn’t very good, I tried to clean it up but the camera was in the back of the room with no external mic. If you turn on captions, you will get 90% of the presentation. I look forward to giving this talk again in person someday, probably at another BarCamp. In the meantime, good luck with your startups, and please don’t say stupid $#!+.
