The Funware Blog @ rmbr

I’m not usually one to react to posts generally designed just to be incendiary, but today’s editorial from Michael Arrington on the subject of “The Twice Shy Entrepreneur” definitely hit home. His basic point: He and VCs (like Saar Gur, whom we adore) think that 1999 bubble entrepreneurs are at a disadvantage in this cycle because they’re we’re not being daring enough.

While I can’t comment on the thousands of pitches Saar’s had to sit through, I can only say that he’s a nice guy and that I’m one of those people TechCrunch is talking about. After helping to launch Trymedia in October of 1999, I stuck with the venture through the ups (impossible valuations, hiring 5 “biz dev” people in 4 weeks, signing an equity-inclusive lease for office space) and the downs (letting everyone go, working without pay, listening to inane ‘advice’ from armchair CEOs). We finally sold Trymedia in 2005 to Macrovision, and I can safely say that the overall experience was formative. Anything you do for 6 years will color your perspective on the world, and I’ve become increasingly aware of how Trymedia has affected mine.

Although the ultimate outcome for the company was great, lately I’ve been describing myself as a “depression-era” CEO. This means that I want rmbr to be viable, cash-flow positive, and to build on its strengths. I want to create something that really connects with users and that generates (a ton of) value for all our stakeholders. I also want to change the world. Chris and I agree wholeheartedly on these points. Now, I’m not sure if this means that rmbr is somehow under-reaching, or if we lack the vision and chutzpah necessary to create a billion dollar business, but I can tell you one thing.

I don’t care.

The lesson I’ve learned first hand is that while there are few YouTubes, and even fewer Googles, there are many BigFish Games. These are companies led by visionary leaders, focused on satisfying consumers and obsessed with financial performance - namely, profits. And while I am a huge believer in the value of purely financial investors (those that invest for their specific financial returns in the short/medium term), like VCs, it doesn’t mean that we desire to create a company that solely serves those needs.

One of the biggest lessons I learned at Trymedia was about alignment. If all parties to a deal are aligned, magic can happen. People punch above their weight, they set aside their differences and they share suffering. But when people become misaligned - because of vastly different shareholdings, divergent career paths, or through fundamentally opposed worldviews, very few organizations can stay healthy and functional. Fractures begin to show, people become partisans, and an “everyone for themselves” mentality quickly pervades.

Perhaps the difference between the old guard and the new can be simply summarized as experience. And while it might seem to some that our Bubble 1.0 experience makes us meeker, perhaps its simply that we know enough this time around, to make sure everyone is aligned correctly. Our vision:

• We want to hire teams that believe in the product as much as the stock options.
• We intend to build products that serve real consumers rather than just the valley.
• And we insist on working with investors that care about companies and products as much as we do.

If this makes me/us old, so be it. Our intention is to rewrite the way that people interact with photos using games - and to pioneer the Funware category by driving broader adoption in the market. The time for our ideas is now - bubble or no.

Maybe thirty (three) is the new twenty (four) after all.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 9th, 2007 at 7:58 pm and is filed under musings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.