lessons from the ‘real’ world ACM-ICPC Programming Contest Discussion
May 10, 2015
lessons from the ‘real’ worldACM-ICPC Programming Contest Discussion
Some perspective:
1. 3.5 years out of college
2. 1 year from founding drop.io
3. Not on a victory lap (yet?)
All I can offer is a view from the trenches…
+ just a few years where you are now.
1. My personal frame of reference
2. The course of events that lead to drop.io today
3. A few preliminary lessons
12 years of tinkering…
1. Zoltar (middle school)
2. Six Degrees (highscool)
3. LifeCapital (highscool – college)
4. CrimsonXchange (college)
5. Facebook (college)
6. Kinjunction (college & post college)
7. Essembly Causes (post college)
8. Bain (post college)
Pure theory and academics
1. Foucault
2. Habermas
3. Hayek
4. Locke
5. Rousseau
6. Claude Shannon
7. etc…
People & conversation
1. Teachers/Professors/Mentors
2. Friends
3. Real Friends FOF
leading to a few theses that gets me out of bed…
Pure theory: Value of information is
inversely related to how probable it is…
price
quantity
Your only photo of mom
millionth photo of baby
s
d
Historical context: For the first time
in history publicity is a negative cost
privacy
~years
cost
publicity
~2005
futureall of human history
security
People are missing the ball:
Privacy isn’t dead
Privacy isn’t Security
Authorization isn’t Authentication
This information is confidential and property of Drop.io, IncDrop.io, Inc 12070604-STH-Overview-v10 Official
And tech is creating openings:
1. commodity computing
2. the ‘cloud’
3. rapid development practices
2. The course of events that lead to drop.io…
Identified the tangible problem: Spring of 2007
at bain… how do I privately share information! why is this so hard!
A framework to solve itSimple Private Sharing
No social, no search, no identity
Strip metadata
Create single private points of exchange
In a manageable footprint
Inputs
Authorization
Outputs
Users ‘lifehack’ their specific solutions on top of us
Left Job, Built V1:four weeks
F.U.N.D.S: lower investor risk =
better deal
RRE Ventures: $1.2 M seed in Nov
RRE + DFJ: $2.7 M A1 in March
Motive Power (from 2 up to 14)
1. smart
2. problem solvers
3. driven
4. intersted in our thesis
5. ‘team’ players
6. (skills)
Grow
Create a virtuous cycle
DEVELOP(core innovaiton)
VALUE
Hire Great PeopleExpand ScopeRaise Capital
Upgrade & Innovate (this month)
1. Going 100% into the cloud = huge
new options
2. ‘Switchboard’ API – allowing you to
leverage all our outputs and inputs for your apps
3. Redesign - for more flexible front end
vocabulary and use
4. Much more…
3. A few preliminary lessons (which might be useful?)
Entrepreneurship is a whole different type of stress…
Can’t express it – you have to experience it, but be ready for it
Don’t jump in lightly
Tendency towards disequilibrium
Success breeds more success failure breeds failure
Set yourself up to succeed in the short term & cycle up
Team is everything
Only work with people you respectPeople in context of team is different than vaccum
Be involved with great people
Build small & variable
small = understandable & manageablevariable = acknowledge you are likely wrong
stay compact
You MUST CARE to act
Too much work, too manic not to
If you & your team don’t care you will fail
This room is well positioned
SignalingFrameworks for learning and thinkingSpecific language knowledge is over-rated
Don’t sweat the market, do what intrests you
If what we are working on interests you: [email protected]
If not: hope the food is good and good
luck!
If the theory interests you: drop.io/swl, twitter/lessin
If entreprenuriship: come drop by
our office for a coffee…