Is the Glass 'Half Full' or 'Half Empty'

  • Posted by
  • on March 16th, 2007

Trading the markets can make your head screwy. Reading Bill Fleckenstein or Jim Rogers can make you look at the world as ‘All Empty’. They can afford to think like this. Remember that!

I have learned that I am a ’3/4 Full’ guy. I am naturally enthusiastic and although I know guys like Bill and Jim are smart and successul, reading them does not make me money. It actually messes with my head.

It’s good cocktail banter for an asshat party.

Same thing in the entrepreneur world I live in. I have blogged about it somewhere, but I believe it is always a good time to start a business.

I was surfing my blogroll tonight and Brad linked to Dick Costello, CEO of Feedburner , and this great post on entrepreneurship .

Here’s a snippet:

It seems silly to me that one would worry about the general market when starting a company, but obviously it’s a bit of a common theme. So, that led me to wonder what would cause you to have that kind of mindset, and what I think I am really hearing is fear of failure. I think the questions are really “is this environment one in which it will be harder for me to succeed?”, and I will therefore provide a simple answer to this question: Every market is one in which it will be harder for you to succeed. If access to capital is plentiful, then there will be more companies chasing that capital and more well-funded ventures against which you must compete. If access to capital is scarce, however, it will be harder for you to raise money and you will have to endure more investor-friendly terms on financing and have to show more business model progress in advance of further funding. If there are few competitors in your market, then you need to evangelize your value proposition more passionately to the market in order to gain traction. If there are many competitors in your market, then you need to distinguish yourself from competitors more thoroughly. If you’re a first-mover, why should anybody need your new service, if you’re a follower, why should anybody switch to your service?

Lot’s of awesomeness in this post. Dick’s a cool guy and I have chatted wih him a few times. Glad he is blogging regularly.

The information in this blog post represents my own opinions and does not contain a recommendation for any particular security or investment. I or my affiliates may hold positions or other interests in securities mentioned in the Blog, please see my Disclaimer page for my full disclaimer.

blog comments powered by Disqus