Author here. I wanted to share some of the early mistakes I made as a solo non-technical founder building a software company. I started learning to code after these early mistakes and it's been incredibly helpful. I can't thank HN enough for encouraging me to learn.
These were not just mistakes, but clearly fundamental failures as a businessman. It's literally amazing that you were able to find any success in your endeavors. Your saving grace was that you basically called yourself out for being a tool because nothing else describes how you present yourself. I honestly feel for "Blake" and am utterly surprised that Joel stuck around. This is an excellent example that business professors and CS professors could use to demonstrate the complexity of trying to actually develop something and why simply having a good idea is not enough.
Totally agree. I look at how I used to think and communicate, and "tool" is spot on. Software is so incredibly hard, it took me years, and many mistakes along the way, to learn this. And I'm still learning.
