Last week my old AOL friend Chamath, who is now the hottest VC in Silicon Valley, unintentionally took a stand against, essentially, the way the Gen-Y founders of Airbnb were pulling $20M out of their startup.
At the same time thousands of the disenfranchised -- from fatigued Marines in fatigues to mid-level execs to mommy bloggers to pilots all dressed up with no where to fly -- occupied Wall Street in protests.
The white-haired White Shirts of New York's Finest lost their cool and pepper sprayed the innocent. Sad shades of a Kent State to come?
These baby-faced, well-spoken and highly intelligent millennials marched around Wall Street leading their parents into the fight of the 99% against the 1%.
The OWS protesters see a corrupt system filled with greed. I wonder if they see the fact that there are two different types of massive wealth creation: the spreadsheet jockeys who create little value beyond the two or three months they work on deals, and the founders who spend years to decades creating real value?
People can easily make millions of dollars without much work in America.
And that's a good thing!
This concept that starting a company is so hard and that you'll never make it is conspiracy concocted by the rich and powerful to keep you from trying -- and you've fallen for it.
You don't need an MBA to start a business, you need big brass balls and the understanding that it takes two to three swings at the bat. Don't give up after one ass-kicking because kicking ass takes getting your ass kicked.
That's why despite all the problems we have, and despite all the growth in China and India, we are still on top of the consumption food chain. America might be a dying empire, but it's not going to die in our lifetime -- and it doesn't have to die at all.
It is within our power to restore the American dream while infusing it with a socialist -- urrr, common good-based -- gestalt.
Yeah, Wall Street got a sick, sick bailout while giving themselves F-U bonuses.
Yeah, the bankers both paid off the government we elected and they scared and bullied them into backing up the bailouts for the mess they created. And yeah, none of them got prosecuted and that's dead wrong.
Move on.
The Airbnb kids created a billion-dollar business that has made it possible for anyone to stay on another person's couch or in their guest house. They've royally screwed big corporations -- the hotel chains -- by democratizing travel while giving individuals the ability to make extra money.
Airbnb is a much more effective protest than shutting down the Brooklyn Bridge.
Airbnb is radical.
Sitting in a park waiting for RadioHead is not radical.
Selling your company for a billion dollars and having RadioHead play your birthday party, which is also a fundraiser for education? That's radical!
Oh yeah, the kids behind Airbnb cleared $20M already for their protest thanks to being able to clear the air with Chamath and gave all shareholders in Airbnb the ability to liquidate. [ The first deal structure was a dividend to only select folks -- or something like that. All the facts are not public. Big picture, more folks get to cash out. ]
They added more socialism to their startup -- everyone gets to sell in the private market!
They are radical inside and out.
Oh yeah, that same capitalism-socialism hybrid is empowering another startup called SecondMarket that, come to think of it, Chamath also invested in. That startup allows for the fluid exchange of non-public, which is to say not controlled by Wall Street, shares in companies.
SecondMarket is a more effective protest than sitting in a park live streaming with bad audio (seriously dudes, invest in good microphones and get some lighting).
We in the startup community operate in the most corrupt financial system ever created: angel investing and venture capital.
In one day you can drive up and down Sand Hill Road with your prototype and early progress and get term sheets from folks who have more capital than they can deploy.
Or you can sit at home in the buck on AngelList and update your subscriber growth daily, wooing thousands of angel investors. I'm sure those ranks will include many members of the soon-to-be-flush teams at Airbnb and SecondMarket -- if not already!
Those VCs get 20% of any profits their money generates while taking 2% of the money they invest to pay for their lifestyle. The angel investors get to play 20 bets knowing that at least one is going be a 20x return (at least that's what I'm hoping!).
If a system is corrupt and you are a good actor, your moral obligation is to leverage it, not change it.
Jeff Skoll founded EBay with Pierre Omidyar.
They became billionaires, but not selfish boring ones.
Jeff is producing the awesome, issue-driven films that the OWS protesters are watching on their iPads as they fight the evil Wall Street bankers. "An Inconvenient Truth," "Food Inc.," "Waiting for 'Superman,'" and "Darfur Now" are among his documentaries while his feature films include "Syriana," "Charlie Wilson's War," "The Informant" and "The Help." All are changing the world.
Skoll is a soft-spoken radical, and you can be one, too.
Pierre is busy investing in startups that do social good, like Meetup.com -- which protesters around the world have used for a decade.
Omidyar is a soft-spoken radical, and you can be one, too.
Protesting in the streets is outdated in an already free society like ours. In Egypt with a clear-cut message like "Mubarak step down?" For sure, protest away. In America with a clear-cut message of... ummm.... what is the message of OWS again? OWS really needs a mission statement!
It's lame to protest for more jobs when you will so easily create them by starting a company.
There is so much capital in the world that doesn't trust Wall Street already.
You don't need to convince the world that Wall Street is corrupt -- we know that -- you need to convince us that your option is better.
All that capital parked on Wall Street wants to participate in the creation of startups and the selling of shares on SecondMarket -- where real money is made. They want to put their money to work on AngelList -- the farm league for SecondMarket.
Rich folks don't want to give their money to the rigged game that is Wall Street because it's boring AND it's rigged. They want the excitement of startups.
Radical is creating disruptive services that let you accumulate massive wealth while creating jobs and social good. Then when you become part of the 1%, you can use your wealth to really change the system by creating awesome movies, improving education or eradicating diseases from the planet.
Sure, OWS is finally getting on TV after being ignored by our corrupt, bought-and-paid-for media machine, but you're probably not going to change much of anything. You've got 100x the number of protesters showing up in Europe, rioting in the streets and throwing bricks -- and they're not getting the change they want.
Protesting isn't bad, and it's important for a democracy, but it's just not the most effective method of delivering change. Being the change you want is the most effective method of change.
We've already won our freedom (I mean, with the exception of gay people and children). The system is already way, way open for everyone to participate in it and leverage it.
Yes, it's not perfect, but it's damn, damn close to perfect -- and you can bridge the gap by participating.
Now get out of your tents, learn to code and make something that changes the world.
You're 100% right that the system is rigged and the opportunity to be disproportionally rich has never been so easy.
So go get that money that is so easy to acquire and use it to make the world a better place.
Time to pack up your sleeping bag and find a co-working space and build something methinks. Or, heck, stay in the park and build a company down there--it's cheaper and I'm sure there are a couple of dozen awesome UX designers and sysadmins down there right?
Perhaps the next Airbnb, Facebook or SecondMarket is being built in Zuccotti Park right now!
Plug in, startup and disrupt.
Be the 1%!
best,
@Jason
Note: This piece leaves out the 50-year-olds who are laid off, don't have skills that are needed in today's marketplace and who are discriminated against. Those folks are seriously screwed and I don't have an answer for solving that problem. Saying "learn HTML/to code" is easy, but even if they did I bet they are going to get looked over for young folks by the understandably biased HR folks (i.e., they haven't seen 50- and 60-year-old developers crushing it so they don't take a chance on them). I'm really sad for the 50 and 60-year-olds who are left behind -- especially since my dad is one of them.
This post originally appeared on LAUNCH.
Follow Jason McCabe Calacanis on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JASON
Gene Marks: How Occupy Wall Street Can Help My Small Business
I have three children all under the age of 20. One is in their first year of college, the other two still in High School. All three have their own companies that they started on their own, with their own money earned, that make them money while they sit in class each day.
I don't want to hear that it can't be done. Like the author said, people don't have the brass ones to do it. It's not only possible, it's the only way to really get ahead of the masses. They may not end up being Steve Jobs, but their future is theirs and theirs alone.
Enough excuses, there is a world of opportunity for those willing to think !
Yes, Mr. McCabe, a small percent of the 99% can and will succeed and become fabulously wealthy inventing, creating, dreaming up and building their own businesses, but most of the 99% would be content to be able to earn a decent living, secure that they aren't going to be tricked out of their hard-earned homes, or out of a crack at a decent future for their kids, or out of the ability to go to a doctor or dentist when they need. It's not much.
We don't need parasitic financial institutions preying on the working class We don't need more derivative-creating, risk-taking, accountability-free, dead-wood banksters. What we need is a set of rules (think Glass-Steagall) that protect us 99%ers from those "geniuses" who stay up late figuring out ways to legally steal the money of productive, hard-working people.
I also imagine that the "bad guys" are hard to spot in their nice suits, smarmy smiles, as they sit behind their desks in well-appointed offices. We simple folk are conditioned to believe these well-dressed, well-groomed individuals are to be trusted . . . like policemen in uniform . . . not to do us harm.
i would love to start a business but im going to school and working my butt off.
i cant imagine how the kids with no jobs and the ones in debt could be entrepreneurs.
and certainly not everyone can be Mark Zuckerburg or Sergey Brin.
These kids may be the greatest and best entrepreneurs that America has ever seen but we may never know it if they arent helped back on their feet, if they arent given a platform to launch from.
Our generation was slighted by people with more power then us, who reaped the benefits of said slighting.
Its time to take back our opportunities.
We owe
We owe
So off to protest we go
Bush and Obama gave bailouts
So we all want some handouts
We are all just your average joe
It will be entrepreneurship that will save this country.
Not a forced redistribution of wealth.
Without those who prosper, nobody has a chance. Ask those in Cuba !
If you learn to code you might want to learn how to speak Hindi or Telugu, because most of the coding jobs are in India these days.
"Yeah, Wall Street got a sick, sick bailout while giving themselves F-U bonuses.
Yeah, the bankers both paid off the government we elected and they scared and bullied them into backing up the bailouts for the mess they created. And yeah, none of them got prosecuted and that's dead wrong.
Move on."
I'm not sure which is most offensive about this statement: that it presumes the public will not muster the forces necessary to prosecute the perpetrators of the biggest swindle in American history, or that the citizenry should simply ignore the pursuit of justice to go about their own self-centered business.
This is exactly the Ayn Rand-ian philosophy that has created this mess in the first place: ignore the greater good in pursuit of self-interest. How's that working for us so far?
We cannot "move on" until (a) we put the regulations back in place that will prevent another meltdown at the hands of greedy financiers and (b) criminally prosecute the perpetrators and levy punitive damages. Why this should be ignored in favor of entrepreneurial pursuits is a false dichotomy. These ideas are not mutually exclusive.
Today they march on wall street (while contemplating their future).
Ever since the death of FDR they have been trying to rescind the rights that working people gained under his administrations. They have done it by buying off politicians and enacting laws that expand the privileges of corporations and diminish the rights of workers. The elite want the power to pillage at will, answerable to no man or government.
I wonder if the future United States will more closely resemble Dickensian England or Fascist Italy.
What most Americans do not know is that THIS HAS ALL HAPPENED BEFORE...so what then is the conclusion of that era. ? Today we have given many of our rights away to the Supreme Court who has changed the playing field of the mega Corporations who continue to fund our legislators to do their bidding.
Today the Banks, Corporations and the Federal Reserve are FLEECING the American Public
If WE do not turn it all around soon we will be relegated to serfdom...THEY will OWN IT ALL
here is FDR response to the big moneyed interest that ruled in that period of time
Stand up now America or be under the heavy hand of the mega Corporations, Banksters & FED.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9yoZHs6PsU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLdcB0ln9t8
http://www.ronpaul.com/2009-02-28/ron-paul-introduces-bill-to-audit-the-fed/
http://www.ronpaul.com/congress/legislation/111th-congress-200910/audit-the-federal-reserve-hr-1207/