INDUSTRY INSIGHTS YOUR PEERS ARE READING
One of our favorite VC firms to work with is True Ventures. I’ve made many investments over the years with both Jon Callaghan and Tony Conrad, and I love being a co-investor with them. Recently, Tony told me a great Jon Callaghan quote. “Money Doesn’t Solve Problems. People Solve Problems.” ” I’ve learned this lesson 7,345,123 times. Every successful company I’ve been involved in had a least one near-death experience. MORE
A central theme of science fiction over the past 20 years has been the dystopian future of humans, laying on couches, connected to machines that feed them and process their waste, while they interact with a virtual world. MORE
Several friends have mentioned that I’d love Cal Newport’s writing. I finally got around to reading his most recent book, Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World and my friends were correct. MORE
Today, Techstars announced a new initiative called Techstars Studio which will allow Techstars to source new company concepts from Techstars alumni founders, community leaders, venture capitalists, mentors, and corporate partners. MORE
I was at a board meeting last week that introduced something new into the mix that I thought was brilliant. At the beginning of each section of the board meeting, there was one slide that was titled: “What Are We Trying To Get Out of This Section.” ” Before we started into a section, whoever was leading it walked everybody in the room specifically through what she was expecting to get out of the section. I think we did this five times over a 3.5 hour board meeting. MORE
192 We are running the Venture Deals Online Course again. Registration is now open and it runs from April 7, 2019 – May 31, 2019. It’s produced by Kauffman Fellows Academy and Techstars. We’ve run the course four times now and have had over 15,000 people take it. MORE
James Oliver, Jr. has written a fun book that is part memoir, part advice, for what he calls Parentpreneurs (entrepreneurs who are trying to raise kids.) He’s got a website with a bunch of history about him, his journey, and the book. MORE
I’ve been working on the Startup Visa since I first wrote about it 2009 in my post The Founders Visa Movement. After a decade, it’s clear that our federal government has broadly failed us on this front. In 2015, I announced the Global EIR initiative to try something different. Today, I’m happy to welcome the University of Michigan to the Global EIR network. MORE
Amy and I recently decided to support Entrepreneurship for All (EforAll) and their national expansion to Colorado through our Anchor Point Foundation. EforAll’s mission is to accelerate economic development and social impact through inclusive entrepreneurship in emerging communities. MORE
David Cohen and I just released Episode 4 of our Give First podcast. We interviewed Mary Grove on the origins of Google for Startups & Startup Weekend among other things. MORE
Amy and I are long-time supporters of the Boulder International Film Festival. The 2019 fes tival starts soon and runs from February 28 to March 3rd. Bias , one of the documentaries that we helped fund, is making its Colorado Premier and showing on Saturday, March 2, 2019 at 10:00 am. MORE
287 Amy and I are big supporters of the Media Archaeology Lab (MAL). I love the idea of a computer museum and believe Boulder deserves to have a large one. MORE
Michael Natkin at Glowforge recently wrote a great post titled Strong Opinions Loosely Held Might be the Worst Idea in Tech. I have never liked this entrepreneurial cliche. While I have a large personality, I don’t have a temper and I’m not argumentative. I try hard to listen (although I’m not always great at it), try to express my thoughts as “data” rather than “opinions”, and try to evolve my thinking based on the inputs that I get. MORE
Last week, Return Path announced it was being acquired by Validity. My fellow board member Fred Wilson wrote a great history titled The Long Game and Matt Blumberg wrote a beautiful tribute titled OnlyOnce, Part XX. MORE
I received a Silicon Flatirons email from Phil Weiser this morning in his role as Silicon Flatirons Founder and Executive Director. My partners and I, especially Jason Mendelson, have been very involved with Silicon Flatirons over the past decade. I have a chapter in Startup Communities that uses CU Boulder – and specifically Silicon Flatirons – as an example of a much better way than the traditional approach (circa 2012) for a university to engage with the startup community. MORE
Over the past few years, you’ve seen me write about Glowforge, the 3D laser printer that made history with their crowdfunding campaign back in 2015. Glowforge launched that very campaign at a jam-packed World New York Maker Faire, where folks lined up for hours to get a glimpse at the shiny new machine. Over the next 30 days, they sold $28 million worth of pre-orders to an insatiable crowd of makers. More recently, Glowforge was named Make magazine’s 2019 Editor’s Choice for a laser cutter. MORE
I’ve been a remote worker for many years. As a result, I think I’ve used every flavor of video conferencing and screen sharing going back to Carbon Copy and PC Anywhere. Today’s bell of the ball is Zoom, which has an outstanding video and audio conferencing experience. MORE
The modern computer science education movement, commonly referred to as Computer Science for All or #CSforALL , has been gaining momentum nationwide since 2004 and is poised to be the most significant upgrade to the US education system in history. History is recorded and codified through the journalism, social media, and public policy, and tends to emphasize the voices of those already in the public eye. MORE
I’ve been open about my journey with depression and the importance of addressing and destigmatizing issues around mental health. MORE
Amy and I decided to match all of the funding for first-time projects in Colorado on DonorsChoosee.org. We are doing this through a gift from the Anchor Point Foundation and will be running it through the end of 2018. MORE
This first appeared in the Boulder Community Health Foundation Summer 2019 Magazine in an article titled Taking On The Mental Health Stigma. I started the second week of 2013 in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics Show. Within two hours of arriving, I was in my hotel room, the shade closed, the door locked, and in bed with a pillow over my head. I couldn’t deal with anything at all. Having been here before, I knew I was in a deep depression. MORE
Jasper Nathaniel recently wrote a long, detailed post titled When Your Startup Fails. It may be the most vulnerable and honest post I’ve read on failure, certainly in a while. I spent the day yesterday in Grand Junction at Techstars Startup Week West Slope. After a full day of meetings, events, and talks, I ended up at dinner with a half-dozen CEOs of startups in the area (Grand Junction, Carbondale, Eagle, and Telluride.) MORE
In February 2017 I met Shawn Frayne, one of the founders of Looking Glass Factory , a Brooklyn-based company with ambitions to make holographic interfaces a reality. MORE
Imagine that when you were a kid, someone told you that your dreams are important for the world and that what you do matters right now. Dream Tank Kids Exploring the Techstars Boulder Accelerator. MORE
I watched HBO’s Chernobyl the past few nights. I finished it last night, took a deep breath, and said out loud to myself, “that was spectacular.” ” One of the final quotes that stuck with me is the title of this post. MORE
David Cohen and I are doing a podcast together called Give First. Readers of this blog likely know that this is the mantra of Techstars and the title of an upcoming book of mine that will be published in 2020. While I’ve been interviewed for many podcasts, I’ve never hosted one before. MORE
398 I read Roger McNamee’s book Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe the day it came out. While likely uncomfortable for a lot of people, it was excellent, provocative, and challenging all at the same time. I have not, nor have I ever been, an investor in Facebook. However, I benefited indirectly from, and indirectly contributed to, the rapid rise of Facebook as an early investor in Zynga. MORE
I read Ben Horowitz’s The Hard Thing About Hard Things last weekend. This is the third time I’ve read it. It gets better each time. If you are a CEO and you haven’t read it, buy it right now and read it next weekend. There are endless gems in the book, many of them from Ben’s own experience. My favorite of all time, that stays with me through all the work I do, is his distinction between “peace time” and “war time.” MORE
If the majority of your understanding of how tariffs work is from Twitter, CNN, or Fox News, I encourage you to go read Trump’s China Tariffs Hit America’s Poor and Working Class the Hardest. And, if you think China is paying the U.S. directly for the tariffs, well, no … We have a lot of hardware companies in our portfolio so I’ve been living in the world of “what to do about tariffs” for several quarters. MORE
I participated in a one hour Crowdcast yesterday with Techstars and 43 North about How to Build a Successful Startup Ecosystem in your City. Some of the thoughts from my upcoming book The Startup Community Way are in the hour, along with a bunch of things Techstars is doing around this initiative. powered by Crowdcast. MORE
In the past 24 hours, I’ve gotten a bunch of emails with positive feedback about my 81st birthday tribute to my dad and the Storyworth history I posted on how we ended up in Dallas. I woke up this morning to another Storyworth history from him, this time titled Birth Of An Entrepreneur: Brad Feld. I read it and loved it, especially since it reflected so significantly on how integral he was to the entrepreneurial path I ended up on. MORE
In the world of entrepreneurship, there are endless things to do. Tasks, to do lists, new initiatives, new projects, and P1s. Leaders spend a lot of time planning, especially in the context of “we have to grow more, do more, and get bigger.” ” Lately, I’ve been suggesting to a few of the CEOs who I work with to make a “2019 Won’t Do List.” ” While this is a high-level list of things not to do, it can be on multiple dimensions. MORE
Stan Feld at his 60-year Columbia Reunion. My dad had his 60-year reunion at Columbia this weekend. He looks great. This morning, I did a talk with Om Malik at the Startup Iceland 2019 conference. Om was in a hotel room somewhere and I was in my office in Boulder. MORE
A lot of people are predicting that 2018 was the peak and the beginning of a downturn / recession / whatever-you-want-to-call-it. I’m not a predictor so I have no idea. MORE
I recently met Renata George through a referral from Katie Rae (MIT Engine CEO, previously Techstars Boston MD). Renata told me about a book she was working on called Women Who Venture and asked me if I’d write the foreword. I was honored to be asked to do this. The foreword I wrote follows. MORE
Jerry Colonna has written a “must read for everyone on planet earth book” titled Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up. Seriously, go by it right now. I’ll be here when you return. Regular readers of this blog know that Jerry and I are extremely close friends and have been for 23 years. I first met Jerry when he was beginning his partnership with Fred Wilson at Flatiron Partners. But, I didn’t meet him through Fred. MORE
A Simple, a Complicated, and a Complex system walk into a bar. Simple says to the bartender, “Can I have a drink?” The bartender gives Simple a glass of water. Complicated says to the bartender, “Can I have a Rum Martinez?” MORE
I used to be chronically late to everything, both personal and professional. In my twenties, before cell phones, I was one of those people that others referred to as having “Brad time” which did not correlate with the actual time in the world. MORE
Amy and I are celebrating our 29/26/23rd anniversary today. It’s the summer solstice, which is a special day for us. 29 years ago we officially started dating. 26 years ago we declared ourselves married (and eloped.). 23 years ago we signed an official piece of paper that was witnessed at the Boulder County Clerk’s Office because it was a pain in the ass to not be officially married. MORE
I recently recorded two free courses with LinkedIn Learning. They are each under an hour long and broken up into a bunch of small segments. The first one is on Raising Venture Capital and is based on content from the book Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist that I wrote with Jason Mendelson. Amy tells me that this is her favorite shirt from my current rotation of Robert Graham shirts. Raising venture capital from Brad Feld on Raising Capital by Brad Feld. MORE
Amy and I are proud executive producers of the upcoming movie Pioneer In Skirts. It has been part of our activity supporting independent documentaries about gender diversity, especially in science and tech. MORE
Yesterday, I started my day by finishing A People’s History of American Empire: The American Empire Project, A Graphic Adaptation and ended my day by finishing Everything Is F*cked: A Book About Hope. MORE
The post May the 4th Be With You appeared first on Feld Thoughts. Investments droids misty sphero star wars MORE
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 14, 2019
I recently met Renata George through a referral from Katie Rae (MIT Engine CEO, previously Techstars Boston MD). Renata told me about a book she was working on called Women Who Venture and asked me if I’d write the foreword. I was honored to be asked to do this. The foreword I wrote follows.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 13, 2019
I watched HBO’s Chernobyl the past few nights. I finished it last night, took a deep breath, and said out loud to myself, “that was spectacular.” ” One of the final quotes that stuck with me is the title of this post.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 24, 2019
Jerry Colonna has written a “must read for everyone on planet earth book” titled Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up. Seriously, go by it right now. I’ll be here when you return. Regular readers of this blog know that Jerry and I are extremely close friends and have been for 23 years. I first met Jerry when he was beginning his partnership with Fred Wilson at Flatiron Partners. But, I didn’t meet him through Fred.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 9, 2019
David Cohen and I are doing a podcast together called Give First. Readers of this blog likely know that this is the mantra of Techstars and the title of an upcoming book of mine that will be published in 2020. While I’ve been interviewed for many podcasts, I’ve never hosted one before.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 28, 2019
In February 2017 I met Shawn Frayne, one of the founders of Looking Glass Factory , a Brooklyn-based company with ambitions to make holographic interfaces a reality.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 28, 2019
Imagine that when you were a kid, someone told you that your dreams are important for the world and that what you do matters right now. Dream Tank Kids Exploring the Techstars Boulder Accelerator.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 10, 2019
We are running the Venture Deals Online Course again. Registration is now open and it runs from April 7, 2019 – May 31, 2019. It’s produced by Kauffman Fellows Academy and Techstars. We’ve run the course four times now and have had over 15,000 people take it.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 30, 2019
I read Ben Horowitz’s The Hard Thing About Hard Things last weekend. This is the third time I’ve read it. It gets better each time. If you are a CEO and you haven’t read it, buy it right now and read it next weekend. There are endless gems in the book, many of them from Ben’s own experience. My favorite of all time, that stays with me through all the work I do, is his distinction between “peace time” and “war time.”
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 5, 2019
David Cohen and I just released Episode 4 of our Give First podcast. We interviewed Mary Grove on the origins of Google for Startups & Startup Weekend among other things.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 30, 2019
I’ve been open about my journey with depression and the importance of addressing and destigmatizing issues around mental health.
Feld Thoughts
NOVEMBER 2, 2018
I received a Silicon Flatirons email from Phil Weiser this morning in his role as Silicon Flatirons Founder and Executive Director. My partners and I, especially Jason Mendelson, have been very involved with Silicon Flatirons over the past decade. I have a chapter in Startup Communities that uses CU Boulder – and specifically Silicon Flatirons – as an example of a much better way than the traditional approach (circa 2012) for a university to engage with the startup community.
Feld Thoughts
APRIL 30, 2019
I’ve been a remote worker for many years. As a result, I think I’ve used every flavor of video conferencing and screen sharing going back to Carbon Copy and PC Anywhere. Today’s bell of the ball is Zoom, which has an outstanding video and audio conferencing experience.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 8, 2019
A central theme of science fiction over the past 20 years has been the dystopian future of humans, laying on couches, connected to machines that feed them and process their waste, while they interact with a virtual world.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 22, 2019
If the majority of your understanding of how tariffs work is from Twitter, CNN, or Fox News, I encourage you to go read Trump’s China Tariffs Hit America’s Poor and Working Class the Hardest. And, if you think China is paying the U.S. directly for the tariffs, well, no … We have a lot of hardware companies in our portfolio so I’ve been living in the world of “what to do about tariffs” for several quarters.
Feld Thoughts
JANUARY 16, 2019
Today, Techstars announced a new initiative called Techstars Studio which will allow Techstars to source new company concepts from Techstars alumni founders, community leaders, venture capitalists, mentors, and corporate partners.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 7, 2019
In the super cool thing category, it’s always fun to see two companies we are investors in easily put together a demonstration of the integration of their products. Oblong is a master of spatially interacting with 3D data on a 2D display.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 7, 2019
Jasper Nathaniel recently wrote a long, detailed post titled When Your Startup Fails. It may be the most vulnerable and honest post I’ve read on failure, certainly in a while. I spent the day yesterday in Grand Junction at Techstars Startup Week West Slope. After a full day of meetings, events, and talks, I ended up at dinner with a half-dozen CEOs of startups in the area (Grand Junction, Carbondale, Eagle, and Telluride.)
Feld Thoughts
JANUARY 9, 2019
James Oliver, Jr. has written a fun book that is part memoir, part advice, for what he calls Parentpreneurs (entrepreneurs who are trying to raise kids.) He’s got a website with a bunch of history about him, his journey, and the book.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 1, 2019
I participated in a one hour Crowdcast yesterday with Techstars and 43 North about How to Build a Successful Startup Ecosystem in your City. Some of the thoughts from my upcoming book The Startup Community Way are in the hour, along with a bunch of things Techstars is doing around this initiative. powered by Crowdcast.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 20, 2019
Over the past few years, you’ve seen me write about Glowforge, the 3D laser printer that made history with their crowdfunding campaign back in 2015. Glowforge launched that very campaign at a jam-packed World New York Maker Faire, where folks lined up for hours to get a glimpse at the shiny new machine. Over the next 30 days, they sold $28 million worth of pre-orders to an insatiable crowd of makers. More recently, Glowforge was named Make magazine’s 2019 Editor’s Choice for a laser cutter.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 16, 2019
I’ve been working on the Startup Visa since I first wrote about it 2009 in my post The Founders Visa Movement. After a decade, it’s clear that our federal government has broadly failed us on this front. In 2015, I announced the Global EIR initiative to try something different. Today, I’m happy to welcome the University of Michigan to the Global EIR network.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 3, 2019
Stan Feld at his 60-year Columbia Reunion. My dad had his 60-year reunion at Columbia this weekend. He looks great. This morning, I did a talk with Om Malik at the Startup Iceland 2019 conference. Om was in a hotel room somewhere and I was in my office in Boulder.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 28, 2019
A Simple, a Complicated, and a Complex system walk into a bar. Simple says to the bartender, “Can I have a drink?” The bartender gives Simple a glass of water. Complicated says to the bartender, “Can I have a Rum Martinez?”
Feld Thoughts
MAY 23, 2019
Michael Natkin at Glowforge recently wrote a great post titled Strong Opinions Loosely Held Might be the Worst Idea in Tech. I have never liked this entrepreneurial cliche. While I have a large personality, I don’t have a temper and I’m not argumentative. I try hard to listen (although I’m not always great at it), try to express my thoughts as “data” rather than “opinions”, and try to evolve my thinking based on the inputs that I get.
Feld Thoughts
JANUARY 11, 2019
One of our favorite VC firms to work with is True Ventures. I’ve made many investments over the years with both Jon Callaghan and Tony Conrad, and I love being a co-investor with them. Recently, Tony told me a great Jon Callaghan quote. “Money Doesn’t Solve Problems. People Solve Problems.” ” I’ve learned this lesson 7,345,123 times. Every successful company I’ve been involved in had a least one near-death experience.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 6, 2019
I read Roger McNamee’s book Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe the day it came out. While likely uncomfortable for a lot of people, it was excellent, provocative, and challenging all at the same time. I have not, nor have I ever been, an investor in Facebook. However, I benefited indirectly from, and indirectly contributed to, the rapid rise of Facebook as an early investor in Zynga.
Feld Thoughts
DECEMBER 12, 2018
Amy and I decided to match all of the funding for first-time projects in Colorado on DonorsChoosee.org. We are doing this through a gift from the Anchor Point Foundation and will be running it through the end of 2018.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 21, 2019
The modern computer science education movement, commonly referred to as Computer Science for All or #CSforALL , has been gaining momentum nationwide since 2004 and is poised to be the most significant upgrade to the US education system in history. History is recorded and codified through the journalism, social media, and public policy, and tends to emphasize the voices of those already in the public eye.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 3, 2019
Several friends have mentioned that I’d love Cal Newport’s writing. I finally got around to reading his most recent book, Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World and my friends were correct.
Feld Thoughts
FEBRUARY 22, 2019
Amy and I are long-time supporters of the Boulder International Film Festival. The 2019 fes tival starts soon and runs from February 28 to March 3rd. Bias , one of the documentaries that we helped fund, is making its Colorado Premier and showing on Saturday, March 2, 2019 at 10:00 am.
Feld Thoughts
JANUARY 10, 2019
I used to be chronically late to everything, both personal and professional. In my twenties, before cell phones, I was one of those people that others referred to as having “Brad time” which did not correlate with the actual time in the world.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 1, 2019
I recently recorded two free courses with LinkedIn Learning. They are each under an hour long and broken up into a bunch of small segments. The first one is on Raising Venture Capital and is based on content from the book Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist that I wrote with Jason Mendelson. Amy tells me that this is her favorite shirt from my current rotation of Robert Graham shirts. Raising venture capital from Brad Feld on Raising Capital by Brad Feld.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 4, 2019
The post May the 4th Be With You appeared first on Feld Thoughts. Investments droids misty sphero star wars
Feld Thoughts
APRIL 4, 2019
Amy and I recently decided to support Entrepreneurship for All (EforAll) and their national expansion to Colorado through our Anchor Point Foundation. EforAll’s mission is to accelerate economic development and social impact through inclusive entrepreneurship in emerging communities.
Feld Thoughts
MARCH 19, 2019
In the past 24 hours, I’ve gotten a bunch of emails with positive feedback about my 81st birthday tribute to my dad and the Storyworth history I posted on how we ended up in Dallas. I woke up this morning to another Storyworth history from him, this time titled Birth Of An Entrepreneur: Brad Feld. I read it and loved it, especially since it reflected so significantly on how integral he was to the entrepreneurial path I ended up on.
Feld Thoughts
JUNE 21, 2019
Amy and I are celebrating our 29/26/23rd anniversary today. It’s the summer solstice, which is a special day for us. 29 years ago we officially started dating. 26 years ago we declared ourselves married (and eloped.). 23 years ago we signed an official piece of paper that was witnessed at the Boulder County Clerk’s Office because it was a pain in the ass to not be officially married.
Feld Thoughts
DECEMBER 14, 2018
In the world of entrepreneurship, there are endless things to do. Tasks, to do lists, new initiatives, new projects, and P1s. Leaders spend a lot of time planning, especially in the context of “we have to grow more, do more, and get bigger.” ” Lately, I’ve been suggesting to a few of the CEOs who I work with to make a “2019 Won’t Do List.” ” While this is a high-level list of things not to do, it can be on multiple dimensions.
Feld Thoughts
OCTOBER 28, 2018
Amy and I are proud executive producers of the upcoming movie Pioneer In Skirts. It has been part of our activity supporting independent documentaries about gender diversity, especially in science and tech.
Feld Thoughts
JANUARY 2, 2019
A lot of people are predicting that 2018 was the peak and the beginning of a downturn / recession / whatever-you-want-to-call-it. I’m not a predictor so I have no idea.
Feld Thoughts
APRIL 23, 2019
Amy and I are big supporters of the Media Archaeology Lab (MAL). I love the idea of a computer museum and believe Boulder deserves to have a large one.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 6, 2019
Last week, Return Path announced it was being acquired by Validity. My fellow board member Fred Wilson wrote a great history titled The Long Game and Matt Blumberg wrote a beautiful tribute titled OnlyOnce, Part XX.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 19, 2019
Yesterday, I started my day by finishing A People’s History of American Empire: The American Empire Project, A Graphic Adaptation and ended my day by finishing Everything Is F*cked: A Book About Hope.
Feld Thoughts
MAY 31, 2019
I was at a board meeting last week that introduced something new into the mix that I thought was brilliant. At the beginning of each section of the board meeting, there was one slide that was titled: “What Are We Trying To Get Out of This Section.” ” Before we started into a section, whoever was leading it walked everybody in the room specifically through what she was expecting to get out of the section. I think we did this five times over a 3.5 hour board meeting.
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