[mkeblx]

This kind of hits the nail on the head. An idea is in many ways the context by which you judge a startup team in terms of a core commitment to a common goal, as shown by working on it together for a period of time (more than a week, etc.). It defines what 'team' means. Without that, what do you have? Credentials.

Of course by disaster I meant just relative to other classes, with a much higher amount of team splits/zombies in such a short period, which seemed predictable. Most startups don't work out, that's expected, but the stage was weighed for things not to work out in re: the startup itself and the friendships involved. Who knows, perhaps you and your friends, with a shared, good idea would have done great in w13, having the right context to build upon where you were at. I know of other teams who were extremely frustrated that something they've dreamed about, Demo Day, turn into something to dread and the quite painfully choosing to give up on the whole endeavor whatever the high personal costs (not necessarily wrongly).

One of the best things about pg's essay was the core message to entrepreneurs that a good startup idea requires not a pressure cooker atmosphere to come up with an 'idea' but the natural space in which you notice a problem that can be solved. It's the starting point, not something that can be tacked on later like the noidea concept would suggest.

[argumentum]

I don't know if it was predictable. It was a thesis that turned out to be incorrect, but on what basis could it have been discounted until tried?

Wrt to my own team, we would not have done great in w13 .. it turned out that we were not a "team", we didn't work well together and had vastly, irreconcilably, different views. Some people just aren't meant to work together, and I'm glad to have learned this sooner rather than later. I now know what to look for in co-founders, and that's not a meager knowledge.

[maximz]

Completely agree. Do you happen to have a link to pg's essay about changes from s12 to w13? Thanks.