Reposted a few things that I wrote on facebook here. I suppose I can see why the RSS market is dying.

Options are strange things.

Back when I was graduating from college, when I suddenly realized I was graduating that semester, there was a little bit of panic about what I was going to do after. So I sent out a few copies of my resume, went to a couple career fairs, and before I graduated only one place offered me an interview and subsequently, an offer. The choice was fairly simple: take the offer and go travel for 2 months, or turn down the offer and figure out something else. Not having much savings the decision was relatively simple to make.

Fast forward more than 6 years, I was having the urge to leave and join a startup. Since I have a tendency to be lazy and stay comfortable, I wanted to make a decision quickly while I still felt the rush. Plus taking days off to interview was getting tiring. In the end I took an offer out of two from the three places I interviewed at. It was not a difficult choice either: one place was doing something I can easily relate to and has an proven business model. It doesn't hurt that the offer was also superior in just about every way, at least on paper.

As the offers started to roll in, I am having to choose between different options again. The difference is that this time around none of the options is significantly better than the others. The difference is this time around I have a new option that I never (thought I) had: the option to not make a decision. Which makes everything so much harder, because of the vast number of (theoretical) future options. Of course, choosing "none of the above" is difficult, because it feels so irresponsible.

At a party last night someone asked me what do I want to do, after I, in an effort to increase my attractiveness, proclaimed in front of a small group that I am an unemployed bum. Fueled by alcohol, and the lack of will to give a 30 minutes rant, I just answered "something that wows me." Of course, that begs the obvious question of what that something is. Feeling like being a smartass (which is again, totally attractive), I said by definition I wouldn't know what's going to wow me. Surprisingly, there was agreement within the circle, which clearly meant my answer didn't stand out enough. So I proceeded to prove myself wrong by giving an example of what would wow me, and at the same time withheld enough details to be vague (damn NDA). This is an attempt to give a sober clarification, while at the same time be brief enough that if I were to say it in a party, no one would walk away to pretend to get a drink or take a bathroom break.

I will first admit that my views maybe screwed by the fact that I've been doing quite a number of interviews recently. After a while they all seem similar. You go in, shake hands with people whose names you barely know, answer a question or two, and then maybe bullshit at each other for a few minutes. Invariably, part of the process involves someone telling you that the sector they are in is a multi-billion dollar market, and they are totally going to disrupt it. After being told so many times that their companies are going to be a billion dollar company, it's hard to not go "ya right" and promptly forget everything that you've heard.

I will also admit that my sample space of what wows me is quite limited. Limited as in one. And my enthusiasm for that place has lowered quite a bit since I was first wow'ed, for reasons that would take too long to explain at a party, so I will omit here.

What wow'ed me about them wasn't about what they do, or how large their sector is, or how they are totally going to take over that entire market. In fact, what they do sounded so uninteresting that I passed on them once (which is why now I am talking to places quite indiscriminately). Before talking to them in depth, I had half a dozen theories of how they were approaching the problem. Those theories turned out to be all correct, which was boring. What wasn't boring was the fact that they lied, or at least was being misleading. They claim to be doing A, but they are actually building a flexible platform, of which A is currently the easiest way to make customers pay them. If they want to, they can easily (with a lot of hand waving) do B, C, and D. And they can do that because they've inserted themselves between their customers and their customers' customers. Not only that, what they are building is technically interesting. The technique is not entirely novel, and yet the application of it in this setting is something that I don't believe anyone else is doing, and is difficult enough that it seemed like magic.

So to summarize, one of the things that wows me is a technically interesting platform that happens to solve some real problems, in a way that not only I couldn't think of, but is also difficult enough that no one else is doing it.

One of the most frequently asked questions I get recently is "so what do you want to do next?". I've been refining my answer to that over the past few weeks, here's an attempt to put it all down so I don't have to keep it in my little head.

Solving problems

I find it easier to relate and be motivated when whatever I am working on is solving a real problem that someone may be having. So that rules out entertainment/gaming related fields. Not saying that entertainments are not important, they just don't fall into the "problems I need to solve space".

Solving problems central to the company

There are always problems to be solved in any company. Some of them are central to the company's mission, and some of them more peripheral. For example, many advertising companies have massive scaling problems that are worth solving, but those are more means to the end whether than the end itself. In my experience, it's much more fulfilling to build the product that makes money rather than the product that sells more products.

Solving MY problems

I don't claim to be a visionary - It's not immediately clear to me that every problem is worth solving, but if I can feel the pain I'd definitely be more motivated to work on a solution. I think that's one of the reasons why the last two products I worked on had been storage products - everyday I am storing more data, and don't get me started on my (lack of) backup plan. There are other problems that I have, and then there are other problems that even though I don't have a pressing need to solve, I can see myself having them down the road.

Solving different problems

This time around, every recruiter asked if I want to talk to this storage company, that storage startup. If I work on another storage product for a few years, that probably defines the rest of my career. Don't get me wrong, I like to work on storage problems, but at this point I want see if there are other things I like more.

Solving problems that I am good at solving

Let's face it, everyone wants to solve world hunger, but that's not something I am good at solving. Having invested years in the systems space, I am not in a rush to get out of it.

Getting in between people

I was talking to a couple people involved in the startup space lately, and one thing seems to be in common: if you can get in between people's communications/endpoints, that will enable you to do so much more. Getting in between people is usually frowned upon in day to day lives, but that worked for Facebook, Twitter, Google, and to some lesser extent, Riverbed. Unless I know exactly what problem I want to solve, a product that gets in between endpoints will allow me to have visibility on more potential problems, and that seems a good place to be at.

Twisting the problems

Not all the problems fit well in the above categories. Sometimes I just can be convinced with enough twisting. For example, payment is not a space that I am immediately interested in solving. However, payment by definition is getting in between endpoints (buyers and sellers), and payment looks slightly more interesting if I see it from that angle.

Good enough problems

Not having enough money to retire means at some point I will have to have a job again. The pressure to not drain my savings too much means I cannot only settle for the perfect opportunity (if I even know what that is). Eventually I will have to settle for what's good enough. Balancing the trade offs is not a topic I'd like to think about right now.

Went to another startup which I talked to last time around. Turns out they moved and I only found out after I went to the old location. Called founder and then cab'ed over. Kind of sort of got verbal offer for an offer, which was offered over email already so not really unexpected. Conclusion was I should reach out again when I am ready to commit. Walked over to the Mission for a burrito, then drove down to south bay for another interview. Talked so much in the past few days that I now have a sore throat. Finished, walked out and was heading back to the car. Founder ran out and called me back inside for another chat. He wanted me to commit to a potential role, which is a little weird because that's before he collected feedbacks and before there's an offer. Not an ideal role, but gave an ambiguous response because I didn't feel like pressing about the details before I know how much they want me. In Milpitas for the night.