
Why Startups Really Succeed: Strings of Luck - dennybritz
http://blog.dennybritz.com/2015/09/13/why-startups-really-succeed/
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SQL2219
I agree, unicorn founders are not a bazillion times smarter than the rest of
us, maybe 1.05X smarter and 10,000X luckier. But what is the formula for luck?
Do we have some minor control over that? I think I read somewhere that
luck=opportunity + preparation. Preparation we have control over, but we must
be preparing for the right thing. I guess we have some control over
opportunity, which might include building your network and getting out of the
basement once in a while.

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dennybritz
Good question. The problem with "luck" is that you only know what's good or
bad in hindsight. For example, if Google had been acquired for $1M the
founders may have lived happily every after. Only in hindsight we can say that
it was lucky the deal fell through. So I guess it'd be better to call them
"random events" instead of "luck".

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dkersten
I do believe that we can influence our luck (increase or decrease the
likelihood of said random events) but I think some people are better at
capitalising on random events than others.

But despite our influences or skills at making use of these things, at some
point random chance does take over and we have no control over that. All we
can do is influence the probability of random events, not control them
completely.

