I heard the word Entrepreneurship first time after joining IIT Bombay in 2000. And I was really surprised by the way it is pronounced. Whatever be the reason the word got screwed so bad, it still is a powerful word. 4 years of BTech at IIT, you keep hearing tales of successful Entrepreneurs from your college. Those days they were of people who made it really very big eventually - like Nandan Nilekani, Kanwal Rekhi, etc. Small-time startups were few, coz there were no smart phones, very few dumb mobile-phones, no e-commerce... nothing much really as compared to the world of today... people had to get really innovative. Things had to scale or die. It was difficult to sustain in hope, coz the hope had no basis, like we do now - the potential reach and the money. The internet and email were gradually changing the world, and the whole world was only talking about IT and the infinite possibilities it could offer. The possibilities did emerge gradually, although none of those were invented in India. But we are doing well to adapt them to our conditions, and generating huge business. And there sprang hundreds of startups with weird sounding names in the past few years.
For kids in this area, especially in India a few years back, the first thought that crossed their minds as soon as it occurred to them to start something of their own was about having a website URL that was really cool. They would keep thinking about it. A few would even go and check for availability of some they can think of. Most would not go beyond that. I kept checking for SochVichaar.com's availability (although not for a startup... just for my blog) for 3-4 years before I finally decided to spend $10 a year and register it. It's not a huge amount, but still good enough to prevent me from spending even for something that I did want. May be I had a price for it in mind, which was less than $10, until I decided to spend it... some sort of continuous pricing exercise our minds keep doing for everything we do in life.
Anyhow, it's different times now and the way startups are started and looked at is totally different from what it used to be 10-15 years back. What kind of companies are seen as startups and what kind of people are seen as entrepreneurs keeps changing with times. It's often a little confusing who should be called an entrepreneur and what qualifies as a startup. Shopkeepers who buy and sell goods are not generally considered entrepreneurs, nor are their shops seen as startups. But similar stuff done online are seen differently. Entrepreneurship by definition has to have some novelty associated with the venture. So right now online shops, which are among the first few, would be considered entrepreneurial and start-ups. But they're almost at the verge of being considered too common to be called novel or innovative from here on, and they'll lose the respect they get. Although some of them may do something really interesting in the way they conduct their business, but that'll be hardly noticed or acknowledged until they scale to a level where they're not considered a chain of shops.
But times these certainly are to start something, whatever random it might be, and make some fame or money or CV points as long as things are hot and as long as you have ways to survive if you go broke, which I think is the biggest fear that keeps even the best of thinkers and innovators from taking the plunge. As I said this, I realized that it's risk takers and politicians who shape the world, not the most innovative and creative people. In fact, a politician is in a way a manager of risk, and perhaps a bigger risk taker than a businessman, coz his pursuit is 'power', which not only does he constantly need to struggle for, but he also has to trust that it somehow helps him make a living more fulfilling than that of a business guy who strives for money - a tangible medium of exchange for anything material he wants. The seeker of power on the other hand is in a constant valuation game - of power: his and others' - and what it can offer in return, besides the pleasure of possessing the power itself. It is not difficult to see why in this herd of competing power-seekers, a lot have to turn corrupt... coz the valuation game has to produce tangible results in some way for each one of them so as to survive, and produce those in huge amounts - coz the valuation, like anything else these guys engage in, is supposed to add to the power they perceive for themselves, otherwise it is self-defeating. It's all a game mind plays with itself.
These mind-games are what keeps the world going. It's amazing how evolution happens in buckets - survival of the fittest leaders and survival of the fittest followers - looked at broadly! And then some more crooked wiring in heads to make sure innovative minds innovate, dreamers dream, entrepreneurs take risks and do stuff - all that adding some action in this world, making people's lives easy in some ways... making the best of the lost, yet comfort seeking lives we are all trapped into, while also forgetting it in the process... telling ourselves that if the show must go on, then why not be on stage like a hero or sit in the audience enjoying the show eating popcorn, without realizing we're equally part of the show - coz there's no hero without the audience... occasionally a seat gets empty and refilled... there is continuous addition of new chairs, as we keep getting added... and the stage keeps getting bigger and bigger, as heroes keep getting added too... and a few go away as well. But we have to focus on the show... or try to... what option do we have. One can exit. But then one ceases to exist. Our mind tells us we want to exist. So... games go on...
But times these certainly are to start something, whatever random it might be, and make some fame or money or CV points as long as things are hot and as long as you have ways to survive if you go broke, which I think is the biggest fear that keeps even the best of thinkers and innovators from taking the plunge. As I said this, I realized that it's risk takers and politicians who shape the world, not the most innovative and creative people. In fact, a politician is in a way a manager of risk, and perhaps a bigger risk taker than a businessman, coz his pursuit is 'power', which not only does he constantly need to struggle for, but he also has to trust that it somehow helps him make a living more fulfilling than that of a business guy who strives for money - a tangible medium of exchange for anything material he wants. The seeker of power on the other hand is in a constant valuation game - of power: his and others' - and what it can offer in return, besides the pleasure of possessing the power itself. It is not difficult to see why in this herd of competing power-seekers, a lot have to turn corrupt... coz the valuation game has to produce tangible results in some way for each one of them so as to survive, and produce those in huge amounts - coz the valuation, like anything else these guys engage in, is supposed to add to the power they perceive for themselves, otherwise it is self-defeating. It's all a game mind plays with itself.
These mind-games are what keeps the world going. It's amazing how evolution happens in buckets - survival of the fittest leaders and survival of the fittest followers - looked at broadly! And then some more crooked wiring in heads to make sure innovative minds innovate, dreamers dream, entrepreneurs take risks and do stuff - all that adding some action in this world, making people's lives easy in some ways... making the best of the lost, yet comfort seeking lives we are all trapped into, while also forgetting it in the process... telling ourselves that if the show must go on, then why not be on stage like a hero or sit in the audience enjoying the show eating popcorn, without realizing we're equally part of the show - coz there's no hero without the audience... occasionally a seat gets empty and refilled... there is continuous addition of new chairs, as we keep getting added... and the stage keeps getting bigger and bigger, as heroes keep getting added too... and a few go away as well. But we have to focus on the show... or try to... what option do we have. One can exit. But then one ceases to exist. Our mind tells us we want to exist. So... games go on...
