Patreon is a great comparison and, I think, supports my position. Only $35 million in annual revenue after 6 years.
Not a bad business but they've taken $160 million in finding to get there.
Actually, my bigger point was just that the tech industry is full of businesses that were hot & sexy in their early years and then people got disappointed when they tried to start being a real business in year 7 or 8 or 9.
Instead of jumping from the Medium hype train to the Substack hype train....it is probably safer just to get off all the hype trains and assume any given startup will eventually try to become profitable and screw over old time customers in the process. You're going to be about 90% right with that as your default assumption.
Not a bad business but they've taken $160 million in finding to get there.
Actually, my bigger point was just that the tech industry is full of businesses that were hot & sexy in their early years and then people got disappointed when they tried to start being a real business in year 7 or 8 or 9.
Instead of jumping from the Medium hype train to the Substack hype train....it is probably safer just to get off all the hype trains and assume any given startup will eventually try to become profitable and screw over old time customers in the process. You're going to be about 90% right with that as your default assumption.