DISQUS

Bart Jellema · 1 year ago

Hi Duncan,

Thanks for showing up for the weekend and interesting to read about your experience. I enjoyed being down in Melbourne and meeting lots of amazing people.

Putting together developers with different skill into teams was indeed a change from the Sydney event. I admit that it wasn't helping the teams in creating a finished product in the limited time. Upside though was that developers got exposed to new tools, new languages, etc. It's a hard trade-off and we'll take a poll for the next weekend to see what people prefer.

When it comes to Jordan Green I have to disagree with you. I believe that his input and feedback was very useful for the teams and it gives some legitimacy to the final pitching. I agree that Jordan was very direct in his comments but I felt he made it clear that he didn't mean anything bad by it. I was glad he did because StartupCamp is supposed to be a learning experience and it gave the participants a chance to understand how VC's or angels think and it allowed them to experiment learn in basically a risk-free environment. For the next StartupCamp we want to have an angel or VC work even closer with the teams to prepare their pitches.

Hope to see you at the next StartupCamp!

Bart

Mike · 1 year ago

I am sorry I missed it. Maybe next time.

Ozan Onay · 1 year ago

My experience from StartupCamp Sydney was that it was a great environment for determining who would or wouldn't be good to work with in the future.

Having a bit of extra drama would have made that even more obvious, I imagine.

Jordan Green · 1 year ago

Duncan,

As a matter of factual accuracy I never offered any affiliation with an organisation called Greenson and I was not attending the event under any such affiliation. Please get your facts right.

You are entitled to your opinion and I am sorry that you were disappointed with my contributions. It is very sad that you heard what you wanted/expected to hear and not what I actually said. Interesting that you were equally inaccurate in your comments about the other teams and their businesses.

From your comments it is clear you completely misinterpreted my comments about your business which were not to "SPAM people". I was also very specific when I said after your final presentation that you should not present - period, regardless of the audience, because yes, you speak too much and say too little which had heads all over the room nodding. On the day I qualified my comment by acknowledging that you had all been with little or no sleep for two days and that perhaps you weren't at your best. If you are so confident you are always right and so resistant to constructive criticsm I congratulate you on being everything of which you wrongly accuse me.

I notice you don't report how I applauded the base concept of a location-based service, nor how I worked with your team to further explore your original proposition of a rollout in airports.

As for your reference to the wrap-up advice well, that is quite offensive because it completely misrepresents what I said and clearly reflects what you expected to hear. I NEVER tell anyone to lie. Yes, I did say understand that an investor is seeking an exit, after all, even you should appreciate that one invests to generate a return. I did not say no-one cares but, I did point out that if you are seeking substantial investment you need to be able to convince the investor they will havea good chance of seeing a commensurate return - so, an investor seeking to invest $1m in your business who says he wants an exit of 10 times his investment in five years (a common benchmark for VC) is unlikely to be thrilled to learn that in five years your business will have revenue of $5m because it is a big stretch to seeing that investor realise a $10m return for his share of your business.

More than you could possibly imagine investors do care about the social and lifestyle elements of a business and its impact on the community. However, if you want money for a non-profit business then you should seek philantropists not professional investors. To be very clear here, VC are not guys with money, they are professionals investing other people's money under a mandate that requires them to seek high returns.

If you have read this far, thank you because i know you are not interested in learning, and are probably just sitting there swearing at me so I will stop now.

I think the Startup Camp is a great idea. I congratulate Bart and Kim on a superb effort and applaud the contribution and effort made by all the participants. It will be my pleasure to support the event again.

Jordan Green

Duncan Riley · 1 year ago

Jordan,
it's on your linkedin profile, so if you're no longer with Greenson, take it off your profile. I did my research, if the information is incorrect, then it is incorrect because YOU put it on the internet...remember, the internet, that thing you don't list as an interest on your Linkedin profile.

Second: there's a difference between greed for greeds sake, and making money because you believe in something, or are passionate about the business sector you're in. You fall into the first category. Every VC wants a return, but some actually take an interest in the business aspects as well. Money comes as a result of that passion, and is not the only factor, as it clearly is with you.

That you'd suggest that anyone who would think otherwise is seeking charity and that their businesses are not worthy, nor even possibly profitable, really goes to the heart of every point in this post I made about you, and clearly demonstrates once again what type of VC and person you are. As I said in the post: if I never have to pitch to a guy like you again, I'll die a happy man. Not all VCs are bad, just some of them.

Duncan Riley · 1 year ago

BTW Jordan, what was your hidden agenda? after all, you deemed it necessary to personally attack me on the floor, but apologize to the next group by saying you didn't want to single anyone out. Constructive criticism would have been telling me I need to talk less in presentations and stay on message, what you did was say that "I talk too much and should never be allowed to pitch to a VC." (I'd note Jordon, for the record, that I was probably the only person in that room who had successfully raised VC for a startup I'd founded...but hey, you know best). That personal angle must have come from somewhere? I'd join the dots but your internet presence is so pissweak that without lodging an ASIC search, I can't find a list of your investments. Did I write something bad previously about one of your investments? is that? or someone you knows investment? What was it Jordan? Have I met you previously? Is there something in our pasts that caused you to be a complete dick on the day...or are you just normally that offensive and rude?

David Monagle · 1 year ago

I had resisted thus far commenting on a blog that is so full of embellishment and inaccuracies that it really did seem to be a waste of time.

Now that once again you have done exactly what you wrongly accuse others of and resorted to personal attacks - I will point out that during our little disagreement on the first night, it was you who resorted to personal attacks. Granted I did tell you that you were being rude because you were huffing and shaking your head at other peoples ideas, but you completely lost it like a spoiled child and threw a tantrum. You really did resort to personal insults such as calling me a "tool" (prefaced with a profanity) simply because I did not have the same marketing experience as you. For the record, I think at that point you lost the respect of the entire team.

Now why is it that you are the only person that I can find from the Startup Camp that did not fully appreciate Jordan's contribution? I found him to be short and to the point, full of good suggestions and even though he did point out issues that were related to my involvement. I am happy to take that on board. Do you think there is a reason that you are the only one that really believes he was offensive and rude? I thought he just gave an honest opinion and you aren't man enough to take it on the chin.

Why is it that you find it so hard to accept criticism? I've seen you cop it twice and both times you have over-reacted big time. I found the Startup Camp to be a great environment for learning and self analysis. I think that you completely missed the point.

Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkins · 1 year ago

Sounds like a swell event - I'd be interested sometime in participating in something like that here in the US.

With regard to this Jordan fellow, a lot of the VCs I've had the mis-fortune of dealing with (mostly in South Florida) are precisely the same. Generally unpleasant, want the whole pie (with a slice for you), and want to trim your budget to nil.

Ricardo from iSportster · 1 year ago

Hi Duncan!

Let me just say I am enjoying reading the comments as much as I enjoyed reading your perception of the event. Do I agree with what you have to say about the VC? Well, I reckon he was tough but fair and he was there to provide advice and when taking advice on board it is about chewing the meat and spitting the bones. However, I wasn't there when he was talking to your team, so you may well be right. I wonder what the other members of your team have to say.

With regards to the drama that went on with our team, man that was something else. It made for an interesting night, "The Apprentice" style. From my point of view, we had two strong personalities with not that different opinions, but just clashed on the night.

You are spot on about the market research on a start up. I do a form of market research called user research for a usability company and we simply had to make do on the night with the resources and the time we had. The idea and its execution weren't perfect, but we all learned a lot that weekend.

You can read about some of my learnings at:
http://www.stamfordinteractive.com.au/index.php...