Kevin Rose
CEO at HODINKEE. Builder of internet things. Tech investor.
Discussion
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
Hi all, can’t wait to answer your questions today. Join me for a conversation around startups, investing, body hacking, product design, podcasting, or whatever. No question is off limits.
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Ryan Gilbert
@ryangilbert · workspaced.com
Hi Kevin!
1) Are there any new Foundation interviews coming in 2016?
2) What three words would you use to describe raccoons? 😬
Thank you!
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@_ryangilbert Nothing planned yet, I might turn this into an audio podcast so that I can crank them out faster, thoughts? re: raccoons: 1. evil 2. oily 3. beasts
@kevinrose @_ryangilbert Nice work Kevin. 💪
Vlad Gidea
@gidea · Lean Analytics
@kevinrose @_ryangilbert yeap, audio podcast would do just fine. we miss you guys and the funny stuff (aka insightful comments). Plus I bet there's so many things you'd like to say about what's going on these days :)
Michael A.
@massoian
@kevinrose @_ryangilbert I prefer video, even if they are less frequent. Adds an interesting dimension to the conversations.
Amir Pakzadian
@amirp · Founder & CEO, Bia2.com
Hi Kevin. Google ( + Youtube), Apple, Spotify and Amazon are all working on music streaming services. What are your thoughts on where the music space is heading? Any predictions or cool opportunities you see?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@amirp I'd stay away from this space and let the giants slug it out. If Amazon can actually launch a product that doesn't look like an e-commerce site I'd be a fan. I love how they are bundling a bunch of free digital media with my Prime membership, more of that please.
Jeff Needles
@jsneedles · BI @ Meerkat & Maker of Things
Hey Kevin! This is awesome 💯 thanks for doing it.
You've kinda gone from being a very public person (TSS, diggnation etc...) to a more private one... A couple questions around this:
1) Have you had any issues with people having a preconceived notion of publicness in what you do?
2) Was something inherently more difficult/challenging in living so publicly vs. not so much?
3) When can we see more toaster pup? He's the cutest dog ever.
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@jsneedles Thanks for the questions. I've never minded being a somewhat public person, meeting fans from TechTV/Diggnation/Digg, etc. was always a lot of fun. In the end, we're all geeks pumped up and excited by the same stuff -- it was always easy to relate to everyone.
Then there was the time I was protested outside of my home, I think that's when I started to pull back a bit. At the time I was a VC at Google Ventures and the protestors pulled an old Diggnation joke from a few years prior (horrible joke based on the movie Clockwork Orange), they used this as ammunition and decided to stalk our family. I had Google security sitting outside my house at night for a few days. Honestly a pretty stressful time. After this and general tech burnout I needed some time off and a reboot. NYC was calling my name and now I'm out here :). Sorry, that was long, oh and more Toaster pics on my Instagram soon!
Andy Newman
@andynewman
Hey Kevin! Thanks for doing this.
What's been the biggest adjustment since moving to NYC? Has it shifted your view of tech and how it fits into your life?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@andynewman Mostly finding new friends, I had a great crew back in SF. It's refreshing how it's not all tech talk in the cafes, I love the industry diversity here (people from finance, film, tech, fashion, etc.)
Joe Arcuri
@joearcuri · UX designer
When Digg pivoted after it was sold, it was such a big change from what you built, yet still remains a great site. The framework you and your team built with Digg can still being seen in sites like Product hunt, What was one take away from your time at Digg that had the most impact on you? oh yea..when are you bringing back the next live diggnation?, I saw you and Alex at SXSW, such a great time.
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@joearcuri Thank you for calling out the framework, I do love seeing sites like PH taking things to the next level, continuing to push things forward :)
Tough question, I think my biggest takeaway is this:
If you're starting something new, and this is your first company, maintain control at all costs. If you're inexperienced, seek our successful mentors that you can trust. Preferably unbiased with zero ties to your company. Be open and honest with them, hell, with everyone. If you don't know something, don't hide the fact, find people that do and take it head on.
After a few months of running digg things started to take off, I was scared of the CEO role so I hired someone. Sadly, we didn't see eye to eye on many things, and I couldn't force him to make changes. Later when things started to decline we had to let him go. It was years of this battling that burnt me out, and sadly most of this could have been avoided if I had stepped up and confronted my fears in the beginning.
Rui Gouveia
@ruigouveia · Founder - Build Up Labs
Do you believe the Venture Builder / Startup Studio model has a viable future for creating stronger startups?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@ruigouveia I do believe in them as long as they are well capitalized. Obvious is a great example here. Medium took awhile (and lots of $$) until the product started to catch fire. The same can been seen w/ Expa. Operator and Reserve are great products but have yet to fully tip. If a studio is underfunded they won't have the time to iterate and find their audience.
Napoleon Suarez
@napoleonsuarez · Founder, Fishbox
Kevin, congrats on joining HODINKEE! I've been following Ben and his team from afar and they're doing some pretty dope things.
When you shut down Tiiny, you wrote a post on Medium about what you were going to do next and the first thing that you said was "No lifestyle businesses" https://medium.com/@kevinrose/we...
To some, HODINKEE qualifies as a lifestyle business. I honestly don't see anything wrong with that, but I'm curious as to why you decided to change your mind on that one. Do you see HODINKEE as being something bigger than a lifestyle business? If so, can you explain how HODINKEE is different?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@napoleonsuarez Thanks for your questions!
You are 100% correct. HODINKEE today is a lifestyle business, we closed out the year with revenue in the millions, but not hitting scale or going public anytime soon. That said, I look at last year as one of technical debt. We had to fix the backend, launch an app, fix the .com usability, etc. That's all done now, so 2016 will be about new products. Products that we hope will tap into something much larger. As I'm sure you know, new and vintage watch sales per year are in the double digit billions. We're investigating ways to reimagine portions of that pie.
Thomas Stöcklein
@tomstocklein · FoundersFundersFuture.com
Kevin, if you could time-travel back to 2004, but retain all of your knowledge, skills and experiences as of 02/2016, what product/company would you build? Would it be a different version of Digg?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@tomstocklein I probably just wait for bitcoin to be invented. Then buy a gazillion coins at .01 cents. Seriously tho, I'd just stay true to the core digg audience, building tools for them, not the publishers.
Greg Moore
@gmoore131 · http://thegregmoore.com
When you're evaluating an idea you want to work on, what's your process? Do you have a framework that helps you weed out weaker ideas?
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Kevin Rose
@kevinrose · Builder of internet things.
@gmoore131 Yes, getting it into wireframes and on your phone as soon as possible. I've killed a few ideas after having a mock UI running on the phone and it not feeling right.