george tziralis thought log - Latest Comments

Re: You learn, when you fail. You fail, when you don’t learn. Thus, you need to fail, at first.

facebook-1469378634 — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 17:40:41 -0000

In this context, there's good and encouraging motto by Esther Dyson, famous VC: "Always make new mistakes" - i.e. you learn and progress this way.

Re: You learn, when you fail. You fail, when you don’t learn. Thus, you need to fail, at first.

asteriosgontikas — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 01:38:19 -0000

Excellent proverb, the only problem is with most of us including me, is we fail and we do not learn, we try again even though we know that we will fail again.

Re: You learn, when you fail. You fail, when you don’t learn. Thus, you need to fail, at first.

kcorax — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 08:36:59 -0000

Openfund aside, I can't help but disagree. You can let others fail, read the case studies and perform without failing. To me it's all about acquiring all the right information before trying.

Re: You learn, when you fail. You fail, when you don’t learn. Thus, you need to fail, at first.

karagos — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:28:26 -0000

Great approach George
It is on our failures that we base a new and different and better success.

Re: Who I endorse in Greek elections, and why

asteriosgontikas — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 21:54:22 -0000

Dear George, as a Greek person living outside of Greece for 30 years now, but never left entirely from their, I return frequently and stay sometime for 3 to 4 months at a time, when I was single I used to stay for 1 to 2 years and come back to the states. I do want to extend congratulations to you on this article, you have hit this nail all the way in, with only one swing.
Congratulations, and keep up the good work, may your words of wisdom be true.

Re: Who I endorse in Greek elections, and why

kat — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 09:50:14 -0000

It was interesting to read your perspective on the Greek elections and candidates. I cannot vote, even after living/working here for 11 years, but I think voters have a difficult choice, something like the lesser of evils between two dynasties. One sentence I found particularly interesting: "I’m not willing to vote again for a person standing for the Greece I hate, or making me feel ashamed the next time I see him in Brussels or next to Barack Obama."

Even before Obama was elected, my Greek partner said that Karamanlis didn't look like a proper politician. He calls him the big, ugly fatso slob who embarrasses Greece every time he speaks. Although I wouldn't go that far, I thought it might have been embarrassing for Karamanlis when his wife performed CPR when all he could do was stand there.

Re: Who I endorse in Greek elections, and why

facebook-612448931 — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 04:36:10 -0000

You have me completely covered.

Re: Who I endorse in Greek elections, and why

PanosJee — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 04:15:15 -0000

You forgot to mention the leftist coalition Syriza and the party of Green Ecologists and of course some liberal parties like the Liberal Coallition and Drassi (not participating in these elections though). I tend to vote for some of those smaller parties which I will not disclose but i have to say that Papandreou has showed some positive signs. One of them is that a big part of the old corrupted PASOK is now missing not entirely though but I do not believe that much in the ones as well. Secondly they said said they will not use any giant posters and they did not. But I will believe in Papandreou if he does one single thing that he announced. Give citizenship to all immigrants' children. The economy and the pathogeny of the greek society cannot change by a single government but at least they can offer the basic human rights to almost 250k children

Re: On Ideas and their Value

spyflo — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 12:50:12 -0000

t=time, v=value

v = if(t=0, 0, x*g*h*e*a*z*v*b*t)

Re: On Ideas and their Value

gtziralis — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 04:34:13 -0000

Nikos, I agree, I'm putting it here from the perspective of the idea holder and aspiring entrepreneur. Bottom line, you shall better do not expect a lot by just "contributing" an idea, and not investing any of your time trying to properly document it and make it happen (even hiring and managing other people to do the job requires a considerable amount of time). After all, you are the first to downgrade it into something less valuable than your very own time in the first place, right after you conceived it. And, if you were the first who didn't believe in it, I consider it almost fictitious -or even ridiculous (just like this one, http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/23/ten-years-... to, let's say, demand a compensation or anything.
Another more harsh parallelism is the one of a kid's adoption. You may bring a child to the world, but then throw it in another's hand, I do believe the latter one who committed by putting all means of effort and time to bring up the child is the one who should take any credit of the "results".

Re: On Ideas and their Value

nikan — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:01:45 -0000

The proper phrasing should be:
"An idea’s value is directly proportionate to the time invested in turning it to reality."
The time does not have to be invested by the one that initially conceived the idea. My take on this here: http://webtropic.cc/2008/08/18/a-surplus-of-ide...

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

gtziralis — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 17:24:22 -0000

Point taken, and you're right at this excerpt. However, by somebody else running it, we may help co-shape decisions, while having access to all the results data :) Thanx

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

nikan — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 17:18:00 -0000

What I am simply saying, and I stop here, is that "we'd rather keep experimenting with it" and having somebody else to run it for three months are not compatible ;)

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

gtziralis — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 17:13:06 -0000

I think I've answered you already :)
First, we do not consider - given the amount of work that we have collectively put on the project- that it is saleable. Second, we don't want to give it away, we'd rather keep experimenting with it; the core benefit we have received and enjoyed so far is *learning*.

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

nikan — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 17:00:27 -0000

Yet, you did not answer my question: why don't you sell it? You are effectively trying to hire a manager at an unknown salary. The project needs an entrepreneur and since you lost your steam, try to find a buyer. Exit strategy.

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

gtziralis — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 16:25:32 -0000

Thank you Nikos. I personally don't consider the model as complicated, you get 50% of the revenues while developing the business around websource.it for 3 months. What's more, we want to keep experimenting with the project rather than anything else :)

Re: WebSource.it wants you (to run it)

nikan — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 09:47:58 -0000

Pretty complicated proposition for such a simple service. Why don't you simply sell it?

Re: VC 101 - Getting to Know

spyflo — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:28:51 -0000

dont be afraid of the anti-dilution term but use it in wise. do not expect someone to value a company for 1bn, when you value it for 100k. none can cancel the anti dilution mechanism apart from the (majority of) preferred shareholders.

this mechanism is very common and dont forget that it can be used as a sweetener to a potential investor (just issue new series of preferred shares or sell some/ all of the existing ones). in any case you can convert your preferred shares to common at any time (after a very hefty share capital increase.)

Re: VC 101 - Getting to Know

gtziralis — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 17:19:01 -0000

Thank you Spyros.

Regarding anti-dilution on the investor's stake, this probably should take place on *every* investment that follows, and I do wonder if this is typical or serves as a significant factor for the next investor to walk away from the deal (aka cancel somehow this provision or just walk away).

You are right (and this was a safe bet actually), the legalities of setting up the Openfund are indeed the hardest part of the job till now, but we love shaping solutions where they did not exist before :)

Re: Switched to WordPress

steve — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 17:12:01 -0000

Your theme is great so good job on the upgrade - its so clean and easy to read. good job.

boat holidays in greece

Re: VC 101 - Getting to Know

spyflo — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 13:55:16 -0000

with regards to the antidilution mechanism just a small correction. it can be used to secure both the value OR the stake of the investor. in other words it can be used to secure that the VC's investment will value at least $X OR to represent at least Z% of the company.

drag/ tag along provisions are not (usually) perpetual. in that case those provisions are similar to the "first refusal" provision.

i was not aware of the dividend provision. it actually seems quite awkward to have an "unconditional" dividend provision for an equity investment (esp in the case of start ups that by definition have no/ minimal revenues)

...i told you so, the legal part of Open Fund will be a pain in the a$$

Re: Openfund - The Business Plan

gtziralis — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 10:22:36 -0000

Seems to work here. You may also try the scribd link instead, http://www.scribd.com/doc/17251050/Openfund-The...

Re: Openfund - The Business Plan

abcccde — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 10:17:39 -0000

full screen mode doesn't work. Downloading it requires scribd login. I couldn't read it.

Re: Introducing The Open Fund

gtziralis — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 18:49:36 -0000

Thank you Doc, I'm honored by such a comment from you.

Re: Introducing The Open Fund

facebook-575409086 — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 16:03:29 -0000

congrats George, looks fantastic