[gailtate]

I don't want to be "that guy" who takes one little comment in a post and blows it out of proportion, but...

The "entrepreneur rhymes with manure" comment is a little over the top. As an entrepreneur having lived in and 100% rejected the Silicon Valley start-up culture, I know there are many kinds of entrepreneurs.

There are the kind who are opportunists and just want to make money. There are the kind who have the resources to start a business, but really don't innovate anything as much as copy what others have done. Then there are truly mission-driven people who want to do things differently, do innovate and don't compromise. A lot of them don't have the success the popular culture celebrates, but they have more integrity in their pinkies than most people in the Silicon Valley game have in their whole bodies.

Elizabeth Holmes was into the fantasy of being an entrepreneur and being adulated by others. She wasn't a serious innovator. She was a con artist and self-promoter willing to fool and take advantage of people. Mark Zuckerberg isn't that much different. But he had the smarts not to bite off more than he could chew, and as fas as I can tell, he isn't interested in being a celebrity. Of course, this makes Zuckerberg far more dangerous.

For the record, I happen to be a once-and-future "entrepreneur", having been present at the creation of three Valley companies, one of which went public in 1995. I was also a low badge-number at Apple, Network Equipment Technologies and NetApp (then called "Network Appliance". I was there when Pete's Wicked Ale did its IPO, too. I'm now the founding CMO of a "low-tech" outfit HQ'd in Scottsdale AZ. I know the territory, the milieu and the heartburn (of making payrolls), stomaching VCs and working long hours for NO PAY. Loved it. Still do.

[gailtate]

I don't want to be "that guy" who takes one little comment in a post and blows it out of proportion, but...

The "entrepreneur rhymes with manure" comment is a little over the top. As an entrepreneur having lived in and 100% rejected the Silicon Valley start-up culture, I know there are many kinds of entrepreneurs.

There are the kind who are opportunists and just want to make money. There are the kind who have the resources to start a business, but really don't innovate anything as much as copy what others have done. Then there are truly mission-driven people who want to do things differently, do innovate and don't compromise. A lot of them don't have the success the popular culture celebrates, but they have more integrity in their pinkies than most people in the Silicon Valley game have in their whole bodies.

Elizabeth Holmes was into the fantasy of being an entrepreneur and being adulated by others. She wasn't a serious innovator. She was a con artist and self-promoter willing to fool and take advantage of people. Mark Zuckerberg isn't that much different. But he had the smarts not to bite off more than he could chew, and as fas as I can tell, he isn't interested in being a celebrity. Of course, this makes Zuckerberg far more dangerous.

For the record, I happen to be a once-and-future "entrepreneur", having been present at the creation of three Valley companies, one of which went public in 1995. I was also a low badge-number at Apple, Network Equipment Technologies and NetApp (then called "Network Appliance". I was there when Pete's Wicked Ale did its IPO, too. I'm now the founding CMO of a "low-tech" outfit HQ'd in Scottsdale AZ. I know the territory, the milieu and the heartburn (of making payrolls), stomaching VCs and working long hours for NO PAY. Loved it. Still do.