To use Fyre’s analogy, it’s enough to look at the rise of Billy McFarland, Fyre’s infamous Millennial entrepreneur mastermind. The guy had no particular field of expertise or interest, he just wanted to make it big in business, any business. So no substance to begin with – like a politician without a program, just aiming for power for power’s sake.
He was much hyped by investors and the dumbest corners of the media for “knowing what Millennials want” and collecting them as customers – but his schemes were never really sound financially, he was always just paying for one thing by launching into another, raising dumb money with attractive buzzwords.
Imagine being Billy’s competitor – but without the fearless attitude to debt and impossible promises. Imagine that you are in the same business, but fettered by the naive habit of only promising what is doable and being absolutely honest when it is not 100% certain. What investor would pay into your commendable, realistic self-doubt? What customer buys a ‘maybe’? They want face and posturing, they actually demand it, just look at any business manual (or political consulting advice). In fact, fake-it-till-you-make-it is the modus operandi of startuppers, always running from debts into even bigger projects, forever hoping that one of them will stick and finally make it so big that 1) they can pay back the loans or 2) they become too big to fail. This is what keep businesses unsound and politicians exposed to blackmail and creditors.
Try to be their honest competitor.
At some point in this communication arms race entrepreneurs and politicians alike have to start actively denying reality – not just neglecting it – because spending all that time doctoring your image makes you even more fat and less attractive IRL.
via meanwhile in budapest
