Half-Baked Product

The founder should have visited China's oven manufacturing market/industry after raising 5 million. This could have solved their first major client Pepepizza feature problem.

This is like a punch in the gut. Holy buckets. How do you prevent this? Bootstrap?

This was exquisitely cringe-laden and I think I may be the Luigi figure

Interesting story. This seems a true story of the author? The author understands the characters of the people in the process of business. Understanding reality is not easy.

While the majority of comments are absolutely right in recognizing and lamenting such situations plaguing our industry, let's not forget this is an ultimate first world problem. It can be stressful and frustrating but we are a privileged bunch to be able to call this 'pain'.

Honest question: Does the founder end up making money this way? Can you really get rich building a failed business?

If I didn't laugh i'd cry.

This was actually so good to read. It really reminded me of so many of my past experiences at startups.

Great story. Reminded me what my professional nightmare would look like. But, I think at the end it started to thin out its allegorical premise when it started including SWE terms like Kanban and retros.

I LOVE THIS!! well done.

Well written. This applies much further than just equity raising startups.

Daft! And very strangely true. I recognised several moments and events in the story

MCP for browser automation is interesting because Safari's WebKit engine is the one most AI agents can't easily drive (Playwright and Puppeteer are Chromium-first). Having an MCP server for it could fill a real gap in cross-browser testing for agent workflows.

Oh, that one hits hard on the nail.

Well written and it perfectly describes reality, it got me hooked and nodding from start to finish.

Ouch, that hits close to home, and it seems like it does for a lot of others out there as well.

So what's the solution? Is there a playbook that avoids these pitfalls, or is it just the cost of the spin. Ideally, something early engineers can point to when we see non-technical founders falling into familiar traps.

This is inkblot test. Some will read it and see fundamental irrationality. Others will read it and say “it could have worked out if a couple of things had gone their way.”

The story could be change with just a few sentences in the middle that would turn it into the founding myth of how Globoven took 100% of the market for energy efficient portable emergency ovens for NATO military use.

Now I remember why I noped out of tech a decade ago...

> The founder is very good. He builds a plan that, on paper, is flawless and airtight: manufacture a more efficient oven using new technology. Selling it is easy. Want to work more efficiently? Buy our oven. End of pitch.

Are you kidding me? Here's my business plan: manufacture faster computer chips than anyone else ever has before using new technology. Selling it is easy. Want faster computers? Buy our chips. End of pitch.

Here's my execution strategy: I'm going to hire the person who comments the most on Hackers News discussions about new chips and let him loose, then come back with a million new requirements because I never bothered to understand anything about how people want to use computer chips or how they're sold today.

My company eventually loses its only customer when it turns out that we don't know how to build faster computer chips at all.

The founder is not "very good", he's a moron who doesn't make a single good decision in the entire story. His failure is absolutely predictable because he doesn't add any value for anyone else at any point in the story, he doesn't understand his customers, he doesn't understand the market, and he doesn't understand his employees and their motivations. The only thing he ever does is raise money, and he's able to do that because his investors also know nothing about the customers, the market, or the potential employees.

Great business parable! This matches how reality works 100%, including the delusion that guys like this are "really smart".

The more I read into it, the more pain memory flashbacks I got. Bravo

my favorite blog post of all time... this should go in a museum

This is so well written. Well done!

Brilliant. Brutal.

Unrelated, but does anyone else remember halfbakery.com?

Oh cool it's still around!

This could have all been solved if they added a setting for bread, pizza, or cake.

Enjoyed this – very entertaining!

s/oven/cms/g

Spoiler: This is not about ovens.

Spoiler: this is not about ovens.

> The founder is very good. He builds a plan that, on paper, is flawless and airtight

Premise is laughable right out of the gate.

I mean sure, but look, I will not make the same mistakes.

Also my context is totally different. And MY oven concept has none of the drawbacks of their oven and Claude tells me I'm definitely on to something.

I'm off to the notary to sign the docs for Oven.ai (got the domain for only 300k!!) See ya on my yacht!

Every feature you add to you product really explodes the amount of new states you have to take care of, in addition to the risk of diverting the core product vision

How on earth did this post get so many points and comments lol

this is the best thing i've read in a while. it's both triggering and prophetic at the same time. really captures the essence of what happens in startups. well done.

i am completely new to this stuff (just made a mobile app). thanks for explaining (in 5 year-old kiddo style) how funding and corpo slop works. WOWOW

No cap

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A legend in the making.