This email greeted me Saturday morning:

One of the drives in the server that runs Startupping had failed. No data was lost, because the drive was part of a RAID. The hosting company was able to quickly replace it and things are back to normal. But it serves as a reminder that hard drives are not nearly as reliable as most people think they are. You need to always plan for hardware failure with your Internet service, because it will happen.

User nalin recently posted these great ones:

1. You'll have to revise your 'strategy' every few weeks so don't spend a lot of time in Word / PowerPoint / Kinkos making it look pretty.
2. No matter where on the emotional rollercoaster you are on any given day, project total confidence to the outside world -- people respond more to that, than your schpiel on disintermediating blah, blah, blah.
3. If you go to a web 2.0 networking event, everyone you tell your idea to thinks they're an expert on what web businesses will succeed or fail. They're not. No one is. They just all read the same blogs which confidently assert constantly changing conventional wisdom.
4. Wear comfortable shoes. You're frequently going to need to step outside to walk around the block while muttering to yourself.
5. Exercise and eat healthy. In the long run, you don't increase productivity by consuming pizza, doritos and red bull while chained to your desk all day/every day.
6. When your friends/family ask you how the business is coming along... always start off by saying "Great!" Save the cathartic sharing of any doubts/stress with fellow entrepreneurs and sites like this! Non-entrepreneurs won't understand and will just feel sorry for you...

Every Friday we summarize some of the interesting discussions taking place in the Startupping community:

Have you ever worked for an equity share?
I have an opportunity where I have been asked to possibly work for equity in a Web 2.0 start-up... I want to find out from others who have worked for equity and have been successful. What did you look for in the venture the gave you clues it would be successful? How did you negotiate the terms to mitigate risk or help to ensure you share in the success? What whould I be aware of?
.... Read More ....

Help Me Find Target Audiences For My website
I am developing a Job listing website which would let people browse jobs that pays cash in hand.These are kind of small & quick jobs which would let people earn quick cash by working for few hours example could be baby sitting , handyman , cleaning , gardening jobs... Can you think about potential audiences for this kind of website?
.... Read More ....

Is it okay for a company not to share its valuation?
I am considering joining this 2yr old, 50 employees startup. The company has raised one round of 10 million dollars of funding earlier and are going for another round soon. They are giving me some stock options, so I was curious what 1) was their current valuation, and 2) valuation when the first round of funding... and 3) expected dilution in my stock as a result of second round. They refused to answer any of the questions quantitatively, and instead said things like "a good valuation" and "not much dilution". Is this normal or this company is too secretive?
.... Read More ....

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