In case any first time founders out there are basing some of their own management ideas on this letter, please remember:
"Families and tribes" (a) get by fine without explicit processes because they are small groups, or (b) they do have the processes but they don't need to be written down because they are taught implicitly from birth.
Arguments of the form "We don't need [insert any concept from management text books] because we are smart, technical people" are the flags on areas of your company that will break the worst.
This might help bloggers write copy, but it's definitely not good for writers. The first paragraph of Chapter 1 of Robert Hughes' Shock of the New has these stats according to Hemingway:
5 of 12 sentences are hard to read.
2 of 12 sentences are very hard to read.
2 adverbs (he should be aiming for "0 or less").
0 words or phrases could be simpler*
*this "could be simpler" feature might be a bit ambitious. If you're confident in telling me that the entire text is essentially too complicated, it seems contradictory that at the same time none of it could be made more simple.
Even though I rarely answer calls from an unknown number, I wish more Startups used something like this within 24 hours of me signing up instead of the usual follow up email 6 to 12 months later telling me about new features or offering help. By that time I can't even remember why I signed up.
I'm also biased because I love being sold to when the rep is executing her pitch well.
I feel the same - intermittent short (1min) down times happen pretty regularly, about once a month, and I only know that from my own monitoring tools - no emails or notifications from them. I want to love them too :(
