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Startup Community Hubbub Emerges from ‘Blame and Failure’

Investors, founders, and advocates have taken to social media to fire shots at each other.
By Danielle Abril |
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The boxing gloves have come out on social media for some members of the startup community.
The boxing gloves have come out on social media for some members of the Dallas startup community.

The latest chatter within the Dallas-Fort Worth startup community could be compared to something out of a reality show: jam-packed with drama, frustration, and verbal left hooks. Investors, founders, and accelerators are taking shots at each other, publicly calling out each other’s failures on social media—a move that’s rare for a community that typically tries to flood its channels with positive news.

Some seem to suggest there’s a Ghostbusters-like slime oozing through the community, spreading negativity. But others say it’s nothing more than the cold, hard truth coming out at a time when the growing community needs it most.

Here’s a taste of some of the social media conversations:

“I’m starting to see a faction within the community that is comprised of people who add 0 value,” Stephen Hays of Deep Space Ventures tweeted on Thursday, reacting to a long conversation involving multiple founders, investors, and advocates. “Some people just whine and complain and are bitter about one thing or another instead of ‘doing.’”

In a separate conversation two weeks ago, Trailblazer Capital’s Joel Fontenot took to Facebook, calling out Tech Wildcatters after CEO Gabriella Draney Zielke posted about the organization’s seventh anniversary.

“Does that mean [you] finally get a real exit?” he posted, drawing backlash from Tech Wildcatters advocates. “Beware of any company, organization or entity that only communicates good news. As a wise man told me once, if you pivot more than once it’s called spinning.”

Draney Zielke responded by saying Tech Wildcatters was tracking just fine.

Meanwhile, critics, sometimes anonymously, have taken shots at serial entrepreneur Alexander Muse, who just launched Sumo Ventures; at Molly Cain, Tech Wildcatters’ former executive director who joined Muse; and at various founders and venture capitalists. Private email exchanges have heated up between individuals, as people take sides, argue over broken deals or departures, and blame each other for falsifying information and successes, sources say.

The new public display of tension from the “modern startup community,” as Dallas Entrepreneur Center CEO Trey Bowles calls it, comes as the community turns 10 years old and is beginning to crawl out of its infancy. The first signs of commotion seem to have appeared just after the Tech Wildcatters shakeup, although much of it is unrelated to the change there. It also comes at a time when some of the community’s startups are having to make tough calls either to continue their growth paths or to pivot in new directions as they mature from their early stages.

Within the past five years, the community has grown to include multiple investor groups, several accelerators, hundreds of events, and various advocacy groups. So, what’s causing all the stir now?

“Failure and blame,” Michael Sitarzewski, a community advocate who runs startup website Launch DFW, said via a private Twitter message on Thursday, adding that this is a sign of growing pains. “One side says the community is crap, the other points to a Slack with 470+ people in it. In 2012, there weren’t 470 people in the whole community.”

Muse, who launched one of the community’s first events several years ago, says the commotion is common, even if it’s new to DFW. It happens all the time in more mature startup communities like San Francisco, Boulder, and New York, he said. With DFW’s community maturing, “some of the cracks are starting to show.”

“By no means are these fissures in the ecosystem unique to Dallas,” he said in a text message Friday, adding that most of the drama goes on beneath the radar. “They’re all serious entrepreneurs and investors, and I think they’re making a mistake airing their laundry in public.”

But Hays, who’s said the community has had too much coddling, says it’s time to get vocal. Startups need a reality check, he said on Twitter. His series of pointed comments toward what he calls “pretenders,” which he refers to as founders with little to show for themselves, have led to some backlash and even to the creation of a parody Twitter account called FakeVCHays, which is now FakeVCHayss. It is unclear who created the account.

But Hays seems unfazed. “I think being vocal with constructive feedback, which may not always be popular, is healthy for founders,” he said in a private Twitter message. “Some advice is good, some is contrarian. Founders need to decide for themselves.”

While the hubbub in the startup community continues, Muse offers two pieces of advice:

“Never burn a bridge with an investor,” he tells founders. “I’ve made this mistake myself, and it’s something I’ve regretted my entire career.”

And to investors:

“Talk less, smile more. You have the power. Don’t abuse it.”

So feel free to heed the advice—or take a shot at it. We’ll continue to report here as the drama unfolds.

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