alt.hn

2/19/2026 at 4:53:39 AM

Why don't entrepreneurs talk about starting businesses publicly anymore?

by silexia

2/19/2026 at 10:26:33 PM

" I think people stopped talking about it because the 'how-to' got buried under 'hustle culture' noise. The simple, honest machine still works, but for a global audience, the biggest barrier now isn't the will to work—it's the infrastructure.

I’m currently building Dollarland on Vercel to help bridge that gap. I see thousands of people in emerging markets who have the skills to 'make things people want' but struggle with the logistics of getting paid in USD or finding remote arbitrage.

Entrepreneurs should talk about it publicly again, but we need to focus on the technical and financial pipes that make that freedom possible for everyone, regardless of where they were born

by Dollarland

2/19/2026 at 10:20:44 AM

It's because the risk ratio has changed for different people. If you're poor, there's much less to lose - you just become in debt, but you'd be there anyway.

America also has the megacorporations. Trillion dollar companies which can hire hundred of thousands of people and pay them what a medium-sized business owner would make. They have the economy of scale; they can pay a single engineer to increase profit by 0.01% and it would be more than a startup growing stuff by 3x.

The odds of me joining a megacorp is nearly nil due to immigration restrictions, so businesses are still more sensible. It's probably the case for most of the world.

by muzani

2/19/2026 at 1:27:43 PM

If I tell you about my billion dollar idea for an app you may steal it, so I am building in secret (it's a decentralized boat renting exchange)

by nananana9

2/19/2026 at 10:53:46 AM

Well publicly is a question of where. There's still a lot of startup talk on startup focused reddits / twitter / hn. The main trend I have seen with AI tooling is the dialogue shifting to indie / small teams rather than the VC rush of the 2010s.

by Cloudly

2/19/2026 at 9:03:15 AM

Hey! You’re right!

I was just thinking about this the other day. Once, it was frequent to see resources for starting small businesses and while they still may be “available”, it is not prominent.

Starting a small business is an advancement of personal power!

by uncanny2