Thanks for weighing in.

Regarding a “user uprising”, consider these 2 points:

1. iTwin has not been commercialized. SocialWok targets small-to-medium enterprise user base. HomeCamera may be commercial, but it targets a niche audience. Not much chance of a popular user uprising, is there?

2. You cannot help the startups gain users if nobody knows about them, and it is difficult to let people know about them without employing the mainstream media. A startup may do it without the mainstream media, but would they scale faster than their burn rate?

Simply said – a startup cannot change the world, if the world doesn’t know they exist.

And if the mainstream media think I’m picking a fight – they’d better grow thicker skin! =)

it is every entrepreneur’s dream to seek acknowledgement and validation of their hard work and determination agst all odds. some face more odds than others, hence it is all the more satisfying when one gets some form of victory, no matter how big or small the victory is.

but entrepreneurs hv to avoid sinking into the self-delusion bubble. one’s personal victory is not necessarily shared by others. publicity is good-to-have, but the “who cares” question is equally as impt in PR as in product feature devt. why bother about what others people think, as what PR is, when entrepreneurs shld care abt their users first and foremost?

in all this talk abt the 3 startups, i have not seen any user uprising about why their startups is not featured. not enough users or users dun care? that is the real crisis. not mainstream media in SG not picking it up. dun get me wrong, the SG startup community should care and comment on this, but lets move on and stop picking a fight with mainstream media and help the startups gain users instead if one is up to it.

I’m not talking about excessive celebration (which I agree can be detrimental); but at least some form of recognition which can spur them to greater things.

Perhaps the problem is that the local mainstream press may not even be clued in even if they are interested.

The best form of motivation for any entrepreneur is to hear a big thank you from your users, and to be recognized by his peers for his achievements. Having mainstream media cover one’s achievements is a good-to-have, but I’m not sure that’s going to be what’s keeping them entrepreneurs up at night.

Excessively celebrating any form of success would also lower the bar for future, more significant successes (yet to come) by them or other start-ups from our ecosystem. Let’s not count our chickens before they hatch. Besides, I’d much rather keep those shots and make them count, rather then expend it here and now.

What’s worthy of our mainstream media would probably be a main win at TC50 (i.e. best of 50). In the meantime, good job guys, and keep doing your best at changing the world.

And I doubt that many would argue that despite the attention they have been getting, most people are still not convinced about Twitter. It is still very much a Silicon Valley thing.

You can do your part to provide coverage, but we shouldn’t blame the local press or others for not doing so. They are not obligated to do so. If they were failing their readers in that respect, then their readers should move elsewhere, and let them be the author of their own demise.

I personally would much rather hear about the companies that truly succeeded and crossed the chasm than to hear about the dozens of startups that are launched everyday.

If you are looking through the eyes of an investor, yes you’re right and entrepreneurs shouldn’t aspire towards media attention as opposed to driving value. But remember, it’s not a sliding scale.

My point is that there are startups in Singapore who can provide business value, and as a country who purportedly is encouraging entrepreneurship, we should celebrate any form of success to, as you said, ’serve as a firm pat on the team’s backs, to drive them to scale greater heights’.

For these successes may not come as often as we’d like.

That’s the sad truth.

If the mainstream press should be interested in this scene only if it is popular, huge and successful, then its not exactly news is it? Oh wait… maybe you’re right – since only now are the local press interested in 3-year old Twitter.

But I agree with you that the press do not owe startups any coverage. You’re also right to say that startups should focus on providing true value instead of clamoring for attention.

Which is why folks like us have to do it on their behalf.

I might be wrong, but I do not think iTwin is the first Singapore start-up to demo at TC50. FusionGarage had demoed as well, and there might have been 1 or 2 others before that.

TC50 is a great event, but being a DemoPit winner certainly isn’t something that any prospective user or investor would care about when they are evaluating the product/service. It’s important for entrepreneurs to be focusing on the right milestones, no matter how difficult things may seem. After all, in a desert, even a drop of water in the distance could be a mirage for a stream.

The sort of entrepreneurs I’d like to work with, are those who would not be spending the time bemoaning the lack of love by his homeland, but instead be continually focused on his product and users. A small win does not maketh a start-up. It should instead serve as a firm pat on the team’s backs, to drive them to scale greater heights.