Goodbye from the Viewzr CEO

I wrote this a few years back, when my cofounders and I decided to shutter our company, Viewzr, after four or so years. I wanted to get it off my chest, so here it is.

There are lessons we’re taught from adolescence to adulthood; don’t run with scissors, don’t drink until you’re of age, don’t spend 50 grand a year on school your dreams ultimately don’t require, don’t work with friends. As a normal-facing human, I sprinted with scissors, I did more than drink before twenty-one, I toured schools that broke my parents bank/heart, and I started a pivotal, career-deciding company with my closest friends.

High school, perfect mixture of hell; misery and mischief. Marketing, DECA, accounting, film, friends and foes. Classic high school experience departed via skateboard through the halls. Summer spent “finding oneself” through anguish mixed unevenly with Vodka. Then college.

Film school, sign me up. Films, films, and more analysis. From high school classes spent filming shows and feature lengths (please don’t look up my reel), to college wasted analyzing garbage films and failing papers with no explanation and zero (I mean zero) physical interaction with a camera. Through the darkness of film school and the classic “no one understands me” of freshman year, I was introduced to @Atmosphere (listen to “Became” as a freshman, tell me you aren’t absolutely floored). Music surpassed film. I render useless, college is ether once motivation is shipped home.

Year spent at home, working at a rock climbing gym and farthing my music exposure, refining my taste and collection (seriously, this iTunes library is beastly). Music school is next. Sabbatical ends, I ship off to Florida.

The Fullest of Sales. College started, classes grasped, girlfriend attained, ease of life achieved. As I pushed through my courses, my passion for entertainment, music specifically, thrived. I found my classic college group of friends; same interests, same dislike for both classes and college, same want for scattered inebriation. As us five began finding success in each aspect of college life, we dove deeper into distasteful discussions of the incumbent entertainment industry. The fruitful expression of our discussions birthed Viewzr.

Fast forward two years. I’m living in Austin, striving for a music job, any job pertaining to my very expensive degree/passion while driving and parking cars. The times whipping around 6th St. in a ’65 Maserati or bumping @GrIz throughout the Lamborghini’s and RS-7’s got me through the monotony, but I felt that lust for more, still constantly aroused by thoughts of entrepreneurship. Eight long months pass, I get a call. “Viewzr is about to be released, a beta strapped with everything we’ve discussed. This is it.” Standing in my shared apartment, girlfriend and best friend staring in anticipation, I immediately decide to jump aboard. I pack my car and leave Austin, apartment and girlfriend in my rear-view. Pick my Dad up from the airport. Have to have the guy for the road trip, who else would provide introspective, Freudian conversation whilst begging to shut off the Bassnectar bangers. Two days pass, I’m in Denver. I move into this surreal house (incubator) and immediate exhilaration struck us all. I’m serious, if you’re ever told, “your room is past the bar, Ping-Pong table, and next to the home-theater”, sign the lease and DON’T LET GO!

Daily, ass early meetings had all us reporting successes and failures matched with nothing but enthusiasm. We operate like a machine, call after call, breaks met at the kitchen joking and eating, then right back to work. Platform updates daily. On the phone with world-class athletes and filmmakers while staring at the snowcapped Rockies. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the real founders meetings: trash talking during heart stopping games of NHL. We sleep, eat, work, play, drink together. Best friends starting a revolutionary company, eyes stuck on the future potential. A year and a half of seeming perfection. I even spend time gassing beers with some of the best climbers to ever live alongside action-sport forward company execs. I’m ticking boxes guys.

Let’s cut to the chase. As much fun as we were having, as many pool and NHL games we virtually bet on, the jade began to set in. Picture the Silicon Valley guys, living and working within 1,000 square feet. It gets to you. One of us stays out, wakes up late, and misses half an 8am meeting. What do you do? At this stage, all of us are CEO, all of us are accountable for our days and nights. Do we yell, bitch, hold this over your co-founder? Hard to do when you did the same last week. Accountability is unbelievably fickle when you all come and leave from the same place. Trying our best to carefully ride that line between friendship and co-founder, as if high lining over the valley in Yosemite.

As we push towards unreached milestones, we see ourselves in a close pre-investment moment. We’re positively frantic; hectic last minute creator-grab attempts, a few pre-celebratory drinks, a mango or two, and some serious internal excitement and angst.

What happens when you feel close to potential investment? What about hearing “you’re about to grab a mil in investment at 10% dilution”? If you’ve ever been here, you know, the first thought is team. Is this the team that will get us that investment? Will we all make it past the vetting process? Most importantly, if I’m asked, can I honestly say each us of is irreplaceable and deserves to stay on the team?

Holy shit.

Inhale. Advice, advice, more advice. We’re not in the spot we need to be in. Push. Traction, more traction, more, more, more. Exhale.

We carry on. We push. We hit a wall, we pivot. We pivot. Yet again. Buzz around desired industries. I hear “Oh, I’ve heard of you guys” from one of my climbing heroes. I reach out, positive of interest and beneficial integration, nothing. Push harder than I ever have.

Foot traffic, both viewers and creators, pushes limits upon limits, Google analytics hitting new highs. Nothing but M83 and celebration coming from us four founders.

Then, stagnation.

Stagnation.

Stagnation.

God, what is it? Team is too small to hit enough creators to bring mass viewers?

How hard is it for you to hear creators across the globe to tell you: this is it, this is the platform that will change all of entertainment, and to be forced to leave the platform’s initial vision and move towards greener pastures? Must we pivot beyond recognition?

If you haven’t experienced this, wow, it’s surreal.

Stagnation: name of the damn game here. Vision clashed with market fit, user want, distribution potential, development bottlenecking, and the ever-frustrating expression, “you need more traction before we look to invest”.

Meetings begin to sour, un/intentional blame placed on each one of us. Less excitement, less to report. The team, the product, the direction, and even the vision that brought us all together in Colorado, put in question. More isolation. CEO in his room for days without interaction, no more pool or NHL. As for me, I took up to sorrow-drowning in climbing and margaritas in the city (a welcome introduction to my next business partner). We push forward, we continue to reach for the stars, yet we attempt with significantly less luster…

We sit here hours before I write this, attempting positivity, ready to discuss the future of the company. Viewzr, a college dream worked out beyond business plans, proformas, “friends and family” investment, friends executing deep business meetings, a 100-year vision, all the way to more than a hundred creators across the globe believing in the dream. We sit here voiceless, unable to capture the right words. Can I even get myself to say it? I don’t have to. I hear it slowly pushed from another’s lips. “I don’t want to do this anymore”. Like a knife into my dream-riddled heart. Is this the end? I’d be ecstatic to have the sight enough to immediately type yes. I don’t. “End of an era” never rang so damn true.

As I proofread this, wishing to my deepest that it wasn’t the sad truth, Viewzr dissolves. You hear the hundred stories of success; the neighbors, the kid down the block creating an app that reaches the Kardashians before you even finish your Bachelor’s degree. What you rarely hear, rarely have the absolute, unequivocal pain and pleasure of hearing of, let alone experiencing, is the 99 of a 100 startup failures. While Viewzr had the potential to change millions of content creators’ lives, to fulfill the dream of four starry-eyed entertainment graduates, to put the hair back on my head like Bezos (don’t worry reader, my full head of hair rivals that of @John Stamos), we were forced to retire under the 99 column.

To those who believed in us, words escape us all, just wow. To those who doubted us, Gramatik just shut you the hell down (mic drop). And to those who invested your time, your money, and your ear to my constant cry of “SUCCESS, SUCCESS”, you have not only allowed for major pushes, mistakes, and failures, but also for four young guys to build a lifetime worth of dreams and goals. We love you.

And finally, through margarita courage on this plane ride, I thank my cofounders. You have shown me the truest of friendships, the hardest of endeavors, and the light in an otherwise mostly-dark tunnel. You will always be my first business partners. You will always be the guys who showed me that entrepreneurship is the only lifestyle I can fathom.

That first major failure is hard. It has been the hardest part of my life to accept. It feels emptying. I spent years, seriously years, feeling to the core that this vision would change the world. Hearing the most talented world-renowned creators; climbers, musicians, filmmakers, skiers, and more tell us that we struck an industry shaker only to tell each and every one of them that we’re snubbing the fire has been not only heartbreaking but also life altering.

As I move forward: please, please contact me if you find connection or some sort of solace in this. I have knowledge and all, but most of the time an ear suffices.

I’d like to add something positive to this. Two of us Viewzr gentlemen will be spearheading into the unknown and opening up Denver’s first cannabis coffee shop. Not only will we be hardcore boasting the social consumption license as if it were a pirate flag, the cafe will also be providing Denver’s first CEREAL BAR!

Either stay tuned or contact me. I answer every email, based on the hatred of people “too good” to answer emails throughout the week. Seriously, why do people ignore sincere emails, especially those asking for advice? Oh, I won’t directly and immediately increase your net worth by a thousand percent?! So sorry!

Love doesn’t seem to touch how I feel about each founder, funder, reader, follower, and of course, Momma and Poppa. You ignited, maintained, and molded my career dreams.

I thank you all again, profusely.

Cheers!

Mike Spidaliere

CEO-Founder

Viewzr

Related posts:

We are all within one breath of expiring. “SAVING BREATH” is published by Stephen C. Rose in Everything Comes.

Ya desde hace unos años todo el mundo utiliza un gestor para construir un proyecto y obtener sus dependencias. Ahora ya no podemos vivir sin estas tecnologías, pero antes se tenían que importar todas…

Marketing blocks are essential tools for any business that wants to succeed in today’s competitive market. They help businesses to reach their target audience, engage with them, and convert them into…