Among those who make the Internet run - some of whom will remind you they were doing it when you were in diapers - there seems to be a rejection of "the VC way." The tone is one of backroom snickering and derision about people with huge amounts of money to waste who get behind technology product / service development that is deemed flawed, opportunistic, and embarrassingly pandering to VC agendas.

There's certainly a range of reactions - from casual "How stupid can they be?" incredulity to venomously hostile tech aggression and boycotting. This extends far beyond simple anti-MSFT.

Techies who retained their integrity thru the golden stupidity rush of the dot com boom may even have some sour grapes. They watch "stupid" people become multi-millionaires  by taking "stupider" people's money. They watch BS and spin perpetuate both players careers. Secretly the person of integrity thinks - "they got paid for really poor quality stuff - I've done much better things and I should have gotten at least half what they did." And they press on, another day, another year, doing high quality work that actually serves real purposes.

Opportunism and "we own the Internet" play very well to the VC mentality.  GRRR - "market share" - GRRR - "traction" - GRRR - "our team."

And "If we could just get $1 from every .... on the Internet who needs a ...." will get you beat up and thrown out of the biker bar where the people who really make the Internet work hang out.

Let's get down to basics. I say that the ethical goal of technology development is to increase the standard of living on the planet. We can shorten this to "help people" - bearing in mind that I want to see a planet that honors animals and plants and whatever microbes similarly so that we can all live in harmony. (/me hands you a sappiness barf bag - but still it would be a nice dream.)

Ok, where does VC, going public, getting rich etc fit into helping people? Supposedly investors are an integral piece of the puzzle. The technology innovator needs capital to convert "ideas" into a product or service that helps people. Investors take risk and thus "should" be rewarded. Sometimes they lose, sometimes they win. It's almost as unpredictable as the weather or a butterfly wing vortex.

The "winners" have to pay for the losers. So as a technology innovator - if you are one that actually makes something useful to help people and you need investor money - you bear the burden of compensating for all the people with all the ideas that didn't help people, but cost investors lots of money. You will need to make up for that.

(drawing: "In order to balance out the losses in the high risk portion of my portfolio, the terms under which I can give you money are...."  What terms would be if every idea had helped people - small box representing what $ the investor would need as ROI for this innovator's idea that can help people. Many boxes, some very fat or heavy, representing the losses the investor suffered by investing in ideas that didn't help. All these are piled on the innovator's shoulders.)

No matter how wonderful the ethics of the Venture Capital firm or investor - they have to make the successful idea-that-can-help-people pay for their mistakes made investing in ideas that didn't help people or companies that weren't run profitably enough.

And now let's take a look anyway at the motives and goals of Venture Capitalists and many investors. I guess they are split into two groups - or are all along a continuum from "highest priority is how much money I get" through "sure I want something good to happen but I must get at least nnn ROI" to "I will only invest in companies I feel are socially responsible."

Based on the way companies "tailor" the investor section of the website, I'm guessing most investors fall into the category of intolerance of anything other than putting their ROI as the number one priority.

Let's see how beneficial investors are as part of the team that is trying to actualize technology that can help people.

 - T or F: While pursuing investor dollars, innovators stay focused on making their product or service the best it can be and the thought they wake up with every morning is how to do better at helping people today

 - T or F: As the innovation interacts with users and requirements inevitably shift as new ways to help people are illuminated - investors encourage innovators to mold the business model to what is best for helping people.

 - T or F: Once the product or service is succeeding at helping people, investors obtain their ROI in the way that is most supportive of the product or service continuing to help people.

Part of the snickering about "stuipid VC" by the folks that make the Internet work comes from the challenge investors have in finding someone highly qualified to evaluate the innovation during due diligence. They pick someone "really smart" about "computers" or "the internet." It's hard for most investors to tell the difference between a techie who "really knows what is going on" in the specific field of the innovation they are considering investing in - and a techie who has impressed them with articulate language, an interaction with technology (fixing / creating / predicting), or CV (degree / used to work for company X.)

VC who support the companies that are being snickered about don't often talk to the people who could give them valuable due diligence intelligence. Maybe the failure to connect goes hand in hand with the greed, blindness, and disinterest in what those people feel is the real question: "What would help people the most in this field?"

The "investor is your partner in getting rich" model for innovators has naturally spawned innovators who also no longer care about helping people as the primary goal, but perhaps about catering to perceived interests of investors as the primary goal. Or "getting rich" when we "go public." Have an idea.... multiply $1 by number of Internet users we capture as market share.... patent it... "sell" investors on it... get kudos for "flipping" the company regardless how it affects the efficiencey of Helping People.

Note that corporations large enough to play out the whole "investor focused innovator / ROI focused investor" scene internally no doubt suffer similar challenges and inefficiencies.

But some use a more successful and efficient model internally - to turn R&D into products and services delivered with continuity and solid profitability to help people. Can this model be brought out and applied to relationships between innovators, customers, and the services and products they create together? (Yes, I say customers are part of the service / product creation. And yes, they do call me Master of the Obvious.)

My first suggestion is that Innovators be supported directly by Implementors. Remove the high risk/high reward investor middleman from the equation. "First let's spend a lot of money getting this ready to sell the the Implementors and then we'll charge them a really high price and give me the difference between fair price and how much we can squeeze them for."

Why is it that the innovator can't go directly to the Implementor for support as things stand now? Yes, there have been Implementors who stole ideas instead of supporting the innovator. Also Implementors who don't have Helping People as their highest priority - want to use Innovators to gain "competitive advantage." Likely this will severely limit how much support and prospering Innovators can achieve - thus how efficiently they can create more things to Help People in their lifetime.

There may be a lot of communication problems between Innovators and Implementors. (See " The 'You're an Idiot' Barrier to Technology Transfer".) Innovators of course also contribute to blocking the process of helping people - when the have fear-based thinking ("I'd rather nobody got to use it than have people steal it and make money off of my idea.") or greed ("I deserve 50 cents for every widget click!") One more mistake Innovators may make is failing to insure that they get *enough* support to do an excellent job with the innovation du jour and the others they could shepherd into existence as their life goes on.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

Support Innovators to ensure that they have what is needed to do their part with excellence. Being at their best will come from every aspect of the support they have in their personal and professional life, including mentoring. Not just the cash or equipment available. Support Innovators long term rather than looking at each innovation piecemeal. Do not support opportunistic, greedy and fear-based Innovators - do remain available to them as a mentor and be sure they have examples of successful models of ethically sound Innovators getting what they need.

Invest in Implementors who support Innovators and have developed more effective methods of discerning Annoying Idiots from Innovators. A great leadership role for ethical investors may be to  facilitate in the forming of relationships between Implementors who can be a bit NIH and Innovators who can benefit from reality checks.

Keep as your highest priority - what will be most efficient for Helping People. The responsibility to take the best care of an idea that can Help People encompasses the need to make a fair profit that will enable all parties to do their part with excellence.