Todd Pinkerton

My friend Chuck studies entrepreneurship at MIT; he turned me on to http://startup-review.com, a blog specializing in case studies of internet companies.

I haven’t seen this approach anywhere else among the ‘innovation’ blogs out there, and the writing quality is pretty good. I read one in particular about Digg.com , whose lessons I plan to utilize in a upcoming project.

Startup-review.com is blogged by Nisan Gabbay, a former VC. While I don’t often agree with (or enjoy reading) the investor’s perspective — I’d much rather read a blog by one of the entrepreneurs “in the trenches” — Nisan’s writing is insightful and thorough. One good reason to read his analysis is that he promises to interview at least one member of the founding team at each company he profiles. This alone should set this blog apart from those which merely speculate.

This kind of hard analysis of what attributes successful startups have is long overdue. Until we understand what factors contribute to success, we have less chance of getting there.

My only criticism would be that he only profiles ’successful companies’ — those that have had an exit, or sustained high revenues, or become a well-known ‘big brand’. Hindsight is 20/20, as they say, and drawing conclusions about the success of these companies after the fact can be misleading. I’d rather see a blend of case studies, including both successful startups and newer ventures yet to be proven.