I've thought of this before. I think a Studs Terkel style oral history from some otherwise successful Silicon Valley entrepreneurs where they recount times they failed horribly would actually be pretty amusing, if not cathartic if done correctly.
I did a startup of my own in the 2000s... I decided to change the domain/company name to something shorter. I assumed I'd just redirect requests and all would be fine. I totally didn't think about the effect that the change would have on my Google SEO. Things were fine, then suddenly the traffic dropped to almost nothing. The new domain wasn't being indexed and the old domain disappeared because of whatever stupid HTTP header I put on it. Cut from this event to three months later having my car repossessed and it's a "fun" story.
I would definitely enjoy a book of fuckups like this from others.
I did a startup of my own in the 2000s... I decided to change the domain/company name to something shorter. I assumed I'd just redirect requests and all would be fine. I totally didn't think about the effect that the change would have on my Google SEO. Things were fine, then suddenly the traffic dropped to almost nothing. The new domain wasn't being indexed and the old domain disappeared because of whatever stupid HTTP header I put on it. Cut from this event to three months later having my car repossessed and it's a "fun" story.
I would definitely enjoy a book of fuckups like this from others.