这就是大多数初创公司缓慢死亡的唯一原因。
大多数初创公司并不会以戏剧性的方式失败。它们往往在几个月或几年中逐渐消亡，而创始人们却不断告诉自己离成功不远了。
实际上，导致它们失败的并不是努力或才华的缺乏，而是缺乏明确的停止规则。
没有预先定义的成功或失败标准，任何微小的信号都可能被解读为进展。几个用户的反馈似乎就意味着有了吸引力。
一次礼貌的对话感觉像是市场需求。活动取代了证据，而“不要放弃”成为了停滞不前的借口。
那些能够提前逃脱困境的创始人会在一开始就做出一些不舒服的决定。他们会明确在固定的时间窗口内，必须发生什么事情才能让这个想法存活下去。
如果这些事情没有发生，他们会在沉没成本占据主导之前选择放手。
我开始应用这种方法，是在意识到“几乎成功”和“悄然放弃”之间消耗了多少时间之后。
这种方法最终演变成了startupideasdb.com，围绕着失败标准而非灵感构建。
如果你已经“快到了”但超出了预期的时间，这篇文章值得你尽早阅读。
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Most startups don’t fail in a dramatic way. They fade out over months or years while founders keep telling themselves they’re close.<p>What actually kills them isn’t lack of effort or talent, it’s the absence of a clear stopping rule.<p>Without predefined criteria for success or failure, any small signal can be interpreted as progress. A few users feel like traction.<p>A polite conversation feels like demand. Activity replaces evidence, and “don’t quit” becomes a justification to stay stuck.<p>The founders who escape this earlier decide something uncomfortable upfront. They define what must happen within a fixed window for the idea to survive.<p>If it doesn’t happen, they walk away before sunk cost takes over.<p>I started applying this after realising how much time disappears between “almost working” and “quietly abandoned.”<p>That approach eventually became startupideasdb .com, built around kill criteria instead of inspiration.<p>If you’ve been “almost there” for longer than you planned, this may be worth reading sooner rather than later.