I learned that the technology co-founders I initially brought in weren't the right fit and didn't have the skills to take the business where I wanted it to go, so I had to fire them.

I realized I wasn't good at product management and had to let go of that role to allow someone more qualified to lead product development.

I hired an incredible CTO who is not a co-founder but has goals tied to his compensation, which has worked well for me.

I called my best friend from Y Combinator, who was working on a different company, and asked him to come to New York because I needed help with technology.

We brought on a friend from college, Michael, to be the CEO and keep us product-focused, as we were prone to distraction.

We realized we weren't solving our users' problems anymore, which led us to halt all operations for nine months to reimagine our product and company.

I was forced out as CEO after a period of rapid growth, which was influenced by market changes and compliance issues that made investors nervous. David, the CEO, focused on attacking me for six months, which ultimately drove the company into the ground.

I managed to convince Brett Taylor to co-found FriendFeed with us; he was frustrated with the slow and clunky product at Google Maps and rewrote the entire JavaScript front-end over a weekend, making it ten times faster.

Our startup had a dreamlike start, but just weeks before launch, our first engineer quit, leaving me feeling like I had failed.