Barack Obama’s Back To School Speech - WhiteHouse.Gov (via fred-wilson)

Failure is such a huge part of being an entrepreneur.  It’s also one of the biggest benefits of starting a company and being an entrepreneur in the US.  It’s not the funding environment, the technical or business talent, or market size.  It’s that it is OK to fail.

My brother used to talk to German investors during board meetings in Berlin for a former company he worked with.  To their credit, they liked his stories of failing, but it was strange for them.  Most of the startup companies they invested in were managed by first time entrepreneurs or people with extensive successful startup histories.