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Selling candles to the night watchmen

Written by Michael Dijkstra on 12 Dec 2012

“Although the posts were unpaid, Josiah [Franklin] practiced the art, which his son would perfect, of marrying public virtue with private profit: he made money by selling candles to the night watchmen he oversaw.” 1

I have just started reading the Benjamin Franklin biography by Walter Isaacson (the same author who later wrote Steve Jobs biography) and the above quote really caught my attention because I feel it perfectly describes what we’re setting out to do with Storyberg.

We’re going to help startups all around the world build more successful businesses by knowing they’re building something people want. While we are building Storyberg and charging a monthly subscription, at the same time we are also going to help entrepreneurs by hosting office hours, events, workshops and giving back to the startup community as much as possible.

Essentially, we will be working, unpaid, to watch over the entrepreneurs while Storyberg is the tool they will use to get the job done.

I’m not sure of all the details, but I like to think that Josiah made high quality candles to make sure the watchmen he oversaw could do the best job possible. Regardless, that’s what we’re going to do.


  1. Walter Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin - An American Life (Simon & Schuster 2003)

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