Vermeer Technologies created Frontpage in the mid nineties and was bought by Microsoft. I highly recommend the cofounder’s book – High Stakes, No Prisoners by Charles Ferguson. It is my #1 or #2 all time favorite business book.

One of the many t-shirts that they made at Vermeer said “You’re working at a good startup when you’re working 80 hour weeks.” On the back it said “Vermeer Technologies – a good startup.”

In a similar vein we have a list of the top indicators that you’re working at a good early stage startup. Here they are, in no particular order:

0. Your living room looks like this:

1. You can’t understand why Boston Market isn’t open at 4am. That’s dinner time!

2. You still have luggage from your move in 6 weeks ago sitting in your hallway.

3. You have 196 inches of LCDs in your living room

4. You start to grow a beard, by accident

5. You have more servers in your apartment than edible items in your fridge

6. Your idea of a decorative wall hanging is a 50×60” printout of the Outlook object model

7. You consider hiring someone to do your grocery shopping

Since these things correlate with a good startup, I wonder if investors should use them to establish valuations. We’ll tell our next investor that we want a valuation at $200,000 per 1/10th inch of hair on my new beard.