Please excuse the interruption to our scheduled programming ⚠️
A decade ago I bet on Norway.
My friends, my colleagues — my personal and professional bubbles — are the kindest, most brilliant people I know. Norway and its young startup ecosystem have been a focal point of my adult life. But I’m a truly terrible gambler.
It’s proving to be a phenomenally bad bet.
The government is an oil-drunk cabal of anti-democratic socialists seemingly hell bent on running every capable person out of town. It’s leaders have proven to be dangerously inept.
Norway is a losing dog.
It’s going to take a decade or more to undo the damage of the past few years, if ever possible. As it stands, my best advice would be:
— Don’t start a company here
— Don’t invest your money here
— Move to Sweden or Switzerland for those “similar but in touch with reality” vibes
Am I leaving? No, a home is a home even if it’s going under. The only option is to fight back. But let’s call an impoverished spade a spade. I can’t get the past 14 years of life back, but if I could I would have stayed in Switzerland.
If you’re a Norwegian founder considering hiring me, know that we’re going to have to work twice as hard for half as much. But I’ve made my bed, so let’s pillow fight in it 🥳
(Fun fact: the royal family is full of gin-shilling mystics and womanizing coke heads, which feels like an accurate representation of the government and popular culture at large.)