Originally posted by Bob Parmenter
The vast majority of small businesses die because of poor preparation.
I don't disagree with you. In my situation more insurance, and perhaps more attention to staying in shape might have saved things and could be called preparation.

A majority of my competitors understood the technical side of the business because they were former technicians. However, they didn't fully understand the business end of things.
A lot of businesses are started by dreamers who don't know much about business. They may or may not know a lot about the business they choose. Some make it, many don't.

Smith was in deep to his printer, paper supplier, ad agency fees, distributor payments, etc. He may have innocently fooled himself into believing that he could convince enough of us subscribers to send him enough money fast enough to meet the obligations that he incurred by his own decisions. He obviously wasn't right.
Fortunately I managed to exit without leaving anyone holding the bag so to speak.

Smith may have made some poor business decisions, and made some people unhappy in the process, the leap I don't accept is that this business failure equates to moral failure.

Being stupid isn't morally wrong.

You don't need to buy his books. I can understand being mad at the way you were treated. I just don't agree with the assertion its a moral issue. You appear convinced he did it intentionally, and I guess I'm not...

And it probably doesn't matter enough to justify the time I've put into this reply, so you don't need to waste any time trying to explain....