Selling a little too soon

A cautionary tale about being too cautious:

[Ron] Wayne, 76, was present at the birth of cool April 1, 1976: Co-founder, along with Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, of Apple Computer Inc., Wayne designed the company’s original logo, wrote the manual for the Apple I computer and drafted the fledgling company’s partnership agreement.

That agreement gave him a 10 percent stake in Apple, which would be worth more than $22 billion today if Wayne had held onto it.

But he didn’t.

Afraid that Jobs’ wild spending and Wozniak’s recurrent “flights of fancy” would cause Apple to flop, Wayne said, he bailed out after 12 days. Terrified to be the only one of the three founders with assets creditors could seize, he agreed to take $800 for his shares.

via Jobs, Wozniak and Wayne: Apple’s third co-founder sold out early, but says he doesn’t second-guess himself – chicagotribune.com.

HT: Joe Carter