Suhail Doshi, who will from now on forever be known as Suhail Bro-shi, is a co-founder and CEO of Mixpanel, a data analytics startup, and like so many world-changing startup bros before him he has a way of saying things that some overly sensitive people might misunderstand or misconstrue or take completely out of context. In this case, these hyperactive reactionaries got all bent out of shape just because Suhail Doshi got up someplace and said that, "No doesn't mean no ... no just means not yet."

Whoever runs the Twitter account for Mixpanel quoted Doshi saying that, because it seems like such a cool quote, right? Because he was talking about what it's like when you are running a new company and you are trying to sell your product and all of your prospective customers keep telling you no.

Doshi says he did not, absolutely not, mean the other thing. Just look at that photo. Sure, it was taken long before this thing happened, but he sure does look contrite. You know what? I believe him. I believe that he used that line and probably didn't even get the connection, because he's probably that clueless, because he is, like so many of his peers, a poorly socialized and not fully educated (college dropout) man in his twenties, surrounded by other men just like him. The real problem is that other people who are supposedly more mature are giving man-children like this tens of millions of dollars and letting them play at being CEOs without requiring them to get any adult supervision.

Here's the original tweet:

People freaked out, and Mixpanel pulled the tweet down. Doshi quickly backpedaled and blamed someone else, which is totally the bro thing to do:

Then someone on Twitter pointed out that this wasn't exactly a slip of the tongue, since Doshi wrote the exact same thing about "No doesn't mean no" in a LinkedIn blog post last September. Whoops! Not sure who on the team wrote that essay and posted it under Doshi's name.

As you can see from the company photo below, Mixpanel is not made up entirely of bros. There are eight women in that photo, and while it is true that six of those women are kneeling down on the floor while all but one of the bros are standing, I don't think we should read too much into that, from a symbolic point of view. Plus: check out those three cool scooters! And bros drinking brews, and sitting on the shoulders of other bros! This place is fun!

Doshi started Mixpanel at Y Combinator in 2009. The company has raised money from the bluest of blue-chip VC firms, including Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia Capital. In December Mixpanel raised $65 million at a valuation of $865 million. That's nearly a billion dollars! Doshi made it onto one of those "30 Under 30" lists on Forbes, and Marc Andreessen raved about him:

The official word from Mixpanel (via its Twitter feed) is that Mixpanel is very contrite about its CEO saying that "No doesn't always mean no." Because he didn't mean it in that context. I am sure they will never, ever say it again. I wrote to Mixpanel via their convenient "Contact Us" form and will update this post if I hear back.

For now I'll close with the words that Doshi himself used in a blog post where he explained to fellow entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs how they could become successful like him: "Good luck and enjoy the struggle, you wouldn't do it if it were easy!" So true. So true.