13 ms·

I Open-Sourced All My Business Ideas

243 points by graham1776 11y ago

jlg23 11y ago
This is brilliant! I wish more people would do that. I'd add a fat, explicit disclaimer that you don't want anything if people actually made a billion with those ideas (but might be happy if treated for dinner ;).
- graham1776 11y ago
  Thanks so much! I should add that disclaimer for sure. Take an idea and go with it! Dinner is expected after your Series D fundraising round though...
d--b 11y ago
Kudos for the last one: re-type the masters. It's brilliantly weird and wonderful! Reminded me of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Menard,_Author_of_the_Quixote https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Menard,_Author_of_the_Q...
- captn3m0 11y ago
  +1 for this. It should be a nice project for someone interested in learning JS, even.
- graham1776 11y ago
  I love this one too. How fun would it be to re-type a chapter of Hamlet, a Hemingway short story, a Walt Whitman poem? Also way more fun than the normal "Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing" prompts.
  - jameshart 11y ago
    Hamlet doesn't have chapters, it's a play. Sorry - pet peeve. It's like people asking if you've 'read Shakespeare'. Makes as much sense as asking someone if they've read Tarantino. Sure, you can read the script, but it's not how it's meant to be consumed.
    - nekopa 11y ago
      You could've read his sonnets...
- EvanPlaice 11y ago
  Ever heard of Keybr? You can specify external sources for practice text. Why just read the news when you can practice typing while you read it. If you could find a hosted copy of a classical piece of literature, this does exactly what you described. Typeracer Uses text excerpts from popular movies and books with competitive match ups with other people. It selects competitors based on their current rated speed so it's challenging no matter how good/bad you are. For something as boring as typing, it's seriously addictive and fun.
- rmason 11y ago
  Actually in his son's book he said that Hunter Thompson started out retyping Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Steinbeck etc. He used to give that advice to beginning writers as it allowed you to be able to develop a feel for what was good in your own efforts.
captn3m0 11y ago
I keep mine on GitHub[0], however mine aren't really business ideas and more like long-term side-projects with very little scope for making money. [0]: http://github.com/captn3m0/ideas http://github.com/captn3m0/ideas
- ugh123 11y ago
  >with very little scope for making money. You've just described about 90% of over-funded startups!
  - nathancahill 11y ago
    No, he said long-term.
- simi_ 11y ago
  Same [1], but I'm considering deleting it, as most of them are shit anyway. After seeing Assembly die in less than 2 years [2], I filtered my side project ideas through a "do you see this running in 10 years?" filter, and I saved them as bookmark folders [3]. 1: https://github.com/andreis/ideas https://github.com/andreis/ideas 2: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wUe7XOlyMZkJ:https://assembly.com/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=de https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wUe7XO... 3: here they are cask.space: website for brew cask packages - categories, info, screenshots, discovery, etc. "deep" ai: strong artificial intelligence - more of a career goal than a side project docsite: simple, standardized landing pages for doctor's offices, á la jameda or zocdoc games: tons of game dev resources and indie game websites - if I ever find time to work on one, I love game development peer interviews: p2p pair mock interviewing for interview practice - an interest of mine (github.com/andreis/interview) sidelog: a tool to organize [ideas for] side projects + collaboration
  - jxm262 11y ago
    I'm genuinely curious how,why assembly failed. I really liked that project, it had alot of good people and potential imho.
matrix 11y ago
Most lists of this type are silly, but for those of you looking for business ideas, this one is actually pretty interesting. But caveat: make sure you get out of the building and talk to potential customers first. Usually there's a very good reason these ideas haven't been executed on yet.
- graham1776 11y ago
  I'll take this as a complement. I've collected these "ideas" for the last 5-6 years, mostly out of complaints of stupid things I have had to do for my job. So there is a "market" even though the market may only be me. I agree on your second point too, these ideas are sitting in front of everyone's monitors right now "gratis" because most likely have no business value and are better suited for side-projects/hobbies.
peteretep 11y ago
I feel like no-one has managed to build a small-business CRM (like his Shoebox CRM) effectively yet. I run a one-person business and I'm still using a colour-coded Excel sheet to try and figure out when I should bug sales prospects.
- graham1776 11y ago
  www.contactually.com has tried pretty hard, but even their UI is too complex. I just need one person to be reminded to reach out to today. And by the way, can you do it for me, Software?
  - skevvis 11y ago
    @Graham fair point (BTW I'm the CEO of Contactually). We've made it as simple as possible for now (and our users regularly say that), but we are constantly working to streamline the UI. Any feedback, I'm very easy to reach.
- rahimnathwani 11y ago
  People are trying, e.g. http://www.karmacrm.com/ http://www.karmacrm.com/
- synunlimited 11y ago
  HubSpot's CRM is made just for this use case. Plus its free! - http://www.hubspot.com/crm http://www.hubspot.com/crm Disclosure: I work at HubSpot
- blowski 11y ago
  > I'm still using a colour-coded Excel sheet to try and figure out when I should bug sales prospects What are the problems with doing that?
  - peteretep 11y ago
    Like keeping your company accounting in an Excel spreadsheet, too easy to make mistakes, forget how certain features you've built work, and doesn't scale beyond a single user.
zem 11y ago
i really love the "talk to the pictures" idea! would translate beautifully to a tablet app too, so that you could get a constant stream of new content (ideally creative commons).
- graham1776 11y ago
  Now I just need that publisher. I'll put a link up to my manuscript later.
- hanniabu 11y ago
  If you want to take it a step further, you have have a button that the parent can press to record the story. It'll be able to playback the story whenever the kid likes and automatically pairs the recording segments to the respective page so that when the page is turned it'll continue on with the story exactly as it was told the first time.
- unixhero 11y ago
  A folder on your tablet which you open with the gallery app is more than enough to do this already. and... Why does this need to be an app? I feel that many people are brainwashed by Apple dogma.
  - zem 11y ago
    just so you can wrap a nicer user interface around the index. it's the difference between a book and a bunch of papers loosely pushed into a folder in a stack of other folders.
hotcool 11y ago
I did something similar. I packaged up business ideas I wasn't executing, along with a domain name, logo and mini-business plan. I call them "StartJumpers": http://startjumper.com http://startjumper.com
- tapp 11y ago
  This is clever. I'm curious if you've sold any?
  - hotcool 11y ago
    Thanks tapp. A few inquiries, but no sales yet.
sivers 11y ago
Love it. Two years ago I did this, and wrote a little something about it when I started: "Why my code and ideas are public" https://sivers.org/ws https://sivers.org/ws I blogged about it to call attention to it for one main reason: I wanted to see if anyone would "steal" the ideas. Because it seems to be many (MANY) people's biggest worry about sharing any ideas: that someone will steal them. See the comments in https://sivers.org/how2hire https://sivers.org/how2hire for example. Also this from Jason Fried of Basecamp: https://twitter.com/jasonfried/status/683809719782215680 https://twitter.com/jasonfried/status/683809719782215680 Anyway - it's been two years now, and nobody has stolen any of the ideas. It could just be that my ideas suck, but I suspect that the worry of people stealing ideas is nothing to worry about for any of us.
- bobby_9x 11y ago
  People always say that it's about the 'execution' and not the 'idea', but it's still not a good idea to share your good ideas until you are sure you either will not use it or have already gone past the initial execution stage. Why? There might be a person that has way more resources than you do (or is just better at executing) and will beat you to the market.
  - DigitalJack 11y ago
    That doesn't bother me with most of my ideas. Reason being, I have the idea because I want something that someone else doesn't provide, and I wish they would. I personally don't want to run a business. I'd rather someone who does take my idea, build the thing so that I get to use it. I've jokingly said to my wife that I need to email some of these ideas to apple and google, because they have the capability to build them and then I'd get to have one.
  - moron4hire 11y ago
    It's pretty unlikely that such a productive person or company would not have their own ideas on which they are already working. The only people who are interested in stealing ideas are people who don't know anything about building things. Lacking that constructive knowledge means they lack the basic foundation on which to riff ideas.
angryasian 11y ago
"Housemax - Carmax for single family homes, buy it now price, close in 10 days, instant home liquidity." Opendoor founded by Keith Rabois is as probably as close to this idea as you'll ever get. http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2015/02/26/startup-opendoor-wants-to-buy-houses-that-are-for-sale/ http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2015/02/26/startup-opend...
- graham1776 11y ago
  Good call. This idea was a little old and there are some new interesting startups in this space.
desireco42 11y ago
So people publish this, but for some reason, either these are high quality ideas, or they resonate with me better, but I really like them a lot. Since it is open, I might do some and who knows, it might even work.
- graham1776 11y ago
  Would love to collaborate if you are interested! Let me know.
marincounty 11y ago
I liked the hacker news for moms. I throw in hacker news for Horologists. (I'm working on this now.) Hacker news for collector car enthusiasts. Hacker news for Jewelers. When I was younger, I wanted to make/sell a chewing gum that that had an alkaline natural substance in it; something that would neutralize the acids in you mouth. Something you could use after eating lunch, or something sweet? I imagine just chewing any type of gum would stimulate salivary glands, and subsequently reduce acids? I noticed a European country came out with a gum that claimed to netralize oral acids, but I lost track of it. In high school, I hooked up a old military flight suit to my motorcycles alternator. It kinda kept me warm, but I didn't know enough about electronics at the time to make it really work. Later I wanted to better the idea, and sell the suits. Never did anything. I now see many different electric jackets/suits for motorcyclists. (I was so sick one year in high school. I remember showing up for class freezing, and wet, but I loved that old Honda.) I kinda passed up a chance to get in on that plastic tooth pick/dental pick business. It wasen't my idea, but I worked for the inventor. I think if I treated him better, he would have brought me in. He handed over everything to his son, and financed everything. I really took off. At the time, I though he was just spoiling his kid, but he knew it was a great idea. He was an older Dentist who decided to market these dental tools to the public, and the plastic dental pick was genius, but horrid to our current enviorment. They are the pull tabs of my generation.
- petersouth 11y ago
  I've been trying to research something similar to your alkaline natural substance recently. Did you ever come up with a good substance? One of the only things I can find with minimal side-effects is baking soda.
- sago 11y ago
  > Hacker news for X Isn't this reddit? Subreddits, in particular. Sure mainline reddit can be banal and toxic, but there are a lot of valuable subs.
rl3 11y ago
>Look Inside for New Hires Company takes pictures of inside of their office so prospective employees know the culture/space they are getting into. Hey Glassdoor this would be great for you! Already done: http://www.officelovin.com/ http://www.officelovin.com/
brikis98 11y ago
Nice! I maintain a list of startup idea lists [1]. If I get some time, I'll add your list too, but if anyone else is feeling up to it, the repo is open source [2] and I'd gladly accept PRs :) [1] http://www.hello-startup.net/resources/startup-ideas/ http://www.hello-startup.net/resources/startup-ideas/ [2] https://github.com/brikis98/hello-startup-site https://github.com/brikis98/hello-startup-site
jcsnv 11y ago
>COLIVING This one is currently being done! hicommon.com
rokhayakebe 11y ago
I actually did Stumble Upon for Ecommerce recently http://sovayn.com http://sovayn.com
- graham1776 11y ago
  This is great exactly what I was thinking of! Keep expanding and get it out there!
  - rokhayakebe 11y ago
    Agreed :), Will Do.
- codecamper 11y ago
  Stumble Upon for ECommerce... Isn't this Wanalo, Fancy, Pinterest? Sorry to be a downer but...
  - rokhayakebe 11y ago
    It's closer to SU than W, F, & P.
quaffapint 11y ago
Was recently approached to work on a commercial real estate idea similar to a lot of yours in the idea of making things easier and more modern. I know nothing of the field, so it's interesting to read your ideas on it and see you share some of the same sentiments.
- graham1776 11y ago
  Would love to collaborate or talk over the phone. Shoot me an email!
jxm262 11y ago
I did the same thing on a trello board. Had some friends collaborate and add some potential projects too. Perhaps we could make a site which allows groups to form around these and contribute? Could tie it into trello, github, etc. If anyone would be interested in collaborating and building something like this send me a message :)
MWil 11y ago
I'll probably never get Jake to admit it, but until proven otherwise, I think being vocal about my own ideas is part of how CaseText came to be - and that was absolutely the purpose of putting it out there. If not me, then whoever. edit: Have talked w/ Jake several times personally since they formed. Sometimes when I'm antsy I beg him for a job as consultant!
danieltillett 11y ago
There are some good things on this list. The real estate industry is a bit of a hobby of mine and the problem with trying to bring it into the 21st century is there are some very powerful vested interests who want to keep things as they are. It is also very local which makes it hard to scale. You have to unlock a lot of value or have very good local connections to get any where.
- graham1776 11y ago
  Mine too, we should talk. I agree after having worked for both small startups and large corporate REITS. Most of my ideas are incremental vs monster changes. Eventually though someone will throw enough money or the government will start to regulate it enough for innovation to start.
  - danieltillett 11y ago
    I would love to talk (my contact details are in my profile). My experience is in Australia where the real estate market is very different to the USA. Each state here is quite different to each other, but the more fragmented the market the more opportunities there are.
  - Cshelton 11y ago
    I'm a lead developer for a well funded CRE asset management SaaS company. We are launching this year and have sold a lot. A good number of the big...and biggest, names are our clients. I guess we would mostly fall into the 'mint for CRE' category, except property/assets are just a piece of it. We go all the way up through loans, deals, equity, the cap stack for each thing and the entire portfolio. All with realtime reporting/analytics, data integration from anywhere (extremely simple to use, unlike most systems...), chart of accounts roll ups, etc. It has been a TON of development time (close to 3 years now) and is a massive system. I think we'll see some more adopted standards in data schemas and APIs with governmental organizations that will really change the CRE world. Underwriting and securitization is a huge opportunity for when that becomes more widely adopted. I'm sure you're quite familiar with the securitization process of today and how crazy it seems...excel workbooks and binders full of reports everywhere is a nightmare. Argus is such a big player, however they won't get disrupted all at once in my opinion. So many processes, reports and data is intertwined in it, it'll take some time to unravel...but yes, big opportunity. All in all, many of the 'ideas' in CRE are well known, it's getting the industry on a macro and micro scale to adopt new practices and solutions that are actually good. For example, think of all the CRE loans out there...to get detail information on them ( thousands and thousands..) you really have to pay big money to someone like Intex or something. And then parsing that data even more to be useable at scale is a whole other undertaking. I'm interested to see how the 'crowdsourcing' CRE world develops. That space is pretty wide open with big but unestablished players. I've got many ideas for stuff I want to do down the road, let's talk. Note: I didn't edit this at all, it's probably filled with grammer errors...but it's late and don't care =p
joshcanhelp 11y ago
I did too! http://www.joshcanhelp.com/ideas-1/ http://www.joshcanhelp.com/ideas-1/
ruffrey 11y ago
The sqwiggle for moms one is easyish with WebRTC. I made one in an afternoon. https://github.com/respoke/yodude https://github.com/respoke/yodude
- lifeisstillgood 11y ago
  So spend the next ten afternoons selling it ... am told that's the hard part
welder 11y ago
> COLIVING - Like WeWork but for living. Already implemented at http://www.buildcampus.com/ http://www.buildcampus.com/ > STOP SLACKERS - Logs all employees use, anonymously. Found http://www.rescuetime.com http://www.rescuetime.com which does this awesomely Already implemented at https://wakatime.com/ https://wakatime.com/
- duvet 11y ago
  Looks like Campus Co-Living no longer exists.
afomi 11y ago
Kudos. It takes a ton of courage to be open and share your ideas. It also shows that the ideas may only be words on a screen. Execution is everything.
tezza 11y ago
The "Talk to the Picutres" books already exist[1]. A good one is Welcome to the Zoo by Alison Jay[2]. Also wordless picture books are popular amongst Rudolf Steiner teachers. [1] https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/wordless-picture-books https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/wordless-picture-books [2] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Welcome-Zoo-Alison-Jay/dp/184011973X http://www.amazon.co.uk/Welcome-Zoo-Alison-Jay/dp/184011973X
hanyoon 11y ago
Awesome stuff! Glad to see that we had a handful of very similar ideas.
onion2k 11y ago
There's a whole website dedicated to ideas like these: http://www.halfbakery.com/ http://www.halfbakery.com/ Some of them are very funny, some might actually make good businesses.
- Chris2048 11y ago
  We need this for tech/software dev ideas. Halfbakery is too half-baked, to much dreamy, semi-humorous nonsense... A real "Is anyone interested in a starting FLOSS project on github?" idea site would be great. I seem to recall there was on I signed up to, can't remember its name...
  - Chris2048 11y ago
    It was "upboat.us", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5916181 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5916181
polemic 11y ago
Minor point: "open source" is not open source because you have the source. It's open source because it's licensed that way. Adding a public domain or cc-0 license to the page would achieve the same effect.
- auvrw 11y ago
  good point, tho.. i'm really appreciative of lists like this b/c, while i don't use spreadsheets, for instance, a i can immediately see why an "excel imgur" is a seriously good idea. but then doesn't "open-sourcing" w/o a creative commons or similar notice just mean that the first person who blogs or tweets or whatever has a legal record that it's their idea? honestly dunno and would appreciate feedback from legally-learned.
eddd 11y ago
I don't mean to troll, but having ideas is nothing. Of course projects start with ideas but if the creator of the idea didn't pursue given concept - neither should you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csyL9EC0S0c&feature=youtu.be&t=835 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csyL9EC0S0c&feature=youtu.be...
- Scea91 11y ago
  Why shouldn't I? What is the reasoning? Sorry, I don't have audio here so maybe it's mentioned in the youtube video.
  - eddd 11y ago
    If the creator didn't find the idea interesting enough to actually put the project into life, it will be probably better to come up with your own project. Of course it has nothing to do with being inspired by someone else.
    - Scea91 11y ago
      but this is so faulty. There can be hundreds of unrelated reasons why he didn't put the project into life. And even if he didn't find it interesting enough it doesn't mean he has better judgement than you.
- bechampion 11y ago
  i agree with the first half ... tons of my friends knowing i might be able to make mobile apps , come tom me with random ideas , thinking that his contribution to the whole thing would be that "idea" ... what about the rest of it , developing it , monetize it etc etc... it's kind of annoying!
- Chris2048 11y ago
  I sort of agree, but a 'proper' idea needs a little fleshing out to show its value. A description isn't enough. If I cam e up with "Twitter for cats", but with nothing dwscribing why this was a good idea, or what form it might take (mockups? detail on how it would differ from twitter, or how it would be the same as twitter in a way relevant to cats). those details are the value, and that's what's needed. One line descriptions are far from 'part implemented' - they're not even fully thought-out. A paragraph at least would be better... then they'd be fit to steal ;-) Also, if an idea implies considerable implementation (twitter impl is known, but still a large task) it has a higher bar to realise (obv.). If the impl is somewhat unknown or novel, it also has to be fleshed out more e.g. a POC if it is uncertain if it is possible, or if there are significant barriers that might have prevented it existing already.
edem 11y ago
https://x.ai/ https://x.ai/ might be similar to Clara Labs.
- dmortensen 11y ago
  x.ai is a Machine Learning company. We'll price at FREE to $9. Clara is an software powered outsourcing company. They price at $200 to $500
elcapitan 11y ago
I guess most people here have similar lists, and it takes a lot of guts to take them public, thanks for that :) At some point I started to split them into technical ideas on the one side and business ideas on the other side. That helps to deal with them in different ways. The technical ideas are usually stuff that would be helpful to have and that solve particular small problems, but on closer inspection they just turn out to be things you can just as well do with existing tools (usually like excel or other tools). Or they are really just ideas for some kind of library or service that could be a small OSS project. Most of those ideas are fun to play with, but the fun would go away if I looked at them in an economic way. The business ideas are the ones where I would immediately think about competition, costs, etc. They are usually more fun to research and reason about. And for most things that you could think about that don't exist yet, the reason for that nonexistence is often much more enlightening and interesting than the original idea.
bewe42 11y ago
When it comes to implementing ideas, I learnt one thing that has become crucial for me: an idea needs to have a deep personal relevance in order to be able to bring it to its fullest life. Since I figured out that personal truth, I stopped searching for ideas from the outside. A list like this can still be inspiring, but just because an idea sounds good or seems to make sense, if I don't have any profound interest in it, I know I won't have the energy and drive to realise its potential.
davidiach 11y ago
One of my ideas was to create a site where people can share their business ideas with the world and others can find them and use them. I would contribute some of my ideas to such a website and there's a good chance that some people might be interested in reading/using them. Anyone interested in building such a website? :)
- troels 11y ago
  I'm fairly sure I've seen several such sites.
- pknerd 11y ago
  Even Google created something similar.. maybe for internal ideas.
nof 11y ago
How on earth does this constitutes as open source? So if I write out my research results to the public, it is considered open source? What is the source? The text is not a compiled version of some previous text. And if it where (LaTeX) the underlying idea is still present in the "compiled" version. No saying I don't like his ideas, but there's beside the point. When open source becomes a layman term for productivity and do "like all the cool guys in the bay", rather than one of ethics and critical reflection on contemporary ideologies underlying technological developments and their affects on society and the world as a whole. BTW: this comment is open source...
- LesZedCB 11y ago
  There is a precedent for open source data sets being called open source[1]. I've heard it before and I don't have a problem calling it that. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_science_data https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_science_data
pknerd 11y ago
Quite a good list. I specially likked Comment App and Pictorial book for kids.
andrewstuart 11y ago
I know it's blasphemy but I think a really good idea should be kept secret. Smart, motivated people will compete if the idea is novel and compelling. The origin of the myth that you should blab your ideas is the fact that the vast majority of ideas are not interesting. But if you have DO one of those rare ideas that is new and interesting, why the hell give it away? Build it and then people can know about it through your nice implementation.
Htsthbjig 11y ago
I made some companies out of ideas that I had. I told everybody my ideas. When I created my first company most people thought I was crazy when I told them my idea. It turned out to be a brilliant idea that worked very well but most people did not recognize it at the time, let alone put the resources to copy it... In fact, because I was young and naive I was enthusiastic about it, but talking to people(specially experienced people) made you doubt in yourself. Now I have friends that are also successful entrepreneurs, and it is a very common experience among us. Now I don't talk with lots of people about my ideas, I don't want to argue or convince or whatever.This can make you to hang on on bad ideas by ego before they are tested. I just test them in the real world as fast as I can. Most of them are not good once you test them, but thanks to them you iterate or discover good ideas.
slantaclaus 11y ago
Just looked up "Dark Ages" in App Store prepared to pay <= $5 for it. Oh well. (I lack self control, need more stuff like this. Also, need something that stops me from texting certain people during certain hours, etc)
miguelrochefort 11y ago
If these low-value ideas are worth sharing, then I have 1000 ideas to share.
- rfrey 11y ago
  Looking forward to your post.
  - miguelrochefort 11y ago
    I'm not going to post such a list. What value would it generate? Such obvious ideas don't need to be said. Moreover, these kind of ideas are a distraction. People go and implement them as if they were all unique and disconnected from one another. I have known for a while that we need to tackle all of these ideas as a single one. I'm building a system that will solve 80% of all problems these ideas could ever be solutions to.
BatFastard 11y ago
Idea's are like blank books. Unless you have passion for the idea, you are not going to fill in the 400 blank pages with the details.
brightball 11y ago
I've thought about doing that too. Would be a fun way to get them all out there.
kalendos 11y ago
It will be interesting to sum up those ideas into an awesome list[1][2] at Github. [1] https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome [2] https://github.com/tastejs/awesome-app-ideas https://github.com/tastejs/awesome-app-ideas
kmonad 11y ago
Oliver Samwer, while of course a controversial person, correctly points out that usually ideas are cheap. Execution, however, is where things get real and therefor hard. I tend to think that this is true more often than not.
positivejam 11y ago
Just a word usage nitpick: In your "Hacker News for Moms" idea description, you say, "Higher quality posts and articles than the dribble that most moms read on their Facebook feeds" (emphasis mine). I believe you mean "drivel" here. Many parents do deal with their fair share of dribble, but that's something else entirely.
elcapitan 11y ago
Reading the list I watched myself clicking on quite a few of the link-like titles, as if there was an actual project following the link. So there's definitely something to them ;)

243 points by graham1776 11y ago

jlg23 11y ago

This is brilliant! I wish more people would do that. I'd add a fat, explicit disclaimer that you don't want anything if people actually made a billion with those ideas (but might be happy if treated for dinner ;).

graham1776 11y ago
Thanks so much! I should add that disclaimer for sure. Take an idea and go with it! Dinner is expected after your Series D fundraising round though...

d--b 11y ago

Kudos for the last one: re-type the masters. It's brilliantly weird and wonderful! Reminded me of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Menard,_Author_of_the_Quixote https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Menard,_Author_of_the_Q...

captn3m0 11y ago
+1 for this. It should be a nice project for someone interested in learning JS, even.
graham1776 11y ago
I love this one too. How fun would it be to re-type a chapter of Hamlet, a Hemingway short story, a Walt Whitman poem? Also way more fun than the normal "Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing" prompts.
- jameshart 11y ago
  Hamlet doesn't have chapters, it's a play. Sorry - pet peeve. It's like people asking if you've 'read Shakespeare'. Makes as much sense as asking someone if they've read Tarantino. Sure, you can read the script, but it's not how it's meant to be consumed.
  - nekopa 11y ago
    You could've read his sonnets...
EvanPlaice 11y ago
Ever heard of Keybr? You can specify external sources for practice text. Why just read the news when you can practice typing while you read it. If you could find a hosted copy of a classical piece of literature, this does exactly what you described. Typeracer Uses text excerpts from popular movies and books with competitive match ups with other people. It selects competitors based on their current rated speed so it's challenging no matter how good/bad you are. For something as boring as typing, it's seriously addictive and fun.
rmason 11y ago
Actually in his son's book he said that Hunter Thompson started out retyping Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Steinbeck etc. He used to give that advice to beginning writers as it allowed you to be able to develop a feel for what was good in your own efforts.

captn3m0 11y ago

I keep mine on GitHub[0], however mine aren't really business ideas and more like long-term side-projects with very little scope for making money. [0]: http://github.com/captn3m0/ideas http://github.com/captn3m0/ideas

ugh123 11y ago
>with very little scope for making money. You've just described about 90% of over-funded startups!
- nathancahill 11y ago
  No, he said long-term.
simi_ 11y ago
Same [1], but I'm considering deleting it, as most of them are shit anyway. After seeing Assembly die in less than 2 years [2], I filtered my side project ideas through a "do you see this running in 10 years?" filter, and I saved them as bookmark folders [3]. 1: https://github.com/andreis/ideas https://github.com/andreis/ideas 2: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wUe7XOlyMZkJ:https://assembly.com/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=de https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wUe7XO... 3: here they are cask.space: website for brew cask packages - categories, info, screenshots, discovery, etc. "deep" ai: strong artificial intelligence - more of a career goal than a side project docsite: simple, standardized landing pages for doctor's offices, á la jameda or zocdoc games: tons of game dev resources and indie game websites - if I ever find time to work on one, I love game development peer interviews: p2p pair mock interviewing for interview practice - an interest of mine (github.com/andreis/interview) sidelog: a tool to organize [ideas for] side projects + collaboration
- jxm262 11y ago
  I'm genuinely curious how,why assembly failed. I really liked that project, it had alot of good people and potential imho.

matrix 11y ago

Most lists of this type are silly, but for those of you looking for business ideas, this one is actually pretty interesting. But caveat: make sure you get out of the building and talk to potential customers first. Usually there's a very good reason these ideas haven't been executed on yet.

graham1776 11y ago
I'll take this as a complement. I've collected these "ideas" for the last 5-6 years, mostly out of complaints of stupid things I have had to do for my job. So there is a "market" even though the market may only be me. I agree on your second point too, these ideas are sitting in front of everyone's monitors right now "gratis" because most likely have no business value and are better suited for side-projects/hobbies.

peteretep 11y ago

I feel like no-one has managed to build a small-business CRM (like his Shoebox CRM) effectively yet. I run a one-person business and I'm still using a colour-coded Excel sheet to try and figure out when I should bug sales prospects.

graham1776 11y ago
www.contactually.com has tried pretty hard, but even their UI is too complex. I just need one person to be reminded to reach out to today. And by the way, can you do it for me, Software?
- skevvis 11y ago
  @Graham fair point (BTW I'm the CEO of Contactually). We've made it as simple as possible for now (and our users regularly say that), but we are constantly working to streamline the UI. Any feedback, I'm very easy to reach.
rahimnathwani 11y ago
People are trying, e.g. http://www.karmacrm.com/ http://www.karmacrm.com/
synunlimited 11y ago
HubSpot's CRM is made just for this use case. Plus its free! - http://www.hubspot.com/crm http://www.hubspot.com/crm Disclosure: I work at HubSpot
blowski 11y ago
> I'm still using a colour-coded Excel sheet to try and figure out when I should bug sales prospects What are the problems with doing that?
- peteretep 11y ago
  Like keeping your company accounting in an Excel spreadsheet, too easy to make mistakes, forget how certain features you've built work, and doesn't scale beyond a single user.

zem 11y ago

i really love the "talk to the pictures" idea! would translate beautifully to a tablet app too, so that you could get a constant stream of new content (ideally creative commons).

graham1776 11y ago
Now I just need that publisher. I'll put a link up to my manuscript later.
hanniabu 11y ago
If you want to take it a step further, you have have a button that the parent can press to record the story. It'll be able to playback the story whenever the kid likes and automatically pairs the recording segments to the respective page so that when the page is turned it'll continue on with the story exactly as it was told the first time.
unixhero 11y ago
A folder on your tablet which you open with the gallery app is more than enough to do this already. and... Why does this need to be an app? I feel that many people are brainwashed by Apple dogma.
- zem 11y ago
  just so you can wrap a nicer user interface around the index. it's the difference between a book and a bunch of papers loosely pushed into a folder in a stack of other folders.

hotcool 11y ago

I did something similar. I packaged up business ideas I wasn't executing, along with a domain name, logo and mini-business plan. I call them "StartJumpers": http://startjumper.com http://startjumper.com

tapp 11y ago
This is clever. I'm curious if you've sold any?
- hotcool 11y ago
  Thanks tapp. A few inquiries, but no sales yet.

sivers 11y ago

Love it. Two years ago I did this, and wrote a little something about it when I started: "Why my code and ideas are public" https://sivers.org/ws https://sivers.org/ws I blogged about it to call attention to it for one main reason: I wanted to see if anyone would "steal" the ideas. Because it seems to be many (MANY) people's biggest worry about sharing any ideas: that someone will steal them. See the comments in https://sivers.org/how2hire https://sivers.org/how2hire for example. Also this from Jason Fried of Basecamp: https://twitter.com/jasonfried/status/683809719782215680 https://twitter.com/jasonfried/status/683809719782215680 Anyway - it's been two years now, and nobody has stolen any of the ideas. It could just be that my ideas suck, but I suspect that the worry of people stealing ideas is nothing to worry about for any of us.

bobby_9x 11y ago
People always say that it's about the 'execution' and not the 'idea', but it's still not a good idea to share your good ideas until you are sure you either will not use it or have already gone past the initial execution stage. Why? There might be a person that has way more resources than you do (or is just better at executing) and will beat you to the market.
- DigitalJack 11y ago
  That doesn't bother me with most of my ideas. Reason being, I have the idea because I want something that someone else doesn't provide, and I wish they would. I personally don't want to run a business. I'd rather someone who does take my idea, build the thing so that I get to use it. I've jokingly said to my wife that I need to email some of these ideas to apple and google, because they have the capability to build them and then I'd get to have one.
- moron4hire 11y ago
  It's pretty unlikely that such a productive person or company would not have their own ideas on which they are already working. The only people who are interested in stealing ideas are people who don't know anything about building things. Lacking that constructive knowledge means they lack the basic foundation on which to riff ideas.

angryasian 11y ago

"Housemax - Carmax for single family homes, buy it now price, close in 10 days, instant home liquidity." Opendoor founded by Keith Rabois is as probably as close to this idea as you'll ever get. http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2015/02/26/startup-opendoor-wants-to-buy-houses-that-are-for-sale/ http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2015/02/26/startup-opend...

graham1776 11y ago
Good call. This idea was a little old and there are some new interesting startups in this space.

desireco42 11y ago

So people publish this, but for some reason, either these are high quality ideas, or they resonate with me better, but I really like them a lot. Since it is open, I might do some and who knows, it might even work.

graham1776 11y ago
Would love to collaborate if you are interested! Let me know.

marincounty 11y ago

I liked the hacker news for moms. I throw in hacker news for Horologists. (I'm working on this now.) Hacker news for collector car enthusiasts. Hacker news for Jewelers. When I was younger, I wanted to make/sell a chewing gum that that had an alkaline natural substance in it; something that would neutralize the acids in you mouth. Something you could use after eating lunch, or something sweet? I imagine just chewing any type of gum would stimulate salivary glands, and subsequently reduce acids? I noticed a European country came out with a gum that claimed to netralize oral acids, but I lost track of it. In high school, I hooked up a old military flight suit to my motorcycles alternator. It kinda kept me warm, but I didn't know enough about electronics at the time to make it really work. Later I wanted to better the idea, and sell the suits. Never did anything. I now see many different electric jackets/suits for motorcyclists. (I was so sick one year in high school. I remember showing up for class freezing, and wet, but I loved that old Honda.) I kinda passed up a chance to get in on that plastic tooth pick/dental pick business. It wasen't my idea, but I worked for the inventor. I think if I treated him better, he would have brought me in. He handed over everything to his son, and financed everything. I really took off. At the time, I though he was just spoiling his kid, but he knew it was a great idea. He was an older Dentist who decided to market these dental tools to the public, and the plastic dental pick was genius, but horrid to our current enviorment. They are the pull tabs of my generation.

petersouth 11y ago
I've been trying to research something similar to your alkaline natural substance recently. Did you ever come up with a good substance? One of the only things I can find with minimal side-effects is baking soda.
sago 11y ago
> Hacker news for X Isn't this reddit? Subreddits, in particular. Sure mainline reddit can be banal and toxic, but there are a lot of valuable subs.

rl3 11y ago

>Look Inside for New Hires Company takes pictures of inside of their office so prospective employees know the culture/space they are getting into. Hey Glassdoor this would be great for you! Already done: http://www.officelovin.com/ http://www.officelovin.com/

brikis98 11y ago

Nice! I maintain a list of startup idea lists [1]. If I get some time, I'll add your list too, but if anyone else is feeling up to it, the repo is open source [2] and I'd gladly accept PRs :) [1] http://www.hello-startup.net/resources/startup-ideas/ http://www.hello-startup.net/resources/startup-ideas/ [2] https://github.com/brikis98/hello-startup-site https://github.com/brikis98/hello-startup-site

jcsnv 11y ago

>COLIVING This one is currently being done! hicommon.com

rokhayakebe 11y ago

I actually did Stumble Upon for Ecommerce recently http://sovayn.com http://sovayn.com

graham1776 11y ago
This is great exactly what I was thinking of! Keep expanding and get it out there!
- rokhayakebe 11y ago
  Agreed :), Will Do.
codecamper 11y ago
Stumble Upon for ECommerce... Isn't this Wanalo, Fancy, Pinterest? Sorry to be a downer but...
- rokhayakebe 11y ago
  It's closer to SU than W, F, & P.

quaffapint 11y ago

Was recently approached to work on a commercial real estate idea similar to a lot of yours in the idea of making things easier and more modern. I know nothing of the field, so it's interesting to read your ideas on it and see you share some of the same sentiments.

graham1776 11y ago
Would love to collaborate or talk over the phone. Shoot me an email!

jxm262 11y ago

I did the same thing on a trello board. Had some friends collaborate and add some potential projects too. Perhaps we could make a site which allows groups to form around these and contribute? Could tie it into trello, github, etc. If anyone would be interested in collaborating and building something like this send me a message :)

MWil 11y ago

I'll probably never get Jake to admit it, but until proven otherwise, I think being vocal about my own ideas is part of how CaseText came to be - and that was absolutely the purpose of putting it out there. If not me, then whoever. edit: Have talked w/ Jake several times personally since they formed. Sometimes when I'm antsy I beg him for a job as consultant!

danieltillett 11y ago

There are some good things on this list. The real estate industry is a bit of a hobby of mine and the problem with trying to bring it into the 21st century is there are some very powerful vested interests who want to keep things as they are. It is also very local which makes it hard to scale. You have to unlock a lot of value or have very good local connections to get any where.

graham1776 11y ago
Mine too, we should talk. I agree after having worked for both small startups and large corporate REITS. Most of my ideas are incremental vs monster changes. Eventually though someone will throw enough money or the government will start to regulate it enough for innovation to start.
- danieltillett 11y ago
  I would love to talk (my contact details are in my profile). My experience is in Australia where the real estate market is very different to the USA. Each state here is quite different to each other, but the more fragmented the market the more opportunities there are.
- Cshelton 11y ago
  I'm a lead developer for a well funded CRE asset management SaaS company. We are launching this year and have sold a lot. A good number of the big...and biggest, names are our clients. I guess we would mostly fall into the 'mint for CRE' category, except property/assets are just a piece of it. We go all the way up through loans, deals, equity, the cap stack for each thing and the entire portfolio. All with realtime reporting/analytics, data integration from anywhere (extremely simple to use, unlike most systems...), chart of accounts roll ups, etc. It has been a TON of development time (close to 3 years now) and is a massive system. I think we'll see some more adopted standards in data schemas and APIs with governmental organizations that will really change the CRE world. Underwriting and securitization is a huge opportunity for when that becomes more widely adopted. I'm sure you're quite familiar with the securitization process of today and how crazy it seems...excel workbooks and binders full of reports everywhere is a nightmare. Argus is such a big player, however they won't get disrupted all at once in my opinion. So many processes, reports and data is intertwined in it, it'll take some time to unravel...but yes, big opportunity. All in all, many of the 'ideas' in CRE are well known, it's getting the industry on a macro and micro scale to adopt new practices and solutions that are actually good. For example, think of all the CRE loans out there...to get detail information on them ( thousands and thousands..) you really have to pay big money to someone like Intex or something. And then parsing that data even more to be useable at scale is a whole other undertaking. I'm interested to see how the 'crowdsourcing' CRE world develops. That space is pretty wide open with big but unestablished players. I've got many ideas for stuff I want to do down the road, let's talk. Note: I didn't edit this at all, it's probably filled with grammer errors...but it's late and don't care =p

joshcanhelp 11y ago

I did too! http://www.joshcanhelp.com/ideas-1/ http://www.joshcanhelp.com/ideas-1/

ruffrey 11y ago

The sqwiggle for moms one is easyish with WebRTC. I made one in an afternoon. https://github.com/respoke/yodude https://github.com/respoke/yodude

lifeisstillgood 11y ago
So spend the next ten afternoons selling it ... am told that's the hard part

welder 11y ago

> COLIVING - Like WeWork but for living. Already implemented at http://www.buildcampus.com/ http://www.buildcampus.com/ > STOP SLACKERS - Logs all employees use, anonymously. Found http://www.rescuetime.com http://www.rescuetime.com which does this awesomely Already implemented at https://wakatime.com/ https://wakatime.com/

duvet 11y ago
Looks like Campus Co-Living no longer exists.

afomi 11y ago

Kudos. It takes a ton of courage to be open and share your ideas. It also shows that the ideas may only be words on a screen. Execution is everything.

tezza 11y ago

The "Talk to the Picutres" books already exist[1]. A good one is Welcome to the Zoo by Alison Jay[2]. Also wordless picture books are popular amongst Rudolf Steiner teachers. [1] https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/wordless-picture-books https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/wordless-picture-books [2] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Welcome-Zoo-Alison-Jay/dp/184011973X http://www.amazon.co.uk/Welcome-Zoo-Alison-Jay/dp/184011973X

hanyoon 11y ago

Awesome stuff! Glad to see that we had a handful of very similar ideas.

onion2k 11y ago

There's a whole website dedicated to ideas like these: http://www.halfbakery.com/ http://www.halfbakery.com/ Some of them are very funny, some might actually make good businesses.

Chris2048 11y ago
We need this for tech/software dev ideas. Halfbakery is too half-baked, to much dreamy, semi-humorous nonsense... A real "Is anyone interested in a starting FLOSS project on github?" idea site would be great. I seem to recall there was on I signed up to, can't remember its name...
- Chris2048 11y ago
  It was "upboat.us", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5916181 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5916181

polemic 11y ago

Minor point: "open source" is not open source because you have the source. It's open source because it's licensed that way. Adding a public domain or cc-0 license to the page would achieve the same effect.

auvrw 11y ago
good point, tho.. i'm really appreciative of lists like this b/c, while i don't use spreadsheets, for instance, a i can immediately see why an "excel imgur" is a seriously good idea. but then doesn't "open-sourcing" w/o a creative commons or similar notice just mean that the first person who blogs or tweets or whatever has a legal record that it's their idea? honestly dunno and would appreciate feedback from legally-learned.

eddd 11y ago

I don't mean to troll, but having ideas is nothing. Of course projects start with ideas but if the creator of the idea didn't pursue given concept - neither should you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csyL9EC0S0c&feature=youtu.be&t=835 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csyL9EC0S0c&feature=youtu.be...

Scea91 11y ago
Why shouldn't I? What is the reasoning? Sorry, I don't have audio here so maybe it's mentioned in the youtube video.
- eddd 11y ago
  If the creator didn't find the idea interesting enough to actually put the project into life, it will be probably better to come up with your own project. Of course it has nothing to do with being inspired by someone else.
  - Scea91 11y ago
    but this is so faulty. There can be hundreds of unrelated reasons why he didn't put the project into life. And even if he didn't find it interesting enough it doesn't mean he has better judgement than you.
bechampion 11y ago
i agree with the first half ... tons of my friends knowing i might be able to make mobile apps , come tom me with random ideas , thinking that his contribution to the whole thing would be that "idea" ... what about the rest of it , developing it , monetize it etc etc... it's kind of annoying!
Chris2048 11y ago
I sort of agree, but a 'proper' idea needs a little fleshing out to show its value. A description isn't enough. If I cam e up with "Twitter for cats", but with nothing dwscribing why this was a good idea, or what form it might take (mockups? detail on how it would differ from twitter, or how it would be the same as twitter in a way relevant to cats). those details are the value, and that's what's needed. One line descriptions are far from 'part implemented' - they're not even fully thought-out. A paragraph at least would be better... then they'd be fit to steal ;-) Also, if an idea implies considerable implementation (twitter impl is known, but still a large task) it has a higher bar to realise (obv.). If the impl is somewhat unknown or novel, it also has to be fleshed out more e.g. a POC if it is uncertain if it is possible, or if there are significant barriers that might have prevented it existing already.

edem 11y ago

https://x.ai/ https://x.ai/ might be similar to Clara Labs.

dmortensen 11y ago
x.ai is a Machine Learning company. We'll price at FREE to $9. Clara is an software powered outsourcing company. They price at $200 to $500

elcapitan 11y ago

I guess most people here have similar lists, and it takes a lot of guts to take them public, thanks for that :) At some point I started to split them into technical ideas on the one side and business ideas on the other side. That helps to deal with them in different ways. The technical ideas are usually stuff that would be helpful to have and that solve particular small problems, but on closer inspection they just turn out to be things you can just as well do with existing tools (usually like excel or other tools). Or they are really just ideas for some kind of library or service that could be a small OSS project. Most of those ideas are fun to play with, but the fun would go away if I looked at them in an economic way. The business ideas are the ones where I would immediately think about competition, costs, etc. They are usually more fun to research and reason about. And for most things that you could think about that don't exist yet, the reason for that nonexistence is often much more enlightening and interesting than the original idea.

bewe42 11y ago

When it comes to implementing ideas, I learnt one thing that has become crucial for me: an idea needs to have a deep personal relevance in order to be able to bring it to its fullest life. Since I figured out that personal truth, I stopped searching for ideas from the outside. A list like this can still be inspiring, but just because an idea sounds good or seems to make sense, if I don't have any profound interest in it, I know I won't have the energy and drive to realise its potential.

davidiach 11y ago

One of my ideas was to create a site where people can share their business ideas with the world and others can find them and use them. I would contribute some of my ideas to such a website and there's a good chance that some people might be interested in reading/using them. Anyone interested in building such a website? :)

troels 11y ago
I'm fairly sure I've seen several such sites.
pknerd 11y ago
Even Google created something similar.. maybe for internal ideas.

nof 11y ago

How on earth does this constitutes as open source? So if I write out my research results to the public, it is considered open source? What is the source? The text is not a compiled version of some previous text. And if it where (LaTeX) the underlying idea is still present in the "compiled" version. No saying I don't like his ideas, but there's beside the point. When open source becomes a layman term for productivity and do "like all the cool guys in the bay", rather than one of ethics and critical reflection on contemporary ideologies underlying technological developments and their affects on society and the world as a whole. BTW: this comment is open source...

LesZedCB 11y ago
There is a precedent for open source data sets being called open source[1]. I've heard it before and I don't have a problem calling it that. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_science_data https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_science_data

pknerd 11y ago

Quite a good list. I specially likked Comment App and Pictorial book for kids.

andrewstuart 11y ago

I know it's blasphemy but I think a really good idea should be kept secret. Smart, motivated people will compete if the idea is novel and compelling. The origin of the myth that you should blab your ideas is the fact that the vast majority of ideas are not interesting. But if you have DO one of those rare ideas that is new and interesting, why the hell give it away? Build it and then people can know about it through your nice implementation.

Htsthbjig 11y ago

I made some companies out of ideas that I had. I told everybody my ideas. When I created my first company most people thought I was crazy when I told them my idea. It turned out to be a brilliant idea that worked very well but most people did not recognize it at the time, let alone put the resources to copy it... In fact, because I was young and naive I was enthusiastic about it, but talking to people(specially experienced people) made you doubt in yourself. Now I have friends that are also successful entrepreneurs, and it is a very common experience among us. Now I don't talk with lots of people about my ideas, I don't want to argue or convince or whatever.This can make you to hang on on bad ideas by ego before they are tested. I just test them in the real world as fast as I can. Most of them are not good once you test them, but thanks to them you iterate or discover good ideas.

slantaclaus 11y ago

Just looked up "Dark Ages" in App Store prepared to pay <= $5 for it. Oh well. (I lack self control, need more stuff like this. Also, need something that stops me from texting certain people during certain hours, etc)

miguelrochefort 11y ago

If these low-value ideas are worth sharing, then I have 1000 ideas to share.

rfrey 11y ago
Looking forward to your post.
- miguelrochefort 11y ago
  I'm not going to post such a list. What value would it generate? Such obvious ideas don't need to be said. Moreover, these kind of ideas are a distraction. People go and implement them as if they were all unique and disconnected from one another. I have known for a while that we need to tackle all of these ideas as a single one. I'm building a system that will solve 80% of all problems these ideas could ever be solutions to.

BatFastard 11y ago

Idea's are like blank books. Unless you have passion for the idea, you are not going to fill in the 400 blank pages with the details.

brightball 11y ago

I've thought about doing that too. Would be a fun way to get them all out there.

kalendos 11y ago

It will be interesting to sum up those ideas into an awesome list[1][2] at Github. [1] https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome [2] https://github.com/tastejs/awesome-app-ideas https://github.com/tastejs/awesome-app-ideas

kmonad 11y ago

Oliver Samwer, while of course a controversial person, correctly points out that usually ideas are cheap. Execution, however, is where things get real and therefor hard. I tend to think that this is true more often than not.

positivejam 11y ago

Just a word usage nitpick: In your "Hacker News for Moms" idea description, you say, "Higher quality posts and articles than the dribble that most moms read on their Facebook feeds" (emphasis mine). I believe you mean "drivel" here. Many parents do deal with their fair share of dribble, but that's something else entirely.

elcapitan 11y ago

Reading the list I watched myself clicking on quite a few of the link-like titles, as if there was an actual project following the link. So there's definitely something to them ;)