2 ms·

Let's play a thought experiment: I'm Paul Graham, and I've got a fantastic, knock-your-socks-off idea for a business. How much will you pay me for it? OR I'

by Travis 17y ago

Let's play a thought experiment: I'm Paul Graham, and I've got a fantastic, knock-your-socks-off idea for a business. How much will you pay me for it? OR I'm Travis. I've got a mediocre idea, but have spent a lot of time learning about my customers and market. I've built a kickass piece of software that solves the pain. But, again, my idea isn't that great (think Craigslist: the idea of online classifieds isn't exactly a great one, or a novel/clever one...) Will you pay me more for this?

sendos 17y ago
Regarding "I'm Paul Graham, and I've got a fantastic, knock-your-socks-off idea for a business. How much will you pay me for it?": First off, if you patented it, and I can see a lot of value from licensing the idea, then yes, I will pay a lot for it. Second, I don't get why people are so focused on valuing an idea in-and-of-itself. Just because when some Joe says "I have a great idea" we don't attach any monetary value to that, doesn't mean that "ideas are useless". It's like if some Joe says "I'm great at executing". Nobody will pay him for that. That has no monetary value. But that doesn't mean that "execution is useless". It's the combination of idea+execution that has monetary value.
- Travis 17y ago
  Ok, I agree that specific ideas have value. However, I think they're not very valuable regardless of quality, because there is little to differentiate a high quality idea from a low quality idea until they are executed. Then your differentiation takes place after-the-fact, making it useless at early stages. If specific ideas are to have specific value, there must be a common method of differentiation. How do you tell the difference between a high quality idea and a terrible one? Finally, if ideas have so much value, how come the market has basically been against the "idea guy", and almost entirely values execution (success = traction, revenue)?

by Travis 17y ago

sendos 17y ago

Regarding "I'm Paul Graham, and I've got a fantastic, knock-your-socks-off idea for a business. How much will you pay me for it?": First off, if you patented it, and I can see a lot of value from licensing the idea, then yes, I will pay a lot for it. Second, I don't get why people are so focused on valuing an idea in-and-of-itself. Just because when some Joe says "I have a great idea" we don't attach any monetary value to that, doesn't mean that "ideas are useless". It's like if some Joe says "I'm great at executing". Nobody will pay him for that. That has no monetary value. But that doesn't mean that "execution is useless". It's the combination of idea+execution that has monetary value.

Travis 17y ago
Ok, I agree that specific ideas have value. However, I think they're not very valuable regardless of quality, because there is little to differentiate a high quality idea from a low quality idea until they are executed. Then your differentiation takes place after-the-fact, making it useless at early stages. If specific ideas are to have specific value, there must be a common method of differentiation. How do you tell the difference between a high quality idea and a terrible one? Finally, if ideas have so much value, how come the market has basically been against the "idea guy", and almost entirely values execution (success = traction, revenue)?