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Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html "27. Hardware/software hybrids. Most hackers find hardware
by ig1 16y ago
Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html
"27. Hardware/software hybrids. Most hackers find hardware projects alarming. You have to deal with messy, expensive physical stuff. But Meraki shows what you can do if you're willing to venture even a little way into hardware. There's a lot of low-hanging fruit in hardware; you can often do dramatically new things by making comparatively small tweaks to existing stuff.
Hardware is already mostly software. What I mean by a hardware/software hybrid is one in which software plays a very visible role. If you work on an idea of this type you'll tend to have the field to yourself, because most hackers are afraid of hardware, and most hardware companies can't write good software. (One reason your iPod isn't made by Sony is that Sony can't write iTunes.)"
- seltzered 16y agoWow, as a hardware/software guy this is comforting to hear. And it's true, there's lots of poorly architected software out in engineering-land.
- moxiemk1 16y agoI had been reading this list; the main reason I still have a question is because this seems to indicate a scale different than I think we can achieve. Not so much the next Flip Camera company, taking a market that major companies think is a toy. Instead, going head-to-head on their products that they've allowed to become crufty square-holes for your round peg and making great tools for real problems, not adapting commodity PCs in ludicrous ways.