5 ms·

Zero to startup in 10 weeks: 2 weeks in

2 points by davnicwil 7y ago

davnicwil 7y ago
Hi HN - OP here - this is an experiment I'm doing where I'm trying to go from nothing but an idea to a product with paying customers in 10 weeks, following along the YC Startup School program, and blogging the whole process. I'm 2 weeks in and have written daily updates each day. Hope this might be entertaining & useful for fellow hackers and bootstrappers in the community!
streetcat1 7y ago
Thanks for the writing. So, doesn't the MVP need to be sellable? What kind of feedback are you are expecting to get from a "junk" MVP?
- davnicwil 7y ago
  My takeaway from what Michael Seibel is saying is that your MVP should just deliver something of value to someone. If it covers more than one usecase, or is polished in any way over and above what's fundamental to delivering that thing of value, then you waited longer than necessary to get it out there and get feedback. I think whether or not it's sellable depends on the specifics of that narrow first thing it does. In the case of Box CI I certainly don't see it as necessary. There's plenty of value in just shipping something that's free to use, to see if it's useful for people.
streetcat1 7y ago
I see. So I agree, but the value delivered should be measured by the amount of money that the user is willing to pay you. If the user does not pay, than , to me, it say that the value is 0. I fail to see how an Junk MVP will do that. I wonder if as part of you blog journey, you can ask for money from your first users and log their response.
- davnicwil 7y ago
  Thanks for calling that out. I agree with you. One of the hardest things I find about doing things like this is trying to stay on the uncomfortable but correct path. It's too easy to do the easy and wrong thing - giving something away for free is easy and has zero risk of rejection and actually finding out it's useless or not what people want. I'll do what you suggest and actually aim to sell even the MVP.

2 points by davnicwil 7y ago

Hi HN - OP here - this is an experiment I'm doing where I'm trying to go from nothing but an idea to a product with paying customers in 10 weeks, following along the YC Startup School program, and blogging the whole process. I'm 2 weeks in and have written daily updates each day. Hope this might be entertaining & useful for fellow hackers and bootstrappers in the community!

streetcat1 7y ago

Thanks for the writing. So, doesn't the MVP need to be sellable? What kind of feedback are you are expecting to get from a "junk" MVP?

davnicwil 7y ago
My takeaway from what Michael Seibel is saying is that your MVP should just deliver something of value to someone. If it covers more than one usecase, or is polished in any way over and above what's fundamental to delivering that thing of value, then you waited longer than necessary to get it out there and get feedback. I think whether or not it's sellable depends on the specifics of that narrow first thing it does. In the case of Box CI I certainly don't see it as necessary. There's plenty of value in just shipping something that's free to use, to see if it's useful for people.

streetcat1 7y ago

I see. So I agree, but the value delivered should be measured by the amount of money that the user is willing to pay you. If the user does not pay, than , to me, it say that the value is 0. I fail to see how an Junk MVP will do that. I wonder if as part of you blog journey, you can ask for money from your first users and log their response.

davnicwil 7y ago
Thanks for calling that out. I agree with you. One of the hardest things I find about doing things like this is trying to stay on the uncomfortable but correct path. It's too easy to do the easy and wrong thing - giving something away for free is easy and has zero risk of rejection and actually finding out it's useless or not what people want. I'll do what you suggest and actually aim to sell even the MVP.