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Sigh. Tech startups aren't ever about the tech. That's not the point. Qwiki isn't about panning around images and playing back TTS. I know that wasn't what the

Sigh. Tech startups aren't ever about the tech. That's not the point. Qwiki isn't about panning around images and playing back TTS. I know that wasn't what the developer was thinking, but I find people making this mistake a lot. Thinking of Facebook as a basic CRUD app you could put together, etc.

melvinram 16y ago
Exactly. It's not the how it's done... it's the problem being solved and how elegantly the problem is being solved.
- snippyhollow 16y ago
  Or... It's about making the right product at the right time and reaching the right market. The problem (even if we consider the social one) that solved facebook wasn't that hard to solve. The timing and bootstrap / first users (universities) was the key. For Youtube the key timing was about bandwidth and for Google about technology/research (as well as a new search vs organize vision of the web).
- il 16y ago
  It really seems to me that Qwiki is a solution I'n search of a problem. What problem is it really solving? Could you ever imagine yourself paying for Qwiki?
  - melvinram 16y ago
    I could imaging paying for a sponsored link at the end of the presentation or below the presentation if someone was watching a presentation on something relevant to my products/services. The problem: People generally prefer not to read. Yet, people are curious creatures. If they could quench their curiosity without having to read, they will.
    - il 16y ago
      The problem is that by definition, people will not go to Qwiki for long-tail searches (because they won't have good content on them). And long-tail, specific, targeted searches/users is where the money is for sponsored links.
    - dstein 16y ago
      The problem: People generally prefer not to read. In Mac OS I have keymapped Option-S assigned to the built-in text-to-speech on the fly, so anytime there's text on any page that I want read back to me I can quickly do so with a keystroke. You know what? I never use it. I generally prefer to read.
  - benmccann 16y ago
    The alarm clock demo they showed was pretty cool. I could see paying a couple bucks to have that on my phone.
mmaunder 16y ago
Tech startups are always about the tech. What's confusing you is that investors and successful entrepreneurs often focus on other essential ingredients that are often ignored.
jpwagner 16y ago
That's fair. But then did they deserve recognition for their "technological achievement" in this year's crunchies?
bkrausz 16y ago
These aren't tech startups: these are web startups. Web startups' main value is the experience, but until they have to scale there's not much value there. Early Facebook, from a technology side, is just a CRUD app that anybody could have written. The value was in the timing, execution, and market. Tesla motors is a technology startup: they're doing something that nobody has done before with technology. Putting something like that in the same categorization as Facebook is an insult to the engineering challenges Tesla faced from day one. Note: Of course Facebook now has a lot of technology, because they're scaling a website to be used by the entire world, but I'm talking about early-stage startups.
- humblest_ever 16y ago
  I mentally do a fist-pump every time someone gets this correct.
whatusername 16y ago
Tech startups are about the tech. What we need is a better word for startups on Techcrunch. "CRUD app + Graphics" or "local social 2.0 buzzword-compliant little companies" While I think they are great (and I use and recommend their product) I don't see Wufoo as a "tech" company. They're like Zappos -- a Customer Service company that happens to be run from a website. That isn't a 'tech' company. It's just a company. Having a Building/shopfront and selling shoes doesn't make you a "real estate" company. Tech Startups are startups taht actually have a technology to sell or a massive technological innovation. Companies like Isilon (had a $2.25B exit last year), or Google or Netscape or PrimeSense.

melvinram 16y ago

Exactly. It's not the how it's done... it's the problem being solved and how elegantly the problem is being solved.

snippyhollow 16y ago
Or... It's about making the right product at the right time and reaching the right market. The problem (even if we consider the social one) that solved facebook wasn't that hard to solve. The timing and bootstrap / first users (universities) was the key. For Youtube the key timing was about bandwidth and for Google about technology/research (as well as a new search vs organize vision of the web).
il 16y ago
It really seems to me that Qwiki is a solution I'n search of a problem. What problem is it really solving? Could you ever imagine yourself paying for Qwiki?
- melvinram 16y ago
  I could imaging paying for a sponsored link at the end of the presentation or below the presentation if someone was watching a presentation on something relevant to my products/services. The problem: People generally prefer not to read. Yet, people are curious creatures. If they could quench their curiosity without having to read, they will.
  - il 16y ago
    The problem is that by definition, people will not go to Qwiki for long-tail searches (because they won't have good content on them). And long-tail, specific, targeted searches/users is where the money is for sponsored links.
  - dstein 16y ago
    The problem: People generally prefer not to read. In Mac OS I have keymapped Option-S assigned to the built-in text-to-speech on the fly, so anytime there's text on any page that I want read back to me I can quickly do so with a keystroke. You know what? I never use it. I generally prefer to read.
- benmccann 16y ago
  The alarm clock demo they showed was pretty cool. I could see paying a couple bucks to have that on my phone.

mmaunder 16y ago

Tech startups are always about the tech. What's confusing you is that investors and successful entrepreneurs often focus on other essential ingredients that are often ignored.

jpwagner 16y ago

That's fair. But then did they deserve recognition for their "technological achievement" in this year's crunchies?

bkrausz 16y ago

These aren't tech startups: these are web startups. Web startups' main value is the experience, but until they have to scale there's not much value there. Early Facebook, from a technology side, is just a CRUD app that anybody could have written. The value was in the timing, execution, and market. Tesla motors is a technology startup: they're doing something that nobody has done before with technology. Putting something like that in the same categorization as Facebook is an insult to the engineering challenges Tesla faced from day one. Note: Of course Facebook now has a lot of technology, because they're scaling a website to be used by the entire world, but I'm talking about early-stage startups.

humblest_ever 16y ago
I mentally do a fist-pump every time someone gets this correct.

whatusername 16y ago

Tech startups are about the tech. What we need is a better word for startups on Techcrunch. "CRUD app + Graphics" or "local social 2.0 buzzword-compliant little companies" While I think they are great (and I use and recommend their product) I don't see Wufoo as a "tech" company. They're like Zappos -- a Customer Service company that happens to be run from a website. That isn't a 'tech' company. It's just a company. Having a Building/shopfront and selling shoes doesn't make you a "real estate" company. Tech Startups are startups taht actually have a technology to sell or a massive technological innovation. Companies like Isilon (had a $2.25B exit last year), or Google or Netscape or PrimeSense.