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How do you propose finding those real problems to solve? I know that every problem I encounter in my life (or work) has already been solved 100 times over.

non-entity 6y ago
Yeah in honestly shocked at how many niche problems. I encounter that have ready solutions. If I ever find a truly unsolved problem, in likely to assume that its just too hard to properly solve at the time.
- jmstfv 6y ago
  > If I ever find a truly unsolved problem Why do you think you need to find a truly unsolved problem? If all you want is a profitable, sustainable business, look at what companies are already paying for, and build a product that solves one of those problems. It doesn't have to be a carbon copy of an existing product. You can differentiate by price or combination of features. Or you can target a different niche. Competition is a signal that there's money to be made in the market. It won't be easy, and you will have to learn sales & marketing. But it is doable. If there are X companies in the market, there's likely a place for another one (as long as this isn't a winner-takes-all type of market).
ScottFree 6y ago
So solve it for the 101st time, but better. Everything is broken and nothing works. So, build something that isn't broken and does work. I just found out yesterday that AWS Amplify doesn't have a manual deploy button. It's only job is to build and deploy an app and there is nowhere on Amplify itself where you can press a button and kick off a build! Junk like this is everywhere now. It's a golden opportunity for people who know what they're doing.
jwr 6y ago
If I were to start again, I would look outside of my tech bubble. Go see a local workshop, baker, restaurant. Look into niche industries. There are plenty of inefficiencies and unsolved problems there. I think the best ones are where you deal with physical things (e.g. not just advertising or getting customers). There are plenty of unsolved problems. An alternative is to look for a problem that has been "solved", but not in a certain niche. For example, inventory control and tracking production seems to be a "solved" problem, but it turned out it wasn't a "solved" problem for small/medium-scale electronics manufacturing, which is the niche I'm in.
winrid 6y ago
Just find a pain point. One of my products sells just because people really don't like certain aspects of my biggest competitor. So I capitalize on that and make migration easy.
kimi 6y ago
Find a problem that is un-sexy enough and work on it. Success is 99% persistence.
nradov 6y ago
Joel Spolsky had good advice on that. “Where there’s muck, there’s brass.” https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/12/06/where-theres-muck-theres-brass/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/12/06/where-theres-muck-...
deleted 6y ago
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non-entity 6y ago

Yeah in honestly shocked at how many niche problems. I encounter that have ready solutions. If I ever find a truly unsolved problem, in likely to assume that its just too hard to properly solve at the time.

jmstfv 6y ago
> If I ever find a truly unsolved problem Why do you think you need to find a truly unsolved problem? If all you want is a profitable, sustainable business, look at what companies are already paying for, and build a product that solves one of those problems. It doesn't have to be a carbon copy of an existing product. You can differentiate by price or combination of features. Or you can target a different niche. Competition is a signal that there's money to be made in the market. It won't be easy, and you will have to learn sales & marketing. But it is doable. If there are X companies in the market, there's likely a place for another one (as long as this isn't a winner-takes-all type of market).

ScottFree 6y ago

So solve it for the 101st time, but better. Everything is broken and nothing works. So, build something that isn't broken and does work. I just found out yesterday that AWS Amplify doesn't have a manual deploy button. It's only job is to build and deploy an app and there is nowhere on Amplify itself where you can press a button and kick off a build! Junk like this is everywhere now. It's a golden opportunity for people who know what they're doing.

jwr 6y ago

If I were to start again, I would look outside of my tech bubble. Go see a local workshop, baker, restaurant. Look into niche industries. There are plenty of inefficiencies and unsolved problems there. I think the best ones are where you deal with physical things (e.g. not just advertising or getting customers). There are plenty of unsolved problems. An alternative is to look for a problem that has been "solved", but not in a certain niche. For example, inventory control and tracking production seems to be a "solved" problem, but it turned out it wasn't a "solved" problem for small/medium-scale electronics manufacturing, which is the niche I'm in.

winrid 6y ago

Just find a pain point. One of my products sells just because people really don't like certain aspects of my biggest competitor. So I capitalize on that and make migration easy.

kimi 6y ago

Find a problem that is un-sexy enough and work on it. Success is 99% persistence.

nradov 6y ago

Joel Spolsky had good advice on that. “Where there’s muck, there’s brass.” https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/12/06/where-theres-muck-theres-brass/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/12/06/where-theres-muck-...

deleted 6y ago

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