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There are no million dollar ideas. There are only difficult decade-long slogs through the hard work of building a company, which may or may not one day yield a

There are no million dollar ideas. There are only difficult decade-long slogs through the hard work of building a company, which may or may not one day yield a million dollars. Take spacex for example, which started like this and 20 years later is aiming for Mars https://www.starletters.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/mariachi.png https://www.starletters.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/maria... Or Amazon, which started like this and took a long long time to become one of the biggest companies in the world https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/7p9n1j/photo_of_jeff_bezos_in_1999_think_about_this_the/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/7p9n1j/photo_of_jeff_... But most people don't want to do the work so they look for million dollar ideas.

LeegleechN 6y ago
You don't even need an idea to reliably make a million dollars. Just get a moderately well paying job and save money. A billion dollars, on the other hand...
- eloff 6y ago
  It's very hard for people to be disciplined about not increasing their lifestyle when doing this in order to actually save enough. But it's a nearly 100% sure-fire way to achieve that goal.
- ummonk 6y ago
  Or make a lucky leveraged bet on the stock market.
eloff 6y ago
As usual the truth is somewhat more nuanced. There definitely are million dollar ideas, and there's a lot of bad ideas that sound like they could be million dollar ideas, but which don't work in practice, no matter how much work you put into it. However, coming up with ideas is far, far easier than executing on them. If you're in a situation where you can't generate ideas, I would recommend reading/watching various advice on the subject in the YC library and elsewhere, to try and get closer to the right mindset to be open to opportunities. Then pay attention to all the little things you ignore day to day. Every time you find yourself getting frustrated with a company or process, that could be an opportunity in disguise. It's also beneficial to broaden your work experience. Go work in a different field or a field at an intersection with yours and pay attention. Be Mindful of The Living Force as you go through life :)
- gen220 6y ago
  > However, coming up with ideas is far, far easier than executing on them. There was an article [0] shared here last month that I found useful for weighing the relative importance of ideas vs execution. IMO, there are many many million-dollar-ideas (million with an m, not billion) out there, that are enough to make a bootstrap startup out of. Many people see these ideas, but don't develop them because the problems are "body-building hard" instead of "ideas hard". Working 9-5 at $BIG_CO is neither kind of hard most of the time, and most people prefer that. [0]: https://www.alexcrompton.com/blog/2017/05/26/hard-is-not-defensible https://www.alexcrompton.com/blog/2017/05/26/hard-is-not-def...
  - toomuchtodo 6y ago
    > "body-building hard" 'Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.' - Ronnie Coleman
    - eloff 6y ago
      This is not really relevant, but I found body building made me a better programmer. I'm not sure if it's just healthy body healthy mind, or building up discipline, or something else. I'm not much of a body builder compared to most, mind you, but I keep at it.
      - sah2ed 6y ago
        > I'm not much of a body builder compared to most, mind you, but I keep at it. Mind sharing how you are able to sustain the habit? I currently jog fairly consistently but only on week days. I’m able to jog for ~25 mins 3 to 5 times a week and make it a point to rest on weekends. I got a boxed set of portable weights just as the lock down was about to be enacted but have not been able to lift regularly. Now, it takes an enormous amount of mental energy to get myself to lift even on weekends that I’ve simply abandoned the weights.
        6y ago
jb775 6y ago
I'm not discounting moonshot business ideas. I'm saying there's a bunch of capable people out there that may not have any idea what exactly to build. And I'm saying people like that could benefit from active discussion on ideas of what to build, and people that already have ideas of what to build would benefit from discussing their startup idea & business plan with others prior to diving in head first. I'm basically saying mix wisdom of the crowd with the startup-idea generation process.
- grey-area 6y ago
  Quite sincerely, I'm convinced YC and other VCs don't do this because they've observed that ideas truly don't matter very much. And if you can't even come up with an idea what hope do you have of finishing the work, why not become an employee (which is fine)? What matters is the journey and how you react to the multiple problems along the way (99% of people give up too early, too much grit is required). Usually by the end of that journey your initial idea has changed beyond recognition, even if there are some common elements between the idea and the endpoint. To come up with some examples: Apple: Computers for everyone -> Phones for everyone Amazon: Buy books online -> Logistics, Free Delivery + Cloud Compute Airbnb: Airbeds in living rooms -> Online bookings SpaceX: Greenhouse on Mars -> Reusable rockets Very few ideas survive contact with reality unscathed.
  - bobwernstein 6y ago
    if ideas don't matter, explain Uber and the dozens of copy cat apps that launched right after all over the world. Why didn't they launch before Uber was even thought of by the founder?
- bobwernstein 6y ago
  I agree with you I also have been looking for place where good ideas are shared and discussed. Couldn't find any except the usual subreddits where posts do occaisionally come by discussing trends, ideas etc. A good idea is rare. I don't follow the belief of ideas are a dime a dozen. If that where the case why was Uber the first company to innovate in the taxi space and why suddenly just after it launched like 20 different companies launched everywhere in the world doing exactly the same.

LeegleechN 6y ago

You don't even need an idea to reliably make a million dollars. Just get a moderately well paying job and save money. A billion dollars, on the other hand...

eloff 6y ago
It's very hard for people to be disciplined about not increasing their lifestyle when doing this in order to actually save enough. But it's a nearly 100% sure-fire way to achieve that goal.
ummonk 6y ago
Or make a lucky leveraged bet on the stock market.

eloff 6y ago

As usual the truth is somewhat more nuanced. There definitely are million dollar ideas, and there's a lot of bad ideas that sound like they could be million dollar ideas, but which don't work in practice, no matter how much work you put into it. However, coming up with ideas is far, far easier than executing on them. If you're in a situation where you can't generate ideas, I would recommend reading/watching various advice on the subject in the YC library and elsewhere, to try and get closer to the right mindset to be open to opportunities. Then pay attention to all the little things you ignore day to day. Every time you find yourself getting frustrated with a company or process, that could be an opportunity in disguise. It's also beneficial to broaden your work experience. Go work in a different field or a field at an intersection with yours and pay attention. Be Mindful of The Living Force as you go through life :)

gen220 6y ago
> However, coming up with ideas is far, far easier than executing on them. There was an article [0] shared here last month that I found useful for weighing the relative importance of ideas vs execution. IMO, there are many many million-dollar-ideas (million with an m, not billion) out there, that are enough to make a bootstrap startup out of. Many people see these ideas, but don't develop them because the problems are "body-building hard" instead of "ideas hard". Working 9-5 at $BIG_CO is neither kind of hard most of the time, and most people prefer that. [0]: https://www.alexcrompton.com/blog/2017/05/26/hard-is-not-defensible https://www.alexcrompton.com/blog/2017/05/26/hard-is-not-def...
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  > "body-building hard" 'Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.' - Ronnie Coleman
  - eloff 6y ago
    This is not really relevant, but I found body building made me a better programmer. I'm not sure if it's just healthy body healthy mind, or building up discipline, or something else. I'm not much of a body builder compared to most, mind you, but I keep at it.
    - sah2ed 6y ago
      > I'm not much of a body builder compared to most, mind you, but I keep at it. Mind sharing how you are able to sustain the habit? I currently jog fairly consistently but only on week days. I’m able to jog for ~25 mins 3 to 5 times a week and make it a point to rest on weekends. I got a boxed set of portable weights just as the lock down was about to be enacted but have not been able to lift regularly. Now, it takes an enormous amount of mental energy to get myself to lift even on weekends that I’ve simply abandoned the weights.
      - 6y ago

jb775 6y ago

I'm not discounting moonshot business ideas. I'm saying there's a bunch of capable people out there that may not have any idea what exactly to build. And I'm saying people like that could benefit from active discussion on ideas of what to build, and people that already have ideas of what to build would benefit from discussing their startup idea & business plan with others prior to diving in head first. I'm basically saying mix wisdom of the crowd with the startup-idea generation process.

grey-area 6y ago
Quite sincerely, I'm convinced YC and other VCs don't do this because they've observed that ideas truly don't matter very much. And if you can't even come up with an idea what hope do you have of finishing the work, why not become an employee (which is fine)? What matters is the journey and how you react to the multiple problems along the way (99% of people give up too early, too much grit is required). Usually by the end of that journey your initial idea has changed beyond recognition, even if there are some common elements between the idea and the endpoint. To come up with some examples: Apple: Computers for everyone -> Phones for everyone Amazon: Buy books online -> Logistics, Free Delivery + Cloud Compute Airbnb: Airbeds in living rooms -> Online bookings SpaceX: Greenhouse on Mars -> Reusable rockets Very few ideas survive contact with reality unscathed.
- bobwernstein 6y ago
  if ideas don't matter, explain Uber and the dozens of copy cat apps that launched right after all over the world. Why didn't they launch before Uber was even thought of by the founder?
bobwernstein 6y ago
I agree with you I also have been looking for place where good ideas are shared and discussed. Couldn't find any except the usual subreddits where posts do occaisionally come by discussing trends, ideas etc. A good idea is rare. I don't follow the belief of ideas are a dime a dozen. If that where the case why was Uber the first company to innovate in the taxi space and why suddenly just after it launched like 20 different companies launched everywhere in the world doing exactly the same.