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I have seen tons of people like this, but they also come with a NDA and somehow strongly believe idea is so much stronger than the team working on it. I think

by azharcs 18y ago

I have seen tons of people like this, but they also come with a NDA and somehow strongly believe idea is so much stronger than the team working on it. I think this is what happens when mainstream media puts Kevin Rose on front of its cover.

crocus 18y ago
He did have more than an idea, though. He had a huge audience. And that is why digg didn't follow the usual path of startups that begin as this cartoon.
- ojbyrne 18y ago
  I don't think the audience was that huge (he was about to be laid off, presumably because the ratings sucked). He did have enough of an audience to get critical mass. Beyond that, there was a lot of luck (and SEO).
chriskelley 18y ago
We had a guy come into our animation studio to pitch his "next great startup" idea to us to get us involved. He refused to even give us an outline of the idea until we all signed NDAs, in fact mid-conversation another producer came in to drop off a message and the guy made him sign one too, "My lawyer would kill me if I didn't make everybody sign them". The idea ended up being something extremely basic - literally something I could have coded up in an afternoon. After he left and took his buzzwords with him, it was my pleasure to assure everybody else that the guy was full of as much BS as it sounded. Hope his lawyer was cheap, and whoever his "rockstar developer" is must be laughing his way to the bank. Edit: I think part of the problem is born from people trying to attack niche markets without doing their research or understanding their users. This guys idea was basic, but still good - but he was pitching to the completely wrong crowd. I tried to gently convey that I thought maybe smaller studios would be looking for something like his product but studios of our size would likely recognize it as unecessary... alas, everybody thinks they have beautiful babies - and I guess you can't fault him for trying.

by azharcs 18y ago

crocus 18y ago

He did have more than an idea, though. He had a huge audience. And that is why digg didn't follow the usual path of startups that begin as this cartoon.

ojbyrne 18y ago
I don't think the audience was that huge (he was about to be laid off, presumably because the ratings sucked). He did have enough of an audience to get critical mass. Beyond that, there was a lot of luck (and SEO).

chriskelley 18y ago

We had a guy come into our animation studio to pitch his "next great startup" idea to us to get us involved. He refused to even give us an outline of the idea until we all signed NDAs, in fact mid-conversation another producer came in to drop off a message and the guy made him sign one too, "My lawyer would kill me if I didn't make everybody sign them". The idea ended up being something extremely basic - literally something I could have coded up in an afternoon. After he left and took his buzzwords with him, it was my pleasure to assure everybody else that the guy was full of as much BS as it sounded. Hope his lawyer was cheap, and whoever his "rockstar developer" is must be laughing his way to the bank. Edit: I think part of the problem is born from people trying to attack niche markets without doing their research or understanding their users. This guys idea was basic, but still good - but he was pitching to the completely wrong crowd. I tried to gently convey that I thought maybe smaller studios would be looking for something like his product but studios of our size would likely recognize it as unecessary... alas, everybody thinks they have beautiful babies - and I guess you can't fault him for trying.