This is funny because one of the first startup ideas I ever had was 'hey, I should make a webservices based site for collecting web payments, lots of people wou

This is funny because one of the first startup ideas I ever had was 'hey, I should make a webservices based site for collecting web payments, lots of people would use that'. This was back when PayPal was still principally something you used to share money between two people, and was limited principally to US accounts. But I made the mistake of talking over the idea with someone who I looked up to at the time, who seemed older and wiser. They said 'there are already systems that do that, I would find something else'. Now I'm not saying I had even the remotest chance of getting such a thing off the ground - but at the time, I was so ignorant that I thought I could - but the ignorance worked both ways in that I would blindly accept the word of someone else, who just highlighted the schlep involved and so I immediately gave up. But that's just what the article says : when you're young ignorance can be a blessing, but you've got to be prepared to put in the hard work and not give up at even the tiniest hurdle. Getting that rare mix in a young person is the elusive part. But I'm convinced you can get young people to put in the hard work - you've just got to give them the encouragement to go ahead and fail big if need be.