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Disruption and My Next Startup... You Help Decide
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoWriting everything down started happening / was inspired by this long Ask HN thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=475736 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=475736 TONS of good stuff in that thread. Still my favorite discussion here.
- javery 17y agoFind an idea that you are passionate about and ready to pour time and money into. I would bet that of those ideas maybe 1 or 2 are things you honestly want to do (and think you can do).
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoI agree. This is the starting point you could say. From here, there are about 4 or 5 different pieces of criteria I'm prioritizing by. The biggest one with the most weight is passion.
- keltecp11 17y agoI'm all for the Home Shopping Network one... WOOT.com For Home Shopping Network... Make a home shopping network for people like us... get a prime time slot... make it huge.
- JacobAldridge 17y agoGreat insight into the thought processes of aspiring start-up founder with track record. Not disimilar to pg/YC's RFS. Key context for all of us with excellent ideas going nowhere: "Ideas only get you so far, and getting true feedback is a lot more valuable to me than the rare off chance of someone 'stealing' 1 of 12 ideas that I may or may not ever pursue."
- auston 17y agoTrack record? I'm not sure that has any basis, surely Jason is a nice guy, but the only track record I am aware of is: Some random company - Social startup which never went anywhere long term, but had decent buzz at some point (iirc). Publictivity - Which the towel was thrown in on (& may go open source) Ramamia - Started with Mark Bao which seems to be barely lingering (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/ramamia.com/ http://siteanalytics.compete.com/ramamia.com/) I'm not sure if that is a track record. [EDIT: Downvoted for disagreeing with someone & backing it up - anybody care to explain why?]
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- run4yourlives 17y agoTrack-record as in has actually launched products. You can look at that as not being much, or you can look at it as being more than someone who hasn't done any of that, which would include a good number of people reading this.
- auston 17y agoInterestingly - I always kind of felt & have seen the opposite, all of the people I know from HN have indeed launched something, although my sample size is only 6 people.
- mediaman 17y agoBecause you're attacking an HN regular for trying and failing, when he already admits he has a lot to learn (and failing teaches you a lot) and just wants to make something useful for people. It's not kind to attack people for failing and goes against the HN ethos, because the only real failures are those who were too timid to ever try. I understand you were replying to someone else's comment, not any claim Jason made. You may wish to explore ways to be more diplomatic, or hold back the attacks if you can't find a better way to express yourself.
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoYeah, I surely wouldn't say track record as if I've done something special or overly successful. I've built products and done things, but I have an insane amount to learn. I'm just a guy looking to build something that people want to use.
- sho 17y agoThere I was thinking that obviously "jasonlbaptiste" and "markbao" were sock puppets but no, mark bao sounds Chinese. A few clicks confirms it. So what the hell? Have you guys got an agreement to submit each other's stuff or something? Honestly I don't like that. If jasonlbaptiste writes something good on jasonlbaptiste.com, then just submit it yourself, jasonlbaptiste. You don't need a proxy.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoI shared the post with Mark and he submitted. I was going to do it in a tiny bit, but it's silly to repost it under my name.
- sho 17y agoOK guys that's cool. Just you know, submit your own stuff. There is no point mixing it up. Hope you didn't take offense, none intended! : D
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoI understand the first glance reaction. No offense taken at all :-).
- modoc 17y agoMark is partners with Jason on one of the startups Mark is involved with (it says that on his profile), so it stands to reason he reads Jason's blog a lot. Don't need to be a conspiracy.
- sho 17y agoMarkbao did 9/11! Hm. Too soon? Anyway, I didn't mean to allege a conspiracy. Just saying that if people write something, and they have an account here, they should take ownership and submit it themselves.
- ujjwalg 17y agoI really like the #4 and #6 mainly because we are working on both. :) I totally believe that education industry needs a makeover because it is extremely fragmented and highly inefficient with very less innovation.
- ujjwalg 17y agoand the strange thing with this is that everyone agrees education industry needs major innovation but not much VC funding is being poured into it in spite of huge (billions) opportunity.
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agothe textbook/education industry is probably the largest on the "change the world" scale. It would take a really adventurous and patient VC and/or Angel group. You would also have to have a good group of advisors and/or team members that knew the space. It's a long long term company, but at the end of the day it would probably have the largest impact. If I were a VC, I would fund the right team to do this without hesitation.
- run4yourlives 17y agoThat's because there are powerful interests that aren't interested in innovating here: they like the industry just the way it is.
- run4yourlives 17y agoI'm loving that woot for dating bit. I think that's a huge winner. Needs to be local though. It would work better as a "auction" though, like you see at those charity fund-raisers. People apply to be "auctioned" off - submit detailed profiles - one girl one guy every day. People bid. Highest bid wins (make it fixed bids), depending on money raised, site sends them on a free date. You might need to give the auctioned some influence in picking the bidder, but man what a cash cow.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- jasonlbaptiste 17y agoI would start it in one city. Miami or SF Bay area were my first gut instinct thoughts. The auction idea was one thought I had, but then it would be dependent upon whoever spent the most, and not the girl's tastes.
- run4yourlives 17y agoThat's the thing that might kill it though. Unless you're talking big money (which you may eventually) you're not likely to find many women/men who are attractive wanting to blind date for a free dinner or whatever. What you could do actually, is get the person's friends to pick from the top 5, or have bidding levels that you can match to be considered "in", instead of auction style bidding.
- icey 17y agoThis sounds like a great facebook app to me - Have their friends decide who they go on a blind date with.
- run4yourlives 17y agoExcept by developing it on that dreadful site, you'll never make any money. :-)