Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or Google Large companies struggle to launch anything due to their staff size. They're as inefficient as a government
how is apple, overall, so good at this?
Is it though?
Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
181–190 of 239 posts
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#182There never was a moat in software. It's your business, value, service, industry knowledge, sales, etc. that's what matters. Not the software. Software is and has always been cheap.
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#183Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#184> Big companies can copy your product in no time Your advantage in this case, now or 10 years ago, is that this is simply not true. If your business is "a flashlight app", yeah, eventually they'll copy it (as it happened). However they'll take an unusual long time to do that simple thing (as it also happened). Why? Because everything at big companies is a political game, full of internal conflicts, multiple prioritie…
What about other smart guys looking for ideas for their startup?
Same as 10 years ago, unrelated to how fast it can be copied.
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#185Short answer: yes, but the “moat” has changed.
A lot of people still think moats are about features. They’re not anymore. Features are cheap now. Execution and distribution are the real bottlenecks.
Big companies can copy your product, but they usually won’t copy: – your speed early on – your willingness to serve a tiny, unsexy niche – your ability to change direction without internal politics
In practice, most startups don’t die because a big company copied them. They die because they never found real users who cared enough to pay.
The moat today often looks like: – deep understanding of a specific workflow or pain point – trust with a narrow audience – compounding advantages (data, habits, integrations, community)
If your plan is “build something cool and hope it sticks”, it’s probably not worth it. If your plan is “solve a painful problem for a very specific group, then expand”, it still is.
Curious how people here think about moats post-AI. Are we underestimating distribution, or overestimating defensibility?
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#186In my experience (enterprise software), customers buy our products not because we have a moat or some hard-to-achieve technical advantage but because they can speak to us in their words, they know we care, and we try solve their problems quickly. Just yesterday I was speaking with the COO of a $200M/yr revenue company in the supply chain space. He'd learned Claude Code and built a couple apps to solve internal proble…
> There is an endless list of problems to solve
As an indie hacker I often struggle to find new ideas. Are there any practical strategies for discovering these real pain points?
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#187There was never a statistical “advantage”, you just never heard about the 9/10 outright failures or even the parts of the 1/10 where people are toiling in obscurity and would have been better off financially “grinding leetcode and working for a FAANG” ((c) r/cscareerquestions) or even being an enterprise dev in a tier 2 city.
> being an enterprise dev in a tier 2 city. Tangential to the question, but this is me and one of my top three regrets in life is not having been a founding engineer. For people without generational wealth or a safety net it takes a particular combination of executive function and youthful ignorance of the opportunity cost (a steady paycheck and obvious career trajectory) to be a founder. As soon as I grew enough of…
I can’t think of any reason for someone statistically to start a company unless they had an “unfair advantage” post 2012 instead of working toward getting a job at BigTech and easily make 1 million+ over 4 years as a mid level developer who should get promoted to a senior by year 3
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#188It’s still hard to create something successful. Remember that Mark Zuckerberg has had “AGI” for over a decade in the form of tens of thousands of human software engineers and Facebook still has barely been able to create a new successful product on their own without acquiring it from a smaller company.
That’s an interesting thought. Thanks.
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#189In my experience (enterprise software), customers buy our products not because we have a moat or some hard-to-achieve technical advantage but because they can speak to us in their words, they know we care, and we try solve their problems quickly. Just yesterday I was speaking with the COO of a $200M/yr revenue company in the supply chain space. He'd learned Claude Code and built a couple apps to solve internal proble…
> There is an endless list of problems to solve As an indie hacker I often struggle to find new ideas. Are there any practical strategies for discovering these real pain points?
The best way to get an idea is to do something for 5-10+ years, learn the limitations, learn what's missing.
2nd best way is to meet those people and talk to them. The more of them from different backgrounds you talk to, the more ideas you can get
Re: Ask HN: Is it still worth pursuing a software startup?
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or Google Large companies struggle to launch anything due to their staff size. They're as inefficient as a government
how is apple, overall, so good at this?
The fruit company still has an internal culture, especially in hardware-focused teams, with a relentless focus on shipping products followed by iterative refinement.