Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#1

Post by leksak » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 9:30 AM UTC

Hi, I am curious if anyone could give any suggestions as to an appropriate sector within the software development industry given my interests.

My interests within the field is not what one would call narrow. Primarily though, I have a fondness for programming language theory, compilers, parsing and writing my own DSLs so that I can make powerful compile-time assertions regarding my code as well as generate tests automatically from the DSL itself.

My StackOverflow cv has an additional set of tasks that pertain to my interests, http://stackoverflow.com/cv/filipallberg.

Regarding my primary interests, the only relevant "thing" I have come up with is web-scraping, but I find it is a dull task as it is a trivial matter to me.

Machine vision is also something that I think a lot about, however most of my ideas are consumer-facing utilities and not something to build a business around. If I get a good idea I'd be willing to go into business myself.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#2

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 10:18 AM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#3

Post by boothead » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 10:21 AM UTC

Whereabouts are you? If you're interested in PLT, DSLs and compilers, there are some small enclaves in finance that might interest you.

edit spelling

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#4

Post by mseebach » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 10:22 AM UTC

What do you want to optimise around? Stable job, 9-17, decent salary? Lost of money, caution to the wind? Be something [for one or more of several values of 'something'] to a lot of people? Fiddle with deeply intellectual CS problems, shielded from pedestrian worries about revenue and users?

I personally enjoy the knowledge of having solved a real (business) problem for real people, and being appreciated both financially and personally for this, even when the actual tech going into this isn't very complicated, and especially, doesn't tick off a lot of "hip" boxes.

I have also met good people who do not thrive in these circumstances, so it's hard to give generic advice as to what might make you happy.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#5

Post by danieltillett » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 10:23 AM UTC

I want to suggest something that I would not normally suggest which is you should pair up with a non-technical founder. What you want to be looking for is someone with deep business experience (15+ years) in a narrow business field. Team up with them and work towards creating something amazing, but tightly focused.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#6

Post by pedrodelfino » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 10:55 AM UTC

Have a look at the legal industry. There are quite a few legal tech startups by now. Even web-scraping applications are rare in legal. The sector is famous for being profitable (high margins), rusty and inefficient.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#7

Post by lmm » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 11:00 AM UTC

I've worked 5-6 programming jobs in 5-6 different industries. Honestly the job is pretty similar in any industry. I'd recommend working for whoever pays best and/or a team you get on with.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#8

Post by yitchelle » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 11:03 AM UTC

I don't have any specific industry for you to get into, but I have a suggestion on how you might be able to find it. Attend as many trade shows as you can and talk to the folks to get an idea of what they are doing, although some of them may be difficult to get to due distance, cost, invites etc.

For example, Embedded World in Nürnberg, Germany provides a good cross section of industry that has embedded engineering involvement in it. There will be a similar one for telecommunications, Automotive etc.

Good luck on searching for your calling.

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#9

Post by sklogic » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 11:04 AM UTC

I'm very much into DSLs, and I've been building and using them extensively throughout a very wide spectrum: database engines, CADs, hardware design and verification, compilers, device drivers, HPC (GPGPU).

Re: Ask HN: Which industry sector should I target?

#10

Post by j0rd » Wed, Feb 03, 2016, 11:27 AM UTC

If you like web-scraping, and you're not an idiot, you immediately have an information advantage for anything you decide to do. Do not underestimate this advantage.

I would suggest you leverage your interest in web-scraping and use it to customers in what ever niche you believe you can sell them something.

Collect your "beta" users through web-scraping, figure out a way to reach them at scale. Build/sell a product they want (you can leverage your information advantage to figure out what this is)

This is personally what I do and have created/worked on many bootstrapped companies over my career. Niche for me is fairly irrelevant, as long as I have a pool of interested customers ahead of time. I primarily use my information advantage to figure these out.

The additional skills you will need is:

* learn to think as a "user/customer"

* minor copy-writing skills (or at least understand what shitty copy is and how to improve it)

* UX

* Data mining & Analytics, Analytics, Analytics

* A/B Testing, Iterations, Incremental Improvements (see point above)

* Hypothesis Driven Development (https://www.thoughtworks.com/insights/blog/how-implement-hyp...)

My one suggestion is to avoid any projects which do not have a clear monetization strategy. If you're following my blue-print companies that don't make money from day will only incur costs as you reach your pool of customers at scale.