Ideas are not worthless

This post is sparked by a thread earlier today that almost turned into a discussion on the value of ideas: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=136970

Ideas need execution to have their value realized. That doesn't mean the ideas are worthless! A leader has value, but only with followers. The most talented salespeople depend on development for their worth. A pill doesn't do anything until you swallow it -- but you'll still be happy to have it, and you can pass one around before someone claims it.

If all ideas had zero value, then it would be meaningless to say that one idea is better than another.

The entire intellectual property system, whatever its flaws, was constructed to try and allow idea-creators to capitalize on the value of the idea independent of the execution.

It's difficult to separate the value of the idea from its execution for two reasons. First, unlike pills, ideas spread by replication; when you give one away you keep yours. Second, when product ideas spread, the value to each holder decreases since there's an increase in the probability of a more skillful execution by someone else.

If there were some way of making the economics of ideas work more like the economics of pills, a startup could presumably intermediate the market and make a profit. Poppysan would be able to claim some of the value for his/her good idea by passing it someone with more freedom to execute.

Here's one way I think it might work. And I don't have the time or passion to execute on it!

The idea is to create an idea-market, where people can buy and sell ideas. The ideas could be simple, like a sentence ("Create a Javascript object that makes server requests without a full page request";"Buy that Google stock, I think it'll hit $300") or full papers like Nielsen Norman sells. How do you sell something if showing it to someone gives it all away? Clearly, you can't show before they pay. But why do you buy something you haven't seen yet?

Well, you need to trust the seller. When you buy a subscription to a magazine or newspaper, it's because you trust the editors not to shove crap at you once they have your money. At first, you build this trust through a track record. If a random stranger walked up to me and said, "I have a great product idea and nobody but you available to execute on it, but I want $1000 first," I'd tell them to fuck off. If pg did the same, I'd call my bank. And I've never met him.

We don't want a daily startup idea for $5, we only want a few good ones. So our trust system needs to be distributed --- A seller's trust needs to be built on a few transactions each with many buyers, rather than deep 'relationships' with few buyers. One way this could work: Would-be sellers give away a few clever thoughts, free, to build up a reputation for insightful analysis; buyers rate ideas; sellers gain reputation points through the ratings; buyers ratings for individual ratings are compared to each other to keep the buyers honest; sellers with good reputations are able to raise their prices. Pleasant side-effect/higher purpose/path to billion dollars: Deprecate the patent system by becoming the central global clearing-house for intellectual property exchange, partnering with universities, corporations, governments and entrepreneurs.

It's investment columns taken digital. eBay for ideas. IP for the new millenium. Whatever.

Or maybe it's a silly idea worth nothing at all!

A really good idea will include enough details, that it spills over into "execution." It's not just an idea-market. It's an idea-market where people submit via a form that looks like this, click that button, get scored this way. We will launch it by doing this, talking to those people, and focusing on this sector. We will convert this into physical and monetary value by selling this service.

Now, that may be an idea that is worth something.

While you have described certain approaches, until you have a very sharp focus that describes exactly how to get from point A to B (nothing to full product), which means not just "one way to do this is...", but "this is how we will do it," then the idea really is not "executable."

I think you are on the right track with your proposed solution, but I think we can improve it:

Basically, ideas are interesting. If you publish ideas, a lot of people would go and read them. So there is your market. And you also note that the value of an idea decreases as it spreads, so that property can be leveraged to generate a competitive market.

So what you could do is generate the ideas and keep them exclusive. Someone can pay to look at an idea, and if they like the idea, they can buy it. If they don't buy, the idea gets released to the public.

I can see why this hasn't been attempted before, because there are some difficult issues that need to be dealt with. I do think that it could be done and made to work, so I might actually play around with this one and see what falls out. ambition, send an email if you'd like to play with me.