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The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

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Re: The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

#12

Post by airocker »

xitrium wrote: post #7

This did not hold up well, imo. Not sure how to count it but by some lists this is stuff like: Tencent, Alibaba, Amazon, Netflix, Priceline, Baidu, Salesforce.com, JD.com. Others would include Uber/Lyft, Airbnb, GitHub, ... There are only a few that would qualify that I can think of - Instagram, Snapchat, and WhatsApp. If folks here have other examples or thoughts on why this does or doesn't hold true would love to h…

Uber/Lyft/AirBnb were considered toys when they began. It may be that nowadays the transition from toy to big company is faster.

Re: The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

#15

Post by OnlineGladiator »

This was the approach Anki (which recently shut down) took for robotics. I actually had a similar idea, but whenever I went to the drawing board to make robot toys I could never make anything that was both fun and affordable - using videogames as a benchmark it basically always lost. I think Anki did as close to an admirable job as you could at trying to sell robotic toys while developing more utilitarian robots (they were working on a chore bot but it was woefully inadequate), but they still failed pretty hard. I was always surprised by their ability to continue to raise large sums of money (they raised about a quarter billion in total).

There is a similar approach being taken in the eVTOL space, with Kitty Hawk trying to develop their Heaviside as an obvious toy for the rich (single seater, short range, "quiet"). I think people will refuse to allow so much noise pollution in the skies, not to mention the inherent question of safety as all these designs make serious compromises to flight stability in order to make them so lightweight and take off vertically.

There is merit to this approach though - you could certainly argue hypercars are toys for the super rich and eventually that technology trickles down to cheaper vehicles. But the economics around racing cars are much more complicated, including making an entire sport (and an extremely popular one at that) to justify the development costs. You could also argue Tesla did this, starting with the Roadster, then the Model S, and now the Model 3. Tesla's financials have been a source of great debate for a decade now though.

Whatever the next big thing is, I bet the media hasn't caught onto it yet. I don't think it's VR, AR, self-driving cars, general AI, or anything else that has already been woefully overhyped. It'll be something nobody was looking for and the right person stumbles upon it at the right place and time.

Re: The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

#16

Post by cpmsmith »

xitrium wrote: post #7

This did not hold up well, imo. Not sure how to count it but by some lists this is stuff like: Tencent, Alibaba, Amazon, Netflix, Priceline, Baidu, Salesforce.com, JD.com. Others would include Uber/Lyft, Airbnb, GitHub, ... There are only a few that would qualify that I can think of - Instagram, Snapchat, and WhatsApp. If folks here have other examples or thoughts on why this does or doesn't hold true would love to h…

I think the "Thing" in Next Big Thing as this article uses it is rarely a business, more often a technology. WhatsApp has never been considered a toy, but IM as a medium has—WhatsApp's genesis as a valuable business is itself that toy becoming a Big Thing. Netflix was never a toy; streaming video was a toy in 2005, Netflix turned it into a billion dollar business.

Edit: Technology, not product, and Netflix example

Re: The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

#17

Post by Ancalagon »

OnlineGladiator wrote: post #15

This was the approach Anki (which recently shut down) took for robotics. I actually had a similar idea, but whenever I went to the drawing board to make robot toys I could never make anything that was both fun and affordable - using videogames as a benchmark it basically always lost. I think Anki did as close to an admirable job as you could at trying to sell robotic toys while developing more utilitarian robots (the…

I actually think AR could still be the next big thing, once the integration becomes seamless and the peripheral technology doesn't look ridiculous

Re: The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)

#19

Post by playpause »

airocker wrote: post #12
xitrium wrote: post #7

This did not hold up well, imo. Not sure how to count it but by some lists this is stuff like: Tencent, Alibaba, Amazon, Netflix, Priceline, Baidu, Salesforce.com, JD.com. Others would include Uber/Lyft, Airbnb, GitHub, ... There are only a few that would qualify that I can think of - Instagram, Snapchat, and WhatsApp. If folks here have other examples or thoughts on why this does or doesn't hold true would love to h…

Uber/Lyft/AirBnb were considered toys when they began. It may be that nowadays the transition from toy to big company is faster.

I don't remember anyone saying Uber/Lyft/Airbnb were toys when they began. Some might have thought them unlikely to succeed, but that's not the same thing as being a toy.
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