Reminds me of Hilbert's list (http://www.math.niu.edu/~rusin/known-math/95/hilb.list). I wish this list also has the same effect and influence as that one.
edit: wikilink - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert%27s_problems
Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
21–30 of 401 posts
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#22Some things I want:
1) A way to ensure that each person can only create one account on a website, without having to sacrifice anonymity.
2) A day planner that plans my day for me; based on my to-do list, what my friends are doing, and also what's going on in the local area. Also, populate the bulk of my to-do list automatically based on what my friends in the same classes are adding to theirs. Plan social dates for me based on when my friends and I are free. Introduce me to people I don't know but should know.
3) A way to get more people involved in Internet-mediated locally social stuff.
4) A semi-standardized way for people to build up a reputation without needing a college degree.
5) An IMDB for people who have won awards. I want to a quick way to find the professors with the most citations in any given subject, the chefs in the area with the best zagats reviews, the local high school football players with the most touchdowns, etc.
6) An academic search engine targeting people who are college educated but who don't necessarily have extensive experience with the inner workings of academia. Right now there are really good ways of accessing journal articles online, but really poor ways of learning what academic journals to look in. There's no way to know which journals are respected and which aren't. No easy way to translate plain English questions into the keywords that are used by academics.
7) A way to turn recipes on the web into peapod orders. A way to turn the customized diets that Weight Watchers or WebMD create into a peapod order.
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#23pg, I have working beta for #1 pls. email me at paulpajo [at] gmail
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but YC's model is built around working with very early-stage, yet-to-incorporated businesses. A team that had already built a product to the point of beta, or that had been working on one of the ideas on the list for the past three years as someone has mentioned here, would probably not qualify, right?
[deleted]
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#24pg, I have working beta for #1 pls. email me at paulpajo [at] gmail
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but YC's model is built around working with very early-stage, yet-to-incorporated businesses. A team that had already built a product to the point of beta, or that had been working on one of the ideas on the list for the past three years as someone has mentioned here, would probably not qualify, right?
Actually we especially like groups that have already started.
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#25The idea I submitted and worked on for three years when I applied in 2007 had three of those in one... I don't think anybody has executed on it yet, if you want to read my Spring 2007 application again. (Though if I apply again, it would be with another, more time-sensitive idea, which can also be split up into several of your categories.) I'm not trying to brag, but I did outline the exact way to beat eBay.
Care to share about your thoughts on eBay? Can you reveal your email address?
One, there's already plenty of competition: Etsy and Amazon are just the tip of the iceberg. There's a whole ecosystem of blogs out there on this. Start with Randy Smythe and AuctionBytes.
I'm not going to outline our strategy to expand beyond gaming, but I think our plan is one (of many possible) that will work.
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#26[deleted]
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#27Motivation re:dating site - the very simple (and quite ugly) dating site, Plenty of Fish, earns $10M a year.
The last confirmation was $5 million a year in July of 2007.
My source: http://myventurepad.com/Startups/17787
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#28I totally agree with the outsourcing of IT. My father owns a minor distribution company. That deals with spa, pool, and bath parts. No piece of software has ever come to make their life easier. I have been involved with every major software purchase and I am constantly thinking to myself, I know these people I could probably make something that would work.
The biggest problem I see is that hosted apps are great, but these guys need the software to be up all the time. They may even have bad internet connections. So I was thinking the best model would be to have a hosted application, and then if the company wanted greater up time they could by a box and put it at their location and it would take care of syncing with the online counterpart. That way they could continue business while offline.
As long as you are taking care of integration, and migration you could probably open source the underlying software and still make money on support services. You could also make money selling monthly low cost licenses per user like 10 or 15 dollars per person.
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#29its depressing, i've had some ideas that i think are good that touch on some of those areas but i'm not applying to YC because i don't have the time to make it up there for a few months. :(
Re: Startup Ideas We'd Like to Fund
#30Weird. The problem we're tackling at Pikluk is exactly what #2 is about, yet we weren't even invited for an interview in 07 cycle. Something tells me we should have polished our application more.