Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop. • Hacker News Board

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#71

Post by switch » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:17 PM UTC

sliverstorm wrote: post #70

switch wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No she is wrong because of this: c) If you become the decision engine (something Google and Bing are trying to do with their Flight Search and other initiatives in various verticals), then you can easily take over the entire business. If people are coming to you and you help them decide what to buy - then you can start selling them that stuff. * If you become the decision engine for Fashion you can decide everything…

Amazon and WalMart are not decision engines, and they never were. Maybe Amazon had a little of that on the side, but both are traditional retailers with all the traditionally hard problems the article mentioned that people don't want to solve. In fact, Amazon is a poster-child example of what you stand to gain if you are willing to tackle more than just being a frontend.

Let me point out how wrong you are.

Amazon started off selling books. What do you think their margin for each was?

Then they took over a large part of the market. Then they moved into selling other things like electronics.

Then they made the Kindle and controlled the device people read on and the starting point and the buying point.

Now they are getting into publishing and self-publishing.

They are taking over everything starting with taking over the online selling point for books.

That's what a fashion startup earning only 10% can do.

Use the 10% (which is mostly profit) to power an engine that slows takes over all of fashion. Move into parallel areas like shoes and accessories. Then starts making their own stuff.

I appreciate your trying to defend the poster of the original short-sighted article.

However, if you look at building a real business that has the power and control to completely take over an entire industry then starting online is much better than starting in the backend.

If you want to provide services to publishers who publish books (which is what back end would be for books) - well and good.

But there's nothing transformative about it.

The real transformation is to replace Publishers.

that's why the poster of the original article is so wrong. She thinks she's thinking big by talking about tackling the back end instead of doing online sites.

However, the real prize is to replace the entire pipeline and then, if the company so chooses, to replace labels and the entire fashion industry.

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#72

Post by div » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:18 PM UTC

jfarmer wrote: post #63

encoderer wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The core of these recommendation algorithms is often a flavor of nearest neighbor analysis. In this case, the computer is using attributes to find people who are similar to you, and then suggest to you things that they liked. All the "robots" do is find people who it thinks you would like to emulate. That sounds like the same thing the fashion industry has been doing for decades.

Robots don't merchandise, that's the problem. For many people decisions about what to wear is very intimate, but algorithms are bloodless. The who, where, and how matter much more in fashion. Algorithms miss that.

I think a strong algorithm may surprise you.

I remember reading about the Netflix contest and how one of the algorithms categorizes movies into it's own statistically relevant categories*.

Once a comparative algorithm is used and the dataset gets large enough, I have no doubt the recommendations will start to get real good real fast.

http://devlicio.us/blogs/billy_mccafferty/archive/2007/01/02...

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#73

Post by switch » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:22 PM UTC

sliverstorm wrote: post #70

switch wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No she is wrong because of this: c) If you become the decision engine (something Google and Bing are trying to do with their Flight Search and other initiatives in various verticals), then you can easily take over the entire business. If people are coming to you and you help them decide what to buy - then you can start selling them that stuff. * If you become the decision engine for Fashion you can decide everything…

Amazon and WalMart are not decision engines, and they never were. Maybe Amazon had a little of that on the side, but both are traditional retailers with all the traditionally hard problems the article mentioned that people don't want to solve. In fact, Amazon is a poster-child example of what you stand to gain if you are willing to tackle more than just being a frontend.

Additionally, let me clarify a few things.

Starting Point: Where people start their search (to buy something or find something).

Decision Engine: Where people make a decision.

Buying Point: Where people actually buy.

What are all the reviews at Amazon for?

Amazon is both a decision engine and a buying engine. They are trying to wean off starting engines like Google and that is why they first tried A9 and now are trying devices in customers' hands.

If you step out of your attempt to defend the poster of the first article you'll realize that her article (not her, just the article) is very short-sighted.

The Internet is destroying entire industries - yet she thinks fashion internet startups should instead compete in the real world.

That makes no sense. We should all play to our strenghts. While she's trying to do backend stuff and help existing Fashion companies, some 'only 3 to 8%' earning Internet startup is going to disrupt the entire industry.

A hacker, in my opinion, is not meant to figure out how to solve the problems the existing industry power players created or want solved.

A hacker, again in my opinion, should solve the most elegant things and solve things for actual people.

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#74

Post by jfarmer » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:25 PM UTC

astrofinch wrote: post #44

jfarmer wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now you have to build two successful products: one to acquire customers, and one to sell to them.

You mean one to acquire customers and one to do customer fulfillment. And customer fulfillment is useless if you don't have any customers. This seems obvious.

To quote another article on the homepage, what I'm saying is: don't be so f*&^ing strategic.

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#75

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:27 PM UTC

rokhayakebe wrote: post #68

switch wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give her more credit for what? She did a fashion startup for a few years and she never figured out that nearly every luxury company gives 10% to 15% commissions? If she really thinks it's 3 to 8% then she's blissfuly ignorant. She doesn't get the fundamental concept of capturing the starting point. If a site becomes the destination for fashion i.e. where people go to search for the next thing they buy. Then that site…

Do you have an example of a site that started as an affiliate and ended up creating its own products? I think this is would be very very difficult.

[deleted]

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#76

Post by switch » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:27 PM UTC

rokhayakebe wrote: post #68

switch wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give her more credit for what? She did a fashion startup for a few years and she never figured out that nearly every luxury company gives 10% to 15% commissions? If she really thinks it's 3 to 8% then she's blissfuly ignorant. She doesn't get the fundamental concept of capturing the starting point. If a site becomes the destination for fashion i.e. where people go to search for the next thing they buy. Then that site…

Do you have an example of a site that started as an affiliate and ended up creating its own products? I think this is would be very very difficult.

Replace affiliate by middleman and you get a lot of examples.

Obviously it's difficult - because everyone's trying to do it and it gives you so much power.

Look at what Amazon is trying to do with books and music.

What Apple is doing.

What Google is trying to do.

What Facebook is doing.

they are all doing the same thing. Become a middle-man and then try to take up power and start producing stuff themselves.

It's why Google is buying content companies. It's why Facebook is a walled web - they want to replace the Internet.

Don't focus on her post. Because her post (not her, just her post) is very short-sighted.

You don't want to read it and catch the disease of not realizing the real prize.

The real prize is not becoming a small service company for the incumbents. The real prize is to take over a part of the supply chain or customer to product pipeline. Then collate all power.

It's how Google and the Internet has made most content worthless.

That's what all the fashion startups have as their end goal. She can't see it because she's caught in her concept of what fashion should be/could be. As opposed to the real underlying dynamics.

In sports terms - she's focused on a particular pitcher vs batter when the real game has a lot more than just how one batter does against one pitcher.

Re: Building a Fashion Company on the Internet? Stop. Just stop.

#77

Post by switch » Sun, Sep 18, 2011, 5:28 PM UTC