11–20 of 44 posts
Covers the inventions at Xerox PARC, how they were motivated by removing modes. Then how Brett Victor of Kill Math http://worrydream.com/KillMath/ fame comes up with his ideas. They all stem from a single unifying principle.
First world problems though and no concern with markets and customer validation.
OK, in a venture that I've already started, I go back to our mission statement[1], and decide if the new idea fits the mission. If it does, I think about whether or not it would be a feature of a project we're already working on, or would become a whole new product. In either case, it has to be prioritized relative to the existing work. In some cases, it's easy enough to say "this isn't important enough to work on right now, so it goes in the backlog." In other case, it's not so clear, so you might want to get out and talk to people. I like to bounce ideas off a select handful of people I know and trust initially, and then - depending on the feedback - I might start talking it up to a wider audience, and/or blog/tweet/g+/etc. the idea to solicit discussion.
Do cool things just randomly pop in your head after whatever things you do through life?
Sometimes, but I find that most of the cool ideas I have (well, the ones that I think are cool anyway) occur in response to reading or studying something new, or something that shifts my perspective. I'm a rabid reader anyway, and I try to stretch my boundaries by reading books that span a lot of territory. Even in terms of technical books... I mean, I'm a software guy by trade, but one of the last books I read was Beyond Boundaries[2] by Miguel Nicolelis, which deals with neuroscience and brain/machine interfaces. And lying around here somewhere are some books on nanotechnology, philosophy of mind, artificial life, economics, etc., etc. I often find inspiration from reading something seemingly fairly unrelated to my day to day work.
I also find that talking to interesting people, doing interesting stuff, with other cool ideas, can spark a new idea. As such, I hang out at the local hackerspace[3] quite often, and just listen in, talk to people, swap ideas, etc. Going to user group meetings around new technologies and talking to people there can also spark ideas.
Another neat thing to do, is to follow the "incubator"[4] discussion list at the Apache Software Foundation. Just following what new and interesting projects are being submitted there can potentially spark some cool and creative ideas.
As a follow-up, how do you actually validate whether or not you will actually move forward with it (market opportunity, personal problem, growth potential, ease/challenge of problem, customer validation)?
See above, but if something makes it as far as being seriously considered for a product / product feature, I'm a big fan of @sgblank's "Customer Development" approach. See his book The Four Steps to the Epiphany[5] for details.
[1]: Previous HN discussion on missions: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3631611
[2]: Author Website: http://www.beyondboundariesnicolelis.net/~beyond/wordpress/
[3]: http://www.splatspace.org
[4]: http://incubator.apache.org
[5]: http://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Successful-Strateg...
I was in tokyo last month on their bullet trains and suddenly this thing came to my mind that why dont I have a bullet train in States. My iphone is my note book, I keep writing stuff in it whenever I have an idea and in the end it goes to my blog from where I choose the best one I think and start developing it. Some of the ideas are here http://nsingh.posterous.com/steal-these-ideas and if you look they are mostly random things that we come across but still ignore them.
But personally I still think that you have to go out of your comfort zone to get different ideas to work on.
Now, how do you find new problems? The first rule is (obviously) there are not rules. But you can improve your heuristics like using serendipity or strong market analysis.
Problems are everywhere, so this are the kind of questions I ask myself searching for opportunities:
- Integration: Does technology X connects with technology Y in a seamless way? What can I do achieve integration. A subset of the (X,Y) is {('.net', 'java'), ('web', 'desktop'), ('e-mail', 'crm'), ('e-mail attachments', 'dropbox'), ('google analytics', 'excel'), ('gdata', 'odata'), ('mobile', 'desktop'), ('thunderbird', 'outlook'), ('mobile phone', 'asterisk')} You can add a relation R, like how can I R=migrate from 'thunderbird' to 'outlook' ?
- Extending Features: Can I open different gmail/twitter/etc accounts in different browser tabs? Does Salesforce has all the features needed? Does Kindle export notes?
- Development libraries: There are easy to use libraries to do X in the technology Y?
- Changing industries: Does industry X have a problem that was already solved in industry Y?
- Futurism: What we will need in one year? and in ten years? For example, do I need a voice based web browsing to use while I am doing other things? (like Siri does with e-mail). How I can integrate the information from a lot of sources (G+, Twitter, Facebook, CRMs, etc). Will the torrent protocol will be the future for streaming? in that case how can I add dynamic advertisement to torrent streaming? new games for toddlers (like the AI toy), and Turing test for toddlers?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I did this and I can see how "getting out of your niche" works but be careful that you know who your customers will be. I went into working with the real estate industry, particularly realtors. I now find myself really wanting to get into high tech because my personality clashes with a lot of my customers. For one, they are incredibly un-tech savy and 80% of them use some outdated windows computer with Internet Explo…
On the other hand, if you invest some effort to get more comfortable working with people like these, you could have access to a market that may have fewer competitors, since many tech-oriented people might have the same obstacles you did. And real estate agents may have real money to spend on a product that would make it easier for them to earn their commissions -- you could get a lot more money on a single sale than…
I also never said I wasn't comfortable working with people like this it's just that I wouldn't if I had a choice and knew what I know now. I do not agree with a lot of their work principles and I appreciate different things than they do.
For me, I'm still young and have the time to experiment in different industries it's not about jumping into the first market that has the least competitors, its about finding something I enjoy doing and am passionate about. I notice that is when I tend to do my best work.
I think finding a job or industry is like dating. You have a relationship with your customers and if they are 2 or 3 times your age and share no common interests, it can make for a not so great relationship.
* How to find ideas that make money: http://paraschopra.com/blog/entrepreneurship/how-to-find-sta...
* How to validate your startup idea: http://paraschopra.com/blog/entrepreneurship/validate-startu...
I am a big believer of market-based approach of doing startups. So, instead of trying to come up with a startup idea out of the blue, why don't you identify a market or an opportunity and then see what problems can be solved.
As soon as I start working on one, another comes to me. So it's kind of like torture. Ideas just keep coming and I find it hard to settle down and commit myself to one. I wish I had a whole bunch of money and just paid people to make them all. But it doesn't work that way.
I think it's my negativity and critisism. When I see something that's already been made, I look for its flaw. I almost always find something wrong or imperfect with it. So then I ask myself why it feels wrong, how it can be made better or different, and from that another idea and invention is born. Sometimes so different from its origin that it becomes a whole new different product or service. I mix and match different little fixes together and eventually they create a whole new product.
Other times, idea formation is just subconscious. It happens without thinking. It cooks in the back of your mind and when it's done it gets pushed towards your consciousness and you realize you have a "good idea". Where it came from, you don't know.
In addition, read some and try to become aware of what others need and what others are working on.
Finally, when you become aware of problems or ideas, write them down. I'm a fan of small notebooks; other people use phones or computers or whatever. Look over whatever notes you've taken once a month, and once a year; look for patterns in those.
The second way is to read - not just articles or HN, but novels or non-fiction are another source for me. It functions in the same way as the first: chances are the main character or at parts in the story you will notice things that seem impractical. I noticed this while reading case studies at school, the authors usually explicitly point out that "this industry was fragmented" or so forth.