Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#11

Post by noodle » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:04 PM UTC

icefox wrote: post #9

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good one. Ebay is just such a force to be reckoned with, but they've completely lost their soul. They've pissed their sellers off like none other. You would have to have something so different and innovative to start stealing their thunder. Maybe you start in a different niche ie- Etsy. I really like what Etsy is doing.

So far the only auction site I have seen that has gone anywhere is tfields.com which started as a transformers toys auction site and grew from there. It is a real catch-22, you need lots of buyers and sellers suddenly.

my initial thoughts on how to make that happen would be to round up some medium-sized ebay sellers, ask them what their needs are, build the site to meet them, and offer them free auctions for a period of time to switch and help promote.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#12

Post by mikecuesta » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:04 PM UTC

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #2

Music Industry This may be one of the most obvious ones out there. Artists don't need the record labels anymore. The money is not purely in the music, but ticket sales, merchandise, extra content,etc. I like what topspin media is doing. Myspace has made great strides, but it's just a start.

iTunes much?

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#13

Post by shalmanese » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:11 PM UTC

Higher Education. Existing institutions are selling inefficient and grossly overpriced products in an environment in which objective evaluation is hard to obtain and the status quo fears innovation. If you could crack that nut, it would be massive.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#14

Post by russell » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:14 PM UTC

mixmax wrote: post #7

Look at a lot of big traditional B2B businesses. They haven't gotten much coverage because they aren't sexy and visible to the normal consumer. - ERP ssystems are impossible to understand for the people that work with them, and require an army of highly paid consultants just to get it up and running. - financial software for large companies doesn't allow managers to see numbers in real-time, is difficult to get numbe…

This is an area that has huge potential. The problem is that the scale is beyond the capabilities of the small startup. I'm involved in something that might have the right model. My client acquired some quite capable, but rough around the edges, software from a supplier that went belly up. The intention is to fix the bugs, enable low cost (non-programmer) customization and spin it off as a separate company. There may be other opportunities out there to take good enterprise software public.

The other approach is to take on a narrow vertical and do a bangup job, Grow from there.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#15

Post by josefresco » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:21 PM UTC

mojombo wrote: post #6

Classifieds. CraigsList is not the be-all end-all of buying/selling things locally online. It may be a tough nut to crack, but it won't be hard to radically improve upon their horrible user experience. I would love to see some competition in this space.

Not going to happen. Craigslist is at that early Google period where everyone who uses it for the first time never looks back and is uber-loyal to the brand. A slick competitor with a great interface and new tools still has to climb that huge Ebay/Facebook-style mountain (no users no stuff, no reason)

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#16

Post by katz » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:22 PM UTC

mojombo wrote: post #6

Classifieds. CraigsList is not the be-all end-all of buying/selling things locally online. It may be a tough nut to crack, but it won't be hard to radically improve upon their horrible user experience. I would love to see some competition in this space.

Or different countries. There are quite a few countries in which CraigsList never really "caught on" and where there isn't really something similar.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#17

Post by icefox » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:22 PM UTC

yan wrote: post #4

You mentioned it, but I think the music industry is really ripe for disruption. Their business model is definitely shifting as we speak. ebay/auction sites/local commerce can be done better.

The problem is that everyone knows that the music world is changing and wants in on the pie and so far Apple has done the best job. The bad part is that they are doing a pretty good job. The hardware is nice and works, the software for the most part does work and gets music easily and cheap to users who are for the most part happy. A high obstacle. Let others try attacking the music problem and instead try one of the easier ones.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#18

Post by josefresco » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:23 PM UTC

mikecuesta wrote: post #12

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #2

Music Industry This may be one of the most obvious ones out there. Artists don't need the record labels anymore. The money is not purely in the music, but ticket sales, merchandise, extra content,etc. I like what topspin media is doing. Myspace has made great strides, but it's just a start.

iTunes much?

His comment would have made more sense if he said "iTunes' instead of the Music Industry.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#19

Post by russell » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:23 PM UTC

Government, Governments are being run on antiquated software created by giants of the military industrial complex. There are huge hurdles on the procurement side, but the opportunities of making a 10x price performance improvement are all over the the place. One key is to make the product highly configurable to accommodate the different laws from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Another key is to tackle smaller entities because they will be more flexible. Voice of experience: dont start with the California DMV or the Illinois Secretary of State.

Re: Ask HN: Industries Ripe For Disruption?

#20

Post by josefresco » Tue, Feb 10, 2009, 8:25 PM UTC

Government. Now hear me out on this one. I think with new technology, and the push for open access to information (that's digestible) will disrupt the political system as we've known it. Doubt it will happen once things get 'back on track' financially in this country.