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Half-Baked Product

weli.dev

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Re: Half-Baked Product

#91

Post by sfn42 »

moffkalast wrote: post #27
sixtram wrote: post #23

Oh, I'm glad I don't work in the oven business. We're just starting a stealth startup that's revolutionizing dishwashers, and the prototypes are amazing. They use less water, less detergent, and this weekend we're hoping to solve the last remaining issue: occasionally, they break glasses.

I hope it's not the approach of using less water by not rinsing properly in the end, so people have to either eat soap or rinse everything manually afterwards, wasting far more water. I swear Bosch is so terrible at this.

I recently learned that you should add detergent for the pre-wash rinse as well. May dishwashers have a separate pocket next to the detergent pocket, often there isn't even a lid on it or the lid has openings so the detergent falls out as soon as you close the door. If they don't have the symbolic pocket you can just pour some extra detergent anywhere, like just spill some outside the main pocket or pour it into the bottom.

This allows the pre-wash cycle to get rid of most of the grease and stuff before the main cycle so the main cycle is more effective and the water is cleaner so the final rinse works better too.

Re: Half-Baked Product

#92

Post by afandian »

pyrale wrote: post #76
afandian wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The innovation here is clearly edible soap. And the 'less water' claim is technically correct, but it doesn't mention the decamethylcyclopentasiloxane. Just because it's complicated to spell, you understand.

Edible soap?! The solution is clearly edible dishes!

Too late, already been done!

https://stroodles.co.uk/collections

I bought some edible cups out of curiosity a few years back. Nice for coffee. I did end up eating them all, although some of them were still dry at the time of consumption.

I think edible soap has better behaviour-adjusted shelf-life here.

Re: Half-Baked Product

#93

Post by afandian »

jodrellblank wrote: post #41
afandian wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The innovation here is clearly edible soap. And the 'less water' claim is technically correct, but it doesn't mention the decamethylcyclopentasiloxane. Just because it's complicated to spell, you understand.

from L'Affaire Siloxane? ( https://mceglowski.substack.com/p/laffaire-siloxane ) (subtitle: "How antiperspirant fumes nearly got NASA to evacuate the space station")

Wow!

(No, from dry-cleaning)

Re: Half-Baked Product

#94

Post by move-on-by »

I remember sitting in on a sales meeting early in my career. I kept quiet, but afterwards I complained to my manager that they were selling features that didn’t exist and conflicted with core concepts of the product. My manager told me that was how sales were made. I left the company not long after, I was already disgruntled prior to that discussion.

I’ve seen the same thing everywhere I go. I don’t have the disposition to be in sales, but I periodically daydream of making huge commissions by straight up bullshitting people. There seems to be no downside.

Re: Half-Baked Product

#95

Post by afandian »

tdeck wrote: post #63
moffkalast wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope it's not the approach of using less water by not rinsing properly in the end, so people have to either eat soap or rinse everything manually afterwards, wasting far more water. I swear Bosch is so terrible at this.

Perhaps a match for the UK market? From what I've read they often don't rinse the soap off of dishes there (I wish I were making this up).

Maybe it's the cause of our "bad teeth".

(I heard the rumour too. But no-one I know fails to rinse the "washing up liquid" (as we call it) off their plates)

Re: Half-Baked Product

#96

Post by dijksterhuis »

weli wrote: post #81
Mizza wrote: post #29

Ouch, that hits close to home, and it seems like it does for a lot of others out there as well. So what's the solution? Is there a playbook that avoids these pitfalls, or is it just the cost of the spin. Ideally, something early engineers can point to when we see non-technical founders falling into familiar traps.

If someone has the answer I'd like to know as well. I think the most important question to ask yourself is: Where did the story go sideways? At what point what character could have prevented the disaster? For me there is no right answer. Maybe the engineer should have been more pushy with what things not to add. Maybe the founder entrepreneur should have been realistic. Maybe sales should have not had to promise thin…

> Where did the story go sideways? At what point what character could have prevented the disaster?

for me the company should never have existed in the first place. and that lies with the founder. starts with them. falls on them.

i'm biased i suppose because my part in the "10%" part of my story was finding out just how little research anyone actually did... they all just wanted to play the role of important businessmen, big brain dev, co-founder etc. etc.

thank you for writing this. i'm still trying to come back from crashing and burning at that place. i might read this a few more times as it felt like my story too. the another Engineer part touched me. that's who i was in my story. it hurt.

edit -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48774444 hits the nail on the head with their last bullet point. bad leadership innit.

Re: Half-Baked Product

#97

Post by TowerTall »

briHass wrote: post #70
askvictor wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've long dreamed of a dishwasher that can detect when you remove the (cleaned) dishes from it, and presents a display saying 'load dishes' or something like that. And after finishing a cycle, says 'unload dishes'. Should be pretty easy to achieve with some load cells in the feet, but haven't seen any like that.

Many modern ones have a door open sensor that allows for the dishwasher to display that dishes are clean after a cycle until the door is opened and fully closed again. That doesn't help, however, if users are lazy and don't unload the dishwasher after opening it to grab a clean plate or whatever. It's a nice feature that can be added with existing sensors and one line of logic in the uC. Another one I noticed recentl…

I used to have two dishwashers. One for clean. One for dirty.

Re: Half-Baked Product

#98

Post by chasd00 »

flowerbreeze wrote: post #60
sixtram wrote: post #23

Oh, I'm glad I don't work in the oven business. We're just starting a stealth startup that's revolutionizing dishwashers, and the prototypes are amazing. They use less water, less detergent, and this weekend we're hoping to solve the last remaining issue: occasionally, they break glasses.

It sounds like you're joking, but I've long dreamed of a different type of dishwasher. One that washes instantly. I don't need it to fit more than a single plate at one time. Just put something in from one end, and out comes clean and dry plate on the other end. Like a car wash. I am quite certain these exist already large kitchens and I seem to remember one from a school diner from maybe 35 years ago, but I've alway…

The answer is obviously paper plates and plastic silverware /s

Re: Half-Baked Product

#99

Post by Sheeny96 »

askvictor wrote: post #68
flowerbreeze wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you're joking, but I've long dreamed of a different type of dishwasher. One that washes instantly. I don't need it to fit more than a single plate at one time. Just put something in from one end, and out comes clean and dry plate on the other end. Like a car wash. I am quite certain these exist already large kitchens and I seem to remember one from a school diner from maybe 35 years ago, but I've alway…

I've long dreamed of a dishwasher that can detect when you remove the (cleaned) dishes from it, and presents a display saying 'load dishes' or something like that. And after finishing a cycle, says 'unload dishes'. Should be pretty easy to achieve with some load cells in the feet, but haven't seen any like that.

We had this at my old work, except it wasn't a display, it was a circular piece of paper with "clean" on one side and "dirty" on the other. When it was done, you rotate the paper so it was clean side up. Should we have gone for series A? It was a pretty great MVP after all, albeit manual, but automation of the paper flipping would of course come on the second iteration

Re: Half-Baked Product

#100

Post by chasd00 »

move-on-by wrote: post #94

I remember sitting in on a sales meeting early in my career. I kept quiet, but afterwards I complained to my manager that they were selling features that didn’t exist and conflicted with core concepts of the product. My manager told me that was how sales were made. I left the company not long after, I was already disgruntled prior to that discussion. I’ve seen the same thing everywhere I go. I don’t have the disposit…

I work in consulting and have been in many projects where the client was sold promises and features that don’t exist in reality. If I had a firm I would have a rule that whoever sells a project worth > $5M would also be responsible for delivering it.
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