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How would I get started?

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Re: How would I get started?

#81

Post by famo »

I didn't see the thread either, but I like this post. I think the best way to go about starting something large and ridiculous is to tell all your friends and family you're going to do it, to the point where it would become embarrassing if you didn't even try to make it a success. Friends and family are the best at calling you out on not living your dreams.

"Hey Gaius, weren't you going to build a Cylon detector? You talked about it for months"

"Yeah, but it was too hard and I didn't know how to start"

"You suck"

A more practical benefit of telling all the people you meet is that one of them might know or be associated with someone who is connected with the industry.

Re: How would I get started?

#82

Post by waterlesscloud »

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #71
daniel-levin wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is 'the current state of the art'? Note that I am a total dilettante in the area of machine learning/NLP. And why couldn't the top k HN users (patio11 et al) be given the option to classify comments {dismissive; troll; shallow-cheering; ...;} and this human classification could be the training set of a supervised learning system that could use NLP algorithms to derive useful metrics. Simplistic example: dismissi…

The immediate flaw in that approach is that "patio11 et al" are top contributers because they post a lot and have valuable opinions - NOT because they are always right. They're not (I'm confident they would agree here). Therefore their opinions would be inappropriate as an AI training set.

That's true. But doesn't that kind of sidestep the question?

It's always going to be a matter of opinion what constitutes middlebrow-dismissalness, so if we accept that then the question is really:

"Is it possible to automatically determine if this post would be judged in this way by this person (or group of people)?"

It seems like that's a question that has at least a possibility of a "yes" answer.

Re: How would I get started?

#83

Post by jere »

JshWright wrote: post #56
jere wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the author is referring to Y Combinator and the startups it funds, rather than Viaweb. Though I'm sure you could argue many of those are rather unambitious ideas also.

I believe the OP was referring to the cable company idea that started this whole discussion.

Woops. I was quite confused by it.

Re: How would I get started?

#84

Post by smoyer »

berkay wrote: post #66
smoyer wrote: post #53

I missed that question and would be happy to help with the technical aspects of starting a cable company (though I'd like to see content delivery decoupled from the infrastructure). I have 25 years of experience in the industry if he gets that far. The hard part of the process (and I believe the limiting factor in a new company's success), is arranging the contracts with the content syndicators. Find my e-mail in my…

Actually even this tidbit (contracts) helps. Identifying the challenges/obstacles is very valuable as it opens it to creative solutions to those problems that may not occur to insiders.

IIRC, ESPN is the most expensive and some of the channels are actually free. If there is information on the history of Telebeam (and how they started), it might be instructional with regards to picking a niche and starting small.

Re: How would I get started?

#85

Post by Mz »

fearless wrote: post #67
Mz wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, what elegant hypocrisy. I want to change healthcare. I have spent twelve years getting myself well when the entire world says it cannot be done. I have a website. I have a mental model for how to proceed forward. I don't have the programming skills I need. I am deeply in debt from the process of accomplishing "the impossible". The specifics of my personal situation are unconducive to applying to Y-Combinator. I…

Aren't you homeless? Your first priority should be a getting a job so you can get out of debt and put a roof over your head. Then worry about big ideas like changing healthcare. To be perfectly candid, the reason people dismiss you is that someone who seems incapable of providing for themselves to take care of their basic needs is certainly incapable of starting a hugely disruptive business. Sorry if this is harsh. J…

I left my job in order to finish getting well. I was working at a desk job but the building was in an industrial park, surrounded by factories. Given how expensive and debilitating my condition is via conventional treatments, it makes no sense, financial or otherwise, to pursue an income source which keeps me ill.

My first priority should be, and is, my health.

Re: How would I get started?

#86

Post by angryasian »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #39

And of course this thread fills up with more of the same negativism trying to justify itself. PG nailed it with the term "middlebrow dismissal". Which is a politer term than what I think when I come across it. I never think to myself "Wow, what a realistic, practical, well-informed comment that generic negative feedback was. My respect for that commenter has certainly increased!" Particularly when it's the 500th exam…

A valuable skill in life is asking the right questions and knowing how to ask it. I think if the original post asked "theoretically how would one disrupt the cable industry" the discussion would of been much different

Re: How would I get started?

#87

Post by zehnfischer »

Sure, the internet can be a cynical place, remote communication seems to wake the worth in a lot of people. At the same time it is full of wonders. Maybe I can invite you to join a discussion about how it could impact in political decision making? Click along: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4891571

Re: How would I get started?

#88

Post by jt2190 »

astine wrote: post #80
bartonfink wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, no. In this day and age, there are far better ways of obtaining preliminary knowledge on a subject besides asking another person to fill you in. There's obviously Google and Wikipedia as starting points, and there are any number of paths those might lead to which would help you form a specific ? - e.g. "what would you have to do to make true a la carte channel options from a cable provider profitable?"…

That's ridiculous. RTFM isn't an attitude that arrose apropos of nothing. It comes from situations where newbies asking the same basic questions over and over again exhausting a community's patience with simple questions that can be easily looked up in a FAQ or manual. Asking an open ended question about starting a new kind of business isn't anything like that. There's no FAQ about starting an ISP* so it's difficult…

HN in this case is what a salesperson would call an "unqualified lead". A good salesperson tries to make sure that they sell their product to someone who will potentially buy it. Similarly, the person who asks a question should try to ask someone who can potentially answer it. Just as the HN community would reject a posting that is a sales pitch for many products, the HN community will reject a question that is too vague to answer.

For reference, here is the original, way too vague question:

  > I want to build a cable company that centers around 
  > viewer types. Basically, it is my understanding that the 
  > majority of my cable costs centers around channels 
  > (like fox) that I just dont watch, if I wanted to build   
  > a system that let customers limit this, where would I 
  > get started?
Note that he didn't ask this question on a discussion forum about cable television. He didn't specify if he was looking for advice on the technical aspects, the regulatory aspects, or the business aspects. He didn't hunt around in the user profiles on HN to see if there were people with industry experience that he could approach directly. He didn't describe whether he was looking for high level answers like a list of websites that might have more information, or whether he was looking for very specific info. He did nothing to qualify HN as a good source for the answer to his question.

Re: How would I get started?

#89

Post by addlepate »

nhebb wrote: post #13

I didn't take part in the previous thread, but I kind of took umbrage with the question. It's really hard to take a question like that seriously when it appears that the OP has put zero effort into researching the subject. How can you not be pessimistic about that? If you're not the kind of person that can do even the most basic research of how cable companies operate, then I don't have one iota of confidence that yo…

Right, but to say such a thing violates the unspoken rule of startup/Silicon Valley culture of being nicey-nice and super excited about everything even when you don't care at all.

Thus the sin was not to ask a question with zero effort on the part of the questioner, moving all the onus onto those meant to answer it -- "I'm just asking questions, man!" The sin was to point out that this was indeed what happened. The sin was not being nice when verbally rolling your eyes.

Look upthread; currently, the highest-rated discussion involves detecting the sentiment of comments programmatically! The point is the sentiment, the enthusiasm -- not the content. Do you see?

Re: How would I get started?

#90

Post by trb »

crazygringo wrote: post #62

I love this idea. Not as something to realistically help you get started, but purely educational. There's so much knowledge tied up exclusively among people "in the industry", that would be great to get out into the public. I would love to know all the things involved in starting an airline. How are planes actually bought? How are mechanics actually procured? What kind of safety regulations are followed? etc. I once…

A lot of this information might already be available, just not in the obvious places. An example:

"how to start an airline" came up a couple of times in this discussion. If you ask an existing airline "How should I begin?", they might see you as a future competitor or as a waste of time - either way, they won't gain anything by helping you.

But plane manufactures do gain something from helping you. Even if only every millionth guy looking for advice actually buys a plane, it's still worth it for them. In face, you can check out Boings guide on how to start an airline:

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/startup/

I'd wager that it's the same in other industries. If you want to start a cable company, talk to the people that'd profit off of it - people selling routers, contractors that build the infrastructure, helpline operators, etc.

Starting a wiki is a great idea, and there's already some information you could copy/link to (depending on the license). You'd have some information right off the start.

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