The case for copying business ideas

#1

Post by gx » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:10 AM UTC

The case for copying business ideas
clearfounder.com

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#2

Post by bitL » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:38 AM UTC

This sums all that is wrong with business. A few original pioneers at the beginning and the rest are at best slightly improved copies as they require lowest energy to spend, yet boasting their awesomeness everywhere in order to sell.

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#3

Post by m0skit0 » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:40 AM UTC

"The market only pays for what the market wants to buy."

This is a typical wrong free market argument. You can create demand, it is a known mechanism in capitalism.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sujanpatel/2016/10/22/create-a-...

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#4

Post by keketi » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:43 AM UTC

m0skit0 wrote: post #3

"The market only pays for what the market wants to buy." This is a typical wrong free market argument. You can create demand, it is a known mechanism in capitalism. https://www.forbes.com/sites/sujanpatel/2016/10/22/create-a-...

Being able to create demand and market only paying for what the market wants to buy are not mutually exclusive. One can create demand for a product through marketing and people are still buying what they want.

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#5

Post by onion2k » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:47 AM UTC

bitL wrote: post #2

This sums all that is wrong with business. A few original pioneers at the beginning and the rest are at best slightly improved copies as they require lowest energy to spend, yet boasting their awesomeness everywhere in order to sell.

Customers want iteration, evolution, and low-risk change. If every new product was a wholesale paradigm shift very few people would ever change what they spend their money on.

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#6

Post by jacquesm » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:47 AM UTC

The Samwer brothers have turned this into a huge business.

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/inside-the-clone-factory

(Fun tidbit: that photograph is also a clone, of a sleeve for a Kraftwerk record: https://nerdist.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/maxresdefault...)

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#7

Post by okket » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:48 AM UTC

bitL wrote: post #2

This sums all that is wrong with business. A few original pioneers at the beginning and the rest are at best slightly improved copies as they require lowest energy to spend, yet boasting their awesomeness everywhere in order to sell.

Being a pioneer does not mean success. It is the execution that counts. The core business idea is important, but less than half of the whole picture.

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#8

Post by chiefalchemist » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:52 AM UTC

Overrated is probably overstating it. It would be better to say:

Originality Without Execution is Futile

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#9

Post by chiefalchemist » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:54 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #5

bitL wrote: post #2

This sums all that is wrong with business. A few original pioneers at the beginning and the rest are at best slightly improved copies as they require lowest energy to spend, yet boasting their awesomeness everywhere in order to sell.

Customers want iteration, evolution, and low-risk change. If every new product was a wholesale paradigm shift very few people would ever change what they spend their money on.

Nah. Customers want low friction and solutions.

Fact: NO ONE wakes up and thinks "I gotta buy me some iteration today."

Iteration, evolution and low-risk change are means. They are not ends.

Re: The case for copying business ideas

#10

Post by bitL » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 10:55 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #5

bitL wrote: post #2

This sums all that is wrong with business. A few original pioneers at the beginning and the rest are at best slightly improved copies as they require lowest energy to spend, yet boasting their awesomeness everywhere in order to sell.

Customers want iteration, evolution, and low-risk change. If every new product was a wholesale paradigm shift very few people would ever change what they spend their money on.

But that creates companies like Behringer; they are right now in the process of cloning every single famous synthesizer that has expired IP, selling it for 5-10x less than the original manufacturers. This would obviously lead to market full of cheap clones (of course welcome by customers), but the original designers would end up on the streets or are forced to change their mindsets to cloners, likely in 20 years completely destroying the market. If nobody is taking risks in bold original ideas, there is no longer any meaningful progress, rent-seeking becomes rampant (we see it with the massive push to subscriptions everywhere already) and once creative exciting industry becomes stale and unappealing.