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I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

blog.tjcx.me

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Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#221

Post by throwthere »

BoiledCabbage wrote: post #199
kdkirsch wrote: post #191

I’m a physician. I really appreciate Tom’s enthusiasm, but I think that enthusiasm led him to overestimate the significance of the problem. Moreover he didn’t really understand for whom he was building this product. At first he thought it would be a consumer product. But he realized that consumers would not pay/subscribe and later learned that advertising wouldn’t work. Next he thought doctors would pay because “Doct…

I agree. And what Tom didn't realize is that Doctors aren't financially incetivized to give better healthcare. There is no money in it for them. If anything, return visits because of a partial prior resolution make more money. Now clearly I'm not saying that doctors try to give bad diagnoses for profit (because they don't). But beyond a certain minimum bar, and on a purely financial basis, improving diagnostics or pr…

I see this take all the time but it’s kind of misleading. Realistically things like uptodate, clinical journals and conferences mint money. Doctors are one of the prime demographics of people who do things for non monetary gains. Yes if you want to be nihilist you’ll find a minority of docs where this isn’t true, but the point is there’sa huge market to doctors willing to improve care without direct monetary gain.

This startup product failed because it wasn’t shown to improve outcomes— it just compiled study results by a non expert. At the very least the founder should have at least attempted doing a study on the tool showing using it resulted in better outcomes. But it didn’t make that link and so people didn’t know what to do with it.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#222

Post by Dave3of5 »

bootwoot wrote: post #16
Dave3of5 wrote: post #4

I've also spent a lot of time on a side project (gravametrics.com). I never spent $40k on it but I've instead done everything myself and it appears to be a non-starter. I think you need something with a very concise value prop I'm working on that for my next thing right now. Something simple. FYI don't use AWS for these sorts of projects use something cheaper.

What are the cheaper options?

Cheaper than AWS ?

I used Scaleway. They don't offer the hyperscale that AWS does but you don't need that for a side project. Just get started then if you suddenly have 100,000 users then switch to something like AWS. Also there are no hidden costs it's like $2 a month for a tiny little server to get you started.

You'll find that's enough.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#223

Post by eyelidlessness »

In all honesty, I don’t think the author correctly identified his error. And I think that’s a shame. It’s right here:

> Here I was, living the Silicon Valley dream: making the world a better place through technology.

I don’t know how this has become a thing people believe, however widely it might be believed. But if it’s representative of SV or tech innovation at all, it’s either wildly distorted through a wealthy person’s pet futurism project—or held in the imagination of someone aspiring to that stature. SV is about making money, that’s it, that’s the whole story.

The totally overlapping error here was assuming those things—making the world better, and making money—aren’t inherently in conflict. And overlapping that: assuming that a profit driven health care system has altruistic goals as such, rather than in concert with its profit-driving priorities.

This project could have been successful (and could still do if the author or anyone else wants to pursue it). And it could have been a valuable contribution to society.

The author would probably have realized this error if he’d considered entering a global market where health care has different economic incentives. Programs like this which help people are funded by government contracts and grants, not by payment from arbitrary people acting on their arbitrary interests.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#224

Post by HWR_14 »

mportela wrote: post #90
red0point wrote: post #22

I think the takeaway from the blog post is wrong and comments focusing on building a faster MVP miss the point. Not everything is a startup. This is a research project - and should be approached that way. There should be donors, a foundation, free access to all participants, reputation-building by writing (& publishing in reputable journals / conferences) studies about its efficacy, a board of doctors actually review…

That's exactly what I was thinking! He couldn't make it viable as a business but it could still be remodeled as a non-profit and make the difference in the world.

There's something sad about "you tried to make the world better, make it a non-profit. And go back to cryptoscams to make money."

[1] That's how the author described his own dayjob, pretty much.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#225

Post by smnrchrds »

kdkirsch wrote: post #191

I’m a physician. I really appreciate Tom’s enthusiasm, but I think that enthusiasm led him to overestimate the significance of the problem. Moreover he didn’t really understand for whom he was building this product. At first he thought it would be a consumer product. But he realized that consumers would not pay/subscribe and later learned that advertising wouldn’t work. Next he thought doctors would pay because “Doct…

If the COVID-19 pandemic has taught me anything about science, it's that if you do a "meta-analysis" without reading each paper carefully and critically, you can end up proving anything regardless of its veracity. You cannot replace domain-expert scientists spending huge amounts of time painstakingly going over every detail of many papers to weed out mistakes and fraud in order to write a meta-analysis, with a computer program. Well, at least not until we figure out AGI. Until then, it would be irresponsible to rely on such a program for any clinical decisions.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29249686

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/ivermectin-much-more-t...

https://ivmmeta.com/ (Note the long list of things in the right sidebar which the "meta-analysis" shows have huge positive effects on COVID treatment)

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#226

Post by fragmede »

abirch wrote: post #65
a1371 wrote: post #31

This was a fun read, but I think it came to the wrong conclusion. The real issue imo was "I had practically only weeks of runway". You just don't have time to make it happen. As a fellow start up founder, I see most of my job being just buying time for the business. Buying time to make, to talk, and to think. It wasn't like the tool had no value to Susan, maybe with a booth at her go-to annual expo, mentioning a few…

I agree with your comment about the wrong conclusion. Google didn't have a monetization plan, it launched in 1998 and didn't do adwords(ads) until 2000. It's always better to have positive cashflow, however, enough capital lets you have more runway. At the end of the day you do need someone who will pay. Not that I dislike attorneys but they could have been a client. If you can show that a doctor didn't prescribe the…

It's not 1998 anymore is the thing. It's obviously better to have positive cash flow but unless you come up with something that is that huge of a hit, in a market where people both understand your product, but also there aren't entrenched competitors to squash you, there's a lot of hard work to get to a place where your product is worth something your customers. Which is expensive, in both time and money. Both of which OP didn't have enough of.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#227

Post by abeppu »

antattack wrote: post #208
BoiledCabbage wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. And what Tom didn't realize is that Doctors aren't financially incetivized to give better healthcare. There is no money in it for them. If anything, return visits because of a partial prior resolution make more money. Now clearly I'm not saying that doctors try to give bad diagnoses for profit (because they don't). But beyond a certain minimum bar, and on a purely financial basis, improving diagnostics or pr…

He actually received a clue from 'Susan', one of the doctors he demonstrated his application to: "in many cases I’ll just prescribe what I normally do, since I’m comfortable with it" He should have sold his tool to sales and marketing at pharmaceutical companies who would use it to convince doctors to prescribe their product.

But if you're selling a drug, aren't you going to rely on just the studies that show the efficacy of your product? If your drug _isn't_ the best according to the meta-analyses, this tool is of no help to you. And even if your drug _is_ the best according to the meta-analyses, that's because there are already multiple studies that show how good your drug is, and you can overstate your product's value by throwing out the rest of the studies.

Re: I wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea (2020)

#230

Post by SgtBastard »

abeppu wrote: post #227
antattack wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He actually received a clue from 'Susan', one of the doctors he demonstrated his application to: "in many cases I’ll just prescribe what I normally do, since I’m comfortable with it" He should have sold his tool to sales and marketing at pharmaceutical companies who would use it to convince doctors to prescribe their product.

But if you're selling a drug, aren't you going to rely on just the studies that show the efficacy of your product? If your drug _isn't_ the best according to the meta-analyses, this tool is of no help to you. And even if your drug _is_ the best according to the meta-analyses, that's because there are already multiple studies that show how good your drug is, and you can overstate your product's value by throwing out t…

Agreed, at that point the value proposition is to some trying to close a sale to overcome the objection that the supplied studies are cherry picked.

Its... uh.... niche.

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