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Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

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Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#41

Post by dxbydt »

debacle wrote: post #16

A problem I see with many of these ideas is what I would call the profitability mirage. The general belief is that the flow is: $founder->getStartup()->iterate()->getUsers()->monetize(), with a AcquiredException thrown somewhere in one of those method calls. The problem is that so many of these startup ideas (that don't happily see an AcquiredException before monetize() is called) will fail at the monetize step becau…

If the default behavior of a program is to throw an AcquiredException after a few iterations, I wouldn't call it an Exception in the first place. imho, the real exception here is the monetizeException.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#42

Post by azylman »

Estragon wrote: post #35
alain94040 wrote: post #28

Even Twitter wouldn't sound ambitious if you say "we are group SMS for the world". To better understand how ambitious a startup is, assume that its adoption is 100%. If everyone is using it, does it change lives? If everyone chats on Twitter, does it impact politics? If everyone is on Facebook, do you reconnect with old friends? Etc. Dropbox is in that category too. With used cars purchases, I can see how everyone wo…

What is the best-case endgame for dropbox? I like it, but I don't understand why everyone's so excited about its potential.

I think this is the best illustration I've seen of what makes Dropbox so great: http://xkcd.com/949/

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#43

Post by Detrus »

azylman wrote: post #42
Estragon wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the best-case endgame for dropbox? I like it, but I don't understand why everyone's so excited about its potential.

I think this is the best illustration I've seen of what makes Dropbox so great: http://xkcd.com/949/

If you miss you just need to make an account and install the..

Dropbox should be a feature of the OS. Otherwise it can only get one part of the UX right, drag and drop.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#44

Post by eru »

alain94040 wrote: post #28

Even Twitter wouldn't sound ambitious if you say "we are group SMS for the world". To better understand how ambitious a startup is, assume that its adoption is 100%. If everyone is using it, does it change lives? If everyone chats on Twitter, does it impact politics? If everyone is on Facebook, do you reconnect with old friends? Etc. Dropbox is in that category too. With used cars purchases, I can see how everyone wo…

Amazon was only new books in the beginning. Once you get a market started, you can add other products. But for used cars my imagination is only good enough to see another ebay as it's extension.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#45

Post by mixmax »

Estragon wrote: post #35
alain94040 wrote: post #28

Even Twitter wouldn't sound ambitious if you say "we are group SMS for the world". To better understand how ambitious a startup is, assume that its adoption is 100%. If everyone is using it, does it change lives? If everyone chats on Twitter, does it impact politics? If everyone is on Facebook, do you reconnect with old friends? Etc. Dropbox is in that category too. With used cars purchases, I can see how everyone wo…

What is the best-case endgame for dropbox? I like it, but I don't understand why everyone's so excited about its potential.

What if you could edit all your files in dropbox' html interface? What if it was easy to do, and kept the simplicity they've become known for?

Then your OS would be a commodity, and Dropbox would be what provided the value. Seamless editing of documents across devices, no matter where you are or what sort of device you're working on.

That's a pretty good endgame for dropbox.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#46

Post by damoncali »

samstave wrote: post #33

The reason why I think that it is difficult to say a frighteningly ambitious startup idea is actually something that is expected to come through YC, is that the funding that YC provides is miniscule, and will cover hardly an annual salary for a single, accomplished person who has a lot of domain knowledge in a field they may want to disrupt. As someone in the medical space who is 37, married with 2 kids - My salary i…

What makes you think there is a connection between your old salary and what you can make as the founder of a new company?

That's not how it works.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#47

Post by ericabiz »

fleitz wrote: post #25

I fail to see why companies that make money would fail to satisfy an investor? Is there something about the YC model that makes companies that go on to turn modest profits not generate returns for the investor? A business like Wal-Mart wouldn't satisfy you as an investor? I wouldn't have any problems taking 8% of Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart didn't invent anything new, they just did it a little bit better than their competitor…

"Wal-Mart didn't invent anything new..."

Whoa! Wal-Mart revolutionized the supply chain. And Wal-Mart also started with a revolutionary idea: We can make stores in rural areas so people don't have to drive to the big city to shop. Every other chain considered those same rural areas unprofitable. It turned out to be a gold mine.

There are several books out there about how revolutionary Wal-Mart has been. I suggest you read one before assuming that Wal-Mart "didn't invent anything new"!

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#49

Post by daredevildave »

tptacek wrote: post #27

X for Y, where X = "Airbnb" and Y = "Large existing market poorly served by technology", is in fact a good shorthand for "frighteningly ambitious". Literally. Airbnb is a frighteningly ambitious company. It is explosively generating value and we don't know how it's going to play out long term. It could end up with us living in caves with dogs watching out for the Terminators. It is hard for me to take the rest of the…

I'm not sure, maybe you have a different definition of 'frighteningly ambitious' to me. What is the largest possible outcome from making it slightly easier or cheaper to repair your car? It saves a few million Americans a few hundred dollars?

My definition would be more like: sending ordinary people into space; making a mass-production electric vehicle; cheap solar power; curing flu/the common cold; inventing a new type of computing device; replacing huge incumbent companies (telcos, oil); reducing home electricity usage by >50%; inventing a new human-computer interface. Etc.

Re: Frighteningly Unambitious Startup Ideas

#50

Post by [deleted] »

mixmax wrote: post #45
Estragon wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the best-case endgame for dropbox? I like it, but I don't understand why everyone's so excited about its potential.

What if you could edit all your files in dropbox' html interface? What if it was easy to do, and kept the simplicity they've become known for? Then your OS would be a commodity, and Dropbox would be what provided the value. Seamless editing of documents across devices, no matter where you are or what sort of device you're working on. That's a pretty good endgame for dropbox.

[deleted]
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