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Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

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Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#51

Post by kin »

binarymax wrote: post #19

Here are some of the other common one's I've heard: - A social-networking site that totally respects my privacy and lets me own my data! - An app store that lets anybody sell their digital stuff to anyone, not in some walled garden! - A drag and drop interface that lets you make any program you want...totally code-free! I could go on and on...

Yeah, there are tons of social networking sites that protect privacy. My question is, I know people aren't satisfied with Facebook's news feed, but with the introduction of Facebook Groups are people still complaining? Isn't it easier to make a few groups and manage some privacy settings than set up an account on Frid.ge or Diaspora and convince your friends to join?

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#52

Post by treo »

blhack wrote: post #40

I hope I don't come across as negative here, but I hate lists like this. Peopel are always raining on each others' ideas "Oh, what, you're going to make a myspace clone? Bahahahaha." (facebook) "Oh, what, you're going to make a facebook clone? Bahahahaha." (twitter) "Oh, what, you're going to make another dating website? Bahahahaha." (Okcupid, plentyoffish) "Oh, what, you're going to make another social bookmarking w…

Just one advice: mod_python is more or less dead (Last Release in 2007) you should probably switch to mod_wsgi.

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#53

Post by [deleted] »

blhack wrote: post #40

I hope I don't come across as negative here, but I hate lists like this. Peopel are always raining on each others' ideas "Oh, what, you're going to make a myspace clone? Bahahahaha." (facebook) "Oh, what, you're going to make a facebook clone? Bahahahaha." (twitter) "Oh, what, you're going to make another dating website? Bahahahaha." (Okcupid, plentyoffish) "Oh, what, you're going to make another social bookmarking w…

[deleted]

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#54

Post by ig1 »

mechanical_fish wrote: post #18
rgbrgb wrote: post #2

All of those ideas have clearly worked.

Of course they all worked at least once. Otherwise the siren song wouldn't be so seductive. Often half the problem with an idea is that it has already worked once. In a world where you're allowed to assume away Craigslist, cloning Craigslist would have a much better chance of working.

Kijiji and Gumtree have also succeeded in this space (albeit in different countries).

What's killing Craigslist/gumtree/etc in practice is their generality, they're no longer the dominant player in their most profitable markets (jobs, dating, housing) all of which are being carved away by specialist sites.

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#55

Post by frisco »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #20
allwein wrote: post #6

In my day (I'm only 32), the startup ideas everyone always wanted to do were: 1. A better bug/issue tracking system 2. A custom CMS 3. A code library/platform for easily building Business CRUD apps. 4. A word processing app that has only the 20% features that 80% of Word users use. 5. A better classmates.com

The difference between your list and his is that some people have actually succeeded with all of the items on your list. But you've still hit the nail on the head with your list: there are vast numbers of failures and uncompleted projects for every success.

That's the point of parent's post: that everyone on the old "stupid repeat ideas" list has now been successfully executed.

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#56

Post by IgorPartola »

blhack wrote: post #40

I hope I don't come across as negative here, but I hate lists like this. Peopel are always raining on each others' ideas "Oh, what, you're going to make a myspace clone? Bahahahaha." (facebook) "Oh, what, you're going to make a facebook clone? Bahahahaha." (twitter) "Oh, what, you're going to make another dating website? Bahahahaha." (Okcupid, plentyoffish) "Oh, what, you're going to make another social bookmarking w…

I have no doubt that all your examples can be improved upon. The problem is that you then need people to use your new and improved twitter/foursquare/facebook/mysqpace/digg, and the market is already saturated. So, to get the users you need to improve on the idea so much that you disrupt the market. Don't get me wrong, it's all in good fun, but there is a difference between a weekend pet project and a funded startup: the funded startup needs to think about where the final product will end up.

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#59

Post by kno »

smanek wrote: post #24
allwein wrote: post #6

In my day (I'm only 32), the startup ideas everyone always wanted to do were: 1. A better bug/issue tracking system 2. A custom CMS 3. A code library/platform for easily building Business CRUD apps. 4. A word processing app that has only the 20% features that 80% of Word users use. 5. A better classmates.com

It seems like someone did do them! Obvious examples include: 1. basecamp/fogbugz/jira 2. Confluence/Sharepoint 3. django/rails 4. Google Docs 5. Facebook

... While we were all sleeping.

Re: Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work)

#60

Post by icefox »

timf wrote: post #35

> Giant, Purposeless, Unfocused Machine Learning System. There's a YC company that does this in a general way but I would not label their use cases as "purposeless". http://www.directededge.com/

You could even argue that is what Amazon.com did with their recommendations. And the main reason I signed up for netflix was after working on the netflix prize. And I have been rewarded by buying things I wouldn't have otherwise and watching movies I had never heard about, but loved. There is $$$ in recommendations and selling solutions.
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