It's a good article and has some good points.
But after some thinking, it seems that almost none of successful startup ideas come with capturing the change of environment. Instead, most of successful startup ideas come from hobby, solving a problem, iteration, improving existing products, etc.
Besides a good idea, building a successful startup requires a lots of other stuff like great team, good fund raising, great execution, great user growth, etc. I guess all the other parts are much difficult than finding a good idea. If you don't have a good idea yet, you can just focus on other parts: building a good team, or learning to executing well. You can start with small projects with positive cashflow like consulting, etc.
The best way to pickup a startup ideas is to look at new startups and find the ideas that you like and that you can improve and execute well. Just as some other posts mentioned, if you are smart, you can make difference even in mature market. Market is not efficient at all, especially for new and emerging market.
How to pick startup ideas
61–70 of 83 posts
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#62What he refers to as "technology" companies are not ones innovating in any technological area. He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap"), for which there's a well-defined assembly line process. A real technology company is defined by their ability to do something hard that others have trouble doing. The first mover has an advantage, but it's not overwhelming. IBM didn't co…
>>> He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap")
No, I don't think so. The author is Slava from RethinkDB. His company is definitely not "appcrap" (as you put it), and I think his same line of reasoning applies equally well to "real technology" companies (like RethinkDB), it just takes place on a longer time horizon. If you extend his metaphors to include the time to competitively create "real technology" they apply equally well.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#63Solutions to problems, be those problems you personally experienced or in the workplace, is what creates a successful product. Without a successful product, you can't have a successful startup. That being said, a successful product doesn't guarantee startup success.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#64What he refers to as "technology" companies are not ones innovating in any technological area. He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap"), for which there's a well-defined assembly line process. A real technology company is defined by their ability to do something hard that others have trouble doing. The first mover has an advantage, but it's not overwhelming. IBM didn't co…
>>> He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap") No, I don't think so. The author is Slava from RethinkDB. His company is definitely not "appcrap" (as you put it), and I think his same line of reasoning applies equally well to "real technology" companies (like RethinkDB), it just takes place on a longer time horizon. If you extend his metaphors to include the time to competit…
Exactly right. If Google can make self-driving cars, there are at least two other companies in the world (and probably many more) that can (and will) make competing self-driving cars. The timeline is a big longer, but the basic rules are the same.
As much as we all like to think we're exceptional, we aren't.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
>>> He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap") No, I don't think so. The author is Slava from RethinkDB. His company is definitely not "appcrap" (as you put it), and I think his same line of reasoning applies equally well to "real technology" companies (like RethinkDB), it just takes place on a longer time horizon. If you extend his metaphors to include the time to competit…
Exactly right. If Google can make self-driving cars, there are at least two other companies in the world (and probably many more) that can (and will) make competing self-driving cars. The timeline is a big longer, but the basic rules are the same. As much as we all like to think we're exceptional, we aren't.
FYI, rethinkdb.com is down.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#66What he refers to as "technology" companies are not ones innovating in any technological area. He's really talking about online application business-to-consumer startups ("appcrap"), for which there's a well-defined assembly line process. A real technology company is defined by their ability to do something hard that others have trouble doing. The first mover has an advantage, but it's not overwhelming. IBM didn't co…
> IBM didn't come out with the first personal computer - Apple and Commodore did.
IBM wasn't a startup -- it had massive distribution resources. When you have access to an enormous distribution channel and massive marketing budgets, the rules are obviously different.
> Microsoft didn't have the first operating system for x86 machines - Digital Research did.
Yes, but Microsoft piggybacked off of IBM's distribution channel. That's extremely rare, and 99.99% of startups can't swing that sort of deal.
> AOL once dominated social networking. Facebook moved into a quite mature space - Myspace, Geocities, and several others were big companies when Facebook started.
AOL, MySpace, and Geocities effectively committed suicide. It's nice when that happens, but you can't count on it.
There are no guarantees, it's all a balance of probabilities. The point isn't that the first mover always wins, it's that if you aren't the first mover the balance of probabilities is against you.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly right. If Google can make self-driving cars, there are at least two other companies in the world (and probably many more) that can (and will) make competing self-driving cars. The timeline is a big longer, but the basic rules are the same. As much as we all like to think we're exceptional, we aren't.
FYI, rethinkdb.com is down.
It seems accessible to me.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#68Really engaging post. Placed in the context of RethinkDB though it is a bit contradictory no? RethinkDB does not have first mover advantage and they are against the likes of Riak, Mongo, Couchbase, Cassandra, etc. All of those I believe are in a much stronger position according to the criteria in the post.
RethinkDB won't be in this position for long (and in fact, most lessons in the article came directly from the mistakes made in the process of building RethinkDB). We found a big point of a differentiation ( http://rethinkdb.com/blog/realtime-web/ ), which, depending on one's definition, can be considered discovering a new market, and we'll be the first open-source scalable database in that market. The upcoming 2.0 re…
The shift from spinning hard drives to SSDs is an environmental change like the ones you describe in the article. What made it hard to exploit? Not enough improvement, compared to legacy databases on SSD?
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
RethinkDB won't be in this position for long (and in fact, most lessons in the article came directly from the mistakes made in the process of building RethinkDB). We found a big point of a differentiation ( http://rethinkdb.com/blog/realtime-web/ ), which, depending on one's definition, can be considered discovering a new market, and we'll be the first open-source scalable database in that market. The upcoming 2.0 re…
Isn't that something like SQL Server Query Notifications, where you can submit a query and the DB lets you know when the results have changed? Albeit your API looks much smoother. Speaking of which, I really hope at one point you reconsider the driver model. Having official drivers for only a few not-so-awesomely-typed languages is a big turnoff.
> Isn't that something like SQL Server Query Notifications
Yes, very similar, but there are a few major differences -- open-source product, horizontally scalable, json data model, packaging/api designed for web developers from the ground up. When you add all of these up, the differences are quite dramatic.
> I really hope at one point you reconsider the driver model.
Yes -- after 2.0 is out, we'll start bringing the community drivers under the official umbrella.
Re: How to pick startup ideas
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
RethinkDB won't be in this position for long (and in fact, most lessons in the article came directly from the mistakes made in the process of building RethinkDB). We found a big point of a differentiation ( http://rethinkdb.com/blog/realtime-web/ ), which, depending on one's definition, can be considered discovering a new market, and we'll be the first open-source scalable database in that market. The upcoming 2.0 re…
The shift from spinning hard drives to SSDs is an environmental change like the ones you describe in the article. What made it hard to exploit? Not enough improvement, compared to legacy databases on SSD?
Yes. There were many, many companies that attempted to exploit this trend in databases and caching, and all of them are now dead, zombies, or pivots.
The reason is that there is no valuable product there one could ship. Putting an existing database on an SSD gives you all of the benefits and none of the drawbacks.