Good luck, baby.
I'm out, baby
81–90 of 103 posts
Re: I'm out, baby
#82Re: I'm out, baby
#83Awesome. Now make it happen. ; )
Re: I'm out, baby
#84I wish you the best. I took this step about 3 months ago (and also announced to the HN community). I've never looked back since. Working on my startup (NewsCred) fulltime has been some of the happiest days of my life. Best of luck!
Re: I'm out, baby
#85When I left the military I had substantial savings to get a startup off the ground and finish a graduate degree. I decided to write software to help people write better. I always had issues with my own writing as was excited about an extended GNU Style / Diction that could curb my own bad habits. I created http://www.polishmywriting.com/ as a technical demonstration for my rule engine. I spent the month of June worki…
The site is awesome and I would love to have something like it that works in Emacs so I can check out suggestions as I'm typing.
Here too, that site does sound very useful.
Re: I'm out, baby
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Though never release half-baked cr@p. You have exactly one chance to make the initial splash, don't waste it." This is absolutely not true! Release ANYTHING. A half baked product will provide you with required flexibility youll need when the market tells you what you really should be making.
> the market tells you what you really should be making. That's what the market research phase of the project planning is for. If you need to fine-tweak your feature set, do a closed alpha with a focus group, that's fine. But if your project plan relies on a public beta feedback for flushing out core feature set, that's just wrong. Or more specifically - it is very risky, because you are essentially implementing a wi…
Well we almost agree don't we? :)
I think you're taking what I'm saying out of context. I said half baked products give you the required flexibility to listen to the market.
I dont think you can over expose your self to the market. The problems come when you don't or cant move fast enough to meet its demands. It seems to me that "don't" happens a lot more than "cant" and that's usually because the founders are clinging to feature sets and ideals that aren't working. Its best to avoid that altogether and release a half baked product that you are willing to change as quickly as possible.
Re: I'm out, baby
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the market tells you what you really should be making. That's what the market research phase of the project planning is for. If you need to fine-tweak your feature set, do a closed alpha with a focus group, that's fine. But if your project plan relies on a public beta feedback for flushing out core feature set, that's just wrong. Or more specifically - it is very risky, because you are essentially implementing a wi…
Well we almost agree don't we? :) I think you're taking what I'm saying out of context. I said half baked products give you the required flexibility to listen to the market. I dont think you can over expose your self to the market. The problems come when you don't or cant move fast enough to meet its demands. It seems to me that "don't" happens a lot more than "cant" and that's usually because the founders are clingi…
> Well we almost agree don't we? :)
I am sure we can agree on something :)
My point (which is based on a relevant experience) is - don't release anything to the public unless you are certain it will get traction. If you want to validate the feature set or your market positioning, do a closed release.
A lot of people tend to underestimate the importance of the initial public release. It is a single, most important natural milestone in the lifetime of a product, so it needs to be handled with an utmost care.
Staying in a stealth mode and keeping your product and its idea confidential has multiple benefits. Most importantly, it allows you to build a competitive entry barrier, which in turn gives you time after the launch to scoop up users and establish yourself as a leader on your target market segment. Disclose your idea too early and you will tip off your competitors, so by the time you have it polished and working, it already gets replicated.
The "release-early, release-often" is an open source mantra, it rarely applies to the competitive start-up environment.
Re: I'm out, baby
#88Congrats. I envy you.
Someone may have asked this, and if so, could you point me to your response. Did you tell your corporate job that you were leaving to pursue your own startup when they asked why you were voluntarily leaving?
I wonder if it's better to be 100% honest about this when leaving your day job. Does anyone have any advice on handling this situation?
Re: I'm out, baby
#89Congratulations! You have no idea how much I envy you right now. Even with the hardships that will come, you will be free. Free! I'm currently in the middle of saving up my own money and though I still have a ways to go, it feels even further away by the minute.
Make an appropriate mixtape for the occasion. It's time to rock.
Re: I'm out, baby
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well we almost agree don't we? :) I think you're taking what I'm saying out of context. I said half baked products give you the required flexibility to listen to the market. I dont think you can over expose your self to the market. The problems come when you don't or cant move fast enough to meet its demands. It seems to me that "don't" happens a lot more than "cant" and that's usually because the founders are clingi…
> Well we almost agree don't we? :) I am sure we can agree on something :) My point (which is based on a relevant experience) is - don't release anything to the public unless you are certain it will get traction. If you want to validate the feature set or your market positioning, do a closed release. A lot of people tend to underestimate the importance of the initial public release. It is a single, most important nat…
Hey Ive been there too and from my experience big splash entries like Techcrunch articles and the likes don't do as much as people think.
"don't release anything to the public unless you are certain it will get traction." This is a distribution issue which is in my opinion is a entirely different feature set than the "product". While off topic I agree the only thing you should be focusing on is getting traction. In fact I would say throw the product out of the equation and only worry about traction. But this is a different argument and admittedly I'm an extremist in this area :)
Essentially we are saying the same thing except you think discoveries should be made in private to increase your popularity at launch while I think (ONLY if you can keep up) going public is more efficient for the successful evolution of your product.
I guess it comes down to how much data you need to interpret what the market wants. Personally I need tons.Maybe you are a better interpreter than I am :)