Having skimmed through the summaries, the general trend is they're trying to solve a non-existent problem, or a problem that isn't painful enough that people would be willing to pay to solve. I mean, who wants to pay for their Facebook statuses to be backed up? They're about as valuable as old voicemails and the threat of loss isn't palpable.
There's a lesson to be learned in all of this: don't think about ways to make money, but think about painful problems that you can solve for someone, and figure out whether a viable business can be created with that idea.
C'mon now, this is just a pool of ideas, no need to draw lessons here and put down all the ideas. I think it's a cool initiative regardless of their quality.
I agree, most of the ideas listed either already exist in some shape, or have no market at all. One issue is not just identifying problems one has, but identifying problems a large group of people have AND that they're willing to pay money for the solution.
The secret behind a great idea is actually the hours of research that go with it. You need to research the market very thoroughly, your costs and such and then suddenly it's an idea that's viable. Of course then comes the execution. But a an idea is not just good because it sounds good.
I think this table is missing some important columns. Consider adding these:
- market size (in $)
- time and cost for acquiring a customer
- margin per customer ($ range)
I used to pay for services to backup my FB status & tweets - Backupify and TweetSaver. There was a market, once! But now FB lets you download your updates for free, and TweetNest lets you archive your tweets for free.
Sometimes the problem isn't identifying the pain point, but identifying the competitors that are already solving it.
These actually seem pretty good to me. Obviously none of them contains enough information to tell if its a good idea because not enough of the idea is expressed in this format. But in the context of the format, it seems like a good list.
eg "Basecamp for travel planning" sounds plausible, but it doesn't tell you a huge amount about the service. If this was being taken on by people who know UI and have a interesting take on how travel planning could be simplified, I would not dismiss it.
My favorite blindingly obvious business plan straight from HN discussions: (insert non-US country X here) clone of (insert successful US-only business that HNers constantly whine about not being in country X).
Examples: Stripe for Norway, Twilio for New Zealand, etc.
But thinking about it a bit more, this idea can be split into:
1. Collaborative editing - Google Docs already allows this to some extend.
2. Document history - Tools like MS Word already does this to some extend. There is still a lot of room for improvement.
3. Using Git as a document store - Is Git really needed for this?
Even if the system was backed by Git, would not it be better if the whole Git related parts are hidden from the user?
Even if the system uses Git as the store, in order to present changesets that are meaningful to the user, the system will have to process the Git changesets. So why use Git?
I took the liberty of submitting this list to /r/startupideas mentioned by realrocker [0] hoping this could bootstrap the subreddit, but it seems to be moderated and people here will forget about it before the moderator gets around to look at new submissions.
I was interested in the "Git for everyone". I made a quick example as a quick project awhile ago. I have the domain http://www.rubberdocky.com. I have not done anything on it in awhile but I think it could be neat. That builds off collaboration on things like Google docs and makes it more social/nice looking.
The main problem at the moment is a lack of incentives to use it at waste water treatment plants, but I guess this will come with increasing Phosphorus prices. Still it would be beneficial to start recovering more Phosphorus already now but this is a political issue rather than an Engineering issue in my opinion.
This would be an excellent application of the Slant [1] concept. Basically create a topic which is the idea, with sub topics for the other columns and then debate them. Then layer on a searchable UX so that different concepts could be tagged and located and correlated. Boom, community curated web site of startup ideas with history.
[1] http:://slant.co/
(I personally have nothing to do with Slant just find it an interesting way to capture a debate like the ones in the spreadsheet into a more structured form)
Seems to be moderated; I submitted a link but it's not there. My guess is people will forget about it before the moderator gets around to see new submissions, and thus the subreddit will remain abandoned.
I like the "date someone with similar interests" idea, but I'd rather see an app to make new friends.
Give your Twitter/FB/IMDb/last.fm usernames, and you'd see the list of people with common interests around you. You could disable this "social mode" when you don't want people bothering you.
The app would provide the perfect conversation opener, eg a recent news item about something you both like.
surprise, surprise hacker news is a great place to crowdsource market research. I had a fun time looking through the list but I can't edit the comments on the Google Doc.
And since I can't edit: "Crowd-sourced shipping" has been done. http://www.uship.com in Austin has been doing this for 5+ years.
I'm thinking this would work better in a stack exchange thread, then we all don't have to read crappy ideas like the pyramid scheme lotto and people could easily upvote and comment on each idea (one idea per post style).
The high traffic is preventing me from entering an idea of mine. The problem is one I personally experience: I don't have time to archive and manage all of the content I want to have digitized.
Mass-media conversion service:
Send in DVDs, CDs, tapes, records, hard drives, iPods, photos, documents, books, (almost anything), to have digitized. Make all digitized content browsable on a web interface.
Allow multiple data export methods such as web availability, as well as hard-drive send-in/purchase. Make data as accessible as possible. Think of the service like Earth Class Mail for digital archives.
How much do people want it? For people to use your new service, they would have to:
- find you online, shop around to find the best service
- trust an unknown startup with their data
- pay a fair price
- put their media in a box, put stamps on it, put it in the mail
- keep track of an account & password
Although you say you want it yourself, I gather you haven't even done step 1 (there are several such services already). So find out how many people really want this thing so badly that they'll do all the steps. If those people exist, they'll be doing some painful version of it today.
Thanks. Just the process of reading a list and thinking about the reasons why things will/won't work & how is very helpful for starting to think of ideas. Also what makes these unique.
How many of us that keep an ideas notebook have similar ideas to these?
I add to my idea notebook a couple of times a week without judgment of the idea itself. I do this as a bit of melon training, encouraging creative thinking. The fun part is reviewing these ideas. Finding an idea you had that resonates in someone else's successful startup is cool. More than anything else it reminds me that implementation is key, the idea is the catalyst.
This is superb. I'm sure all of us have an Evernote notebook, spreadsheet, or text file with startup or app ideas (if you don't, you should) but most of us also keep these lists top-secret for fear that somebody else will steal billion dollar idea #1023 right out from under us.
It takes alot of courage and openness to share your list in this way. For this, you have earned my respect and appreciation.
Most of these "ideas" are neat apps, but i don't see how they are startup ideas. A startup is a business, has a LOT more to do with a productivity app.
Are these just nice, potentially open-source able apps? I would agree with that. I think the valley, is suffering in realizing the difference b/w apps and companies! :)
The "double index stock fund" - The stock market doesn't sleep it just closes. It opens the next day at a different value than what it closed based on any new information.
"Lock your savings into the housing market, so you don't get priced out!" - REIT
What do people think about the "Imaging REST API" idea? It seems all the needed infrastructure exists (AWS, etc), are there any services like this already?
[+] [-] kintamanimatt|13 years ago|reply
There's a lesson to be learned in all of this: don't think about ways to make money, but think about painful problems that you can solve for someone, and figure out whether a viable business can be created with that idea.
[+] [-] samrat|13 years ago|reply
This reminds me of something Paul Graham called "sitcom startup ideas" in a recent post.
[+] [-] jcfrei|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tlextrait|13 years ago|reply
The secret behind a great idea is actually the hours of research that go with it. You need to research the market very thoroughly, your costs and such and then suddenly it's an idea that's viable. Of course then comes the execution. But a an idea is not just good because it sounds good.
I think this table is missing some important columns. Consider adding these: - market size (in $) - time and cost for acquiring a customer - margin per customer ($ range)
[+] [-] SyneRyder|13 years ago|reply
Sometimes the problem isn't identifying the pain point, but identifying the competitors that are already solving it.
[+] [-] wwwtyro|13 years ago|reply
The value of old voicemails goes way up when the people that made them are no longer around.
[+] [-] netcan|13 years ago|reply
These actually seem pretty good to me. Obviously none of them contains enough information to tell if its a good idea because not enough of the idea is expressed in this format. But in the context of the format, it seems like a good list.
eg "Basecamp for travel planning" sounds plausible, but it doesn't tell you a huge amount about the service. If this was being taken on by people who know UI and have a interesting take on how travel planning could be simplified, I would not dismiss it.
[+] [-] jaredsohn|13 years ago|reply
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1190974
[+] [-] harshadura|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] runako|13 years ago|reply
Examples: Stripe for Norway, Twilio for New Zealand, etc.
[+] [-] trevorcreech|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wgx|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdqali|13 years ago|reply
But thinking about it a bit more, this idea can be split into:
1. Collaborative editing - Google Docs already allows this to some extend.
2. Document history - Tools like MS Word already does this to some extend. There is still a lot of room for improvement.
3. Using Git as a document store - Is Git really needed for this? Even if the system was backed by Git, would not it be better if the whole Git related parts are hidden from the user? Even if the system uses Git as the store, in order to present changesets that are meaningful to the user, the system will have to process the Git changesets. So why use Git?
[+] [-] TeMPOraL|13 years ago|reply
[0] - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4899874
[+] [-] Jonovono|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sterna|13 years ago|reply
http://www.grontmij.com/highlights/water-and-energy/Pages/pe...
The main problem at the moment is a lack of incentives to use it at waste water treatment plants, but I guess this will come with increasing Phosphorus prices. Still it would be beneficial to start recovering more Phosphorus already now but this is a political issue rather than an Engineering issue in my opinion.
[+] [-] ChuckMcM|13 years ago|reply
[1] http:://slant.co/
(I personally have nothing to do with Slant just find it an interesting way to capture a debate like the ones in the spreadsheet into a more structured form)
[+] [-] chmike|13 years ago|reply
Make a website to list, vote and discuss business idea should be first on the document. :)
[+] [-] vlokshin|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] icebraining|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] realrocker|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TeMPOraL|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] glomph|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MasterScrat|13 years ago|reply
Give your Twitter/FB/IMDb/last.fm usernames, and you'd see the list of people with common interests around you. You could disable this "social mode" when you don't want people bothering you.
The app would provide the perfect conversation opener, eg a recent news item about something you both like.
[+] [-] halixand|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aliukani|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] randomsearch|13 years ago|reply
A big part of starting a business is ensuring that you do your market research right, know your competitors and identify what need you are fulfilling.
Some examples:
* "Share your wifi" - see http://www.btfon.com - this started years ago and is back by a huge telecommunications company.
* Checking browser and O/S versions - https://browserlab.adobe.com/en-us/index.html
* Anonymous email - http://www.sendanonymousemail.net etc.
* Online image editing... http://www.photoshop.com etc.
RS
[+] [-] geori|13 years ago|reply
And since I can't edit: "Crowd-sourced shipping" has been done. http://www.uship.com in Austin has been doing this for 5+ years.
[+] [-] evolve2k|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chmike|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evv|13 years ago|reply
Mass-media conversion service:
Send in DVDs, CDs, tapes, records, hard drives, iPods, photos, documents, books, (almost anything), to have digitized. Make all digitized content browsable on a web interface.
Allow multiple data export methods such as web availability, as well as hard-drive send-in/purchase. Make data as accessible as possible. Think of the service like Earth Class Mail for digital archives.
[+] [-] tlb|13 years ago|reply
- find you online, shop around to find the best service
- trust an unknown startup with their data
- pay a fair price
- put their media in a box, put stamps on it, put it in the mail
- keep track of an account & password
Although you say you want it yourself, I gather you haven't even done step 1 (there are several such services already). So find out how many people really want this thing so badly that they'll do all the steps. If those people exist, they'll be doing some painful version of it today.
[+] [-] tlextrait|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] netcan|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcs|13 years ago|reply
Original: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1190974 (almost 3 years ago)
[+] [-] gogatsby|13 years ago|reply
I add to my idea notebook a couple of times a week without judgment of the idea itself. I do this as a bit of melon training, encouraging creative thinking. The fun part is reviewing these ideas. Finding an idea you had that resonates in someone else's successful startup is cool. More than anything else it reminds me that implementation is key, the idea is the catalyst.
[+] [-] zupreme|13 years ago|reply
This is superb. I'm sure all of us have an Evernote notebook, spreadsheet, or text file with startup or app ideas (if you don't, you should) but most of us also keep these lists top-secret for fear that somebody else will steal billion dollar idea #1023 right out from under us.
It takes alot of courage and openness to share your list in this way. For this, you have earned my respect and appreciation.
Thanks.
[+] [-] shrikanthr|13 years ago|reply
Are these just nice, potentially open-source able apps? I would agree with that. I think the valley, is suffering in realizing the difference b/w apps and companies! :)
[+] [-] schraeds|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] rbirnie|13 years ago|reply
"Lock your savings into the housing market, so you don't get priced out!" - REIT
[+] [-] glomph|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] keph|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] trevorcreech|13 years ago|reply