Ask YC : How to find ideas for a web startup

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=217311

by vp • 18 years ago

7 17 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I have a day job in IT firm bulding "Enterprise Class Application" in Java/J2EE. There is a lack of innovation, creativity and challenges in my current job. I want to do something innovative, meaningful and challenging. So, I am working to start a web startup. But, I am unable to find unique ideas. Whatever I think of, already exists in one form or other. How do I find an idea?

tomh• 18 years ago

Some people actually blog about ideas they'd like to see: http://blog.stevepoland.com/

One way might be to combine a platform (PC/Mobile/Voice) with a communication medium (RSS/Twitter/Video) and think about ways people could use a new combination. For example, Voice + RSS = people 'reading' the web from listening to a phone.

Another way might be if you are using a service already but there is a serious 'feature gap' that you could address, i.e. how to find out what Twitter users are linking to? Sure you would have to de-code tinyurl addresses, what else would you have to do to accurately report that figure? (Idea was suggested by Merlin Mann; he is another guy who frequently posts ideas he'd like to see).

vp• 18 years ago

Thank you all for the help.

gscott• 18 years ago

If you are looking for something absolutely no one is doing then you are going to end up having to open up the whole market on your own.

I would suggest making something that exists, better. Something that people will want and will use because they are already trained to use it.

Go one step further and make sure that it runs on people's system tray as well as on the web, and on a mac, and linux.

xenoterracide• 18 years ago

or in our case, we are applying and combining existing proven technologies into existing markets that haven't used this tech yet. Stay tuned for updates on how well we do, but if we fail it's not likely due to that.

vikram• 18 years ago

You need to work on your it sucks radar. In my experience all software sucks (even what I've written). The user is typically looking for a piece of software where something works, anything.

So everything that you see can be improved. What you want to find our improvements which change the market? Sometimes you can see this before you start working on the problem. I can only see the possibilities when I consider the problem deeply.

So my suggestion is to find a problem that you have, and figure out what is the least that you have to do to solve it. (You really want this to be 1 weeks work). Then develop the solution and figure out how it sucks, and it does, all software sucks. Get feedback from your friends and make improvements.

davidw2• 18 years ago

Partner with someone who has more ideas than you? But beware of "idea guys" who only have ideas and no useful skills.

tstegart• 18 years ago

Isn't having great ideas a useful skill?

agotterer• 18 years ago

Coming up with ideas isn't all that hard (I have about 20 on a list right now). There are very few world changing ideas, even though everyone thinks their idea is. So most ideas have been done in one way or another. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't do them.

Facebook wasnt the first social network, but they did it. Basecamp wasnt the first project management tool. They took something that they thought wasnt great and made it better.

"Idea guys" as mentioned earlier often come to you with a "world changing" idea. Offer you 50% of the company and you, the tech guy assume all the time and risk. If you do partner with someone, find someone who brings a viable skill to the table and not just a pile of ideas.

davidw2• 18 years ago

As agotterer says, the problem is with people who only "have ideas". Having an idea and communicating it takes 10 minutes. If that 10 minutes is all you spend on the startup, while the technical guy spends months... it kind of sucks for the technical guy.

timcederman• 18 years ago

Who cares if something exists? The important question is can you do it better?

Once you get the urge to do your own thing an important stage is to reflect upon your ideas and their feasibility. Once you hit on the right one, you should get a "this is it" feeling. Seeing other sites doing the 'same' thing should just spur you on.

swombat• 18 years ago

Definitely. Most innovation is incremental, not revolutionary. And, in fact, revolutionary innovation is incredibly difficult to pull off. Better make an incremental innovation first to learn the ropes and make some money to fund the revolutionary innovation that you may decide to go for later.

jon_dahl• 18 years ago

Agreed - IMO, until 2 or more players have saturated the market, competition isn't going to necessarily keep you out.

Two other bits of advice:

1. Find something limited in scope, and build it under constraints. At least to start, assuming that you're going to keep your day job. In other words: can you build something that actually has value, and that you would use, in 40 hours? This is a good exercise for a first startup project, and can keep you from running down a rabbit hole.

2. Decide if this is a side project or a full-time job. If it is a side project, you can build something you like and help it grow slowly, without worrying about your take-home pay right away. If you're going to quit your day job, the stakes are much higher - you can't rely on slow growth (because your rent/mortgage depends on profit), and you should never rely on explosive viral growth (because it probably won't happen to you, no matter how good you are).

ordinathorreur• 18 years ago

Solve a problem, and don't look at how the competition tried to solve it until you've formulated your own solution, then start looking at how your competitors do it. Note that this doesn't mean that you should ignore your competitors; obviously you need to investigate the market potential before you draw up your own plan. Competitor analysis is part of that process.

ashleyw• 18 years ago

As people have mentioned - who cares if it exists, everything exists in some shape and if it didn't exist, it probably doesn't have a market anyway!

If you can do it better, you can succeed. (though don't try, for example, to create a mail app like Gmail, you will probably never keep up with them!)

cesart• 18 years ago

Agree with timcederman. Pre-Google buyout, there were and still are tons of video hosting/sharing startups. BUT, why did YouTube ultimately take off and get purchased by Google? They did something different/better than everyone else.

In YouTube's case, I argue that they knew how to market themselves. Don't discredit your positioning and target audience. Write a kickass app tailored to what they specifically need. And hey, if it's another video app, how is your version better or more niche than YouTube?

adrianwaj• 18 years ago

Paul Graham would say: "Build something people want."

And in your case, "Build Something You Want" (provided it doesn't exist) - and you'll have more energy to play with too.

Ask YC : How to find ideas for a web startup

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