Ask HN: Is making clones bad?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=410224

by SingAlong • 18 years ago

37 49 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Just a few hours ago, a friend sent me a message that he was planning to make spanish or french clone of a famous site. He said there was a market for this since this kinda site didn't exist in French or Spanish.

I suggested to him that he shouldn't make a clone of some idea UNLESS he's going to OFFER something BETTER (if it does something better I wouldn't call it a 'clone').

Am I right in saying so? Or is there anything I'm missing?

vaksel2• 18 years ago

he IS offering something better. Does the original site exist in French/Spanish? No. So he is doing something the original site isn't.

Frankly I don't mind clones at all. Its all about execution...if someone can clone you and take any marketshare...then you might want to look for another job

wesley• 18 years ago

Err, localizing the site is already offering something better. I'd say go for it. Are you suggesting non-english people simply shouldn't have access to such a site because it already exists in english and the company chose not to build a localized version?

There's a huge market there ripe for the picking and many American companies aren't taking notice.

randomwalker• 18 years ago

Echo that. Besides, unless the creator deliberately sets out to copy every last detail of the original, their knowledge of local customs will inevitably result in subtle design differences that will make the "clone" a much more cohesive and pleasant experience for people in the target market, even those who can speak English.

modoc5• 18 years ago

While you're offering something better, you're not offering a new actual feature or function, just a swap of the text. It's like adding an 'S' to someone else's big word in Scrabble. Yes, you get the points, but it's not nearly as satisfying as laying down your own word. It's a move of last resort: "I have nothing better I can do".

I'm not saying he shouldn't do it, but if I'm at a gathering and person A says "I built this new web-app that does cool new thing X" and person B says "I copied site B, only I changed the text to Spanish", it's pretty clear who I'm going to want to chat with.

alex_c• 18 years ago

I think it depends what you're after. Building something brand new is more interesting and challenging, but taking a proven design and introducing it to an untapped market has a higher probability of resulting in "something people use", for substantially less effort. So I disagree with the "I have nothing better I can do" sentiment.

vaksel2• 18 years ago

yet 5 years later the guy who built "this new web-app" is still floundering trying to compete with the behemoths for attention, while the guy who did a +1 in a foreign market is #1 or #2 in his country, rolling around in millions and waiting to be acquired for a ton of money.

Nothing is stopping the guy who did +1 from doing the innovative thing after he makes his millions.

SingAlong• 18 years ago

I too had the same thought. If he(friend) wants to go for money over an interesting hacker life and his clone idea works out, he has his share of cake.

If he chooses an interesting hacker life over money, he sure shouldn't clone it if he cannot add innovative ideas to it.

I'm glad that a lot of guys here share my hacker zeal.

swaroop• 18 years ago

Definitely. This is like Bollywood/Hindi movies making rip-offs of English movies. It still adds value because it brings the idea (the story) to a number of people who wouldn't have been able to use it otherwise (language barrier).

baddox• 18 years ago

America's Hollywood also does this to foreign films, though it's rarely anything close to what you'd call an improvement.

parenthesis• 18 years ago

MercadoLibre.com started out as a latin american 'ebay clone'. They seem to be doing okay (== monopoly in their region); in fact, ebay now own a stake in them.

mtw• 18 years ago

it's a good idea as practice. Otherwise, if you or your friend are planning to make it a major business, don't, because of legal repercussions when it will be popular

danw3• 18 years ago

Amazon expanded into Europe by buying up it's 'clones' in other languages, so this might work out well.

Facebook chose to translate and expand by itself instead of purchasing local clones.

I guess the difference is amazon was buying shipping and warehousing.

electromagnetic• 18 years ago

Amazon had physical assets it needed to acquire, at best Facebook needs a data center, however a 'clone' is unlikely to have one worth the money.

danw3• 18 years ago

Exactly. Buying a facebook clone would be for the user base.

rokhayakebe• 18 years ago

I can guarantee that the site he will clone is an actual clone of another site.

Everything you see today is a clone of something else and they simply change the theme, the message, this or that.

True innovation looks too dumb to be copied.

visdo• 18 years ago

Bad? No. Cloning idea is actually good thing. We need multiple choices. Doing better is also not a necessary thing. I say doing different.

mcxx• 18 years ago

But only cloning doesn't bring multiple choices. You have to bring innovation to create a difference.

eugenejen3• 18 years ago

"Bad artists copy. Great artists steal." -- Pablo Picasso.

I think as long as your friend is conscious what Picasso said in the quote above, it will be ok. Because the clone is just the starting point. There is market there but no product is available. So by cloning this product, he gets his foot out of the door and the rest of journey is up to him.

modoc5• 18 years ago

There's getting ideas and inspiration from existing works is one thing.

Selling your The Frugal Repast forgeries is another.

eugenejen3• 18 years ago

It depends.

In early 1980, all Apple IIe in Taiwan were made by clone manufacturers. There was a market, but Apple's price was too high by living standard then. Most of the clone manufacturers just copied the Apple IIe. But some of the clone manufacturers started to experiment with new features and improvements, and learned the experience of making computers. They later cloned IBM PC, Compaq and continued the process for each generation. Some failed but some survived and became stronger.

Many years later, they are so much better in cost and design of the system and take over the business from large manufacturers in U.S. and lower the price of PC to today's level. Ain't that a good thing to enable us to own cheap computers? While Apple, HP all outsource their manufacture to them.

Meanwhile, some of them start to improve the design and create their own product line, and finally they reach the level with confidence to introduce their own new designs and innovations.

Acer was one of this cloner. ASUS's founder was part of Acer team. And you can see how far they have progressed.

But they all started because they want to make something that people want, even just clone it.

kingnothing• 18 years ago

I've always heard that quote as "Good artists copy; great artists steal."

Any idea which is correct?

DougBTX• 18 years ago

I've heard the "Good" version too. On Google it wins 35,000 against 2,660, which is closer than I'd expect. The Wikipedia page has it as "Good", but Unsourced.

Timothee• 18 years ago

I think there is a good market for cloning site.

But I agree with you though, that if it's literally cloning, it's not great... and some people will notice anyway and that would give you a bad image.

Overall though, I don't think there is anything bad about it. That means you start with a proven idea. We all know execution will make the difference anyway.

code_devil• 18 years ago

I think its fine. Look at even the current social networks in English itself.

Dating Sites ---> Friendster --> hi5 --> Facebook --> Orkut

                                               --> Bebo

                                               --> WAYN

                                            --> LinkedIn

They all started with the same base, a database of people that interact.

Again, the App development platform was started by facebook and now everyone else copied it. So, once you clone it you can always give it your own unique flavor with time.

iamelgringo• 18 years ago

I think that making clones is a great idea. My current project is making a reddit clone on top of Django. I'm planning on setting up social news sites focused on niche markets.

I know that there's already sub-reddits, Digg, etc.. but I'm pretty convinced that your average person in Peoria/Des Moines/Kansas City isn't going to get past the first page of reddit or Digg without running away screaming because of the trolls.

Think about it this way. How many web forums are out there that are devoted to niche markets? How many magazines are there? How many local newspapers are there? How many sitcoms are there? How many movies are there? The web is media.

There's nothing wrong with taking a format or platform, and targeting it at a niche market. You don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you make a consumer facing web application.

The problem of "What do people want" has already been solved repeatedly. As long as you're not infringing on IP, if you can take an idea and focus it on a specific market, you're one step closer to making money.

eugenejen3• 18 years ago

Not a bad idea! But reddit is pretty bad in dealing with trollers in non programming subreddit.

But I like the newmogul when nickb released it. The feeling is very natural but each focuses on its own subject.

ojbyrne• 18 years ago

I like to call the strategy "fast following" rather than "cloning." It made Bill Gates a billionaire.

swapspace• 18 years ago

It depends on what he means by cloning. Speaking from an Indian perspective, there is a horde of vanilla Indian social networking sites which are just floundering. On the other hand, there is bazee.com, an ebay equivalent which was bought by ebay and is now known as ebay.in. There are other startups similar to US ones in travel, mobile payments and so on, which are doing pretty well.

I guess it's not just about localization in terms of language but also about making related offline services available, which is sometimes not feasible for the original site(s) to do all over the world, at least fast enough.

known• 18 years ago

"Imitation is the sincerest of flattery." --Charles Caleb Colton

mattjaynes• 18 years ago

I often find myself wishing for variations of popular sites and services since often I can find one that does what I want, but fits me better.

For example, when I was recently looking for some good bug-tracking software I used FogBugz as a trial and really liked it, but they're pricing was really ridiculous for my use case. They would charge $20 per user per month for whoever uses the site. That will work great for other folks who have a static team, but I work with a revolving pool of outsourcers. So for me, it would cost an extra $20 for a outsourcer of mine to perform a $10 task that month and use the bug tracking system. Great software, but their pricing model was a bad fit for me.

So, I started looking at other bug tracking software sites and found some that I'd never heard of, but that looked promising. I eventually settled on Unfuddle since it allowed me to have a revolving pool of users and not be penalized for it in the pricing. I tried Lighthouse and a few others, but there were slight variations in their functionality that didn't make them an ideal fit. Of course, those aren't exactly 'clones', but they duplicate significant portions of functionality and vary in small ways that can be significant for a user like me (i.e. pricing structure).

So, I'm all for clones - bring 'em on. It keeps the established guys on their toes and innovating and gives users slight variations to choose from.

It's basically slight genetic variation and natural selection in business.

P.S. The only time it really seems wrong to clone is when the site's text is copied too closely - or if the visual design is too similar.

P.S.S Also, if the site being cloned is super unique and pushing the realm of some new functionality, it seems bad form if clones don't at least acknowledge and give credit to the original site for their inspiration.

wheels2• 18 years ago

I have mixed feelings here. On the one hand, from a market perspective I think, "Sure, why not. Just exploit the race condition that exists between The Next Big Thing in the US and those startups recognizing the European market."

On the other hand, as someone that cares about the health of the European startup scene, it doesn't set a good precedent that successful European startups tend to far too often just be knock-offs of American companies, and in fact the cycle feeds itself -- it's such now that European investors often want to see a "proven model", meaning a knock-off, which makes it harder for European startups to find funding when doing something riskier.

owkaye• 18 years ago

It's not all "America to Europe" you know ... there are startups in Europe that are innovating in ways the Americans haven't tried yet. Maybe not many of them, but my new business is based on one of them and it wasn't that hard to find.

The European company mine is modeled after is not doing well because they've made a fatal flaw in their implementation that's preventing their growth, and it seems their management doesn't recognize this, but other than this simple issue their business concept is sound, and when they eventually recognize this issue I'm sure they will do well.

But I'm American and I want to bring the same service to the USA so I'm proceeding with a slightly modified version -- one that will actually work well in the USA. I see nothing wrong with this whatsoever, it's a simple task of bringing a good service to places where the originator cannot or will not.

wheels2• 18 years ago

It's not that there aren't ideas coming from Europe to the US; it's rather that there's not a statistically significant number of American startups that are knock-offs of European ones. The converse isn't true. That there exist European copies of American companies doesn't bother me in the least; that they're probably half of the European startups does.

mixmax• 18 years ago

I actually hacked up a clone of HN because I thought it would be nice with a hn-like site for "normal" news in Danish and there aren't any. I don't feel bad about it in any way because it doesn't infringe or subtract from HN since it's a totally different crowd.

If you want you can check it out here: http://www.deloghersk.dk (still has a few bugs...)

Raphael3• 18 years ago

Well, HN is just a clone of Reddit. And Reddit is just an improved Digg. When someone makes a clone of yours, then you'll know you've hit it big!

palish2• 18 years ago

Awe. I thought this would be a philosophical discussion about the merits of human cloning.

Raphael3• 18 years ago

It's so easy to make people naturally that it would be pointless to make more than a few clones, just to prove it can be done. The same applies to apps. If you are looking for a programming or design exercise and can't think of anything original, rewrite an app you like.

palish2• 18 years ago

Mm, consider what it would be like to not be forced to wait for a heart transplant. At that point, you could grow your own.

Of course, that would be quite controversial.

joshu• 18 years ago

For an exact clone, it's pretty lame. And even worse, because the cloning process doesn't teach you any of the reasons the product is like that, when you DO need to diverge, you won't have learned anything.

It used to really upset me as the creator, as well. But then I realized they don't really have what it takes to be successful, anyway.

gommm2• 18 years ago

I think part of the problem with cloning a website is the motivation. Feeling that you're just cloning a succesful website without adding your own touch is just not as motivating (at least for me).

I'm a bit in this situation currently since I had an idea for a product that I really wanted to do, but by the time I quit my job to work on it, someone else had the same idea and implemented it for the american market... So, I let the idea by the wayside for a while but recently I decided to implement it for another market... So in a way I'm cloning someone's website (same base idea) without cloning since I originally wanted to do exactly such a website...

Ask HN: Is making clones bad?

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