Clone Wars: Rise of the Fast Follower Startups | Hacker News Reader

Clone Wars: Rise of the Fast Follower Startups

betabeat.com

37 pointsshakes17 comments

"We launched first, so they must have copied us." - I really wish I'd quit hearing this.

Just because you wrote code fast and launched fast doesn't mean someone else did. It could be they took their sweet time and had actually started first, but you beat them to market.

It IS possible for 2 people to envision the same concept in the same way. It's actually quite likely, given how imagination works.

Having said that, I also don't think there's anything wrong with seeing something and thinking you can do it slightly better. That's the nature of capitalism.

parallel thinking

Yeah I had a reaction like this in the past, but I got to meet the people who worked on a similar project as mine and they did their thing completely independently. I can't say the same of another group who took my css files for their site. Can't be anymore obvious than that. I'm pretty sure they died off anyway.

That's why the patent system doesn't really account for real world business, either. In the real world when you have a "product category" you will have competitors that copy each other's features and try to do them better.

This happens everywhere, in every single product category. Yet, if the patent system was actually enforced for every infringed patent, you wouldn't be able to do that at all, which would dramatically slow down competition in each product category.

Having a "product category" by default means that 80% of the product is similar between competitors, otherwise if it were 100% original you'd have completely different products not in the same product category.

And the patent system doesn't account for that all, and acts as if it's ok to not let anyone do something remotely similar (see Apple vs Samsung case in Europe) for 17 years.

Agreed with wccrawford. There are just so many things that become self-evident if you watch the trends. Seeing that the digital elite tends to hang out on the same sites and forums, it's hardly surprising that we'd find a spark of the idea from the same trends and lead to similar output.

"Last week, two ads appeared from the other side of the fence: a programmer-for-hire looking for something to build who claimed to have built a Facebook clone in four days, a Flickr clone in three days and a Google clone in two weeks. He noted that he’d also created a Craigslist clone, adding, 'but no one visits it so we are posting this ad to Craigslist.'"

The former ad is Ted Dziuba's troll post, so not serious: http://teddziuba.com/2011/07/the-craigslist-reverse-programm...

Someone might want to let the journalist know that he got trolled. :)

Mr. Furman gets waves of clients who ask him about patenting the same thing. “In a month, six or seven people come to me with virtually the same idea!” he told Betabeat.

The way that certain ideas are "in the air" is fascinating to me. Presumably a lot of this is taking a logical next step, or combining ideas that have just been discovered/talked about.

There's a great book by Steven Johnson called "Where Good Ideas Come From" that talks about a lot about new ideas being the logical next step or a combination of ideas that have just been discovered/talked about. I'd highly recommend it.

My father has saying: running business is a marathon. So from that perspective first 100s of meters (cloning the initial version of a web site) means nothing.

A friend recently told me he would no longer pursue his personal original ideas, but rather find a recent YC company whose idea he could get behind and create a clone.

It feels a little dirty, but the idea of tackling a problem vetted by YC and closely watching to learn from their problems is fascinating.

I was talking with a friend about how, if we were just starting out, our best strategy would probably be to pounce on the market abandoned by an acquisition, particularly a talent acquisition.

For example, after Fflick got bought by Google early this year, they closed their site up. But they clearly had decent traction, users and press interest. And if it's a straight-up talent acquisition, that's a reliable signal the opportunities in that field of technology are substantial.

Doesn't it make sense to have another startup (a re-startup?) steal the ball and kick it down the field when it comes to something like Fflick?

There are abandoned users who you can court right away. They've already paved the roads as far as publicity and how to sell the idea. And it's not like the game is over once Google buys a company. Finally, if Google turns this technology into a hit product, you know their competitors are going to be envious.

It made me uneasy to say but couldn't find much fault with this line of thinking.

This strikes me as a perfectly reasonable course. If people want something that isn't for sale, for heaven's sake, find a way to sell it to them!

Edit: anyone ever see the movie Robots? "See a need... fill a need."

More often, I see an idea that I've had for a while, then some group with the same idea gets vetted by YC and other investors. In this case, I would feel a little conflicted about still going forward with it due to possible "follower" perception issues, but I think two groups can honestly come up with similar solutions to the same problem.

I don't think you should ever let the "possible 'follower' perception" hold you back, especially if you have a legitimate claim to the idea and think you can execute well. Don't let yourself trip over the starting line!

>web ecosystem rather than contemptible parasites.

That's because they're competitors. When you find a market, don't expect to own it forever.

Can someone point to an example where a website where a clone was more successful, or even on the same level of success as the original? To be clear, Facebook was not in any way a clone of Myspace or Friendster. I'm talking about someone who posts a request saying "I want a clone of X website" and then proceeds to turn that into a successful business.

This seems natural. The same things reducing the cost of first movers also apply to second movers. The only way to win is to provide better value, either through getting network effects quicker, or innovating more.

For better or worse the half life of competitive advantage is shrinking.

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