Ask HN: Why haven't you founded an AI startup yet?

3 points·atleastoptimal··6 comments

From the looks of it it seems like a huge gold rush, and for many in the space it doesn't seem that you need a lot of technical skills; a lot of startups are just an API and marketing built on top of ChatGPT.

The risks are small but the rewards are huge. Why haven't you dipped your toes into the space yet?

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- Not a business person

- As you say, it's all built on a single product, so rugpulls are a real risk

- Not attracted to marketing-driven companies where you try to get a large number of users onboard and figure out a business plan later

Rug pull is terrifying. If you spend $X with OpenAI now to process a ton of data, how long can you amortize that cost, until the particular model you used is deprecated?

If you go all in on a trend like this and take VC money, you don't really work for yourself, but still have all the downside of your own company. The way to capitalize, for those positioned to take advantage, is to work for somebody else.

When I looked at what it took to get VC money, it seemed less appealing and more constraining than getting a job. Bootstrapping always makes sense, buy you can capitalize on money flowing into a trend in the same way, you actually need something people will buy.

All this is exacerbated by the current hype cycle.

Just like the gold rush, the ones making the real money will be selling shovels and pickaxes.

So, OpenAI is likely going to make the real money.

i have: https://gnow.ly

How about some up-front pricing for the non-free courses?

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