Ideas are cheap, development easy, so why aren't we rich? | Hacker News Reader

Ideas are cheap, development easy, so why aren't we rich?

kineticac.posterous.com

25 pointskineticac15 comments

I find this to be a confusing article. So, I couldn't resist to spend "10 minutes" to point these mistakes:

"10 minutes to come up with something amazing"

It's impossible to think of something amazing in 10 minutes.

"We aren't rich because we have cheap ideas, or can develop easily, we are rich because we have friends and support. "

This is conflicting to the title of the article and in any message attempted to be addressed.

"We will never succeed with selfless promotion, so don't do it!"

Who said a startup is about self promotion? If you are doing a startup for that, you are doing it already for a wrong reason. Of course you can be proud but the difficulties will really keep you rather silent and in need for focus on the real issues.

"Build something fun, not serious at all, that has no tool or function that people can use."

the world would be a big Disneyland if everything built is not serious, fun and had no function whatsoever!

"But if you have something great, make it sound like it's for the masses."

what do you consider great? and since when great things are targeted for the masses. Probably the best "toys" are exclusive to those with more money.

"Otherwise, if you have no crazy educational background, awards, job positions at big companies, nobody takes you seriously."

Again, expecting approval is the wrong way to go. Feedback is good, but if you are in need of approval to go after something, it's probably because you are not ready yet (lack of desire, lack of expertise or belief in your abilities etc).

"Development is pretty easy as well"

since when? If you are not building something new yes it probably is. But then you'll probably wont be a startup.

Also, the article began saying he will not share experience and the article is full of "advice" derived from personal experience, which may not complete yet, therefore there will be wrong conclusions that are not helpful for most. The only thing I somewhat agree is:

"Don't go out to places like Hackernews, TechCrunch, Mashable, etc hoping to pitch your idea."

Of course you should know your audience and what you are building.

If ideas were cheap and everyone was able to think of something "amazing" the article wouldn't be full of confusion.

"This isn't an article about my experience"

There are many other mistakes. But to conclude I'll just say that the author began saying that it's not about his experience when the whole article is based on them, from which someone can see that these are current/already expired point of views which will change accordingly if more experience is gained.

Yes, ideas are cheap judging from the whole article. Otherwise, the article would be filled with correct ideas.

Continuing flow of ideas and execution is what is hard.

"It's impossible to think of something amazing in 10 minutes."

I would beg to differ. Think about what you are saying for < 10 minutes and it might come to you.

"Software is easy. Since when? If you are not building something new yes it probably is. But then you'll probably wont be a startup."

Creating a rough prototype isn't that hard, if you think it is you are doing it wrong. Getting that prototype in front of real users isn't hard either, in fact if you use modern frameworks it will likely be as good as lots of other software out there. Creating great software is extremely difficult, but I know software companies making an absolute killing with hacky interfaces, no testing and poor qa.

My take: Ideas aren't hard at all. Neither is building a product. Almost no one does the necessary steps (e.g. steve blanks process) to get their product right, which boilds down to heaps of face-time meetings with the target market to truly understand their problems.

If you have found a new way to tackle a problem, then, by definition, there are no frameworks for you.

I think you are mixing up problem and tools.

OP was probably thinking of something like web frameworks that help you realize your idea for a web-based app..

If you have a fundamentally different approach for developing web-based apps, you might have to start from the scratch, though.

The article says: “any competent developer out there can make basically anything”.

He really should read Software is Hard: http://www.gamearchitect.net/Articles/SoftwareIsHard.html

Also, while ideas are cheap, that does not mean that all ideas are lucrative or practical, and lots of people are not able to come up with product ideas or be able to judge the feasibility of an idea.

Lastly, there are actually a lot of people making a living in this virtual economy based off their ideas.

Indeed. It's easy to make anything. It's hard to make something great.

Any developer can make a crappy product with no finish and no market fit. It's a lot harder to pull off something that large numbers of users love and get excited about, and even harder to make something they're willing to pay good money for.

I'll grant the author that some niches are more easily served because they have basically no software available, so in those cases even bad software is better than nothing, but those niches are not so easy to find, and even in those cases, figuring out what software to build (rather than copying and extending someone else's offering) is pretty hard.

I feel we _are_ rich. You don't have to launch a Google or Microsoft to be rich. Launch a small niche product, get a few customers, earn enough to live a typical western lifestyle. That's enough for me to feel rich.

I will probably get downvoted for not adding anything but I found this article really worthwhile and interesting. I think the problem I have is supporting the idea and the development process both financially and motivationally. Then once you have the product where do you go next?

Are you working on the projects with someone else? I feel like one of the biggest motivators are teammates or a client who's excited about the product. Someone to work with you on something definitely makes things a lot more exciting for many reasons.

1. Check and balances, they help you rationalize and keep you in check as an outside entity. This makes you confident that at least one other person truly believes in this project 2. Excitement is inherently contagious 3. More ideas, more resources, faster development 4. Fun to hang out with

The financial and the next part, I have no clue, but I do know there is no golden rule that applies to every situation.

I also found this article confusing. The title seemed to hold some promise but the arguments are random and not well thought. The author seems to say that those who make it and do get rich do so because they have the right pedigree--right school, right connections etc. Nothing could be further from the truth than this. If you make something people find useful, they don't care what college you went to. Conversely if you have the right pedigree--Harvard CS, Stanford MBA, previously successful startup and make something no one wants, they won't use it because of your background. There are examples aplenty!

Cheap ideas and easy development translate directly into low barriers to entry -- if anything these are obstacles to getting rich, not gateways.

The TL;DR nutshell: Appropriate sales & marketing FTW.

Answer: because cheap ideas and easy development don't make money!

We are, but like the future, it isn't evenly distributed yet.

plenty o ideas along with easy cheap dev just make for mass experimentation, eventually you'll hit something that really sticks

we do far more time manifesting stuff then really working from a core need in the first place

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