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Free Startup Ideas

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153 pointsvladmk96 comments

I hate to hijack this submission, but not so long ago I tried submitting some free startup ideas of my own on Github here: https://github.com/Vheissu/Free-Ideas — because I'm not a Hacker News power-user and don't live in a popular time zone (I'm from Aus) it was largely ignored.

Ideas are very much in the execution, but I think you need a good idea to execute upon in the first place and this Google Doc and the likes of my repository of ideas are perfect ways to find an idea or perhaps add to an existing idea.

Yes this is certainly a problem with HN where its active timezone is US centric. Which means news not submitted during those time are likely to never shown up.

"I tried submitting some free startup ideas of my own on Github here"

https://github.com/genesisdotre/wikify/wiki/Main-Index-Title...

Same here. Although my intention was to put IP into public domain before signing employment contract.

(first step was to find suitable wiki / collaborative engine to put everything in place)

maybe a future idea should be a tool for timing HN posts ;)

Hey I posted a comment below...but I was just wondering if you could add these ideas to the following site.

It would make it easier than having to go to a github page or read a google doc.

http://ideas.ozonebit.com/

I was thinking of setting up a site similar to yours. I even got a domain and set up a launchrock page [1].

But after a couple of months (still haven't started it), I'm finding that putting up a google doc/hackpad/blog post is a lot less friction. The nice thing about having a centralized place like yours (and the one I intended to build), is that the ideas wouldn't be fragmented into different sites/docs.

If anyone's interested in using the domain (unused.me) for an idea site, let me know, I'd gladly give it up :)

[1] http://signup.unused.me/

Oh wow! This is awesome! Yours looks so much better. I went with the simplicity approach. I had the same belief, having them in one place allows people to go to ONE hub of ideas.

Thanks!

I'd like to throw an idea into this thread that's relevant to the recent events in Turkey.

Twittor - A Twitter client with built in Tor integration.

Lol no worries man

I don't think build a business is as easy as choose from a list.

You sure can implement every problem reported in that list but if you don't know/have the problem in first person, how good can your solution be?

I heard about a small business that makes bingo cards for non-technical (putting it mildly in some cases) mostly US-based elementary school teachers, created by some guy in Japan.

I don't think that having the problem yourself is necessarily good. I think it's better in many cases to go solve a problem for "real people" - those that are currently using, say, an Excel sheet in place of what your solution offers, or something like that.

Eh this guy is patio11, he's a practically celebrity around these parts!

> I don't think that having the problem yourself is necessarily good.

First off when he started this, he was very close to the "problem". Then, for years he listened intently to almost every single minor or major feedback putting himself in their shoes, which again is very "close to the problem".

Eh this guy is patio11, he's a practically celebrity around these parts!

I'm pretty sure davidw knows that and said it tongue-in-cheek. davidw has been on HN a long time and is, himself, high up on the highest karma list of people.

I actually met patio11 in person at MicroConf Europe, last year. He's a nice guy, and some of his BCC stories are very entertaining.

"I'm pretty sure davidw knows that"

35k karma (davidw) means more than "pretty sure" I'd say that's certainty.

You're thinking of Patrick McKenzie (patio11, one of the top posters here) and his bingo card creator.

http://www.kalzumeus.com/ http://www.bingocardcreator.com/

On a slight tangent: his blog rocks!

And he works 70-80hrs a week, which explains parts of the successful implementation of his ideas.

FWIW: I don't work 70 to 80 hours a week. My best estimate would be 35 to 45, with variances depending on what is happening in life.

The more useful numbers for calculating successful implementation of my ideas are 8 and 5. I have 8 years in the game, and get +/- 5% compounding improvements a month. This happens fairly reliably whether I work 20 hour weeks or 90 hour weeks and, after a few years in the salaryman salt mines, I know which I'd rather pick.

His newsletter is cool too. One of the few Newsletter I'm happy subscribing to.

The replies to this post show there is no market for humor on HN, even if some seem to lack that exact thing :(

Oh there is a market just a small one. :-)

startup idea: invent a way to signal humor/sarcasm on the internet

The guy you're talking about is Thomas Ptacek, he's been known to comment here from time to time. He's also interested in crossword puzzles.

"I heard about a small business that makes bingo cards for non-technical ....created by some guy in Japan"

Trying to say this in a nice way: I personally don't think it's good form to use these "insider" type things. Would be curious how many people are aware of what you are referring to or even for that matter who "PG" is (although that one for sure I understand as being a necessary part of some indoctrination..)

That said since I know what you are talking about I found it enjoyable!

Anyway, for one thing it's not particularly googleable. So it's not like saying "write your own shell script perl is to much work for that" where because this site is for hackers and further "shell script" or "perl" can be understood by newbies by, say, "searching that site funded by YC that is run by a guy in PA and has a funny game like name with an animal in it".[1]

I do agree with your point. Specifically because not knowing something can sometimes be an advantage instead of a disadvantage because you can be more creative in your approach.

[1] duckduckgo.com

Indirectly you've identified a product in great need - a sarcasm detector for the humor impaired. ;-)

83 intrigues me.

Even with the move by many sites of having to pay to message, there is still a huge problem with the experience for women dating online. Very few of my female friends even want to try it, given the horror stories they've gotten from others. A Sadie Hawkins approach would be interesting.

And yeah fellas, I know it's not all of us that send unbidden wang pics or do those overly aggressive creepy PMs and then flip out when someone has the audacity to exercise their free will and say no. But there's enough that do that it poisons the whole experience. And if you think the problem is exaggerated, read any of the numerous articles done by guys who also doubted how bad it was who posed as women on dating sites - it's revolting.

83 already exists in France. It's called "Adopte un mec" (translation: adopt a guy) and it's very successful (http://www.adopteunmec.com). It ysed to target a yound adult crowd with some funky design but the UX and design god much better over the years so they may be moving up.

I used to work with an office full of females, and a French woman was showing this site to the others. They were reading it and laughing about it, and I remember feeling uncomfortable then. I was imagining how a woman would feel if a room full of men went onto a website and laughed about picking out their ideal woman. A bit of a double standard because it's funny if girls are doing it, but if guys did that it would be sexual harassment. But I'm sure it was all in good fun and it was done in a classier way than men would have done.

herway.com has existed for many years (despite sharing part of the name of a Hanes underwear brand). They interestingly also provide analytics so you can do A/B testing on your profile as a guy.

Not that I'm in the market, but a domain like "herway.com" wouldn't be appealing to me as a guy. It's one thing for a dating site to have a rule that only girls initiate contact, it's another to have a dating site which gives the impression that "Everything here is done the girl's way, guys have no say on anything and must obey or go away." It's just a bad first impression and very off-putting.

They're willing to give up some appeal with the over-saturated audience to draw in the under-saturated one :).

At the risk of sounding negative, I thought the majority of these ideas were absolutely awful. Even if one of these did inspire someone to put the work in, I doubt it would get them very far.

You get what you pay for.

Precisely, way to complain about free stuff geez, so you want me to execute them, pivot and mail the money? :-)

Sounds like a great business to me, better than I've managed to do by myself. Sign me up.

I think that one will go bankrupt and we'll have to pivot.

Remember though, that the best ideas initially sound like really bad ideas, as explained by PG in his essay (based on pretty good empirical evidence from funding hundreds of them ): http://paulgraham.com/swan.html

So there could well be a few outliers in there. Of course, that is a necessary, not a sufficient condition, i.e, not all bad ideas are going to be successful - but the most successful ones sound like really bad ideas to begin with.

Spotted: Find me in every available internet picture. Ohh look a wedding in Munich, there's me walking past.

I'd pay some good money for this service!

If only non-technical people cold emailing programmers suggesting 50-50 cofounder partnerships knew such a list existed.

Precious ideas! Not one, but MANY!

If only programmers beating their heads against a brick wall wondering why their new "startup" isn't getting any traction knew the phrase "domain expertise" and the word "sales".

Most of the nontechnical people you meet who will claim domain expertise are full of shit. The ones with real domain expertise are still technical, but of a different type. For example, in my field, domain experts know programming, but they do it with AMPL, AIMMS, BUGS, Stan, etc. The ones who run around claiming domain expertise, however, are mostly commodities: MBAs that can only accomplish something by hiring someone to do it for them.

There's a very well funded company in Vancouver (yes, really) that's working on #38 a crunchbase for charities. So far they've linked up all Canadian charities to their platform (US next) and are themselves a registered charity.

What's unique is that you can 'donate' to them anytime, get a tax receipt, & decide which charity to give to at a later date.

They're called Chimp Fund (Chimp.net) - I've met the founders and contracted for them before.

interesting. There's also apparently a company going public that's also, tho the doc is a bit crazy right now maybe once it cools down you can see that comment.

Free as in sofa. (No cost, similar value)

This post reminds me that I need to have more diversity in my life and reading material. All of these ideas struck me as good, and then I realized they are all basically targeted at people like me because that's the type of people who created this list.

Sure, we're just regular people. My small biz is making a few k right now and I'm looking into testing new ideas this week for something bigger. If we're similar lets connect: https://twitter.com/VladMkrtumyan

The dating website where only women can start a conversation has been tried with success (AdopteUnMec in France).

I like the MTurk for cryptocurrency idea.

The Mturk for cryptocurrency already exists (and works through Crowdflower) : https://coinworker.com/ I made about 0.2 btc there last year when I dropped out of university with no direct other plan. (But then I lost the private keys to that wallet)

Edit: clarify that I respond about the Mturk idea

I have a niche dating site that has had about 9 girls for every guy consistently for years. I thought the problem would logically take care of itself, but here is a real counterexample. As a guy with limited ladies-man skills, it still boggles my mind to this day.

It would be much easier to believe you if you provided a link. Might also help to solve your ratio problem?

This might work better as a subreddit than a Google doc.

There used to be (still is?) the half baked blog which was fun and interesting.

A similar sub reddit would be ace if properly run.

http://www.reddit.com/r/SomebodyMakeThis/

I find lists like this to be rather naive. A lot of people think that businesses are all about: good idea + great execution. Wrong! A business is about: making money. Plain and simple. You don't need a fancy idea and the latest execution 'methods' (e.g. agile, lean, etc.) to make money.

You need a market, hard work, smart decisions, and a bit of luck. There is way too much conversation conflating the concepts of innovation and business. I would say that in the case of innovation it IS about: good(novel) idea + great execution.

I imagine many startups feel that they MUST innovate to be a 'worthy' company. But, you really don't. To be a company you just have to make money. You do whatever is necessary to do just that. Nokia sold rubber tires FFS [0]

[0] http://www.nokia.com/global/about-nokia/about-us/the-nokia-s...

I think you misunderstand. This isn't "just do this and you'll be rich". It's obvious that it isn't because then why would they give out the ideas? This document exists precisely _because_ ideas are cheap.

Since ideas are easy and execution is hard, it makes no sense to hoard ideas.

The things that you say are necessary and which are in your control (seeing if you have a market, working hard, making smart decisions) are collectively what people call execution.

The title of the article is: Free STARTUP (Business) Ideas. NOT: Free Product Ideas.

This concept still doesn't seem to phase people. You don't need novel ideas to start a business. That's why I am trying to make it clear that it is incorrect to conflate a startup (business) with some sort of invention (like the car or lightbulb). The two are non-equivalent. Although, one can lead to the other.

This reduction of business to: idea + execution is not doing anyone any good.

>seeing if you have a market, working hard, making smart decisions) are collectively what people call execution

This thinking can also be misleading as business ideas can actually be a sub-component of smart decisions.

>ideas are easy and execution is hard

This is also an over-simplification that will do no one any good. And it seems to be pervasive throughout the 'startup community'. Google started on a research paper. Research papers are NOT easy. So, no, ideas are not always easy.

Of course, you might argue that the research paper was part of the 'execution' in which case you would be arguing my previous point: innovation is what has the idea + execution phase. The end result of innovation is usually an invention (whether it be fractional reserve banking or microprocessors).

The research paper was not a business and not part of a business. The invention was eventually used to power a business. The same with the invention of the lightbulb.

Anyways, I just wish people would stop oversimplifying things. It really does no good.

I think you have too much time on your hands...

FWIW - I do a version of the Idea Validator mentioned there at services.withstartups.com

I think the validation methods mentioned are pretty valid. The one major problem I have found is that there is a very small/distinct set of people who even understand what the validation is all about, and get the idea of developing a quick MVP. And these people are usually savvy/skilled enough to do a quick validation themselves. The opposite end of the spectrum are people who cannot do this, but then they also do not understand that this is not a quick & cheap website making service.

Still, you get to talk to a lot of people. So if you like to bounce ideas (I do), it is an interesting business.

>I do a version of the Idea Validator... >I think the validation methods mentioned are pretty valid

Emphasis added :)

> Problem: people think ideas are really valuable. > Solution: a marketplace to sell IP

Haha. If only there was a place where nobody would buy their ideas, they'd realize how worthless they are.

Problem solved either ways!

Most people who are delusional about the value of their ideas would refuse to put it up on such a website / share it with anybody unless the other person signed a non disclosure agreement.

I wonder if there's some way to capitalize on that...

We could have a site-wide NDA

I personally research Twitter and message boards the way you described it for "blogdia". But I don't think there would be people / wantrepreneurs willing to pay for such an app.

Instead, why not doing a private / paid newsletter for that? Or a site where wantrepreneurs can buy your market research about a specific idea. And only a limited number of each idea can be sold in order to increase the perceived value of it.

Interesting. I left me twitter at the beginning of the doc feel free to reach out and we can talk it through.

Wow this is great... Now all that remains to do is years of hard graft, hustling and a massive truck of luck and you might be successful! Amazing!

OMG please improve typograpy. One font size/weight for introduction, one for list and another for your service promotion.

Someone made this spreadsheet back in the day (I don't know when I got it, but it's in my google drive)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ag-R_ZlGO21NdE9...

"There are tons of contracting jobs that are easy to do, but people think only ‘real programmers’ can solve valuable problems."

I see more the opposite - non-programmers attempting to solve problems (easy or hard) and making a huge mess of things. The video series might help people avoid these problems.

That too! One of the most common contracting jobs is to fix somsone's mess.

Maybe the video series will be: Top 10 Code Fails and How to Fix them

Just a quick website to add the ideas and vote on them. Check it out!

We can add all the ideas in this post and then the community can upvote / downvote the most popular ones.

http://ideas.ozonebit.com/

Why can I vote multiple times on the same idea as a single user? I just gave 5 votes to the top one.

" Video Only Job Board "

Have seen this attempted before, but the issues about potential discrimination always crops up. Hard to say you didn't pass over someone because of their appearance when the entire process is video-based.

It also drastically increases a recruiter/hiring manager's time spent looking at résumés if they can't skim them.

I agree. In fact, I think the opposite is quite interesting: a jobs board where applications are sanitized of race, gender and age information.

Thanks for compiling these ideas @vladmk. However, I wonder if there's a web application that functions similarly (i.e. provide startup ideas and enable the users to vote for the most popular ones).

It would be cool build. :-) My pleasure.

Mirrored it in HackPad :)

https://freestartupideas.hackpad.com/Free-Startup-Ideas-Oy39...

"Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration"

The list takes care of 1% part. Perspiration is fueled by passion. As long as one can strike the right mix, why not.

If Edison spent more time thinking, he wouldn't have to perspire as much. (Paraphrasing Tesla[0])

[0] http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/1010603-if-he-thomas-edison-...

Touché

Lessons learned and takeaways from this experience:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7454441

http://www.googlesciencefair.com/springboard/en/

Some ideas on firespotting are good candidates. But of late there are more completed products than ideas there.

Good startup ideas are surprisingly cheap, execution is where fortunes are made.

Please let's not have another ideas versus execution debate, thanks!

Wow, this document totally overtaxes my perception ability.

You get for what you pay for here...

free startup vomit

:-) pivot. I wanna see your golden patented idea ;)

This whole thing is an early April Fools' right?

"44 Trademark exchange I like that we build lots of IP Problem: people think ideas are really valuable. Solution: a marketplace to sell IP"

your life is an early April fools :P couldn't resist.

To quote John Gruber, "Ideas are worthless". It's the implentation that matters. So the idea about an idea generating website isn't all that good. :P

Heh, had this idea some while ago. Anyway i can contribute? I got a bunch of great startupideas but i'm busy with other stuff and i don't mind sharing em. Someone register startupleech

Sure, just give me your email address here on or on twitter or request it on the doc if it ever settles down. https://twitter.com/VladMkrtumyan

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