

TV show panel full of experts tells entrepreneur his idea is worthless, he proves them wrong - nickb
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=475095&in_page_id=1770&ito=1490
Never let anyone persuade you your product is useless until you prove its usefulness in the market!
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dpapathanasiou
Yes, professional investors _do_ make mistakes (as the better VCs will admit:
<http://www.bvp.com/Portfolio/AntiPortfolio.aspx>), so this is something to
keep in mind after meeting with potential investors.

BTW, what is David Beckham doing designing toys?

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hcho
That guy was not rejected because his idea was bad. The prototypes he brought
with were of very low build quality. The investors had doubts about his
abilities of running the bussiness rather than the idea itself. I don't think
they made a mistake.

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jey
A prototype is just to get an idea across. He easily could've hired a firm to
design the product properly with the GBP100k he stood to gain from that
contest.

The main motive behind these shows is entertainment. They just need to make a
big showy production with drama, excitement, and hurt feelings. They are
pretty lame imo. On the other hand, it's a chance for some investment, so I
won't fault people for going after it.

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vikram
I've seen a bit of Dragon's Den. My observations, unlike VCs, these guys tend
to be absolutely direct and say what they think about the idea and the ability
of the founders. I've found that they tend to look for either business
experience or real traction like revenue and profits. So the show isn't web
2.0 compliant.

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snorkel
"Reality" contest TV shows are anything but objective to begin with. The
judges are purposely overblown so the audience will react to the judges. The
contestants are selected according to personality, also for audience reaction.
It's about making good television, not good inventions.

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nickb
I think I saw two episodes of UK's Dragon's Den from the first season (you can
find them on bittorrent sites). It was an interesting show from what I
remember. For those that never heard of it, here's what wikipedia says:

"Dragons' Den is a television programme that originated in Japan where the
format is owned by Sony. The format, which now airs internationally, consists
of entrepreneurs pitching their ideas to secure investment finance from
business experts -- the "Dragons"."

Basically, you pitch a bunch of rich people, entrepreneurs and investors and
they tell you what you think and they might invest into your idea as well.

