

What to do if your primary data source thinks of you as a competitor? - marcamillion

I am building a product that uses an API from a fairly large site.<p>The problem is, that my product is considered a 'direct competitor' (I was told this by one of the co-founders of said service/site) to the API provider.<p>They also told me that the site's API is available on a non-commercial basis.<p>What should I do?<p>I am inclined to go ahead and build the non-commercial version, launch an MVP and see if we can negotiate a fair licensing agreement.<p>The obvious risk is, what if they say no and close the pipes on me?<p>Would love to hear some thoughts.<p>P.S. I am not VC-funded, so don't have any restrictions like risking investor's money or anything like that. It's just a lone guy in a garage wanting to build something he thinks would be cool - especially for this crowd :)<p>P.P.S. They weren't a jerk about it, they were totally cool - not surprising though, because their public persona leads you to expect the 'cool response' they gave. So this isn't a "F^&#38;% the man, trying to keep me down" type of a situation.
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karmajunkie
The obvious answer is to see if you can get the data from somewhere else. If
its proprietary information to their app, then you may be stuck there. If
that's the case, I'd ask yourself whether its something you should really
build. Let's assume you do, since it would be cool, and you're happy making it
a non-commercial product to be able to keep using the API—if you can add other
features/connections/data sources that make a commercial offering compelling
and less dependent on a single source of information that in all likelihood
will want to cut you off, then you may be able to make it work, and might be
an attractive acquisition for the company whose data you want to use.

But i'd make sure you don't invest too terribly much in the effort. As Fred
Wilson has pointed out, never fill holes in someone else's product.

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marcamillion
Fair enough.

I do plan on adding additional data sources, but the data that this source
provides is pretty unique.

Not so much filling holes in someone else's product, but rather using the same
data to build a competing product.

Fun times ahead!

