
“Is your startup idea taken?” and why we love X for Y startups - motiw
https://andrewchen.co/x-for-y-startup-ideas/
======
robomartin
Very often engineering types can only think of differentiation in technical
terms. I think I can say that, in practice, at least in mature markets,
differentiation is more about positioning and marketing rather than almost
anything else. Easy examples:

    
    
        - Cars
        - Bottled water
        - Computer monitors
    

The vast majority of automobiles produced today have reached a level of design
and manufacturing maturity that makes them pretty much equally reliable and
equivalent. The days of a Porsche or BMW being markedly better than a Toyota
or Nissan are gone. Sure, we can point at the extremes and find differences,
but I am not talking about that, I am focusing on what the vast majority of
consumers look for or need in a car. Today you could pick any vehicle almost
blindly and not make a purchasing mistake. That was not the case a few decades
ago.

How do they differentiate and sell you cars then? Branding, positioning,
marketing. They sell the feeling of owning the car rather than any true
technical differentiation, because those really don't matter as much in non-
technical markets.

Bottle water is another case. I'll generalize and say that most bottled water
is pretty much the same. Or, let's put it another way, no bottled water has
magical properties that make it significantly better than the others.

Again, marketing. They are selling you an image. In some cases it's a glass
bottle with a different feel or a social mission. The product, however, that
thing you drink, most of which you are going to urinate, is basically the
same. If you position the product well you can command much higher pricing
than the competition.

Computer monitors fall under the same category. Nobody cares any more outside
of those using them for very specific applications. There are only a few
companies who make LCD panels. Every single computer monitor buys from them.
So, if you buy a 24 inch HP vs a Dell monitor they very likely have exactly
the same LG or Samsung panel inside. They might even share the rest of the
electronics. For most computer users these products are perfectly
interchangeable; they just don't care because it makes no difference at all.

Not sure how computer monitor makers differentiate their offerings any more to
the masses. Sure, there are folks who are more comfortable with one brand over
the other (despite the fact that it might actually be exactly the same product
inside) and, of course, there's pricing. This is one example of the fact that
significant differentiation might not always be an absolute necessity in order
to have a successful billion dollar business.

One area where they do differentiate --although consumers never see it-- would
be in the terms and relationship they have with distributors and retailers.
This is a big money play. For example, HP could drop two million dollars of
inventory into Best Buy warehouses, effectively on consignment, and get paid
based on what is sold. Best Buy, will, of course, push those products because
they represent pure profit without any capital investment to speak of. This is
a distribution chain differentiation that drives sales rather than
differentiation to drive consumer behavior.

Books have been written about this topic. I've read a few of them over the
years. Still much to learn.

~~~
MuffinFlavored
> How do they differentiate and sell you cars then? Branding, positioning,
> marketing.

If I'm in the market for a BMW M3, it is because it is a stellar performance
car. A Toyota Camry does not fill those roles.

~~~
throwaway1777
That’s positioning and marketing too since you don’t really need the
performance. For 99% of the time you use the car they’re about the same. If
only life were all twisties and race tracks, but in reality it’s mostly
traffic jams.

~~~
amit_m
I happen to own a Toyota Camry and a BMW 5 series (not M5 or any other
specialty model). Even for day-to-day errands, the BMW is a pleasure to drive.
There is a lot of feedback and sharp responses from the steering wheel and
throttle.

The Camry on the other hand is one of the least pleasing cars to drive. The
suspension feels “floaty” and the steering wheel is completely dead. It also
feels completely outdated and cheap and the UI is bad.

~~~
kkarakk
That's interesting, do you think you would buy a Camry that was as responsive
as the BMW - if it were available- and replace your BMW with it?

I think most of car ownership is Signalling personally

~~~
timc3
It can be but often it’s not, particularly when people are into cars.

Things like handling, the interior quality, noise makes a big difference to
some.

Would I replace my BMW with a Toyota if it handled as well, had as good
engine, had a better screen and computer system and such a well calibrated
gear box - of course. And Lexus IS getting close.

------
snegu
One category that's missing on the left is "Parents." There's Tinder for
parents (Peanut), Birchbox for parents (multiple subscription boxes). It would
be interesting to think about what Uber or AirBnB for parents would be.

I couldn't read the article though because I got that absurd uncloseable
newsletter subscription screen. That was one of the most user-hostile things
I've seen on a website lately.

~~~
nostrademons
So Tinder for parents is a terrible idea. (Full disclosure: my wife's a Peanut
member. She's been meaning to uninstall it for a while.) Think about the key
observations that made Tinder take over the dating space: people are basically
superficial and judge who to go out with based on looks alone; people have
spare time to flip through photos; people want to be casual and not invest too
much in a date before getting to know them. _These are the exact opposite
qualities that you want in a mom-friend._ When you're a new mom you're
probably not looking your best, and putting up a profile picture isn't high on
your list of things to do. You don't give a shit what your mom friends look
like, and once you're reading through text it's more like "Facebook for moms".
You have very little free time to swipe through profiles, and when you do, you
want your mom-friend-relationships to count.

There's a lesson there for people who want to phrase their startup idea as "X
for Y". You should ask how similar Y is to the userbase that originally made X
popular, and whether you are capturing the qualities they have in common or
just randomly cargo-culting a successful product. "Flickr for video" works
because a photo-viewing community and video-viewing community are
substantially similar: they both have similar casual interactions around
shared multimedia, and they both benefit heavily from recommendations,
discovery mechanisms, and social sharing. Similarly, "Google for China" works
because people in China have information needs too yet actual Google has an
antagonistic relationship with the CCP. "Uber for laundry" and "Uber for
housecleaning" are both terrible ideas because Uber's value proposition is
that you can get transportation on-demand and it can be done by unskilled
people as long as they get you safely to your final destination, while both
housecleaning and laundry are stuff you do once a week, on a planned basis,
and you really want to trust the people who are doing it. "Uber for grocery
delivery" (Instacart/UberEats/DoorDash/Postmates) is a decent idea, though,
because grocery delivery is also something you want on-demand, do regularly,
and can be done by basically anyone.

~~~
greggman2
me being stupid but I actually thought flickr for video would fail because
video takes more work than photos to create and because it takes more time to
view them. clearly I was wrong

~~~
rhizome
The part that gets me with video is the upload time. Do people just have
faster connections than me, or is the secret to create a phone app that
restricts the files to greatly reduced resolutions? Seems like flickr for
video would require greater bandwidth or time requirements, but I might simply
be clueless.

~~~
jlokier
Mobile data has been fast enough for many years now, depending where you live.

My 2 year old phone has 20Mbit/s upload and 79Mbit/s download on a good day. I
don't upload videos, but if I did I expect that's fast enough in the
background.

The phone upload is way faster than my "fiber" connection at home was, when I
still had one.

------
symplee
Some say that's how they got the idea for MongoDB:

    
    
      Snapchat for Databases

------
cabaalis
Do I have any of these "realms" wrong? It seems the best startup idea would be
one that adds a new "realm" rather than rinses and repeats for another direct
object.

Uber for = simplify a process that involves transporting or delivering
something somewhere

Tinder for = rate/advertise/connect some product nearby

Birchbox for = periodically refill a perishable or consumable

Airbnb for = locate and book some experience or resource

~~~
mr__y
Tinder for heroin (or maybe Birchbox?) and airbnb for used syringes

~~~
jebeng
> airbnb for used syringes

So just regular airbnb?

------
noonespecial
By "taken" do they maybe mean "validated"?

Ideas are executed not "owned". The proof is in the doing.

~~~
holler
this. While it's an interesting article and thought experiment, I don't think
anyone should be discouraged from trying to build the next ride-hailing,
dating, or couch-surfing platform simply because others have already found
success in it. Competition makes the world spin, and in the grand scheme of
things, we're only just beginning.

~~~
im3w1l
I think when you make the world's first couch-surfing app you can plausibly
tell your self that you are changing the world. The world goes from not having
couch-surfing apps to having one.

Creating a second couch-surfing app with the idea of out-marketing the first
doesn't inspire the same sense of purpose.

~~~
holler
Innovation usually happens in small increments. Uber/Lyft/x/y/z ride hailing
app, airbnb/vrbo/booking, tinder/bumble/match/pof/bagel/hinge/x/y/z dating
app,
friendster/myspace/facebook/twitter/pinterest/imgur/giphy/justin.tv/twitch/reddit/hackernews/discord/beam/dlive/slack/x/y/z
social app, they're all just incremental. I agree it'd be foolish to try and
out-compete or out-spend a goliath, but I'm saying that you can still be
competitive in other ways. Build something people enjoy, start there.

------
hising
Reading the article and trying to think of different startup ideas. Gets a
non-closable (AFAIK) modal that covers the whole screen force you to go back.
Maybe a startup idea that helps entrepreneurs grow without adapting to bad UX
behaviour is a great idea that needs attention

~~~
superqd
yeah, I didn't actually read the entire article because of this.

------
alex-wallish
"Airbnb for Gamers" according to the infographic isn't taken. Any potential
there? Letting people rent out their physical gaming rigs to other people in
the area, in their homes. Seems like it'd be pretty easy to set up.

I could see it be kind of like gaming cafe's in Asia, except you'd be renting
a rig in somebody's actual home. I don't know if there'd be any market for
this, but it seems like it wouldn't take to much to whip up and to a trial run
in a city.

~~~
QuinnWilton
I suspect that, at least in places with decent internet, something like
ShadowPC negates the need for such a service. I rent a top of the line gaming
PC for ~$25/month, and run my games in the cloud.

With what I used to spend keeping a gaming rig upgraded, it doesn't even make
sense not to rent something that's always going to be state of the art.

~~~
airstrike
Can't really play FPS or RTS on the cloud, though

EDIT: I'll be damned, according to reddit you can even do CSGO on one of these
beasts. I guess that solves what I'm buying myself for Christmas

~~~
redkoala
I was on an early pilot for Google Stadia and could play Assasin’s Creed
Oddyssey smoothly on a high speed internet connection.

~~~
kkarakk
Odyssey isn't even responsive on a local gaming pc, your character moves like
it's behind 50ms of latency in any case

------
gwbas1c
I started scrolling around, and then an unclosable "subscribe to my
newsletter" blocked the entire page.

WTF???

No, I don't want to subscribe to your newsletter. Furthermore, forcing me to
subscribe to your newsletter just to read a silly post on your website is a
jerk move.

~~~
tonynguyen1
Exactly, that's how I come back here and leave this comment.

~~~
mc3
"[op] is a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, a Silicon Valley venture
capital firm"

It's also an odd move. If you have that level of credential, then you
definitely don't want to be doing that!

------
bananatron
Tinder for bodily fluids is just tinder.

------
lancewiggs
This gives strong flashbacks to the dot com boom and bust. Folks were going
through ISO codes looking for new B2B marketplaces to launch.

Start with an end user need.

------
treblig
[http://itsthisforthat.com](http://itsthisforthat.com) (2010)

:)

------
paultopia
tinder for weed. somebody did tinder for weed. that's got to be the most young
californian thing ever.

~~~
mordechai9000
I had an idea kind of similar to that. Call it Herb Grind(e)r. I don't use
weed myself, and I'm married, so I don't know how much need there is.

I actually think something more like Meetup for weed users would be kind of
cool, though. Find fun activities to do with herb friendly people.(Disc golf,
anyone?)

------
theandrewbailey
This idea needs to be incorporated into
[https://thisstartupdoesnotexist.com/](https://thisstartupdoesnotexist.com/)

------
cbanek
Tinder for laundry seems like good, clean fun.

------
luizb
F annoying pop-over after X seconds. I will _not_ give you my email.

------
ijidak
It would be neat to see a more in-depth analysis on the success of these X for
Y startups vs non.

A big reason for X for Y, besides simplicity of explanation is...

X is usually a novel NEW process -- or way of doing things -- that either
became only recently possible , or was recently demonstrated as successful.

Suddenly it becomes clear that this NOVEL new process can be applied in other
areas.

Uber and AirBnB opened up efficient sharing of expensive resources that were
underutilized prior.

Now, the natural next step is:

"What other expensive resources are underutilized?"

Boats? Commercial retail or wharehouse space? Tractors and heavy equipment?

So, in the early stages of rolling out a newly realized novel process, it
seems impossible that the process should not expand to a number of similar
problems.

Until the low hanging fruit is all gathered.

Uber for Y, for example, seems to be only in its VERY EARLY stages.

No doubt there are MANY Y's out there to roll out the Uber model to.

------
neonate
[http://archive.is/7q806](http://archive.is/7q806)

------
sk84life
I am always questioning why startup idea have to be unique ? Let's say you
sell "books" we all know who's biggest.. but they idea was not definitely not
unique.

My opinion service quality for customer matters more than uniqueness..

------
Jun8
I think the reason this sort of thinking works is that it's an effective way
to perform exhaustive search in idea space where metrics may be hard to
define, based on combinatorics. A very early example of such an approach was
Ramon Llull's _Ars Magna_
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramon_Llull#Llull's_Art_(Ars_M...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramon_Llull#Llull's_Art_\(Ars_Magna\))).

------
mokarma
Airbnb for bathrooms, you can use it to allow desperate strangers to pay you
to use your toilet. Preferably while you're not home. We'll call it Airpnp.

~~~
symplee
AirPnD

------
magashna
20000 startup ideas -
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21112345](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21112345)

Seems people found this pretty funny when it was posted

>> Document software defects, using hand and horn signals.

~~~
icebraining
Those "ideas" are just occupations, as categorized by the US federal
government, called "Standard Occupational Classification System".

------
ethanpil
I'm looking forward to seeing the first startup in the Uber for Beards space.

------
goldenegg
My startup business - GoldenEgg

[https://www.thegoldenegg.in/services/address-
change/](https://www.thegoldenegg.in/services/address-change/)

------
LoSboccacc
the list is questionable. I was very hopeful to see if there was a tinder for
gamers (say, to find people to play coop games) but there's some sort of
tinder inspired incremental game in that spot, so I wonder how much is it
really curated and how much is a proxy to a Google 'feeling lucky' search

------
JoeCianflone
Can we all just please agree that Tinder for Kids should not exist? Please?

------
haolez
Uber for underwear? I’m having trouble imagining some of those open spots.

------
thorwasdfasdf
this post was obviously just satire. but, just so we're clear, Paul graham's
article on this concept unequivocally says this is NOT how you build a start
up.

------
SmelyMonkyFart
It's not about is it taken it's who can do it better

------
polynomial
"Plaid for Bitcoin"

------
dheera
Besides the "X for Y" approach, I find it laughable that every time someone
says they are doing just "X" that the usual Bay Area response is "How are you
differentiating from your competitors?"

Go ask how UPS differentiates themselves from FedEx. Or how Shell
differentiates themselves from Chevron. In reality, while product
differentiation is good, unless there already exists a monopoly that has eaten
every inch of the market, the market is probably big enough to fit multiple
nearly identical products at the same time and still have them all profitable.

~~~
tootie
How Lyft differentiates from Uber might be more on the nose.

~~~
cortesoft
When Lyft first started, there was no set price for rides... you would pay
what you wanted. It was very strange, I didn't like it.

~~~
ghaff
I only started using Lyft when they transformed themselves into a clone of
Uber. (Not that I use either all that much.) I found the whole fist-bump, pink
mustache, weird pricing, etc. completely off-putting.

------
jonfw
I searched a startup name in a seperate tab, came back and had an inescapable
subscribe screen.

If your going to attempt to hold the rest of the article hostage pending a
subscription to your newsletter, at least let me get interested first. This is
both hostile and ineffective- and unsurprisingly is the most amusing part of
the website

~~~
sp332
Firefox is working on a JS popup blocker. They're collecting data now, use
[https://github.com/ehsan/popup-reporter](https://github.com/ehsan/popup-
reporter) to report sites.

~~~
musicale
Yes!! It's time for browsers/users to fight back against this madness.

We all blocked pop-ups for a reason: they are obnoxious interruptions that
interfere with web browsing.

Unfortunately site designers learned the wrong lesson from, thinking "oh, I
guess that means we need to come up with a sneakier way of forcing obnoxious
pop-ups on users that don't want them."

------
malodyets
Is anyone else offended by the non-dismissable email signup pop-over on this
page? Ctrl/Cmd-R refresh allows continuing to read from the same point, but
still....

~~~
mrbuttons454
I came to the comments looking for this, and was surprised it was so far down.
They are just asking for garbage input...

------
jtth
the popup modal for the newsletter is undismissible and blocks the article
completely in the latest safari

------
jrochkind1
popup that keeps me from reading the article unless I give them an email
address when I'm half-way through?

No thanks.

~~~
musicale
That is an extraordinary anti-pattern.

Is there any browser in 2019 that is actually capable of blocking obnoxious
pop-ups? It seems like we're losing the arms race.

Fortunately the best part of the article was "above the fold" so I didn't run
into that monstrosity.

