
Bread and Circuses: The State of Web App Startups - jayliew
http://jolieodell.wordpress.com/2010/10/07/bread-and-circuses-the-state-of-web-app-startups/
======
dasil003
Reading this resonated with me. I knew that the responses here would pretty
much rip it apart, but I'm surprised that as of right now only _one_ of 15
comments is positive.

It's pretty easy to find ways to criticize this post. It's not particularly
well written, it's not inspirational, and of course you can poke holes in any
kind of argument this vague. But if you don't agree, I think it's worth it to
stop and be honest with yourself about whether you really think it's complete
bullshit, or if there is maybe a tinge of guilty defensiveness mixed in.

I'm not claiming that this article is anything close to the whole truth—after
all, we can't make a difference if we can't make a living—but if there wasn't
at least a seed of truth here then I don't think "changing the world" would be
part of the standard entrepreneurial goals.

~~~
david927
I think this is a great criticism of Silicon Valley, in general. It used to be
filled with nerds who wanted to change the world. Now it's filled with hackers
who want to get rich.

Let me quote the author again:

 _They’re creating "bread and circuses" ... apps that are wildly popular,
infinitely entertaining, and exactly what people want._

 _The only problem is that they don’t really do anybody any good. They’re not
doing what technology is intended to do: Solve problems._

I'm ringing the bell on Silicon Valley. It's days are not up, but they're
numbered. Because it doesn't understand this, it will begin its slow descent
to become part of Hollywood. And real innovation will happen elsewhere.

~~~
MarkSweep
Was silicon valley really originally about changing the world? It is my
understanding that the customers for integrated circuits during the 70s and
earlier were primarily the military and large corporations. While delvoping
technology for those sort of companies may be more "real", it hardly seems
like that sort of work would be any less profit-driven.

Also I would guess that the prominence of silly start-ups that are based on
"game mechanics, addiction, self-reference, and narcissism" is made to appear
larger because these sorts of companies need large numbers of people to be
aware of them. Start-ups that create products that are not used by the general
public probably will not seek publicity and thus you are less likely to read
about them on tech crunch.

I have interned at three start-ups over the last 4 years and none of them have
ever been mentioned on Techcrunch, despite one of them being involved in some
serious M&A action. But why would they be, since readers probably are not
hugely interesting in moving silicon wafers around a fab and companies are
unlikely to find customers for their protein analysis hardware.

So before you lament that lack of "real" start-ups, consider the possibility
that you just are not hearing about them.

------
replicatorblog
I didn't find the reasoning in this article very sound and the heated "high
school angst" quotes hurt its credibility. e.g.

"These products feed and profit from our bovine adoration of mindless time-
wasting."

That said, to address her point, I don't understand why tech start ups would
be the answer to everything, especially a complex problem like homelessness.
Homelessness isn't going to be solved by some RoR hacker creating a website
that matches the homeless with available space. Rather it is the challenge for
social workers, mental health practitioners, etc.

The same with education, the problem with inner city education isn't
technical, its that vast swaths of the population do not respect education. My
wife taught in an inner city, had amazing technical resources thanks to grants
and well meaning donors, but had parents who were totally checked out.

Furthermore, because some people use tech in a frivolous way doesn't mean
there aren't noble uses. e.g.

Foursquare - Learn about resources in my town and places I visit I wouldn't
have otherwise. Lets me provide info about areas I know well to those who
don't. Makes my consumption choices visible and potentially incites me to make
better decisions for the community and my health.

Groupon - Helps support local merchants who have difficult challenges
marketing against national chains. Reduces risks for customers to try new
things.

Twitter - connects me to people and bodies of knowledge that would otherwise
be hard to tap. Lets me connect job seekers with job holders.

Zynga games - Creates a meeting place/activity for friends/family. Sure, at
its worst it has "junkie" characteristics, but used sparingly it gives me a
way to say hi to a friend and keep a little social bonding going.

Commerce isn't bad and tech isn't the solution to every problem.

~~~
timr
_"Homelessness isn't going to be solved by some RoR hacker creating a website
that matches the homeless with available space. Rather it is the challenge for
social workers, mental health practitioners, etc."_

I think you're missing the larger point: when the best and the brightest
technological minds are chasing the instant riches of social networks for
dogs, they're not creating new antibiotics, energy efficient cars, cheap
building materials, or any of a thousand other different things that people
with big brains might be doing to better the world.

People who are smart enough to be writing social networks are more than smart
enough to be doing pharmaceutical research or inventing solar cookers for the
third world. There's just not much of an economic incentive to do it, when
it's easier to sell to the vices of the first world.

That said, I realize that I'm a hypocrite on this point: I'm in this wacky
social-network-hoo-hah business as much as anyone else. I just wish the
economic forces were aligned differently.

~~~
replicatorblog
I work in medical/pharma, an area that some consider "Socially Beneficial".
The reality isn't much different than the consumer web. For instance, hundreds
of millions of dollars are spent on making small improvements to diabetes
monitoring tools. We are talking about chasing minor improvements e.g.
reducing test times by 1s. All those resources could be spent researching a
cure.

Pharma's actions are dictated by the same financial reporting as tech so even
if smart people moved from consumer web to pharma, its not as if we'd end up
with a better world. Maybe just one with thinker, more lustrous
lashes...<http://www.latisse.com/>

I guess my take on the "bigger point" is that the market seems to work. We are
much better off in almost every area of our lives now compared to 50 years
ago. Walmarts goal of keeping their shelves stocked for the "bovine masses"
has led to a revolution in logistics. People who invented cellular phones as
yuppie status symbols have saved millions of lives through better
communication. And a couple guys who made devices to get free calls on pay
phones ignited a computing revolution that has reshaped the world in the most
grand fashion since Gutenberg.

My larger point is that toys have a way of becoming seriously useful and that
socially engineering people to go into "valuable" fields could lead to a glut
of mismanaged resources that don't necessarily yield benefits.

~~~
aamar
Great comment. There are probably many, great, socially beneficial things for
technical-entrepreneurial people to do in healthcare (a field I worked in for
a long time), education, and poverty. But "industry" is the wrong level of
analysis for social benefit -- the analysis has to go to specific problems and
impact.

Ten years ago, one would very frequently come across essays decrying the
alienating nature of the internet, how it dehumanized us and isolated us. They
would argue that online relationships are inveterately shallow but displace
our fraying real-word relationships with friends and family. But: Twitter,
Facebook, Reddit, etc. alongside broadband, wireless, cell-phone cameras, etc.
seem to be doing something very meaningful to reverse the (real, though
possibly exaggerated) problems those essays described. And by correcting these
problems and strengthening the social fabric, we may be indirectly reducing
problems in healthcare, education, and poverty.

Again, the problem with the article is not really misprision of social
networks, the problem is analyzing social impact at a level where Twitter =
Zynga = LinkedIn.

------
davidu
So stop living in a world of bread and circuses. I don't use foursquare
because I get no value. Nor do most people I know. I use Twitter for work,
nothing else. I produce, I do not consume. I am not special. There are lots
more like me.

There is an entire world of startups focused on societal betterment -- some
with the stated goal of just being self-sustaining rather than profit centers.

    
    
      in finance: kiva, prosper, even greendot which is now worth $2b, banksimple, etc. etc.
    
      in energy: bloom, kitegen, blacklight energy, etc. etc.
    

And the list goes on... for a really really long time.

~~~
davidu
And I forgot my other comment to make which is, as someone else before me once
remarked, many startup's problem space early on appears to be a toy or
something of little utility or value, but that is rarely the case in the long-
run. Just look at Facebook!

------
waterlesscloud
This is shallow thinking.

Facebook and the various other social apps do in fact address serious societal
problems and needs.

There's been a trend for several decades of people in modern society growing
further apart. It's been lamented at great length in numerous studies and
publications. It's a natural consequence of the other choices our societies
are making, becoming more mobile in both work and home. People move more than
they did, they change jobs more than they did, and thus they change social
circles more than they did.

Social Networks compensate for all that. They do in fact bring people closer
together than they would be otherwise. Certainly much of the interaction
appears superficial, but if you think that indicates it's meaningless, that's
because you don't understand social interaction. Even casual, seemingly
superficial interactions bring us closer. They help us define our communities.

On Facebook I'm friends with people I haven't seen in 20+ years. Yes, most of
our interactions seem superficial. But they aren't just that, they're tying us
all closer to where we came from. And sometime it's more than that. That
friend of yours from high school struggling with cancer? It means something to
them that 50 people post well wishes weekly. It helps them. It's meaningful.

I lost track of many people in my life, without really meaning to. It's just
how things work. Facebook et al help me correct that. They keep me in touch.
Sure I have my "real-life" friends, but it's also nice to have the extended
group.

I lost track of these people. My 13 year old niece will _never_ lose track of
someone unless she wants to. Think about that. Tell me that's not
transformative.

Shallow thinking.

~~~
acgourley
From the article, "Those relatively comfortable “problems” of modern life have
already been solved to death, beginning with Alexander Bell and ending (sort
of, for now) with Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

Many of the apps we have nowadays — the successful ones, at least — revolve
around game mechanics, addiction, self-reference, and narcissism. Even apps I
use and actually like quite a lot fall into this category."

A more charitable reading would take it to mean that the problem of social
connection is important, but it's been adequately addressed by Facebook, and
/new/ startups shouldn't focus on it.

~~~
waterlesscloud
The most charitable reading I can give it still has it missing the point and
not understanding what it is that's being built up with all these companies.

Facebook, as I've said, restores and maintains social connections. This is
absolutely not a minor thing, it's life-altering. Perhaps it's too early on in
the process to understand that, but 10 or 20 years from now, everyone will get
it when they look at who has been around and what they've shared as
experiences.

Twitter is the global hive-mind. It tracks what everyone in the world is
thinking about, or at least it or its successor will when extends its reach
that far. Yes, most of that is shallow, because most of what most of us think
about is shallow. Duh. That's sort of by definition if you think that through
for five minutes. If we were all deeper, then the norm would be redefined and
we'd all seem shallow again. Twitter succeeds at capturing the hive-mind
specifically because it is so short. Your immediate thoughts are immediate,
they're bite sized. The format matches the format of your thinking. There's
value in knowing what people are thinking, though of course that value will be
applied in different ways.

Foursquare is a few things. One, it's designed as a universal customer loyalty
system on its primary level. I suppose if you think commerce is of necessity
shallow, you can dismiss this as meaningless. Of course, it does give the
small niche businesses a tool to level the playing field, but even that's
probably not enough for some. But what about this- it's also restoring a sense
of place to urban and suburban environments. There's a trackable history of
who was where and when. It's not as disjointed as it was, there's a
throughline. "Oh", you might say, "Bob goes to the same coffee shop I do, but
three hours later". Now you're closer to Bob, and the coffee shop has more
history for you.

Yeah, ok, none of this is curing cancer, but it does matter, it does make a
difference, and it does improve people's lives.

You can tell me it's meaningless, but you're wrong.

~~~
adbachman
> It tracks what everyone in the world is thinking about

I think her point was that it doesn't track what everyone in the world is
thinking about. It tracks what everyone wealthy enough to have the free time
to commit to maintaining their social network presence is thinking about.

> universal customer loyalty system

2.4 billion people (about a quarter of the planet) make less than $1000 year.
Only 500 million people's income exceeds $11,500 a year.
(<http://ucatlas.ucsc.edu/income.php>)

It is extremely significant that the businesses she picks on (not saying it's
fair to call other folks' life's work pointless) focus on creating narrower
and narrower slices of the 500 million. The 90% of the planet (!) that lives
on less than $11000 a year is completely untouched by customer loyalty
programs and social connections apps.

To be clear, I'm not arguing that the businesses you mentioned aren't doing
the things you say they are. My life is richer because of the internet and
specifically social networking. I am arguing, similar to the author, that the
work Silicon Valley seems to be dedicated and that seems to get the most
attention is not solving problems most of the world has.

------
edw519
_Those relatively comfortable "problems" of modern life have already been
solved to death, beginning with Alexander Bell and ending (sort of, for now)
with Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin and Larry Page._

I doubt that you'd get many of the 7 million small and mid-sized businesses in
the United States to agree with this. Many of them have an unquenchable thirst
for information: more, better, faster, in order to survive. Thousands of
developers (and start-ups!) are working furiously to provide it to them. In
fact, they're so busy that they don't have much time to tell you what they're
doing.

Which may be why OP doesn't realize they exist.

~~~
peterbessman
Really, the OP is complaining that she thinks people want the wrong things.
There's nothing here particular to web apps.

------
Empact
Alright, a few of the top comments point out the good of the Foursquares and
Facebooks of the world.

Except, that's not the point - on anything beyond the personal scale the
question is not, "which of these two do we want?" but "how much of each do we
want?" She asks: "How well are our resources allocated?"

I think there's a strong case that we're under-invested in some of the largest
problems of society - personally I'm working towards reforming government
<http://votereports.org/>, and I can tell you the government directly spends
some 40% of the GDP, and indirectly affects every other bit of it. Do we have
anything close to 40% of developers working on disrupting our stodgy old
government? How about 5%? 1%? I know of 3 good folks I work alongside
(including these folks: <http://circlevoting.com/>), and a handful of other
part-time, side-job efforts. But is that a proper reflection of the relative
return of the problem, when compared to hundreds of facebookers or dozens
elsewhere?

Health care is 17% of GDP. What are the big, disruptive health care startups?
Who is going to build the tool that enables doctors and patients to circumvent
the worst of the system? Or something that serves the economic purpose of
insurance while avoiding the onerous regulations thereof? I've had the
pleasure to meet with Jay Parkinson of <http://thefuturewell.com>, and I'll
bet he could put the 30-some foursquare developers to better use.

Again, this isn't an either/or question, but a question of resource
allocation.

Perhaps what we've done so far has made sense because those are the easy
questions to answer - the money is there and the consumers are willing. But
sooner or later we're going to have to recognize that the biggest problems of
society deserve more of our attention.

~~~
daeken
I also have to ask: Where are all the education startups? We have a massive,
high-speed communication tool and I don't see much changing with respect to
education. There are a few things out there (the Khan Academies of the world),
but they're _very_ few and far between.

~~~
jlees
Especially given pg's comments on education in 'Hackers and Painters' (which I
just finally read). Yeah. Why on earth aren't we solving this? It's because
it's not just hard (as in hard math, or hard code, or hard sell) but it's
actually very hard work, and while people like to be remembered as the
billionaire who invented something, they don't care so much for being the
philanthropic [mo/fa]ther of today's educational system.

I think Jolie's right, to some extent -- we are selfish, and the demands of
selfish people make us think we are creating things of value. It's easier to
create something for pleasure and gratification or to solve an obvious problem
than to entirely overhaul a nationwide, endemic problem with hundred year old
roots, red tape up the wazoo and a severe shortage of cash.

------
tgriesser
It really depends on whether you look at the startup as the means or the end.
For example, while the creation of Microsoft did not directly fix the problem
of healthcare or hunger, it allowed for Bill Gates to create his foundation,
and thus indirectly created a ton of good for the world.

Same goes for Facebook, yes of course keeping up with your friends has no
_direct_ impact on real issues, but the fact that 110m went to public schools
in an area that really needs it - that is a pretty big impact.

The same goes for any other person who creates wealth from web startups or any
business in general - I don't think that web startups themselves are going to
do much directly but when you take the knowledge and potential wealth that you
acquire in the process and put it toward a good cause, that is one way that
you can fix a _social or human problem with your app_ as the author
challenges.

Just my take on it.

~~~
alex1
In some ways, Facebook _does_ have a direct impact on real issues. It is much
easier now for non-profits to get their message out to people, through
Facebook. Applications like Causes makes it easier for organizations that _do_
have an impact on real issues to collect donations from Facebook users.

~~~
tgriesser
Agreed, I actually think all of them have direct impacts, it seems however the
author is implying that if the app is not built specifically for the means of
doing something altruistic it is in some way greedy or frivolous or something.

I'm arguing that the applications doesn't have to be directly focused on a
particular issue, and it still has legitimate uses as you pointed out, and
make real world changes that are on the scale that the author thinks that
technology apparently should be used for.

------
ryan
I find it really difficult to read such an argument (whether I agree with it
or not), if it doesn't come from someone who is actually out there trying to
solve these problems himself or herself.

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong
man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The
credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred
by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short
again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but
who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the
great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows
in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails,
at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with
those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_in_the_Arena>

Edit: at least the gladiator image in the post is apt :)

~~~
marshallp
So you're saying OP isn't allowed to point out that the emperor wears no
clothes, or that roger ebert is useless.

~~~
ryan
Maybe if she was pointing out facts, but this strikes me as an opinion piece
and I have a hard time reading this particular opinion unless the author is
actually practicing what she preaches.

FWIW I tend to agree with the opinion.

I don't know who roger ebert is so I can't comment on whether he is useless,
but I guess he has no relevance to me.

~~~
marshallp
roger ebert - the most famous and celebrated movie critic in america - he's
never made a movie, but writes opinions about movies all day long and is still
highly respected

------
chegra
Stage 1: Create a massively successful app.

Stage 2: Give back

at Stage 1.5: Jolie complains that we aren't doing stage 2.

Well for most of us we aren't at stage 2. Didn't Zuckberg who has just finish
stage 1 give 100 million to education? Didn't Bill Gates, another stage 1
success, get 40 billionaires to give away most of their wealth to charity?

The question arises why don't start at stage 2 first. Well, sequence matter.
Think of stage 1 as taking off your clothes and stage 2 as bathing. You do
stage 2 first you end up without your skin being washed and wet clothes.

So far there isn't much technology that has been successful in those areas
Jolie think start-up should focus, but with the apps you criticize, they have
been making loads of money. In terms of risk, it is better to choose the
latter type of business and then seek to help solve the other problems with
the money generating from the first, same outcome but lower risk.

As Jay-z would say:

"And the music i be makin

I dumb down for my audience

And double my dollars

They criticize me for it

Yet they all yell "Holla"

If skills sold

Truth be told

I'd probably be

Lyricly

Talib Kweli

Truthfully

I wanna rhyme like Common Sense

(But i did five Mil)

I ain't been rhymin like Common since

When your sense got that much in common

And you been hustlin since

Your inception

Fuck perception

Go with what makes sense

Since

I know what i'm up against

We as rappers must decide what's most impor-tant

And i can't help the poor if i'm one of them

So i got rich and gave back

To me that's the win, win"- Moment of Clarity

Paraphrase, if solving homeless problem made money that is what entrepreneurs
would be doing, but since it is not they choose problems with lil significant
and give back that is the win,win. They are still changing the world but in a
different sequence that reduces risk and ensures changing the world is more
likely.

~~~
trustfundbaby
Had to upvote for the Jay-Z lyrics son!

------
gamble
I've worked for healthcare and education startups. These are very, very hard
markets for a startup to tackle. They combine the slow, expensive sales cycle
of a large business with the regulation and bureaucracy of essential
government services. It's a long, hard slog that most investors won't touch
with a ten-foot pole.

Programmers start companies that solve their own problems because they
understand those problems. Few programmers understand the problems in health
care or education, and it's not a market to screw around in when you don't
know what you're doing.

~~~
marshallp
Write the software and sell/rent it on to businessfolk who can navigate the
regulatory hurdles.

------
Bostwick
I think my main problem with the article is that the three big, meaningful
problems it presents are so vague as to be virtually unsolvable.

Let's use facebook as an example. Here's a problem: The internet and modern
society drives people apart and increases isolation. Facebook's effect has
been to greatly decrease this problem, but it's not the problem that Facebook
set out to solve. The web app that Zuckerman copied and extended was designed
as catalog of who was in a dormitory (house) at Harvard. It just so happened
that adding on messaging features and massively scaling this over time created
a startup that also helps solve a larger social problem.

The problems the author presents as "real" problems are so ill-defined that it
is impossible for technology startups to solve them. But, for people who
actually work in those areas, I'm sure there exist problems web-apps could
solve.

Here's an example: the problem of "Many Americans can't afford medical care."
The cause of the high cost of health care is complex, relating to R&D at
pharmaceutical companies, patent law, government regulations, and market
incentives. Programming won't solve that. However, a problem that programmers
_can_ solve is "electronic medical records suck." To that end, there are
programmers working on that, and, hopefully, their work will uncover smaller
problems also solvable.

I see large, ill-defined problems like this as a bit like the beginning of a
recursive problem. The big problem needs to be broken down into a large series
of smaller problems, some of which we, as programmers and entrepreneurs, may
be able to solve. The hard part is knowing how to break the large problem into
smaller ones, and the acknowledging the efforts of those people working on the
smaller problems.

------
callmeed
"Many Americans can’t afford a decent education"

Baloney. I worked in the CA community college system. It's $26 per unit.
TWENTY SIX dollars. Oh, and if you're poor, it's nothing.

A college education is accessible to just about everyone in the US who _wants
it_.

~~~
apsurd
We have this problem that Universities are _GREAT_ at marketing.

Jane doesn't want to go to some stooooopid lowly community college, she wants
to go to USC because ahem, it's better!

~~~
jayliew
You take as many classes as you can at community college then you transfer to
a real university and technically graduate from there. Massive $avings.

------
jeromec
_Here’s a problem: Many Americans can’t afford medical care._

Er, not sure where the author has been since the November 2008 election, but
President Barack Obama made tackling this decades long problem a signature
issue of his presidency, and actually got the problem addressed
comprehensively. Sure, there is still work to do, but health care which makes
up 1/3 of the economy was never going to be solved by programmers building web
apps. And there _are_ projects pushing technology forward in this area to
increase efficiency.

 _Here’s another problem: Many Americans can’t afford a decent education, and
many parts of our public school system suck._

There are technology projects working on improving this, both within the
school system and in the tech arena.

 _Here’s another, even more pressing problem: Many Americans are homeless.
Many can’t afford to eat._

I'm not sure how technology might solve homelessness, but there are actual
real world answers like food banks and soup kitchens to address the hunger
issue. The homeless experiment posted on Nev Blog shows how relatively easy it
is for _real_ homeless people (not those that panhandle, then jump into sports
cars, or those with addictive habits to feed) to acquire food.
(<http://www.nevblog.com/homeless-experiment/>)

The author reflects on some problems in America -- where even the poor are
really not that poor by the standards of many other nations -- and seeks
solutions in technology because technology is good at solving certain kinds of
problems, especially ones mechanical in nature. This doesn't mean it can solve
any kind of problem. Large, longstanding, complex socio-economic problems
can't be solved by Twitter type applications. The kinds of problems of which
the author speaks require a combination of educated people, politics, and
economic focuses for making any real difference. Technology may certainly
help, but it's not the sole answer.

~~~
PStamatiou
Just wanted to say thanks for the link to nev's homeless experiment. I rather
enjoyed reading it (and keeping my mind off getting my wisdom teeth pulled in
the AM)

~~~
jeromec
I enjoyed reading it too. For the wisdom teeth extraction, when not going to
sleep, a trick I used was trying to recall the details of the more positive
points of stories I'd read to keep the mind busy and happy. It helped me, at
least. :)

------
abcxyz
Those who has the ability to program has a moral obligation to drop everything
to help the homeless? Classic slave morality, cliched moral self
righteousness.

"Getting together with your friends? Not a problem. Staying in touch with
people you care about? Not a problem. Trying to find information about
businesses and products? Not really much of a fucking problem." -- and 640K is
enough for everyone, right? It's pure arrogance to think that just because you
don't use something it's valueless. LinkedIn is _incredibly_ useful for me.

If you save each of your users a minute everyday and you have 10 M users,
you'll save 6944 man-years per year. That's more than the life-time economic
output of 70 people. The point is, incremental improvements matter. A 0.01%
improvement over millions of people add up. So go for the 0.01% improvement --
you _are_ changing the world.

------
yummyfajitas
I find it rather ironic that many of the problems she claims the rest of the
world should address aren't even real problems at all.

Her problems: _Many Americans can’t afford medical care....many parts of our
public school system suck...._

The real problems: Many Americans are unhealthy, many Americans lack the
skills necessary to get a job. When you prematurely narrow the problem, you
can't identify all solutions.

Jolie's premature narrowing of the problem makes it impossible to think of
some solutions. If you think the problem is affordability of health care,
you'll never think of a healthier lifestyle. If you think the problem is that
public schools suck, you'll never think of scrapping them and replacing them
with some alternative.

~~~
kjksf
High cost of medical care is an orthogonal problem to a healthiness level of
Americans. Even if Americans were the most healthy nation in the world,
medical care and health care insurance would still be expensive.

As to the school example: if dissatisfaction with schools system won't lead to
improvement or replacement, then what will? Certainly not satisfaction.

I don't see anything ironic in that post. Both the high cost of health care
and (objectively measured) low quality of school system are real problems that
affect almost all americans. The fact that there are other problems that
affect them as well doesn't make them any less problematic.

~~~
yummyfajitas
To show that high cost of health care is not a problem, consider the following
thought experiment: if you never visited the doctor but were healthy, would
you be unhappy? Similarly, if we had no school system, but every person
developed useful skills, would we be worse off?

Premature narrowing of the problem also leads you to solutions that might be
counterproductive. For example, to reduce the cost of health care (or at least
prevent further increases), we could deliberately stifle innovation. This
would reduce costs because instead of spending $250,000/person on the (to be
invented) Alzheimers cure, we just spend $10k/year warehousing them and
waiting for them to die.

This is a partial solution to the _stated_ problem of high costs. It isn't a
solution to the real problem of poor health.

------
DanielBMarkham
I ran into a great quote the other day, "Civilization advances by extending
the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking of
them." I'm going to start keeping this in mind with every one of my technology
interactions.

Two days before that, I spent probably 20 minutes of my day playing around
with a flash gravity simulator somebody posted over here.

Why? Am I to be in charge of hand-manipulating the orbital mechanics for
dozens of bodies any time soon? Probably not. _Because the interface has
become the app_.

It's not about value any more, it's about stickiness. Tens of millions of
folks spend hours on Farmville each day. Is this because they are just
technically inept people who would be wasting their time doing something else
anyway? I know this is what some folks would like to believe -- it makes them
feel better about making more of the same stuff. But I don't buy it. Even if
it were true for 90% of Farmville players, that still leaves 10% of the
remaining users who would have done something that had more long-term value to
them. Taking self-perceived long-term value away from millions of folks for
days or weeks should be at least very noteworthy.

Many web startups have found the magic equation: stickiness beats value.
Expect to see more of the same.

------
patrickgzill
I fail to see how overly bureaucratic paper-pushing and stiflingly ridiculous
licensing and regulatory frameworks (which are the REAL reasons that medical
care is the problem) can be solved by technology.

That is, it is not a technology problem, it is a problem of regulatory
capture.

~~~
replicatorblog
I work in medical and regulatory compliance isn't that big a burden. The
simplest way to reduce health care costs in the US would be reducing obesity
which tends to cause the most expensive diseases (Diabetes, Heart Disease,
Stroke).

~~~
patrickgzill
No offense, but I find that a little hard to believe. Every doctor's office I
have ever visited in the last 10 years had more admin staff than nurses and
doctors.

That is, for each doctor there were perhaps 1.5 admin people doing paperwork.
While they are cheaper than doctors, that is a still a large expense (figure
$60K per person as a minimum, thus $90K per doctor per year in additional
expense).

However I do agree that obesity is a problem in the US.

~~~
Empact
Yeah, but I'd argue the solution isn't to nice up the regulatory system, but
to step outside of it. Clinics like Qliance in Seattle provide direct primary
care (cash only, no insurance) largely because it's much nicer for both the
doctor and the patient, because you can circumvent the bureaucratic nonsense
and admin busywork.

<http://qliance.com/>

The founder, Dr. Garrison Bliss, does a great job summarizing his approach in
this talk:
[http://www.tvw.org/media/mediaplayer.cfm?EvId=2008030136C...](http://www.tvw.org/media/mediaplayer.cfm?EvId=2008030136C&bhcp=1)

------
csomar
I think the article is not attacking Facebook or Twitter. It's attacking the
infinite clones of them. I'll give you a problem: There isn't a PHP Qr Code
decoder in the web.

Why hadn't anyone gave a damn about it? Because it's hard, take time and you
simply don't know how to start and how to monetize.

I'll give you another problem: Google don't happen to give the best search
result. You'll (in many cases) get SEO spammed results. Why not re-invent a
new search engine? Sure there are SE startups, but not enough for the solution
to get solved.

~~~
s3graham
I'll bite: why would one want a PHP QR Code decoder?

------
BjornW
I haven't read all comments on this, but I get the feeling a lot of HN-ers are
not too fond of the article.

Personally it struck a chord with me.

In a previous life I worked at a non-profit aimed at doing 'R&D' in a social
context (yes, this is vague and that was just one of the things making me
leave...). Although I've left this organisation disillusioned and a lot more
cynical about non-profits and their methods / goals, I still strive to use my
skills for the betterment of all. Not that I always succeed (I'm by far not a
saint), but I try to give something back. In my case I do this by offering a
lot of my stuff under a open source license or Creative Commons license.
Still, I sometimes wonder if I could/should strive to do more in the real
world with tangible / physical results. Staring at a screen all day long and
hoping my virtual work will lead to some positive results in the 'real' world
and be meaningful for people occasionally makes me feel like I'm fooling
myself. Therefore I think that the gist of Jolie's article hits the nail right
on the head and asks the difficult question (for all of us regardless of
skills or area of expertise): what have you been trying to do not just for the
betterment of yourself, but also for the betterment of other's? Trying to
combine this in your work is something I belief is worth striving for, even if
we cannot always achieve it.

------
brownleej
I have a serious problem with the logical connection between these two
statements:

    
    
       They’re not doing what technology is intended to do: Solve problems.
    

and:

    
    
       But by and large, these apps do not exist to solve problems. They exist and thrive because they feed our individual vanity.
    

In the first statement, she is saying that these technologies _do not do_ what
technology should do. In the second, she says that their _intention_ is not to
do what technology should do. I think that the latter is more the point of the
article, but the former is the more interesting question. Great scientific
discoveries can be produced by accident. If a process regularly produces good
things, we should be hesitant to malign it just because it was not the
intention of those producing the initial technologies. The classic example is
that penicillin was discovered by accident, but there are more. One of the
motivations for the initial development of Unix was the desire to play games.
Computers themselves started out as tools to crack codes and calculate
ballistic trajectories. Technology naturally grows beyond its initial limits,
and given how fresh these technologies are, we should be hesitant to
characterize them as being without meaningful value for society, which I saw
as the author's intent with this article.

~~~
moultano
I might be putting words in the author's mouth, but I think the things he's
talking about are "products" not "technologies." This isn't to say that the
same sort of beneficial serendipity doesn't apply, but it applies less.

------
benreyes
Not everything has to be solving a direct problem, secondary benefits have to
considered.

Let's take Dailybooth (YC Summer 09)which was mentioned in this article.
Whilst the creator may have just created the site because it sounded like a
"fun" idea the value of the website is with the micro community that thrives.

Heck, I'll even go as far as saying Dailybooth has helped to save lives. It's
dedicated users consists of a subsection of society that may be outcasted in
real life. Lets take a teenager who lives in a small town, whom may feel more
accepted in a city but has no similar peers within a small town. Dailybooth
facilitates this teenager to connect and belong to like-minded individuals
people whom they have never met before. Over time real friendships are created
over a shared connection which is the website and community.

I heard of actual stories where a teen attempted to commit suicide due to
being perceived as an outcast. In this case Dailybooth has facilitated
friendships and connections with similar peers which in turn reduces the
feeling of being outcasted in a small town, thus indirectly reducing the
chances of suicide.

There are even a number of Dailybooth users who travel across different
countries to facilitate in real friendships and connections. It allows for
boundaries of prejudice to be broken.

So Dailybooth may not be solving a direct problem. But does it have value in
our society? I would argue is certainly does.

(I have researched extensively into the userbase and mechanics of Dailybooth
and have been involved in it's community)

------
wmeredith
This is utter bullshit. It's the same reasoning that leads people to say that
video games or guns cause violence. Web apps are just tools, you can't out-
code human nature, just like you can't legislate morality. It doesn't work.

For example: Twitter is a powerful platform for sharing information. This
could be leveraged for dissent or education, and it is in some ways. However,
most people just follow Justin Bieber and Lada Gaga. "Bieber Fever" allegedly
consumes about 3% of Twitter's entire infrastructure. (Source:
<http://mashable.com/2010/09/07/justin-bieber-twitter/>) Take that stat with
salt, but it's certainly not improbable.

The argument put forth in this post is older than dirt and completely false.
I'll wager a bet that this argument is just slightly older than it's cliché
response, "You can lead a horse to water, bu you can't make it drink."

There are plenty of web apps that are truly kick-ass implementations of "doing
good" (<http://mycharitywater.org> comes to mind), but they aren't going to
ever be as popular as something like Farmville, because of human nature.
Making your "do good" web app kick more ass won't make people want to do more
good.

------
Natsu
Actually, I've been thinking about ways to improve education.

Many of them are already out there for those motivated to seek them. With
MIT's stuff online, you can learn from them for free. A lot of more basic
stuff is also out there if you know how to look for it.

But there are a lot of teachers out there who have their education budgets
spent on crazy toys and scoreboards that don't do the kids a whole lot of
good. Educational software is a mixed bag, though I have fond memories of
Number Munchers. I don't know if that led me to learning as much math as I
did, but it sure didn't hurt.

Right now, a lot of money is wasted on new versions of textbooks. Most of the
underlying material hasn't changed and isn't really going to, except for the
meddling of various government types who want to add or delete things they
disagree with from the curriculum. Most of the publishers have been around for
ages. I have to think there's some opportunity for someone to automate certain
kinds of tests.

For example, simple math tests could more easily be randomized and each
student could have their own set of problems (no more photocopies with kids
cheating off the guy next to them). Word problems can be autogenerated. Stuff
like that.

Unfortunately, most of my knowledge comes second-hand. My mother was a
teacher, but she's dead now, so whatever I know about the problems they face
has probably gotten out of date. But I have a feeling that education money,
especially their tech budgets, getting spent on things that do little good is
something that probably hasn't changed. I have to think that there are still
quite a few things that could be improved.

------
alexqgb
This is such a ridiculously ridiculous post. I'm saying that having worked on
a number of media campaigns for a small but excellent medical research charity
that has benefited enormously from the technical progress made in the last few
years.

That benefit comes from making savvy use of everything from (now) cheap
digital cameras and video editing, to carefully cultivated email lists,
dedicated web-pages for outreach teams, and growing profiles on social
networking sites.

All that seems like basic stuff, I know, but that's what's so amazing. Five
years ago it was either much more expensive, or nonexistent. Today, it's
ubiquitous (Facebook, for example, had 1% of its current base in 2005, and
today I can shoot a better picture with a $5k camera than a $75k camera could
capture back then).

That massive and very sudden shift has allowed organizations to do things
(real, saving lives and avoiding death things) that simply wouldn't be
imaginable - let alone possible just a few years ago, at least not with the
limited resources they had for outreach.

So, Jolie O'Dell, if you want to see homeless people getting help, stop
waiting for 'tech to do it'. Instead, just go out and talk to some homeless
people. You don't need an app for that. Nor, you'll find, do they. And when
you _do_ figure out what's most likely to help, you'll probably be pleasantly
surprised at how helpful all these new resources can be - provided you're
creative enough to use them imaginatively.

Separately - all of you working on this 'pointless' stuff; you're awesome. And
thank you. You're making vital connections. You've helped tremendously. The
world is a better place because of you. Please, by all means, carry on.

------
rubinelli
In my experience, people who ask "why aren't you working on a cure for
cancer?" never had to build a HIPAA-compliant system, much less get something
as harmless as a nutritional supplement approved by the FDA. You can't disrupt
a "serious" field with two college buddies and a few AWS instances.

Anyway, this "bread and circus" discussion reminds me of all the authors --
Tolkien in particular -- who were accused of wasting their talent in escapist
works.

------
Mz
I wrote a long post. It timed out. It's probably a bit ranty anyway. Shorter
version: I got well when doctor's were trying to convince me I should accept a
slow torturous death as my only due in life (I guess so they could feel they
knew something and deserved their high salaries) by eating better food and
routinely buying new clothes (and throwing out the old stuff when it got too
unclean for my needs). I prefer pissing my money away on cheap clothes from
Kmart and affordable, decent food from various eateries to pissing my life
away on doctors and antibiotics (which I had free access to at one time
because I was a military dependent -- and I walked away from that).

This person has no clue what it takes to solve really hard problems.

PS: "Bread and Circus" is a form of Roman wisdom. Quit trying to give it a bad
name. "Idle hands are the devil's workshop" and empty bellies are worse. In
times of crisis, I practice a policy of "bread and circus". Making sure my
sons and I are well fed and have something entertaining to do so we don't go
stir crazy and can mentally focus on something other than our overwhelming
problems has been critical to our track record of success.

------
timinman
Fantastic. Inspiring, and a little bit of a kick in the back-side. There's
nothing wrong with games or social media, but they shouldn't be the only thing
we have to offer.

You've probably seen the Nathan Myhrvold quote: 'the old Silicon Valley was
about solving really hard problems.'

While a Web App Startup may not be able to solve every problem, we can do more
than offer empty self-gratification.

------
zone2
thank you jolie. this has been on my mind for nearly 2 yrs. i'm glad some one
wrote about it.

------
rodh
I've gone a couple of times to Social Innovation camps, here in the UK
(<http://www.sicamp.org/>). For those who don't know, it's a get-together
where hackers gather with social problem experts, such as youth offending
teams (YOTs) and people who work for charities, etc.

It felt good to work on projects like that. Everyone was so excited about
making change. As an example, a few months back I worked on one trying to
reduce youth offending by providing a really usable sms gateway for young
offenders to get in touch with local experts on certain problems.

The problem I've seen, is that it's not always easy to get people to follow up
on them after the excitement of collaborative change has passed. Once people
are working from their desks again, personal success seems to be once again
the key motivator.

I don't know how to solve this.

------
techiferous
Yelp is not fluff. It solves the problem of information asymmetry in the
marketplace.

Since Yelp makes it easier to tell lemons from businesses that shine, it makes
the market more efficient. This means your money goes further. Which means you
have more of it to spend on education, health insurance, etc.

------
bendmorris
So, if a person has a great idea for a web app that might be useful to some
niche group of businesses, they should throw it out and keep thinking about
how to feed the hungry or cure diseases - problems they have no expertise in
and that they are unlikely to ever solve?

Smart people should figure out what they're good at and what they're
interested in, and do that. If you have a good idea that has worth to some
group, you should try to implement it. A good idea is a good idea.

And while we're at it, things like Google and Facebook, in addition to
facilitating wasting time for those with no motivation, can also be used by,
oh I don't know, medical research companies or nonprofits trying to feed the
hungry to get the word out.

------
radu_floricica
> Here’s a problem: Many Americans can’t afford medical care.

> Here’s another problem: Many Americans can’t afford a decent education, and
> many parts of our public school system suck.

> Here’s another, even more pressing problem: Many Americans are homeless.
> Many can’t afford to eat.

I agree with the whole article, but this stuck to me. (except the "American"
part... European here). It's a problem, a big problem waiting to be solved.
And I found I'm itching to give it a shot.

Like somebody else already said in this thread, this kind of problems can
usually be approached only with a ton of money and prior experience - but on
the other hand, there should be much less competition then in writing the next
killer Android app.

------
makeramen
Notable contradiction:

 _Here’s a problem: Many Americans can’t afford medical care.

Here’s another problem: Many Americans can’t afford a decent education, and
many parts of our public school system suck.

Here’s another, even more pressing problem: Many Americans are homeless. Many
can’t afford to eat.

...

I would like to propose that technologists apply their ample skill to solving
the real problems of humanity, not just the perceived problems of their very
privileged social set._

How about we broaden our scope to beyond "Americans," which I believe she
actually means "United States Citizens." Don't forget all the other countries
and continents doing much worse than we are.

------
InclinedPlane
Summary: people have worse problems than you, stop being so self absorbed,
stop hanging out with your friends, stop having fun, join the peace corps and
change the world. Or something.

------
toast76
How any one who writes a blog can consider themselves anything other than
self-serving is beyond me. You can't get any more narcissistic than having
your own blog and prompting people to subscribe to it whilst telling everyone
what movie you're out seeing with the hip crew du jour.

People like entertainment. People like socializing. Whoop dee doo. How is that
any more self-serving than telling the world you're seeing "Waiting for
Superman with the Facebook crew".

------
jasonkester
It occurs to me that my latest project actually gets me off the hook from this
guy.

Problem: People in developing countries have to work for 3rd world wages,
selling products and services to people who really can't afford to buy
anything. Thus, they are doomed to remain poor by western standards.

Solution: Jason's website that lets them teach Spanish online to rich
Americans, and doesn't let them pay themselves less than ten bucks an hour.

Dodged a bullet there!

~~~
swah
OTOH, people in 3rd world countries that have fast internet access and get to
know your startup aren't probably the ones interested in teaching spanish to
americans. I know I won't.

~~~
jasonkester
The nice thing about the 3rd world is that fast internet is _everywhere_. And
it's cheap. Like cheap enough that the locals in the most remote little
villages can afford to spend hours online every day.

~~~
swah
Talking about my country: Brazil. Most people that know english well probably
have fast internet, but no way its everywhere. Lan houses are pretty common
here, and many lower income people still use those as they only access to
computers and internet.

------
mmmmax
I wonder how many addictive, self-referencial and narcissistic tweets it took
for the author to convince 16,402 people to follow her on Twitter.

------
jamesaguilar
I understand the feeling, it's one articulated by people around the world
every day. But look at the commonalities between the things she mentions as
real problems. What is the shared thread? They're all about people who can't
afford certain things. There are some businesses built on serving these
markets, but they aren't typically internet technology businesses.

------
agentultra
_And in the meantime, ask yourself, “Does my work as a technologist really
help people? Am I solving a real problem, or am I chasing personal success?”
If you don’t like the answer, change something about what you do or how you do
it._

Tall order.

Also, can personal success not align with more humanitarian goals?

------
mr_twj
This only confirms my conviction that solipsism syndrome should be studied
more closely in relation to the internet:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism_syndrome>

Edit (corollary): therefore Farmville is actually healthy.

------
jasonwilk
Just re-read this (8 Best Questions We Got While Fund raising):
[http://techcrunch.com/2009/11/18/good-question-the-eight-
bes...](http://techcrunch.com/2009/11/18/good-question-the-eight-best-
questions-we-got-while-raising-venture-capital/)

------
preichen
you missed the point completely.your focus is too narrow. there are vast
quantities of people on this planet who are working to solve the "real"
problems that you mention. your argument does not hold because you are only
talking about the base of the maslow hierarchy of needs. OF COURSE there are
people whose most basic needs are not solved yet on this planet. You are only
argumenting for the lowest levels of the pyramid! Once someone has covered his
basic needs and moves up the pyramid "other" types of problems emerge like
"how do i watch my favorite tv show on my mobile phone" etc. you have to
segment your argument and make it very clear that you are addressing the lower
levels of the pyramid.

------
srwh
We need more articles like this one or Max Klein's Dark Angels, the web
startup world is like being at Disneyland the whole year!

After reading the article only hope nobody came with a social network for
homeless...

------
resdirector
I think Don Draper's "wheel" pitch nicely summarizes my counterpoints to this
article:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2bLNkCqpuY>

------
d99kris
It would be interesting to see more startups in the genetic programming area
(or related). Once/if reaching singularity I'm sure there's gonna be more than
bread and circuses.

------
tomjen3
With what right do you presume to tell people what problems they have? Surely
that would be the choice of the individual free person?

------
megamark16
And I was getting down on myself lately because I hardly ever hit Twitter
anymore. How will all my tens of followers remember who I am and what projects
I'm working on if I don't tweet about them twice a day? I guess I shouldn't
feel to bad, Twitter really isn't doing me much good, at least not as much as
just sitting down and focusing on knocking out new functionality for my
customers. there'll be time to talk about what I'm doing later...

------
misuba
If there were money in solving real problems, there wouldn't be any real
problems!

------
marknutter
Suppose we solved all these "real problems." What then? We're done? No more
startups or apps?

------
earl
Similar thoughts come to me from time to time, mostly when I realize I spend
50-60 hours a week making advertising more efficient. Still... there are
upsides. I left a career as a scientific programmer creating medical research
software because selling out offered me a 90% raise. That's not an
exaggeration. And a chance to work for companies that offer enough equity that
it might change my life, even if it's just a hefty downpayment. And the chance
to work in my choice of cities on America's coasts.

------
sovande
A classic mistake; The parish pump generalizing.

~~~
sovande
I see I get down-voted on this. I agree. It was presumptuous of me to suggest
that the blog post author maybe should look beyond her henhouse. Of course her
generalization of web-app's and observation of lack of world changing startups
is correct.

