

Ask HN: What's my next move? - jdrobins2000

As a SV/startup outsider, I would really appreciate any help the benevolent members of HN care to offer in figuring out the best next steps in pursuing my goal.<p>I have an idea for a social media app that will help people explore truth together more effectively, which I've been brewing for about 10 years. I have an initial demo now, but there is much more to do. I have thought through many many design issues, so it is not simply a general idea but many specific ones combined.<p>Ideally I would like to work on that app, or a product that fulfills the same goals. It doesn't have to be my own company, but I would like to be able to influence the product direction if I have something useful to add. I would also like to maintain a high level of user focus and intellectual integrity, not sacrificing these just to eek out a little more profit.<p>I applied to YC and wasn't accepted, so now I am trying to figure out my next move. I could:<p>1. Apply to Launchpad LA and other YC alternatives<p>2. Try to get VC funding<p>3. Find a company doing something similar and try to get a job there (Obvious Corp may be doing something similar, but I can't even find contact info, much less get hired. But they seem like great people.)<p>4. Take a job building something else, try to establish credibility in the SV community, and look for future opportunities. Along with this, I could also work on my project on the side, and possibly try to launch small and grow organically.<p>As my idea is novel but possibly unpatentable, I am uneasy about sharing all the details. How much detail must be typically shared to secure funding or incubator acceptance, especially without inside connections?<p>Those of you who made it this far, you are very generous. Thank you in advance for your thoughts, they are much appreciated.
======
gexla
A lot of those options rely on circumstances not entirely within your control.
You can't force anyone to give you a job, you can't force your employer to
give you time / resources to work on your idea and you can't force anyone to
give you funding. If you do happen to achieve any of the above (except for
funding,) then you can't be sure that you will have enough influence for the
idea to remain your own. There is a lot of potential for wasted time and
headaches here.

Why not bootstrap? SV is insanely expensive and your progress will be slow
working on this thing during your down time. Can you do freelance work? If so,
one crazy idea would be to banish yourself for six months or so to a super
cheap area of the world, do freelancing part time and then spend the rest of
the time furthering your app. There are lots of places in the world where you
can live for as low as $600 / month, internet included! If you can do some
freelance work for even $50 / hour then you could truly be living a 4 hour
work week! At the same time, you get to experience another part of the world.
Perhaps you could even pick up some cheap developers there to help you out
with certain parts of it.

Do you have any users yet? Would it be possible to build out a community
before you even get the app to a point where it's usable? You may get more
interest in funding if you could demonstrate some traction. I'm pretty sure
investors are more interested in their ROI as opposed to throwing money at
cool ideas. Would this be a wise investment? ;) If not, then that's probably
the component you need to be working on.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thank you very much! To your first paragraph, YES!!! :) There is a tremendous
amount that is out of my control, which is not my favorite situation to be in,
but sometimes it's the only way. I believe my idea is very big, and for
reasons stated, I am concerned I need to go big out of the gate. I may be
underestimating my capabilities, but I'm not confident two people (my partner
and I) can pull that off. And anyway, eventually I will want to work with
others, so it's either find good people now or find them later.

I ironically have recently, in a roundabout way, already done the live
someplace cheap thing (very complicated to explain, though amusing, but I'll
save that for another time). It didn't go well. Suffice it to say, I have a
wife and son, and have found out my wife does not adapt to big changes well,
so I don't want to move around frivolously.

I had bootstrapped using savings, and again it's complicated, but I am running
out of runway. I'll need to feel really good about my plan to spend much
longer without a job, funding, or mentorship. Maybe I could start small and
grow, but I'm just not sure how long it would be take to grow revenues to
cover my living expenses. SoCal is decided not a cheap place to live. :) Doing
some freelance work is definitely a potential option and would buy me some
time. I had considered that, but for some reason it fell off my radar, so
thanks for the reminder.

My only user now is myself, though I have shown a few others. Perhaps I should
get a MVP out and see what kind of traction it gets? I may be overly concerned
about someone copying my idea and scaling it up faster, but only because I
don't have a strong argument to counter the concern. Can you explain why I
should not be afraid of that?

I guess that's the thing. I'd like to at least be able to know and choose the
entities I am deciding to trust. By putting it out there for anyone to see,
what stops someone from just ripping it off?

Is this a wise investment? I believe it is, for the right investor who can
afford the risk, but I understand the onus is on me to convince would be
investors. It's certainly costing me quite a bit to work on it, but then again
my motivation is more humanitarian than financial. I was hoping to at least
get an interview with YC and get some feedback from some people with major
experience under their belt, either "yeah that could fly" and then we'd get to
it, or "never going to work because of X and Y". But, I didn't get an
interview, so I got approximately zero feedback. I'd prefer to have a tech-
savvy investor/partner who would really be able to see potentially fatal
flaws, than a non-savvy investor who might invest without realizing those
flaws.

~~~
MortenK
Build a basic version and see what traction / feedback you get. Don't be
afraid of people ripping it off, it doesn't happen. Everybody capable of
ripping off your idea will have plenty of their own, that they'd rather
pursue. The people I know, who talk about their great ideas but are vague with
details (because it's so groundbreaking that everybody would steal the idea if
they could), are the same folks who never actually get anything done. Don't be
that guy. Get it out there, discuss it with as many people you can and get
valuable feedback. By holding back of fear of your idea getting stolen you are
not accomplishing anything.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thanks, a very rousing pep talk. I am sure what you are saying is true that
most people worried about having their idea stolen end up doing nothing. I am
trying to figure out how to not be that guy. But I am also trying to figure
out the smartest way to do it.

Maybe the answer is, whatever way gets my feet moving? It's interesting that
no one has had an opinion on how to go about doing it, just that I should stop
worrying and just do it.

Which is exactly what I would expect someone to say who wants to steal my
precious idea... ;)

------
mikecane
>>>I have an idea for a social media app that will help people explore truth
together more effectively

I don't even know what that means to begin with.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Fair criticism, I was too vague. I'd love to just describe the details as is
my typical MO, but I am not convinced yet that is wise.

It means sharing ideas and opinions in the most efficient and effective way
possible. So, sharing your opinions, seeing others opinions, and interacting
in a way which hopefully will be constructive to everyone as they determine
their own version of what they think and believe. My goal is to optimize this
process so there is less wasted time and cognitive energy fighting ignorance
and intentional misinformation, with the result being a more well-informed
public, and all of the secondary effects that brings. We have already seen
this effect in action (arab spring and twitter, for example), and I want to do
whatever I can to promote it further.

There are a few fundamental tweaks I would make to current methods, which will
allow me to provide an interface with distinct advantages which I believe far
outweigh the capability given up.

Hopefully that is at least slightly more clear.

------
t0
Who are you? Around here, ideas aren't very important. Everybody has ideas.
They're easy to come by, and they're usually not as huge as you might assume.
The most important aspect of a startup is a founder that can get things done.

Do you know how to build it? Then build it. Else, find a cofounder that knows
how.

~~~
jdrobins2000
RE: ideas aren't very important

I wholeheartedly agree, to the extent the idea is vague and general. To the
extent the idea becomes more detailed, I think the importance grows. A
software program is nothing more than a bunch of ideas written down to the
degree that a computer can understand the meaning. So, the importance of the
idea can range from "nothing" to "everything". I know a lot of people seem to
subscribe to the ideas are nothing mantra, so I'm wondering if it is shorthand
for "vague ideas are worth nothing", or applies to the entire spectrum?

How detailed is my idea? Enough that I think it is significant. Enough that I
think it creates substantial advantages over current alternatives, and even
up-and-coming OSS which has similar aims. Could I be wrong? Of course, but in
the past I have had very accurate gauge on this. The core idea I am very
confident in, as long as I can present the user a very clean and easy
interface. The major risk I have identified is that I could be underestimating
the difficulty of implementing the software which performs some key tasks
which are required to support that goal maximally. I have some ideas of how I
will do this, more than vague but less than pseudo code. I will no doubt
encounter challenges, but my feeling is that I could probably at least
minimally satisfy my goal initially, and move towards a perfect solution
later.

------
miles
_Find a company doing something similar and try to get a job there (Obvious
Corp may be doing something similar, but I can't even find contact info, much
less get hired. But they seem like great people.)_

C'mon, man - you can do better than that:

<http://www.google.com/search?q=Obvious+Corp>

Second result:

<http://www.crunchbase.com/company/obvious>

Twitter @ObviousCorp Phone 415-285-4255 164 South Park Street San Francisco,
CA, 94107

Whois reveals yet more.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thanks, but you didn't try calling that number, did you? It is disconnected.

~~~
miles
A quick whois search turns up yet more:

415-513-5196 domain.admin@obvious.com 2601 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA,
94401

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thanks! Seems like an unconventional and creative route. I've used whois of
course, but never to get contact info for a well-known company, so I didn't
even think about it. I will give it a (admittedly long) shot.

Oh and for the record, yes I had already tried the number on crunch base. I've
also sent a twitter message, but no response yet.

~~~
miles
I guess my point was this: it shows a lack of motivation and drive saying that
you can't find out how to contact a company you are genuinely interested in.
The Google and whois queries took less than 30 seconds to come up with and
perform. A motivated person should be able to do much better in 10 or 15
minutes. May you find what you are looking for!

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thanks, I appreciate the well wishes and practical help in getting there.

I certainly understand your reasoning, even if my conclusion is different. I
try to be careful not to judge anything based on one small aspect without
considering the whole, or jump to conclusions on a decidedly complex issue
(any human action, really, including my own). You may of course do as you
wish.

I did the google query a couple days ago, called the number twice to verify
the disconnected message wasn't the result of a weird network error, then did
several more queries and surfing around their various web sites (obvious.com,
which now redirects to medium.com, jellyhq.com (where I promptly subscribed to
the early adopter list), media stories, and social media accounts, to no
avail. I spent much more than 15 minutes on it, and hopefully my post here
displays at least a modicum of motivation and drive. I made the remark because
I thought it was odd, not as a request for someone else to do my homework for
me, but I appreciate your initiative.

I think what you read as lack of motivation, I believe is infrequent use of
whois (due to its irrelevance for the vast majority of my work on classified
networks) and especially in this capacity, leading to oversight of that tool
as potentially useful for solving my problem. I overlooked the whois
suggestion in your first post, because I was in the middle of composing a
response to someone else, and probably because my attention went straight to
the phone number I recognized. I am sorry my oversight inconvenienced you, but
I do appreciate you lending your expertise to help (however trivial it was to
you).

I think it would be accurate to see this as a weakness of lesser familiarity
with certain things due to having spent large amounts of time in a different
environment. That would be fair. I just think those type of things are
generally easy to pick up, compared to the things that are difficult to learn,
or just can't be taught period. Not unimportant or trivial, but a minor
challenge. And those concepts that are difficult or critical to get right the
first time, are the reason why I applied to YC, and why I am asking HNers for
advice. And I will make every effort to eventually give back more than I
receive.

~~~
miles
Thanks for the thoughtful reply. You are clearly well-spoken and patient, two
excellent traits in any profession. Godspeed!

~~~
jdrobins2000
Number called, no answer, anonymous voicemail recording. Message left, fingers
crossed... star wished upon. Ironic that I may need to resort to snail mail.

~~~
miles
_Number called, no answer, anonymous voicemail recording. Message left,
fingers crossed... star wished upon._

I'm sorry, you're still missing the point. You can and should do FAR more than
this if you are truly motivated. I strongly recommend you read _Think and Grow
Rich_ :

<http://archive.org/details/Think_and_Grow_Rich>

Here's a taste:

TRULY, "thoughts are things," and powerful things at that, when they are mixed
with definiteness of purpose, persistence, and a BURNING DESIRE for their
translation into riches, or other material objects.

A little more than thirty years ago, Edwin C. Barnes discovered how true it is
that men really do THINK AND GROW RICH. His discovery did not come about at
one sitting. It came little by little, beginning with a BURNING DESIRE to
become a business associate of the great Edison.

One of the chief characteristics of Barnes' Desire was that it was definite.
He wanted to work with Edison, not for him. Observe, carefully, the
description of how he went about translating his DESIRE into reality, and you
will have a better understanding of the thirteen principles which lead to
riches. When this DESIRE, or impulse of thought, first flashed into his mind
he was in no position to act upon it. Two difficulties stood in his way. He
did not know Mr. Edison, and he did not have enough money to pay his railroad
fare to Orange, New Jersey. These difficulties were sufficient to have
discouraged the majority of men from making any attempt to carry out the
desire.

But his was no ordinary desire! He was so determined to find a way to carry
out his desire that he finally decided to travel by "blind baggage," rather
than be defeated. (To the uninitiated, this means that he went to East Orange
on a freight train). He presented himself at Mr. Edison's laboratory, and
announced he had come to go into business with the inventor. In speaking of
the first meeting between Barnes and Edison, years later, Mr. Edison said, "He
stood there before me, looking like an ordinary tramp, but there was something
in the expression of his face which conveyed the impression that he was
determined to get what he had come after. I had learned, from years of
experience with men, that when a man really DESIRES a thing so deeply that he
is willing to stake his entire future on a single turn of the wheel in order
to get it, he is sure to win. I gave him the opportunity he asked for, because
I saw he had made up his mind to stand by until he succeeded. Subsequent
events proved that no mistake was made."

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thank you miles, but again I think you are the one missing something, because
you are too quick to assume. I appreciated your help, but you were clearly too
quick to declare your own success and my lack of motivation or effort. You
provided two phone numbers, one of which I had already tried, and both of
which were dead ends. That was the only issue you expressed interest in
talking to me about, so that is the only thing I mentioned in my reply, so I
didn't waste your time or mine.

I am traveling up to Napa very soon, and was considering trying to drop by
their office, but politely and without presumption. However, it is not my
dream to work with Ev and Biz. I just have the impression they share my goals
and values, so would potentially be great people to partner with. I will
continue to be on the lookout for opportunities to connect with them, but it's
not my only option.

What I AM doing is moving forward on the MVP of my product, with my partner
who has committed to a substantial amount of effort to building the business.
I am feeling great about our prospects, as he has brought more to the team
than I had even hoped for. He is very confident we can handle the big data (as
he has already done major projects using Cassandra). And since he is willing
to contribute more than I expected, and we work together even better than I
hoped, things are looking up.

I have endured far more for far longer in pursuit of this goal than Barnes'
blind baggage ride. In the last year alone I have endured several trials that
would have broken many men (no exaggeration). I (and my family) have come out
the other side stronger than ever, and I am determined to do everything in my
power to pursue this goal. This year, next year, 10 years, this is what I will
be doing, because I would do it even if I didn't need any money. And in fact I
didn't need the money, but as a result of pursuing this instead of playing it
safe, that is increasingly in jeopardy.

Well, since you seem to be an advocate of tracking down complete strangers and
demanding they give you what you want, I would be remiss if I didn't inquire
as to what I may demand of you, where I may find you, and if you could make
the trip from LA worth my while? ;)

EDIT: So, Maui it is! I appreciate you living somewhere nice to visit, and
even on one of the HI islands I've yet to visit. Now I just need to figure out
my demands. That is, in addition to some delicious vegan fare, and some
Japanese lessons for my Japanese wife, who knows less Japanese than I do. :)

~~~
miles
_Well, since you seem to be an advocate of tracking down complete strangers
and demanding they give you what you want, I would be remiss if I didn't
inquire as to what I may demand of you, where I may find you, and if you could
make the trip from LA worth my while? ;) EDIT: So, Maui it is! I appreciate
you living somewhere nice to visit, and even on one of the HI islands I've yet
to visit. Now I just need to figure out my demands. That is, in addition to
some delicious vegan fare, and some Japanese lessons for my Japanese wife, who
knows less Japanese than I do. :)_

No, you have misunderstood: I am an advocate of following through with action
on your dreams. If your dream is to harass me, I suggest you dig deep and find
a more worthy goal. Best of luck.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Sorry miles, just a bit of friendly ribbing. Hence the winky face, but I guess
that wasn't clear.

------
lifeformed
How hard is it to implement your idea? I don't know the details of your
situation, but if you can build it yourself, and you are confident in its
ability to succeed, you can move somewhere with a cheap cost of living and
just do it all yourself. It only costs like 15k to live frugally for a year in
some parts of the country.

~~~
jdrobins2000
Thanks for the feedback. I've got a family, so it's less cheap. Plus, health
insurance and health expenses alone cost me more than 15k.

I could build part of it myself, and am already on my way. I probably could do
a MVP which could possibly get traction. But for reasons stated already, I'm
not sure starting small is the best option. But I would certainly appreciate
it if someone could ease my mind about that.

Also, please see my other responses related to your questions, so I don't
pollute the comments with repetition. Thanks!

