Respectfully disagree with _pdp_ here. Many ideas are not low hanging in retrospect. The three pre-internet businesses I cite are obvious needs (trade, oil refining & transportation) and yet had requirements that made them untenable business ventures for people without the specific advantages required by those business models. Government support, a superior position in the supply chain or access to vast amounts of capital provided barriers to entry for potential competitors. Having demonstrated that the second claim is false, I will not address the first claim.
Something that has not been done before is not low hanging fruit. To be sure, it is difficult to know if there are fewer good businesses to be started today, but the economic evidence has been stacking up for 30 some years now. Here are some papers showing the slowdown in productivity and new starts:
Part of this is a sclerotic antitrust regulator that has been defanged by lobbyists. Part of it is the internet removing information asymmetries, leading to natural monopolies. Part of it is probably the cheap "bits" businesses crowding out "atoms" investments in VC. Another part is probably that we are simply running out of easy defensible businesses to create. This is ok! People will have to get more creative and humanity will progress more slowly, but from a higher base.
