"Start -" up "or" down "?, Guide for Dummies ... with ideas
Not often in the Russian-language network appear MASTER revelations ... on start-ups.
I suggest to familiarize ... and compare with your presentation on the topic of startups.
Sincerely, Vladimir Khakham.
“I already (including here) drew an analogy of the situation in the social Internet with the times of the Gold Rush. As then, now the value of the “prize” along with the simplicity of the toolkit attracts hundreds to the mines, speaking in modern Russian, startups. And again, in reality, everything turns out to be much more complicated than many of them imagined. I will try to clarify my idea on one task, which often has to be solved by the generator of ideas - the founders of startups. It turned out a kind of roadmap for beginners, developed on the basis of my own experience ...
Formulation of the problem
Given:
')
1. there is an idea which, and you are sure of it, will change the world (at least, the world of social Internet)
2. there is a preliminary understanding of how to realize this idea alone you cannot do (the reasons may be very different, some of them will be discussed later)
3. no team
4. no money
To find:
1. Who is to blame? - remove the question. Each of us already has an answer to it. Especially well we know who is to blame for the fact that we have no money.
2. What to do? - select the answer (you can not pay attention to my comments):
- patent an idea, then sell it (taking the above conditions, I consider the occupation meaningless)
- to sell the idea immediately (I also consider it almost a waste of time - you are unlikely to find those who want to buy a “cat in a bag”)
- give an idea (why not? There is Open Source, there is Open ID, and now there will be Open Idea. How many such gifts are scattered in the blogosphere!)
- forget about it and generate a new one (it will always be in time)
- to make the idea “spun” all the same (I am for)
3. Where to start? - Answer options depend on the selected answer in accordance with claim 2. I want to share with the reader some considerations in case he or she chooses DO option in paragraph 2. In this case, there are not so many sub-options at our disposal:
• develop a business plan for the idea, and then look for money
• seek money immediately for the implementation of the idea
• to put together a team for the full realization of the idea and to do without external investments at all
• put together a team to implement an idea at the level of a working prototype, and then look for money
• create a prototype after all for yourself, and then sell it along with the idea
I have already explained my skepticism about the business plan in the early stages of a web project. Start looking for money right away? You can, of course, try. However, only under one of the conditions (and it is better if all the conditions are together):
- you have several completed projects
- you are well known in your professional circle
- you have familiar investors or acquaintances of these acquaintances who are ready to vouch for you
Is it all there? But then, if you consider that you are still to all this and so clever (otherwise, where are the ideas from?), The counter question is “according to an American”: why are you not a millionaire? Very sad thoughts sometimes come to mind when you try to answer this question yourself. But let's not talk about sad things.
And if you try everything at once and without money? Will not work! The fact is that the creation of a new product is not limited to programming. You want to make a product not for a dozen of your friends, hundreds of acquaintances or a few hundreds of random fans, but you dream of an audience where the bill goes to millions or tens of millions. True? And if this is so, then very substantial investments are needed to make the heap not always pleasant and / or not familiar to you, such as: marketing research, documentation, good Help, advertising, reliable hosting in all respects, copyright protection, other legal issues , very high-quality testing, great design, working with the internal cash flows of your resource, accounting and other financial issues, and so on and so forth.
So, we will rely only on a working prototype. Then there is one question: to rely only on yourself, or to create a team. Let's talk about this ...
Linked by one chain
I myself! Unfortunately, immediately disappears. Even if you are a super programmer and are ready to switch to bread and water for a couple of months, fully devoting yourself to your project and not doing anything else. And this is why it disappears ...
You do not need to be a great specialist to, looking at the many social resources on the Internet today, understand that the vast majority of them are built on the basis of a very limited toolkit. About ten more or less “open”, so-called engines and several relatively accessible “libraries” of improvised building materials based on technologies like ASP.Net, PHP and AJAX. Here startups and turned out to be connected by one chain (instrumental).
And they continue to produce these “connected” start-ups on these de facto standard base platforms with new, faceless and almost no-one-needed social resources. After all, it is known that from changing places (design elements) the amount (total functionality) never changes. But you have an idea designed for something completely different. You dream of a resource with a “face not a common expression” and with functionality that no one else can find. And in order to realize this “big and white”, you need to start almost from scratch, with creating many building bricks with your own hands. And at the same time everything needs to be done quickly enough. How not to twist, but work is not measured by one “person-month”.
By the way, to the statement often heard from the generators of ideas that they do not need any startup, since their ingenious concept can be realized only in a very popular social resource. It will not work, even if your idea really pleases the owners of this resource. The owners will like the idea, but unfortunately the resource itself is not compatible with it. And it is unlikely that anyone will want to break the already untwisted even for a very beautiful idea.
This also applies to the traditional requests with which we, the users appeal to the owners of the resource when we ask them to change or add something to the resource. In most cases, they simply cannot do this, even if they really want to - the basic platform does not allow it.
So, there is only command building, what we turn to ...
The idea can only be believed
Before us works no end. And everything is only calculated for future profit. But after all, developers - potential members of the team being created live something for something. And if you also feed the family? So, as a rule, each of them can give the project only a fraction of their time. From this it follows that in the mythical “man-months” of these same months it was less, these “men” should be more. And these "men" would be more qualified, more experienced. And where to find them? Yes, only in the virtual world. Soon the fairy tale affects, but in fact there are many problems.
All geniuses have their own ideas, and each of them believes that only his ideas can turn the world around. Two geniuses in one team, that two bears in one den. But in order to start labor, gratuitous at first, you need to figure out the idea of ​​someone else and, most importantly, believe in it. And here with your ideas you do not know what to do.
Programmers of all countries ... Well, everything is clear with geniuses. And if not a genius, but simply a good specialist, he prefers to work on the principle of Ostap Bender: “Money in the morning, and chairs in the evening.” Well, if not the full amount, then at least 50% of the advance. And all these conversations about equity participation are for him the same as (again, the "bearish" analogy) invitation to share the skin of an unkilled bear. I remind you that you don’t have the money, but even if you didn’t give any advance payment to the virtual partners. Money is not virtual.
But the “throw” can (remember, you do not have a patent, and it does not always help). And so not only do you think, but your potential partners, All, although a little bit, they don’t believe each other. Indeed, in most cases - this is not friends, but only friends. And, as one colleague correctly explained to me, friends and friends are "two big differences."
Look for a prototype. And yet you were lucky, you ignited the masses with your idea, and the virtual “friends” turned out to be, if not friends, then at least potentially good partners. And they decided to unite everything in an online start-up, working at first only “for shares”. The first thing that these same partners will ask for you, after finally talking about money has calmed down, is the technical task (TK). Well, at least in order to assess the complexity of the project. We will talk about TK below, but for now let's imagine that you already have it, but for now you (I believe, but still ...) have decided to hold it. How would you be in that case? Look for a prototype (or prototypes)! Naturally, not the prototype that your team will have to create, but some basic analogue with which you can compare your dream. Once found, then everything is very simple. Once again, carefully work with him (with them) and try to assess how much your project is functional (only functional!) More complex than its analogs. All the answer for the masses is ready. In a very schematic form, this is the formula “Amount (k1 * k2 * prototype)”, where k1 is the weight coefficient of proximity of each prototype to your task, k2 is the coefficient of its complexity compared to this prototype. And everything is your experienced team, they will understand everything further. Can't find anything even a bit like your idea on the Internet? Honestly, I don’t know if I should envy you or sympathize with you.
Without paper you are a bug. Even if you are a carrier of brilliant ideas. In this case, by “bump” I mean, if not a business plan, then at least TK. Otherwise, you risk getting at the exit, (if, in general, you get something), it’s not at all what you have been waiting for so long and so eagerly. After all, your team has gathered people all the initiatives: smile
Shoemaker without shoes. This is me to the fact that in today's social Internet (Enterprise 2.0, including) there are no normal tools for joint engineering activities. We all say: "Oh, wiki and oh, wiki." What is a wiki? Yes, nothing more than a Web remake of Word Track Change. Such a small SaaS. And I need SaaS-tools for normal project management, bug tracking (Bug tracking) and many other things, without which it is extremely difficult to conduct joint development in on-line mode. In other words, almost according to Munchhausen, you have to think about how to pull yourself “by the hair out of the swamp” by your hair - to build a startup to create a social resource that would help others organize new startups.
A few additional words from my own experience about how to develop TK. Everything can be illustrated by simple comparisons. Personally, I need to:
a) to formulate an idea at the level of blog notes — a maximum, a couple of hours, and some will need ten minutes
b) intelligibly expound the concept at the level of a “good” journal article or section of a “good” business plan - a couple of days
c) write TK - at least a month. And this is despite the fact that the development experience in my baggage is not one such task. And this is despite the fact that I am writing TK, based on narrow professionals in my field, who do not need to “chew on” many things.
By the way, returning to the thesis “shoemaker without shoes”, I give the idea of ​​a viable social web environment for online startups working together to everyone. I do not mind - I have many of these ideas: smile All the same, for all their TK you do not “arrange”. The rest of his life is not enough. In general, a lot of people are talking about using social networks as a springboard for what I call the on-line incubator of startups (the participants of our Commonwealth refer to a note on its closed forum, the version of which, as far as I know, the author will soon post on Habré). However, as you can see, there are a lot of difficult problems to solve, and not only technological ones. But still…
hope dies last
As a once forgotten classic taught us once, we need to find a weak link and, by pulling on it, try to solve a difficult problem. Such a weak link in any idea is the absence of a “good” technical task under it.
Why should an idea generator begin to truly promote its concept only after developing a competent TK for it? I list - only having developed such a document:
1. you yourself will understand, finally, and what do you actually want to tell everyone
2. You will answer finally and to the question whether your idea is another perpetum mobiles and whether it is realizable.
3. you will sharpen the details of your concept, understand your niche better and with whom you will have to compete there
4. you will be able to at least roughly estimate the laboriousness of your idea, what kind of specialists you need, and when you should expect a result
5. you explain to your partners what you expect from them
6. you will find for your team some other “geniuses” who, having understood that they are dealing with a practical person, maybe they will want to combine their ideas with yours
7. You will gain a lot of your new ideas (but, unfortunately, with the need to answer the same questions: what to do with them and where to start?)
8. you will receive a sound initial material for the development of any other documents that you may need during the promotion, regardless of which way you decide to move (see Problem Definition)
9. You will feel confident talking about your idea with anyone, even with the worst investor. And, what the hell is not joking, what if you can immediately sell such a well-formed idea?
10. you satisfy your hunger for real creative activity, which, as it may seem strange at first glance, is peculiar to many generators of ideas. In the words of the hero of one not very decent joke: “I’m not catching up, I’ll warm up” smile.gif
11. you will feel (if, of course, you are not a web specialist yourself), but what is the practical way to start developing a new product for the Internet? Understand at least a little, but enough for your next idea to be even less divorced from life.
12. You will again prove the truth that hope dies last. Isn't that right?
All this, in aggregate, will be much more useful than losing time on the development of a business plan that is not needed by anyone yet.
It was such an almost optimistic tragedy for a person with ideas. And you're talking about startups. And nevertheless, although in most cases we have not start-ups, but start-ups (this is not sicknessmile.gif, but just a tracing with “down-down”, as an alternative to “up-up”), I like you already saw, continue to be optimistic. What and all of you I wish, dear fellows in misfortune - the generators of all kinds of ideas! Well, and how, from my point of view, a “good” TK should look, I will try to answer in the next article.
Source:
This post has been edited by amilner: Oct 25 2007, 01:49 PM
www.itechbridge.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=52011
I suggest to familiarize ... and compare with your presentation on the topic of startups.
Sincerely, Vladimir Khakham.
“I already (including here) drew an analogy of the situation in the social Internet with the times of the Gold Rush. As then, now the value of the “prize” along with the simplicity of the toolkit attracts hundreds to the mines, speaking in modern Russian, startups. And again, in reality, everything turns out to be much more complicated than many of them imagined. I will try to clarify my idea on one task, which often has to be solved by the generator of ideas - the founders of startups. It turned out a kind of roadmap for beginners, developed on the basis of my own experience ...
Formulation of the problem
Given:
')
1. there is an idea which, and you are sure of it, will change the world (at least, the world of social Internet)
2. there is a preliminary understanding of how to realize this idea alone you cannot do (the reasons may be very different, some of them will be discussed later)
3. no team
4. no money
To find:
1. Who is to blame? - remove the question. Each of us already has an answer to it. Especially well we know who is to blame for the fact that we have no money.
2. What to do? - select the answer (you can not pay attention to my comments):
- patent an idea, then sell it (taking the above conditions, I consider the occupation meaningless)
- to sell the idea immediately (I also consider it almost a waste of time - you are unlikely to find those who want to buy a “cat in a bag”)
- give an idea (why not? There is Open Source, there is Open ID, and now there will be Open Idea. How many such gifts are scattered in the blogosphere!)
- forget about it and generate a new one (it will always be in time)
- to make the idea “spun” all the same (I am for)
3. Where to start? - Answer options depend on the selected answer in accordance with claim 2. I want to share with the reader some considerations in case he or she chooses DO option in paragraph 2. In this case, there are not so many sub-options at our disposal:
• develop a business plan for the idea, and then look for money
• seek money immediately for the implementation of the idea
• to put together a team for the full realization of the idea and to do without external investments at all
• put together a team to implement an idea at the level of a working prototype, and then look for money
• create a prototype after all for yourself, and then sell it along with the idea
I have already explained my skepticism about the business plan in the early stages of a web project. Start looking for money right away? You can, of course, try. However, only under one of the conditions (and it is better if all the conditions are together):
- you have several completed projects
- you are well known in your professional circle
- you have familiar investors or acquaintances of these acquaintances who are ready to vouch for you
Is it all there? But then, if you consider that you are still to all this and so clever (otherwise, where are the ideas from?), The counter question is “according to an American”: why are you not a millionaire? Very sad thoughts sometimes come to mind when you try to answer this question yourself. But let's not talk about sad things.
And if you try everything at once and without money? Will not work! The fact is that the creation of a new product is not limited to programming. You want to make a product not for a dozen of your friends, hundreds of acquaintances or a few hundreds of random fans, but you dream of an audience where the bill goes to millions or tens of millions. True? And if this is so, then very substantial investments are needed to make the heap not always pleasant and / or not familiar to you, such as: marketing research, documentation, good Help, advertising, reliable hosting in all respects, copyright protection, other legal issues , very high-quality testing, great design, working with the internal cash flows of your resource, accounting and other financial issues, and so on and so forth.
So, we will rely only on a working prototype. Then there is one question: to rely only on yourself, or to create a team. Let's talk about this ...
Linked by one chain
I myself! Unfortunately, immediately disappears. Even if you are a super programmer and are ready to switch to bread and water for a couple of months, fully devoting yourself to your project and not doing anything else. And this is why it disappears ...
You do not need to be a great specialist to, looking at the many social resources on the Internet today, understand that the vast majority of them are built on the basis of a very limited toolkit. About ten more or less “open”, so-called engines and several relatively accessible “libraries” of improvised building materials based on technologies like ASP.Net, PHP and AJAX. Here startups and turned out to be connected by one chain (instrumental).
And they continue to produce these “connected” start-ups on these de facto standard base platforms with new, faceless and almost no-one-needed social resources. After all, it is known that from changing places (design elements) the amount (total functionality) never changes. But you have an idea designed for something completely different. You dream of a resource with a “face not a common expression” and with functionality that no one else can find. And in order to realize this “big and white”, you need to start almost from scratch, with creating many building bricks with your own hands. And at the same time everything needs to be done quickly enough. How not to twist, but work is not measured by one “person-month”.
By the way, to the statement often heard from the generators of ideas that they do not need any startup, since their ingenious concept can be realized only in a very popular social resource. It will not work, even if your idea really pleases the owners of this resource. The owners will like the idea, but unfortunately the resource itself is not compatible with it. And it is unlikely that anyone will want to break the already untwisted even for a very beautiful idea.
This also applies to the traditional requests with which we, the users appeal to the owners of the resource when we ask them to change or add something to the resource. In most cases, they simply cannot do this, even if they really want to - the basic platform does not allow it.
So, there is only command building, what we turn to ...
The idea can only be believed
Before us works no end. And everything is only calculated for future profit. But after all, developers - potential members of the team being created live something for something. And if you also feed the family? So, as a rule, each of them can give the project only a fraction of their time. From this it follows that in the mythical “man-months” of these same months it was less, these “men” should be more. And these "men" would be more qualified, more experienced. And where to find them? Yes, only in the virtual world. Soon the fairy tale affects, but in fact there are many problems.
All geniuses have their own ideas, and each of them believes that only his ideas can turn the world around. Two geniuses in one team, that two bears in one den. But in order to start labor, gratuitous at first, you need to figure out the idea of ​​someone else and, most importantly, believe in it. And here with your ideas you do not know what to do.
Programmers of all countries ... Well, everything is clear with geniuses. And if not a genius, but simply a good specialist, he prefers to work on the principle of Ostap Bender: “Money in the morning, and chairs in the evening.” Well, if not the full amount, then at least 50% of the advance. And all these conversations about equity participation are for him the same as (again, the "bearish" analogy) invitation to share the skin of an unkilled bear. I remind you that you don’t have the money, but even if you didn’t give any advance payment to the virtual partners. Money is not virtual.
But the “throw” can (remember, you do not have a patent, and it does not always help). And so not only do you think, but your potential partners, All, although a little bit, they don’t believe each other. Indeed, in most cases - this is not friends, but only friends. And, as one colleague correctly explained to me, friends and friends are "two big differences."
Look for a prototype. And yet you were lucky, you ignited the masses with your idea, and the virtual “friends” turned out to be, if not friends, then at least potentially good partners. And they decided to unite everything in an online start-up, working at first only “for shares”. The first thing that these same partners will ask for you, after finally talking about money has calmed down, is the technical task (TK). Well, at least in order to assess the complexity of the project. We will talk about TK below, but for now let's imagine that you already have it, but for now you (I believe, but still ...) have decided to hold it. How would you be in that case? Look for a prototype (or prototypes)! Naturally, not the prototype that your team will have to create, but some basic analogue with which you can compare your dream. Once found, then everything is very simple. Once again, carefully work with him (with them) and try to assess how much your project is functional (only functional!) More complex than its analogs. All the answer for the masses is ready. In a very schematic form, this is the formula “Amount (k1 * k2 * prototype)”, where k1 is the weight coefficient of proximity of each prototype to your task, k2 is the coefficient of its complexity compared to this prototype. And everything is your experienced team, they will understand everything further. Can't find anything even a bit like your idea on the Internet? Honestly, I don’t know if I should envy you or sympathize with you.
Without paper you are a bug. Even if you are a carrier of brilliant ideas. In this case, by “bump” I mean, if not a business plan, then at least TK. Otherwise, you risk getting at the exit, (if, in general, you get something), it’s not at all what you have been waiting for so long and so eagerly. After all, your team has gathered people all the initiatives: smile
Shoemaker without shoes. This is me to the fact that in today's social Internet (Enterprise 2.0, including) there are no normal tools for joint engineering activities. We all say: "Oh, wiki and oh, wiki." What is a wiki? Yes, nothing more than a Web remake of Word Track Change. Such a small SaaS. And I need SaaS-tools for normal project management, bug tracking (Bug tracking) and many other things, without which it is extremely difficult to conduct joint development in on-line mode. In other words, almost according to Munchhausen, you have to think about how to pull yourself “by the hair out of the swamp” by your hair - to build a startup to create a social resource that would help others organize new startups.
A few additional words from my own experience about how to develop TK. Everything can be illustrated by simple comparisons. Personally, I need to:
a) to formulate an idea at the level of blog notes — a maximum, a couple of hours, and some will need ten minutes
b) intelligibly expound the concept at the level of a “good” journal article or section of a “good” business plan - a couple of days
c) write TK - at least a month. And this is despite the fact that the development experience in my baggage is not one such task. And this is despite the fact that I am writing TK, based on narrow professionals in my field, who do not need to “chew on” many things.
By the way, returning to the thesis “shoemaker without shoes”, I give the idea of ​​a viable social web environment for online startups working together to everyone. I do not mind - I have many of these ideas: smile All the same, for all their TK you do not “arrange”. The rest of his life is not enough. In general, a lot of people are talking about using social networks as a springboard for what I call the on-line incubator of startups (the participants of our Commonwealth refer to a note on its closed forum, the version of which, as far as I know, the author will soon post on Habré). However, as you can see, there are a lot of difficult problems to solve, and not only technological ones. But still…
hope dies last
As a once forgotten classic taught us once, we need to find a weak link and, by pulling on it, try to solve a difficult problem. Such a weak link in any idea is the absence of a “good” technical task under it.
Why should an idea generator begin to truly promote its concept only after developing a competent TK for it? I list - only having developed such a document:
1. you yourself will understand, finally, and what do you actually want to tell everyone
2. You will answer finally and to the question whether your idea is another perpetum mobiles and whether it is realizable.
3. you will sharpen the details of your concept, understand your niche better and with whom you will have to compete there
4. you will be able to at least roughly estimate the laboriousness of your idea, what kind of specialists you need, and when you should expect a result
5. you explain to your partners what you expect from them
6. you will find for your team some other “geniuses” who, having understood that they are dealing with a practical person, maybe they will want to combine their ideas with yours
7. You will gain a lot of your new ideas (but, unfortunately, with the need to answer the same questions: what to do with them and where to start?)
8. you will receive a sound initial material for the development of any other documents that you may need during the promotion, regardless of which way you decide to move (see Problem Definition)
9. You will feel confident talking about your idea with anyone, even with the worst investor. And, what the hell is not joking, what if you can immediately sell such a well-formed idea?
10. you satisfy your hunger for real creative activity, which, as it may seem strange at first glance, is peculiar to many generators of ideas. In the words of the hero of one not very decent joke: “I’m not catching up, I’ll warm up” smile.gif
11. you will feel (if, of course, you are not a web specialist yourself), but what is the practical way to start developing a new product for the Internet? Understand at least a little, but enough for your next idea to be even less divorced from life.
12. You will again prove the truth that hope dies last. Isn't that right?
All this, in aggregate, will be much more useful than losing time on the development of a business plan that is not needed by anyone yet.
It was such an almost optimistic tragedy for a person with ideas. And you're talking about startups. And nevertheless, although in most cases we have not start-ups, but start-ups (this is not sicknessmile.gif, but just a tracing with “down-down”, as an alternative to “up-up”), I like you already saw, continue to be optimistic. What and all of you I wish, dear fellows in misfortune - the generators of all kinds of ideas! Well, and how, from my point of view, a “good” TK should look, I will try to answer in the next article.
Source:
This post has been edited by amilner: Oct 25 2007, 01:49 PM
www.itechbridge.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=52011
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/17614/
All Articles