Comments on: On the important issue of copycat companies

By: Andy Swan » Try It Local goes for the win-win-win relationship

Andy Swan » Try It Local goes for the win-win-win relationship — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:00:18 +0000

[...] First of all, I wouldn’t be anti even if this was a purely copycat company. [...]

By: Dave Pinsen

Dave Pinsen — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 07:01:46 +0000

You're one of the commenters at AVC.com, so you deserve some of the credit too. Especially for that one about global warming a couple of weeks ago.

BTW, speaking of new ideas and new businesses, did you see the e-mail I sent you about one a couple of weeks ago? I sent it on 1/21 and the subject line was "Winning in 2010".

By: andyswan

andyswan — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:08:23 +0000

I'll take 2nd to avc.com :)

Sent from my Millennium Falcon

By: Ruang

Ruang — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:07:07 +0000

Like the famous football adage, winning at startups is becoming 'a game of inches'. An incremental improvement can result in a big edge over the competition. A popular example being the difference between having the #1 and #5 ranking in Google.

I've just noticed you have the best commenters of any blog I've seen. Thanks for your active replying!

By: andyswan

andyswan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:11:06 +0000

Everyone and their uncle has a dozen ideas for a business in a lifetime.
It's safe to assume that ideas are cheap because they are in abundance.

I put money into "pre-venture capital financeable ideas" [sic] all the time,
because I believe that the PEOPLE I am investing in will execute on those
ideas and return a profit. It's quite simple, really.

By: andyswan

andyswan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:05:20 +0000

Consider the amount of IMPROVEMENT and INNOVATION that would be missed if
multiple startups weren't attacking the same problem. If we relied purely
on the original idea-holder to execute his plan.

Or maybe you would enjoy car shopping more with one truck (version 36.1!),
one minivan, one sedan and one motorcycle as your choices?

Lousy comment.

By: Michael F. Martin

Michael F. Martin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:56:59 +0000

Just once I would like to see a VC acknowledge the law of supply and demand when it comes to ideas. If ideas are cheap, it could be because supply is cheap OR it could be because there is no demand.

And why would anybody put money into pre-venture capital financeable ideas? There is no company big enough to compete with universities and the federal government in financing that work.

Please put a little more thought into this and repost.

By: Michael F. Martin

Michael F. Martin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:52:15 +0000

1 is a straw man. Nobody in their right mind is going to argue that ideas that violate physics are worth something.

Consider the time and money that would be saved if multiple startups weren't competing pre- or post-funding nationwide. What the same people knew about each other and started differentiating from the beginning?

Now tell me how we can make that happen without requiring these people to file information about their ideas in a central repository, indexed, and publicly available -- i.e., a patent office.

Lousy reasoning, lousy conclusion. Good business is not about "knocking off" ideas from smaller or weaker people. It's about a harmony of ideas and action, which results in a performance that others cannot imitate.

By: andyswan

andyswan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 03:21:05 +0000

I'm in!!!

By: Mark Essel

Mark Essel — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 03:20:52 +0000

Awesome Dave