It's The Execution That Matters, Not The Idea
from the ideas-without-execution... dept
For years we've tried to explain the difference between ideas and execution, and how lots of people have ideas (in fact, many have the same ideas entirely independently), but without good execution, those ideas aren't really worth much at all. This point comes up a lot in the debates we have over the patent system -- with patent system supporters often overvaluing the idea part, and grossly underestimating the importance of execution. Often this is because they've never built a real business, and don't realize how little an initial idea plays into the final product. The two are often oceans apart. But stopping others from executing well (or forcing them to fork over a ton of money) just because they executed well where you did not? That doesn't seem like encouraging innovation or promoting progress at all.DSchneider points us to an excellent recent Jeff Attwood post about the differences between the idea and the execution. It's well worth reading as it covers a bunch of different things, including a common refrain made against those who successfully execute: that they were only able to do so because they were "well-connected." As he notes, being well connected may get you an initial head start, but if you can't execute well, no one will come back. The idea, alone, is almost meaningless.
Attwood highlights this by pointing to a recent letter to a mailing list from one of the guys who started a crowdfunding operation called Fundable a while back, which failed miserably (and very spectacularly in public, with an open letter posted to its website laying out all the dirty laundry). There were all sorts of problems with the execution, which the guy even admits:
Yes, Fundable had some technical and customer service problems. That's because we had no money to revise it. I had plans to scrap the entire CMS and start from scratch with a new design. We were just so burned out that motivation was hard to come by. What was the point if we weren't making enough money to live on after 4 years?The "technical and customer service problems" underplayed how significant some of those problems were. And yet... now that other crowdfunding platforms are getting attention, such as Kickstarter, this guy is crazy upset that they "stole his idea."
I feel that this story is important to tell you because Kickstarter.com copied us. I tried for 4 years to get people to take Fundable seriously, traveling across the country, even giving a presentation to FBFund, Facebook's fund to stimulate development of new apps. It was a series of rejections for 4 years. I really felt that I presented myself professionally in every business situation and I dressed appropriately and practiced my presentations. That was not enough. The idiots wanted us to show them charts with massive profits and widespread public acceptance so that they didn't have to take any risks....Now, I have started my own company, and I've had lots of other people either come up with the same idea separately, or even blatantly decide to do something similar to various aspects of our business. So I do know how it feels. And, certainly when you first hear about it, it may be annoying, but it's really just a challenge. I'll be honest, there are times when others have done a better job executing on ideas than I have in the past, and in the end you either compete, or you tip your hat and move on. Competition breeds innovation and better execution since you know you need to do more. And that means not screwing up your technology and customer service and not lashing out and blaming others when someone else executes better.
I cannot tell you how painful it is to watch 5 assholes take your idea and run with it and not even give you credit. I hate all 5 of them for that. If I see them, I may punch each one of them in the face. If you have never started your own company and then had someone else steal the credit for what you worked hard to develop, you don't understand.
And, the thing is, given what we write about, and all the business model examples we've see over the years, we're pretty damn familiar with many of the players in the whole "crowdfunding space." There have been lots of players who have come and gone, and there are at least a dozen players in the space today. And it's not because they all "took" the idea from this guy, but because lots of people recognized that it's an idea that makes sense. Kickstarter is certainly getting a ton of press these days, but that's mostly because of some top notch execution on its part.
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Filed Under: crowdfunding, execution, ideas
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Re: It's The Execution That Matters, Not The Idea
As a prodigious idea producer, I can tell you that generally speaking, without the idea, nothing happens.
My ideas have made literally trillions of dollars. (Filming Star Wars was my idea. Avatar was my story. I invented the word "inclusive" and "inclusive democracy" The HOPE Scholarships, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Deadbeat Dad Laws, 100's more)
What we need to do is to vaporize thieves who try to copyright or patent other people's ideas. We have the technology to determine truthfulness now. We should use it to reward those who have ideas and harshly punish those who steal other people's ideas.
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Re: It's The Execution That Matters, Not The Idea
As a prodigious idea producer, I can tell you that generally speaking, without the idea, nothing happens.
My ideas have made literally trillions of dollars. (Filming Star Wars was my idea. Avatar was my story. I invented the word "inclusive" and "inclusive democracy" The HOPE Scholarships, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Deadbeat Dad Laws, 100's more)
What we need to do is to vaporize thieves who try to copyright or patent other people's ideas. We have the technology to determine truthfulness now. We should use it to reward those who have ideas and harshly punish those who steal other people's ideas.
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1.) "lots of" is wordy. Try replacing it with "many"
2.) Avoid contractions in formal writing. "Don't should be "Do not", "can't" should be "can not"
3.)"this by pointing" is an unusual word combination. Are you missing a word? You may want to re-write it.
4.)"one of the guys" is also wordy. It can stand on it's own with "one guy"
5.)"the guy even" is weird. The subject "Guy" conflicts with "even" why not just say "the guy"
6.)"4 years, 5 assholes, etc." Be sure to spell out numbers less than or equal to ten.
7.) While technically correct as is, use "feel" only when expressing emotions.
8.) Blatantly" is "offensively loud of noisy. But "Flagrant" may work better because it means "outrageous behaviour"
9.) "it's an idea" might be shortened up to just "its"
See Sargeant Anous battle grammah crimes! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9_kahA_wQo
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Well, I hate people with bad B.O. and those that don't tip the minimum amount. These are two things that bother me, but that doesn't keep me from 1.) loving the man I am with who wears the same pair of undies for a week straight. 2.) putting a few dollars extra down because my man is a complete and total jew.
Get this, folks, I think someone doesn't like me, and that's quite okay.
You have some major problems you need to fix and figure out.
Have you considered professional halp? Alas, I can only give you the name of a few psychologists in the SFO area I've worked with.
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Listen, I'm sorry for my GF guys, I didn't know she was commenting on here. I'm real embarrassed, but she's quite the lyricist, huh? Anyways, I'll have a talk with her tonight.
I'm so embarrassed that I won't say who I am. But I'm definitely not Jeff Atwood.
I'm sure that if this blog was run by decent people it would remove that name because his name is misplaced, and it's definitely not true.
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Troll
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Re: Troll
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Troll, not bot. Just ignore.
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Okay, I'm done; I'm sure you're right that she's intentionally trolling with poor grammar advice, so I won't comment in reply to her anymore.
And sorry, I don't know grammah correction specialist's gender, so I decided to use she and her instead of it.
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I alsos wants to know what Mike's Vaudeville Theatrical Troupe thinks. I spends lots of teim matching up sylabals and rhimes.
Something emerged from the bridge today
I don't know what it is
Views my own trolls didn't verbalize.
The posts all have weird things to say
I guess it's probably theirs
It looks like backhanded drive...
And they're livin' under the bridge... livin' under the bridge
Livin' under the bridge... livin' under the bridge
There's a comment on the blawg today
Must be from a troll; green and growing hair
But they've commented since July
If you can follow that thing
That they said over there
Then mister, you're a better man than I
Livin' under the bridge
I won't stop (shut us up) the view from postin' (hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
Can't tell what (shut us up) it means at all (hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
I won't stop (shut us up) the view from postin' (hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
Tell me, do you think this custom should be eradicated
Obliterated or annihilated and put to sea?
You try to share a little bit of you're opinion
Couple weeks later, got a scary-lookin' banyan
It always happened, my friend
Again and again and again and again
(Repeat)
The comments on the blawg all stink today
But they've been postin' there all week
It could be a cool retort or a helpful assort
Well, maybe I should another peek...
(sound of a hard-drive running and modem connecting)
AHHHH!!
Livin' under the bridge
I won't stop (shut us up) the view from postin' (hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
Can't tell what (shut us up) it means at all (hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
I won't stop (shut us up) the view from postin' (hundred million)
Livin' in the fridge (shut us up, hundred million)
Livin' under the bridge
Don't know what means, don't know what means
Livin' under the bridge
Don't know what means, don't know what means
Livin' under the bridge
Don't know what it is at all
Livin' under the bridge, yeah!
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah!
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This reeks of a bot scanning the copy of the posts, returning a set of grammar suggestions based on keywords and regular expression string matching, and then automatically making the comment. I have a feeling no one is ever going to receive a reply to a comment left to one of these again.
There was a series of regular posts by this person earlier where that feels like the programmer was trying to figure out how TechDirt's comment system works while programming his bot to parse TechDirt's content and be able to automatically fill in comments linking to various junk sites. The programmer was probably collecting HTML field names, backwards engineering how the posting of comments works, and then fed this data into his bot.
Mike, I highly recommend you investigate this "person" for bot activity. Each comment includes a link, so it's likely all intended to generate seemingly relevant comments to sneak in spam links.
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Alliteration are words with the same consonant used in succession. While those two words did begin with "w", it wasn't used in an alliterative sense. Additionally, since writing phonetically begins with an "r" sound, you chose the wrong phonetic replacement. "Reading, Writing, and Arithmatic" is an alliteration because of this reason.
Grammar fail.
And I still don't believe a person wrote those bullet points, because I can't believe there is a real living person stupid enough to write so horribly with absolutely no sense of proper English usage and meaning. It would shatter the minimum IQ threshold I believe a person would need to have to be self-aware.
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When you work on the next version of your program, be sure to check for "wr" and swap it out with "r" words, as the "w" sound is rarely emphasized in verbal usage.
Actually, I would drop the alliterative function from your program altogether, it's just stupid. And your random word ending replacement function could use a bunch of tweaking, like "-ore" to "-oar" just doesn't work visually.
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Evil dead
CHOP CHOP
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ALSO
AND THAT'S ENGLISH YA FOOKIN LAMA
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its tam in new form guys
i decided to come at him sideways while you guys have fun actually discussing things rationally
however michaelgeist.ca had same issue where he had to get that post thing with the picture it however has hacks around but does get rid a noobs.
just dont call the conservative govt facist at his site ( banned me from posting about a law that was about warrant less search and seizure and i said "hitler would be proud of such a fascist law".
I will say at last here there is a sense a humor and a lil more freedom to speak your mind BUT ill say it the tam guy is a good laugh. Its one think to be like a devils advocate to SPUR discussion but when doing so constantly contradicts oneself and makes you look like an idiot when facing irrefutable evidence or facts of sanity well. thats when you become an utter troll.
P.S. OMG large words hopw you don't get confused by them TAM
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crowdfunding by cupcakes
To my actual point. I fully agree on the post itself. Just yesterday I posted about one entrepreneur that had the idea for crowdfunding without knowing it
http://www.growvc.com/blog/2010/02/crowdfunding-by-cupcakes/
What comes to fundable, I think they were just too early to markets.
Note: if you find yourself in the position where you need to educate your market in the main concept, you may be too early...
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This is the dawn of Web 4.0
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Jeff Atwood
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Re: Jeff Atwood
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I guess "execution and idea" can also be "means and end", like the saying "The end justifies the means".
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The original idea was Schneier's, or Street Perfromers
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Very interesting
Thanks
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