Startup Ideas – from Paul Graham

20th of July 2008 by admin

Paul Graham – author of Hackers and Painters – and the man behind Y Combinator shares his thoughts in this post.

We don’t like to sit on these ideas, though, because we really want people to work on them. So we’re trying something new: we’re going to list some of the ideas we’ve been waiting to see, but only describe them in general terms. It may be that recipes for ideas are the most useful form anyway, because imaginative people will take them in directions we didn’t anticipate.

The full list…
1. A cure for the disease of which the RIAA is a symptom.
2. Simplified browsing.
3. New news.
4. Outsourced IT.
5. Enterprise software 2.0.
6. More variants of CRM.
7. Something your company needs that doesn’t exist.
8. Dating.
9. Photo/video sharing services.
10. Auctions.
11. Web Office apps.
12. Fix advertising.
13. Online learning.
14. Tools for measurement.
15. Off the shelf security.
16. A form of search that depends on design.
17. New payment methods.
18. The WebOS.
19. Application and/or data hosting.
20. Shopping guides.
21. Finance software for individuals and small businesses.
22. A web-based Excel/database hybrid.
23. More open alternatives to Wikipedia.
24. A buffer against bad customer service.
25. A Craigslist competitor.
26. Better video chat.
27. Hardware/software hybrids.
28. Fixing email overload.
29. Easy site builders for specific markets.
30. Startups for startups.

I know a few web2ireland startups are tackling some of these ideas – would love to do a follow up post to categorize those companies – please let us know what “number” you fall under.

2 Responses to “Startup Ideas – from Paul Graham”

[...] – see list of coverage IETF Meeting in Dublin Three Weeks left to apply to SeedCamp Barcamps – Cork Startup Ideas – from Paul Graham Building your webapp in the [...]

I would love to know what to do with a great tech start-up idea if you do not have technical skills to see it through!