Frighteningly Ambitious Startup Ideas

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<img src="http://www.virtumundo.com/images/spacer.gif" height=15 width=1> 想要创业吗？

Get funded by Y Combinator .

获得 Y Combinator 的资助。

</td > March 2012 One of the more surprising things I've noticed while working on Y Combinator is how frightening the most ambitious startup ideas are.

</td> 2012 年 3 月 在 Y Combinator 工作期间，我注意到的最令人惊讶的事情之一是最雄心勃勃的创业想法是多么可怕。

In this essay I'm going to demonstrate this phenomenon by describing some.

在这篇文章中，我将通过描述一些现象来证明这一现象。

Any one of them could make you a billionaire.

其中任何一个都可以让你成为亿万富翁。

That might sound like an attractive

这听起来可能很有吸引力

prospect, and yet when I describe these ideas you may notice you find yourself shrinking away from them.

然而，当我描述这些想法时，你可能会发现自己在回避它们。

Don't worry, it's not a sign of weakness.

别担心，这不是软弱的表现。

Arguably it's a sign of sanity.

可以说，这是理智的标志。

The biggest startup ideas are terrifying.

最大的创业想法都是可怕的。

And not just because they'd be a lot of work.

不仅仅是因为他们需要做很多工作。

The biggest ideas seem to threaten your identity: you wonder if you'd have enough ambition to carry them through.

最伟大的想法似乎威胁到了你的身份：你想知道自己是否有足够的雄心来实现它们。

There's a scene in Being John Malkovich where the nerdy hero

《成为约翰·马尔科维奇》中有一个场景，书呆子英雄

encounters a very attractive, sophisticated woman.

遇到一位非常有魅力、成熟的女人。

She says to him: Here's the thing: If you ever got me, you wouldn't have a clue what to do with me.

她对他说：事情是这样的：如果你得到了我，你就不知道该如何对待我。

That's what these ideas say to us.

这就是这些想法告诉我们的。

This phenomenon is one of the most important things you can understand about startups.

这种现象是你能理解的关于初创公司的最重要的事情之一。

[ 1 ] You'd expect big startup ideas to be attractive, but actually they tend to repel you.

[1] 你可能期望大型创业想法很有吸引力，但实际上它们往往会让你感到排斥。

And that has a bunch of consequences.

这会带来一系列后果。

It means these ideas are invisible to most

这意味着这些想法对于大多数人来说是看不见的

people who try to think of startup ideas, because their subconscious filters them out.

人们试图思考创业想法，因为他们的潜意识将其过滤掉。

Even the most ambitious people are probably best off approaching them obliquely.

即使是最雄心勃勃的人也可能最好以间接的方式接近他们。

1.

1.

A New Search Engine The best ideas are just on the right side of impossible.

新的搜索引擎 最好的想法就在不可能的右侧。

I don't know if this one is possible, but there are signs it might be.

我不知道这是否可能，但有迹象表明可能是。

Making a new search engine means competing with Google, and recently I've noticed some cracks in their fortress.

制作一个新的搜索引擎意味着与谷歌竞争，最近我注意到他们的堡垒出现了一些裂缝。

The point when it became clear to me that Microsoft had lost their way was when they decided to get into the search business.

当我决定进军搜索业务时，我才清楚地意识到微软已经迷失了方向。

That was not a natural move for Microsoft.

对于微软来说，这并不是一个自然的举动。

They did it because they were afraid of Google, and Google was in the search business.

他们这样做是因为他们害怕谷歌，而谷歌从事的是搜索业务。

But this meant (a) Google was now setting Microsoft's agenda, and (b) Microsoft's agenda consisted of stuff they weren't good at.

但这意味着（a）谷歌现在正在制定微软的议程，（b）微软的议程由他们不擅长的东西组成。

Microsoft : Google :: Google : Facebook.

微软：谷歌：：谷歌：Facebook。

That does not by itself mean there's room for a new search engine, but lately when using Google search I've found myself nostalgic for the old days, when Google was true to its own slightly aspy self.

这本身并不意味着有新的搜索引擎的空间，但最近在使用谷歌搜索时，我发现自己怀念过去的日子，当时谷歌忠实于自己略显迟钝的自我。

Google used to give me a page of the right answers, fast, with no clutter.

谷歌过去常常给我一页正确的答案，速度很快，没有混乱。

Now the results seem inspired by the Scientologist principle that what's true is what's true for you.

现在的结果似乎受到山达基教原则的启发，即对你而言，真实的就是真实的。

And the pages don't have the

并且页面没有

clean, sparse feel they used to.

干净、稀疏的感觉是他们习惯的。

Google search results used to look like the output of a Unix utility.

Google 搜索结果过去看起来就像 Unix 实用程序的输出。

Now if I accidentally put the cursor in the wrong place, anything might happen.

现在，如果我不小心将光标放在错误的位置，则可能会发生任何事情。

The way to win here is to build the search engine all the hackers use.

在这里获胜的方法是建立所有黑客都使用的搜索引擎。

A search engine whose users consisted of the top 10,000 hackers and no one else would be in a very powerful position despite its small size, just as Google was when it was that search engine.

一个用户由前 10,000 名黑客组成的搜索引擎，尽管规模很小，但没有其他人会处于非常强大的地位，就像谷歌作为搜索引擎时的情况一样。

And

并且

for the first time in over a decade the idea of switching seems thinkable to me.

对我来说，十多年来，第一次有了转变的想法。

Since anyone capable of starting this company is one of those 10,000 hackers, the route is at least straightforward: make the search engine you yourself want.

由于任何有能力创办这家公司的人都是这 10,000 名黑客中的一员，因此路线至少很简单：制作您自己想要的搜索引擎。

Feel free to make it excessively hackerish.

随意让它变得过于黑客化。

Make it really good for code search, for example.

例如，让它非常适合代码搜索。

Would you like search queries to be Turing complete?

您希望搜索查询是图灵完备的吗？

Anything that gets you those

任何能让你得到这些的东西

10,000 users is ipso facto good.

10,000 个用户本身就很好。

Don't worry if something you want to do will constrain you in the long term, because if you don't get that initial core of users, there won't be a long term.

如果你想做的事情从长远来看会限制你，请不要担心，因为如果你没有获得最初的核心用户，就不会有长期的发展。

If you can just build something that you and your friends genuinely prefer to Google, you're already about 10% of the way to an IPO, just as Facebook was (though they probably didn't realize it) when they got all the Harvard undergrads.

如果你能开发出你和你的朋友真正喜欢的东西，而不是谷歌，那么你就已经成功完成 IPO 的 10% 了，就像 Facebook 招揽了所有哈佛本科生时的情况一样（尽管他们可能没有意识到这一点）。

2.

2.

Replace Email Email was not designed to be used the way we use it now.

替换电子邮件 电子邮件的设计目的并非像我们现在使用的那样。

Email is not a messaging protocol.

电子邮件不是消息传递协议。

It's a todo list.

这是一个待办事项列表。

Or rather, my inbox is a todo list, and email is the way things get onto it.

或者更确切地说，我的收件箱是一个待办事项列表，而电子邮件是处理事情的方式。

But it is a disastrously bad todo list.

但这是一个灾难性的糟糕的待办事项清单。

I'm open to different types of solutions to this problem, but I suspect that tweaking the inbox is not enough, and that email has to be replaced with a new protocol.

我愿意接受针对此问题的不同类型的解决方案，但我怀疑调整收件箱还不够，并且必须用新协议替换电子邮件。

This new protocol should be a todo list protocol, not a messaging protocol, although there is a degenerate case where what someone wants you to do is: read the following text.

这个新协议应该是待办事项列表协议，而不是消息传递协议，尽管存在一种退化情况，即某人希望您做的是：阅读以下文本。

As a todo list protocol, the new protocol should give more power to the recipient than email does.

作为待办事项列表协议，新协议应该为收件人提供比电子邮件更多的权力。

I want there to be more restrictions on what someone can put on my todo list.

我希望对某人可以在我的待办事项列表中添加的内容有更多限制。

And when someone can put something on my todo list, I want them to tell me more about what

当有人可以将某件事放入我的待办事项列表时，我希望他们告诉我更多关于什么的信息

they want from me.

他们想从我这里得到。

Do they want me to do something beyond just reading some text?

除了阅读一些文字之外，他们还想让我做点什么吗？

How important is it?

它有多重要？

(There obviously has to be some mechanism to prevent people from saying everything is important.) When does it have to be done?

（显然必须有某种机制来防止人们说一切都很重要。）什么时候必须这样做？

This is one of those ideas that's like an irresistible force meeting an immovable object.

这是一种类似不可抗拒的力量遇到不可移动物体的想法。

On one hand, entrenched protocols are impossible to replace.

一方面，根深蒂固的协议是不可能被取代的。

On the other, it seems unlikely that people in

另一方面，人们似乎不太可能

100 years will still be living in the same email hell we do now.

100 年后我们仍将生活在同样的电子邮件地狱中。

And if email is going to get replaced eventually, why not now?

如果电子邮件最终会被取代，为什么不现在呢？

If you do it right, you may be able to avoid the usual chicken and egg problem new protocols face, because some of the most powerful people in the world will be among the first to switch to it.

如果你做得正确，你也许能够避免新协议通常面临的先有鸡还是先有蛋的问题，因为世界上一些最有权势的人将是第一批转向它的人。

They're all at the mercy of email too.

他们也都受到电子邮件的支配。

Whatever you build, make it fast.

无论你构建什么，都要让它快速。

GMail has become painfully slow.

GMail 变得慢得令人痛苦。