Someone Created a Startup Just like Mine and Here Is Why That Is Awesome
blog.nugget.one
blog.nugget.one
Just want to preface this by saying Nugget.one is an incredible product that essentially inspired Opps Daily.
I signed up for your product shortly before new years, trying to figure out what kind of venture I would launch in the New Year.
I'm always struggling to find good software ideas, so your service seemed great. But it stopped after about a week and there was a hefty price tag to keep getting these ideas.
I just wanted ideas, not the community, so I figured out how you were getting the ideas and started getting them for myself. A few days later it became clear that I should start Opps Daily because there is incredible potential to help solve problems.
Anyways, just writing in to say I find your service pretty inspiring although I'm not trying to build a community to launch Saas products, but more of community where people learn about problems others are having and connect with those people.
I've actually sent a few people your way when they mentioned my emails lacked the analysis they were looking for.
Anyways, Im sorry if you feel like I stole something from you, I'm always singing your praises when someone mentions the similarity.
I'd love for you to drop me a line if you ever want to compare notes! :)
Regarding privacy: I deeply screwed up on this. Somehow I just assumed because Corey was so radically transparent that it was ok. That was my error and I apologize. Also I guess since the only identifying data was the domain name, which is public, I also somehow thought that was ok. I was wrong.
Regarding intent: It was not meant to come across as mean spirited. It really was just meant to be a good blog post. I missed the mark. Obviously my authorship screwed up on that point.
> I wish he wasn’t ripping off Nugget, but the fact that he is actually doing something is a big deal.
This would be a lot more impactful edited as such:
> The fact that he is actually doing something is a big deal.
The little (potentially read as snide ["ripping off"]) opening context for the sentiment actually detracts from its point and helps establish a negative author tone for potential readers. In general, placing any point behind a "but" detracts from impact and moves said impact to the opening context.
Hey writing is hard and written tone is super difficult to manage! As an idea, you might consider having friends read posts and comment on the overall tone before publishing (if you don't already).
Disclaimer: I am not a good writer so apply grains of salt liberally.
I ran the post past my smartest friends who read HN, they all said it looked good.
We just missed the privacy aspect and also in trying to be funny I went at it too hard.
FYI I just signed up to Opps Daily.
Sure, I'll send you an email and let's hook up and have a chat I have some thoughts about your vault idea.
On another note, I'm really curious to know how are the ideas worded in such a similar way. Were you inspired by my HIT process?
No worries if yes, it will just help to clear things up.
Thanks, Justin
It was just such a compelling format, you really nailed it.
I never saw the actual questions you asked, although I wished I had it would have saved me several bad batches :)
Also, fwiw I'm going to try and move away from Mechanical Turk soon, its good for a volume of responses, but I'm sure as you're aware most of the quality is low and you really have to filter.
Additionally you could have people bet money on the idea they prefer, and if the money stack got big enough, you use the stack to outsource a team to build a MVP and randomly give it to one of the gambler on the next day. DailyValidatedNugget?
But it does matter that you decided to publicly out him. This is very petty and as a user i would feel betrayed of my privacy.
You could have actually taken advantage of this and wrote a completely different blog post and people would have appreciated it, but this feels too petty. Even when you say it doesn't matter and all the diplomatic cliche saying competition is good, it just doesn't feel right because I can sense the bitterness in every word.
It's not like this guy was freelancing for you telling you he's going to build your idea and one day suddenly he launched it as his own. You already have a service out there. It's public domain. You can't "steal" an idea that's already out there.
He gave this guy a product idea, which is literally the goal of his own product, and now he's mad about it. Mad enough to breach his own privacy policy[1] and publicly out the guy, and to do it 1) to improve his own position, and 2) to hurt the other guy's.
It's a whole compact lesson on how not to treat your users.
[1]: Nugget Personnel: Nugget personnel and authorized consultants and/or contractors may have access to user information if necessary in the normal course of Nugget business.
Protection of Nugget and Others: We may release personal information when we believe in good faith that release is necessary to comply with a law; to enforce or apply our Terms of Use and other policies; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of Nugget, our employees, our users, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for fraud protection and credit risk reduction.
If I were the OP I would just delete the post. This is a free market and it shows that having and executing a nice idea is just half the battle, you need to think also about how to make your business model defensible, something the OP haven't done.
He may have gotten some pageviews out of this, but I think that it will take a very long time to repair his brand.
Having never been subscribed to any lists like this the post comparing the two didn't even convince me that Nugget was superior. Quite the opposite, I signed up for Opps Daily.
I for one don't think it is trivial to steal someones idea, but also response was a little bit too much.
Before I started a company, I probably would have said yes. After a few years in the startup world, I'm not so sure anymore.
There is, after all, a reason why inventions are patentable and ideas aren't.
Execution is king.
Competition, for the most part, is healthy. It validates that there is a market. Many successful businesses are created this way. The competition may/may not execute the idea better, but if they do then at least you know you have room for improvement. If they don't, well then that only strengthens your position as the front runner.
If it's a complete carbon copy, then it's usually survival of the fittest with who can obtain the most exposure. Don't get me wrong, I understand why you would be frustrated - it's never easy when a direct competitor pops up that can threaten the success of your business just as you're getting established (especially when you're emotionally and financially invested in it), but I think you're going to look back at this and realise exposing the competition this way really wasn't beneficial for you.
Regardless, keep your chin up. Don't let these types of things get you down - use it as a driving force to continue to improve and grow!
[0] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-slacks-full-page-ad-new-y...
I've always been kind of annoyed by pg's "Thanks to [these 8 influencers] for reviewing early versions of this article" footnotes, but I think it's valuable. (Annoyed because it feels like namedropping. That's my bias though, not his problem.)
"Sharing Your Information
Rest assured that we neither rent nor sell your personal information to anyone and that we will share your personal information only as described below. Nugget Personnel: Nugget personnel and authorized consultants and/or contractors may have access to user information if necessary in the normal course of Nugget business. Protection of Nugget and Others: We may release personal information when we believe in good faith that release is necessary to comply with a law; to enforce or apply our Terms of Use and other policies; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of Nugget, our employees, our users, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for fraud protection and credit risk reduction."
Any advice on how to technically change it but keep the HN submission live?
Someone Created a Startup Just like Mine and Here Is Why That Is Awesome
And changed the link to:
https://blog.nugget.one/upstart/someone-created-a-startup-ju...
It's like getting mad that you like woodworking and publish your projects online and then someone else decides to take up woodworking and publish their projects online.
Your article is both resentful and positive...I'd edit it to be more positive about the validity of what you're doing and not publicly bash this individual for getting excited enough to do the same.
After posting to HN, is it okay to edit the title and change the tone of the piece a bit at this point? How does that "look"? Is there precedent on HN for such edits? I've seen it done effectively elsewhere.
Personally, I like when the dialog continues, I like to see an article writer evolve his position after taking time to listen to, and fully grok the feedback he's getting. But, is that just me?
The word "Stole" implies something was taken, something was lost, something changed possession. Yet, the services are not identical, Nugget offers much more value for its customers, has an established trajectory and customer base. I don't see what has been "taken" from you, here.
Perhaps change it to:
“One of My Customers Created a Look-alike Business, and Here's Why That Is Awesome”
or
“One of My Customers Duplicated My Business, and Here's Why That Is Awesome”
or
“One of My Customers Copied My Business, and Here's Why That Is Awesome”
2. The FBA problem has been solved by Inventory Lab.
3. Regardless of the tone of OP, publishing any user data is bad.
When you control a service like this it's very easy to forget that while it's casual and normal for you to be able to see peoples information, to other people this is an awesome responsibility you've been entrusted with. Especially since it probably doesn't come up very often until it does, but by that point the cat is out of the bag.
To help prevent a normalization of deviance, you should put in some kind of mechanism to remind yourself that customer data is private and handling it should be treated with extreme care.
Every idea has multiple people who are considering it at around the same time. And rarely people act on it, because giving birth to new idea's can be like a 9 year gestation period. Not for the faint of heart.
Personally I know when I see someone who is also executing on an idea that I have had, I subscribe to them, just to keep up.
Mine:
I work in the eCommerce/re-seller business. In particular I sell products on Amazon. Specifically Amazon FBA.
As my business is scaling up it is becoming more difficult to keep track of what we scoured for product in the field and the costs associated with it. Tracking COGS and the sources to monitor and report would be great.
The software would need to be something mobile so I can put in the costs, source of product and expected profits. It would also need to be linked to Amazon.
Yes I would pay for this software.
Theirs:
I sell vinyl records on eBay, Amazon, Discogs, and Etsy.
I find it time-consuming to list products on each of these different sites.
Software that facilitated the listing and cross-listing of products would save me time and make me more money because I have far too much product on hand and not enough time to list it. Ideally the software could automatically pull info from one listing on one site and populate the other sites for me.
I would pay a monthly service fee for this.
Since we don't know who you're talking to, they introduce their industry. They name their problem. They guess at what a solution might do. And "will you pay for this" is product validation 101.
I could see having a longer template, but if you want the barebones edition, I don't see how you could come up with anything else.
I don't think you've got something novel--I think you learned it through repetition, here on HN.
<Problem Detail>
<Solution Outline>
<Whether/How Much $ It's Worth To a Customer>
I wonder what's the earliest copyright date on a business-plan book that contains this exact format for validating business ideas.
When your target demographic is composed of people desperate for startup ideas, you should expect this to happen.
There is no shortage of ideas. Those who succeed at this game already have more ideas than they have ambition. Those who would use a service like yours are not likely to succeed.
Over the years I've met developers and others who've talked about how they have a great idea, but then they Googled their idea and someone is already doing it. My response is always "so". Either analyze the deficiencies in their product and do it better, or find a new twist or angle to a concept that has never been tried.
Anyways, while the tone and content of this specific blog post is questionable and sub-par, I find many of Justin's other blog posts to be interesting.
Don't worry Justin, you'll be able to write a post after Cory does titled: "How I mistakenly accused a competitor of being evil led to market validation that ended up helping us both!"
Seems unlikely that could happen in the scenario you describe.
It could maybe be coincidental, since that's basically the default things you'd ask someone when trying to understand pain points and product ideas, but I do see your point since it seems like it's the same 4 questions.
Mine:
I work in the eCommerce/re-seller business. In particular I sell products on Amazon. Specifically Amazon FBA.
As my business is scaling up it is becoming more difficult to keep track of what we scoured for product in the field and the costs associated with it. Tracking COGS and the sources to monitor and report would be great.
The software would need to be something mobile so I can put in the costs, source of product and expected profits. It would also need to be linked to Amazon.
Yes I would pay for this software.
Theirs:
I sell vinyl records on eBay, Amazon, Discogs, and Etsy.
I find it time-consuming to list products on each of these different sites.
Software that facilitated the listing and cross-listing of products would save me time and make me more money because I have far too much product on hand and not enough time to list it. Ideally the software could automatically pull info from one listing on one site and populate the other sites for me.
I would pay a monthly service fee for this.
I've literally ripped a the summary i found from someone else's LinkedIn summary, tweaked (personalized for moi) it, published it because it was way better than mine and then over the ensuing week tweaked it again and again to the point that it didn't even resemble the original in any way. It just provided the foundation for moving in my own direction. Essentially i used that person's inspiration and came up with my own totally unique interpretation.
This guy could be doing that too. Good link bait though. Not classy, but good for sure.
If you think he's copying your MTurk generated ideas, go ahead and call him out. Don't write up a "competition is great" and "we're getting along well over the phone" nonsense. You're not buying it, we're not buying it.
What I recommend is you take the high road. As in don't dox your user base and keep on improving your product.
For what it's worth, you sitting on this until he paraphrased more than two email (e.g. like 10+) and then posting a "competition is okay, but plagiarism is not" article would have fared much better.
I am a big fan of anybody who manages to push a project into production, so the last thing in the World I want to do is be demeaning about somebody's project - nonetheless, I imagine at least one person has 'invented' a similar version of this idea every month for the past few years at least.
Luckily, it is operating that separates the wheat from the chaff.
I wonder if this was an attempt at virtue signaling (by making yourself seem untouched by him copying) or calling someone out; kind of pretentious.
You even tries to have another jab by asking him about his email procedure; trying to make him look bad.
Edit: I just wanted to point this out as an example of how much of CJ this community is. Everyone touts the same principles, but rarely follow them. Simply reading PG's essays is not enough.
Regardless, thanks for the read.
He might have copied it, but you can't be sure.
No Nugget for me ever.
@jv22222: in your opinion, does this blog post fall under any of these categories? And if not, why bother having a privacy policy at all?
That was not the point dude, you are still identifiying him in the blog post and showing your spy log on him.
The whole post is in bad taste. Epic failure.
While most people have enough ego and morals to do their own thing, there are many out there looking for easy ideas and methods to imitate. They like to call it inspiration which is a self-serving label to an otherwise immoral action.
Lets say there is competitor A, they have a SaaS application.
Developer looks at that and says, "that can be done in a weekend".
So he does it.
Scenario 1. He uses the same HTML, CSS and jQuery to base his application on. His SaaS application behaves exactly as theirs. His backend code is unique to him.
Scenario 2. He uses unique HTML, CSS and jQuery to base his application, but it looks the exact same. His SaaS application behaves exactly as theirs. His backend code is unique to him.
Scenario 3. He uses unique HTML, CSS and jQuery to base his application, unique to him. His SaaS application behaves in a unique way but achieves the same result as theirs. His backend code is unique to him.
Under which scenario will he get sued and which scenario is he untouchable?
I was watching Dragons Den CA and Michelle Romanow said that "Copying was ok".
Where is the line, which scenario can the Competitor claim copyright to their works?
Has anyone faced this situation?
Thanks
Edit.
I find it interesting you say all 3 scenarios when the 3rd one is all unique code.
For example. If we look at behavioral marketing.
mouseflow hotjar navilytics fullstory crazyegg
+ im sure there is more.
What you are saying, is that any of these guys could sue each other? For what, copying the same idea and executing it?
It's actually launching something that's the most difficult problem; a startup helping with that could work, anyone know of one?
I'd love to get your thoughts and feedback!
Then, it could just procedurally generate a company name and logo (lowercase white letter on a rounded rectangle), reserve the domain name, file the FTC paperwork, and send automated emails to venture capitalists. Then just watch the money roll in.
Throw in a startup buzzword lorem ipsum generator and this sounds like a winner. Instead of domain squatting it will be like startup squatting.
Learned a lot, but it doesn't help me get my business launched.
The problem is that they're usually only interesting to me :)
"I am finance officer for a startup ..." How is a finance officer for a startup going to end up on mturk doing HITs? What am I missing...
your "ideal world" is actually (surprisingly) the world of free market capitalism.
You see, most "free market" "private sector" types base their views on microeconomics, "let the market decide" what "the market clearing price" is, there will be no shortages, price gouging is a signal to competitors and new market entrants...
But they forget that microeconomic theory is entirely based on some assumptions and axioms, one of which is "perfect (symmetric) information", buyers, sellers, competitors, and investors are assumed to all share the same information, no secrets, and without that openness, the market will never find the market clearing price.
creating wealth is not the raison d'etre of free market capitalism; cheap and abundant goods and services for consumers is
I don't think this is true. In this world, companies keep business ideas for themselves, so they can try to be first to market, which is more important than almost anything else (even to a large extent product quality). On the other hand, potential customers don't ever publish their needs, they just don't seem to know what they want until somebody tells it to them.