My strategy is the opposite - take ideas that are often simple to state but whose execution is so complex as to tax the limits of the human mind. Then if I succeed I shouldn't have to worry much about competition (at least for a couple of years).
I often wonder why the software and internet businesses seem so strongly winner take all, where the winner is most typically not the first but the best (in a sense measured by the market) to execute an idea (ie. Microsoft, Google, Facebook). It seems like the classical economic view of competitive markets is becoming more and more of a fantasy world.
"In economics and business, a network effect (also called network externality) is the effect that one user of a good or service has on the value of that product to other people. When network effect is present, the value of a product or service increases as more people use it."
Not just internet and software businesses, railroads, telephone networks, and financial markets are other businesses that are impacted by network effects.