<sarcasm> But Alex, the government would do such an efficient job of running a high quality, five star hotel.</sarcasm>
This post makes me think of an old Chinese proverb: "The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed." True in everything from sports to startups.
Sometimes it is good to give without any expectation of return. If nothing else, it's good karma just to help out some startups that need it, whether or not you ever get anything in return. I'll go on record and say this... I guarantee that any true "hackstar" out there who volunteers this summer will be far better off in the future (job opps, co-founder relationships, VC relationships, learning experience, etc.). Guarantee.
Bradley, thanks for the good, succinct summary of the tweet stream. The link to this post was ranked third in the Entrepreneurs swarm on Swattr when I found it.
I hate patent trolls, which is exactly what this person sounds like. As an entrepreneur, I never ask for NDAs. For one, no smart VC or investor would even consider signing it and it would make me look stupid for asking. Second, if my idea is so easy to execute that me simply telling you about it at a high level gives you the ability to go out and do it better and faster than me, then I have to ask, ...is this idea really much of an opportunity? Can I (and my team) really execute on this idea? And if I don't have much of an opportunity, why would you want to steal it?
Patent trolls are evil. They undermine the trust and goodwill of the entrepreneurial community, and by doing so, make it more difficult for the legitimate people building real companies with solutions to real problems.
Agree. That was my thought exactly. The value proposition of ShopSavvy is obvious, but it's not an iPhone app, so it's automatically dismissed by the Crunchie crowd.
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Contraption