[skulled]

(05-21-2013 04:06 PM)Plutoman Wrote:  

Well aware of potential difficulties - not looking at free millions, but more whether hoofing it without the degree can promote a stable career in the field. I'm fairly confident that I'll be successful in whatever field I branch into; I could be modest here, but I feel honesty is better when I say I know I'm more intelligent than 95% of the people in my classes alone in my field from the ease at which I grasp new topics and end up teaching them.

I have access to resources and capital - I'm very good with networking. I am very, very sure I want to go on my own. I do not want to work for a company. I am not the personality type to work under someone for years and years. I could do it for periods of time, but it is not a career to me to follow someone else's direction. I want to go my own direction, and find people interested in doing that with me (this isn't necessarily for the point of my way or the highway, but I want to have input in the topic - I'll work with a small group, we'll figure a goal, we'll accomplish it, etc).

If this is the case, then by all means go for it. I am in no way encouraging you to stop university or such, but the reality is that it won't really help much in any case except if you want to have a backup plan to get a 9 - 5 type of deal later.

(05-21-2013 04:06 PM)Plutoman Wrote:  

Input on the idea stages -> business plan is useful. I'm working on that. Are there any good books you could recommend per chance? The main difficulty is understanding what specifically I need to research - what do I need to look at, take notes on, plan for. I'm very confident that if I have a good idea, then I can make it happen from the resources I have available (between close friends, mentors, capital, etc).

There are some books that might be helpful, I have a list somewhere, I will try and post it up.

These are some things you want to keep in mind, off the top of my mind:

- Remember that the idea by itself is neither good or bad. It is the execution that matters.

- Things to look for:

-- Viability of the idea as a product - the idea needs to be transformed in to a viable product. Viability on multiple fronts as well - financial, economical, benefits, ease of use etc. A silly example, you can power a light bulb with a potato, but it is not viable long term and in mass. You get the point?

-- Your market and target audience - This should be your biggest focus of attention. Who will you be catering to - regular users, enterprises, small businesses etc? What is your competition? How can you be better than them, if there is competition? Is it easy to break in as a new player?

-- Product offering - Would it serve you better to offer the product as a revenue making one or a service or a mix of both? There are already examples of existing products which use the different methods.

-- Past examples - Try and learn about existing products, how they went about and came to be. Look at the failed ideas or products very keenly, you can learn a lot from why they failed as much as you can learn from why something was successful.

(05-21-2013 04:06 PM)Plutoman Wrote:  

Questions on advertisements are specifically related to the monetization of a piece of software, and whether it would be more beneficial to pursue free products with advertisements, paid, subscription, etc. Currently, my ideas are in lists - not any single one, but a multitude, and I want to sit down with a small group, discuss them, figure out which is the most productive idea to turn into reality. Sort them into a list and provide backup options, keep a couple closely related ones that could be transitioned in any odd circumstances.

Revenue and monetization are essentially tied in with the nature and features of your product. Will the product be SAOS, or client based? This single question will answer the path you will need to go on.

Although monetization is possible with ads, it should not be your main source of revenue. This is not always the case, but it predominantly is. It is hard to offer suggestions without knowing more about the idea or the product itself, so I will leave it at this.

Another thing you need to account for, only in the case of one time payments or client based products, is how will you overcome or combat piracy or free loaders, and deal with enforcing licensing for your product?

(05-21-2013 04:06 PM)Plutoman Wrote:  

The notes on an exit strategy is a good one. That had entirely escaped my consideration, yet is an extremely important thought in the development process.

Pay close attention to this factor. A bunch of times, a good product will lose out only because there isn't a clearly defined exit strategy.

You need to be clear on how you want to go out, or if you want to go out upfront. Sometimes you can change course, but often times it is not possible or beneficial to change course mid-way.

(05-21-2013 04:06 PM)Plutoman Wrote:  

I'm sorting through my thoughts and building contacts, getting in touch with people, I will send you a PM in the next few days if you don't mind. I want to get serious with this, but I have to get the decision fleshed out through this summer, so I will be trying to work quickly. I just met a guy yesterday who is self-taught doing web design, my age, got a job right out of high school. Interesting synchronicity. Going to be talking with him, as he knows PHP/MySQL/etc that I don't know well, while I correspondingly know Java, C++, some C#, that he does not.

With that - I very much appreciate the input. Exactly the type of response I was looking for, and I appreciate the depth of the response and the questions put back to me.

No worries, glad to be of help.

A quick note, focus a bit more on UI/UX as well. A good product is one which people want to use, not the one which has most features or does really complicated things.

You have to get people to want to use the product because it is easy to use, and they have fun using it and it does exactly what they want without hurdles. You could have come up with an algorithm to determine the exact numbers for the next lottery, but if a user doesn't feel at home they will rather turn to that product, which merely throws out random numbers simply because it looks nicer and is easy to use.

Another thing since you pointed programming languages, don't discount any particular language or platform simply because you don't know it or you know someone who knows something else. The platform should always be dictated by how your platform will work and what components will make it work most efficiently.

Hope this helps, if you have any further questions, don't hesitate to let me know.