Example: Y combinator app

=YC Winter '10 App=

Submitting ideas

 * We want to create an environment that nurtures the development and cross pollination of ideas, by allowing users to submit thoughts about ways to improve their daily experiences.
 * Things that Would Be Nice to have, that the user might have a vague idea of how to implement.

Fleshing out ideas

 * A way for users to break down the refined idea into discrete problems that need to be solved


 * Users break the problem down into smaller units
 * A tool that helps startups bloom would require
 * A way for users to submit ideas
 * A way for other users to respond to those ideas,
 * refine them
 * distill them
 * expand them
 * shape them into something else
 * apply them to a different context,
 * etc

A Knowledge Base

 * A way for users who have experience solving similar problems to contribute their solutions to the knowledgebase
 * These solutions can be as specific or abstract as the contributor would like
 * A way for users to respond to a solution:
 * Refining it,
 * Criticizing it,
 * Suggesting alternatives,
 * Breaking it down into even smaller discrete problems to be solved

Community submitted solutions

 * Architecture patterns (?)
 * Programming design datterns:
 * Create a reusable solution to a common problem encountered in programming.
 * Architecture patterns:
 * Like language specific design patterns, or generic software design patterns, but abstracted more.
 * Doesn't solve a programming problem, but rather a project design problem.
 * In project design / architecture, there are many problems encountered that have a common solution.
 * Startups often roll their own solutions, and are pretty opaque about both their end solution, and the process by which they arrived at it.
 * If startups contributed their solutions to a knowledge base, other startups could use them, and focus on more interesting problems.

Fleshing out the idea, part two
Hopefully, at this point we have
 * A database of ideas, at different stages of development
 * A database of solutions to frequently encountered startup problems
 * Software Design / Architecture
 * Other startup issues, such as
 * legal,
 * health insurance,
 * funding
 * how to find office space


 * A way for other users to expand upon that knowledge, and document how they applied this knowledge
 * A way for users to learn how to solve the problems that they identify
 * A way for other users to post new problems that arise, and seek suggestions from a community

From ideas to implementation
Our service will allow people to fill one or more roles:

A Project Manager

 * Someday, hopefully one of the users is frustrated enough by a problem or interested enough in an idea to realize it into a project
 * That user can
 * examine the problems presented,
 * identify existing solutions for some of the problems,
 * design custom solutions to the problems that are not yet solved
 * implement or recruit someone to implement these solutions

When the user decides to implement the problem, he/she becomes its project manager.

The project manager must then recruit people to fill one or more of the following roles:

A Software Engineer

 * Someone to supervise individual programmers
 * Ideally, people with extensive experience
 * Usually one of the founders

Coders

 * Users who submit solutions probably have experience implementing them
 * Some of the users might have spare time,
 * Some may be interested in some of the projects that are implementing their solutions
 * They might be persuaded to contribute their expertise to projects

Compensation
Different users have different motivations Some will work
 * for free (ideal)
 * could be open source,
 * scratching an itch
 * personal satisfaction
 * portfolio building, summer of code, etc
 * in return for equity shares
 * depends on the valuation of the company
 * in return for money (worst)

Our service will facilitate these transactions

=For each founder, please list: YC username; name; age; year, school, degree and subject for each degree; email address; personal url (if any); and present employer and title (if any). Put unfinished degrees in parens. List the main contact first. Separate founders with blank lines. Put an asterisk before the name of anyone not able to move to the Bay Area.= milkshakes, James Brim, Brown '11 - Computer Science, Economics

=Please tell us in one or two sentences about something impressive that each founder has built or achieved.=

Jamie
Jamie build a municipal wifi network that provided free, stable internet to an island community. Unfortunately, he was not politically savvy enough to unseat the establishment, which provided shitty, slow, expensive dsl. =Please tell us about the time you, most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage.= =Please tell us about an interesting project, preferably outside of class or work, that two or more of you created together. Include urls if possible.= N/A

=How long have the founders known one another and how did you meet? Have any of the founders not met in person?= N/A

=What's new about what you're doing? What are people forced to do now because what you plan to make doesn't exist yet?=

Problem:
Right now, there are many quality collections of literature, news, and lessons related to startups, all of which are freely available. However, it this information is scattered across the vastness of the internet, and not centrally indexed anywhere.

Solution:
We want to search for, aggregate, and index this information, and present it in an intuitive, intertwined format.

Problem:
Right now there are many interactive services that allow users to submit news articles, links, and media related to startups, however there are no central interfaces through which a user can access all of this functionality simultaneously.

Solution:
We plan to implement

Problem
Right now, there are lots of micro funding sites, seed camps, etc. But they are scattered as well, and there are only partial guides to navigating the sea of options out there. And there is no central place to evaluate and eventually select one of your options.

Solution
We will provide a facility that allows the community to vote on what to fund. We will raise money, and allocate it according to the community's votes. We'll provide a common application that answers most seed / angel / vc funding questions, and allow a user to submit to many potential investors at once.

=What do you understand about your business that other companies in it just don't get?= =Who are your competitors, and who might become competitors? Who do you fear most?= =How will you make money?= =If you've already started working on it, how long have you been working and how many lines of code (if applicable) have you written? =If you have an online demo, what's the url? (Please don't password protect it; just use an obscure url.) =How long will it take before you have a prototype? A beta? A version you can charge for? =If you're already incorporated, when were you? Who are the shareholders and what percent does each own? If you've had funding, how much, at what valuation(s)? =If you're not incorporated yet, please list the percent of the company you plan to give each founder, and anyone else you plan to give stock to. (This question is as much for you as us.) =If we fund you, which of the founders will commit to working exclusively (no school, no other jobs) on this project for the next year? =For founders who can't, why not? What level of commitment are they willing to make? =Do any founders have other commitments between January and May 2010 inclusive? =Do any founders have commitments in the future (e.g. finishing college, going to grad school), and if so what? =Are any of the founders covered by noncompetes or intellectual property agreements that overlap with your project? Will any be working as employees or consultants for anyone else? =Was any of your code written by someone who is not one of your founders? If so, how can you safely use it? (Open source is ok of course. =Are any of the following true?
 * You are the only founder.
 * You are a student who may return to school when the next term starts.
 * Half or more of your group can't move to the Bay Area.
 * One or more founders will keep their current jobs.
 * None of the founders are programmers.
 * If you had any other ideas you considered applying with, feel free to list them. One may be something we've been waiting for.
 * Are any of the founders covered by noncompetes or intellectual property agreements that overlap with your project? Will any be working as employees or consultants for anyone else?
 * Please tell us something surprising or amusing that one of you has discovered. (The answer need not be related to your project.)