Even though we won’t get in I’m quite excited to get our hacker news rejection email (such is my anticipation) in the morning.
Although the focus of the software startup community is mostly about realism and this annoying tendency is a realistic one, it still grates when smart people are too focused on the marketing. I get it, it’s how you sell. It’s absolutely necessary for good products too, otherwise they’ll just die on the vine leaving the crappy products victorious. But it ain’t pushing us forward, it’s pushing marketing forward, not us.
Also marketing by market testing. Just build a landing page, buy some ads pretending you’ve solved a problem, then see if anyone cares. Do you care? Can you not make something from your own imagination. What would make the world better? Does the pop viewpoint have the best visions? Doesn’t the fringe move us forward or are they merely pushed along by the mass behind them?
The process is a good one. Makes you ask the right questions, face reality. The means rather than the ends.
Re: marketing. It’s what got me about Seth Godin. Make something so remarkable people can’t ignore you. You still have to get it out there, but if it’s good enough, people will share.
Re: pop viewpoint. The non-gimmicky fringe is the fringe because it’s pushing the boundaries, not being pushed. One thing you learn early on as a BA (and is attributed to Steve Jobs as so many pithy product quotes are now) is that you don’t ask what people want. You give them what they don’t know they want yet.