The graveyard of good ideas
Solutions that were tried, and what stopped them.
Patents that were rejected or abandoned, products that shut down, projects that went quiet. Borrow the idea, avoid the dead end.
3,400 solutions
- startupShut down2013
Ask HN: Twitter/Posterous - The Archive Team needs more time to save 1.3M blogs
TL;DR Posterous is shutting down in a week and the Archive Team needs more time else 1.3 million blogs will essentially disappear. -- I've been following an exchange between Jason Scott (Archive Team / Internet Archive) and Sachin Agarwal (Posterous) [1]. It appears that Posterous gave the Archive Team some dedicated servers to hit but it wasn't sufficient to download the amount that's going to be deleted. I don't know all of the details but saving content to a historical archive is invaluable. Offering the ability for users to download their content is great but it serves a very different purpose than what the Archive Team and Internet Archive does. Additionally, it's certain that much of the content will disappear because users didn't receive the shutdown email, 30 days wasn't long enough or simply didn't bother to do anything. The public content there is still valuable. [1] https://tw
Why it failed: TL;DR Posterous is shutting down in a week and the Archive Team needs more time else 1.3 million blogs will essentially disappear. -- I've been following an exchange between Jason Scott (Archive Team / Internet Archive) and Sachin Agarwal (Posterous) [1]. It appears that Posterou
jmathai
- startupShut down2013
Aaron Swartz (and others)
The suicide of Aaron Swartz is a tragedy. There have been many others who have "chosen" to end their lives, e.g. Sam Roweis (http://www.cs.nyu.edu/csweb/People/samroweis.html and http://samroweis1972-2010.blogspot.ca). I put "chosen" in quotes because one thing they have in common is Clinical Depression. This condition is not the sort of hipster malaise / ennuye that we like to attribute to "Genuises", or "Artists" as some kind of "Creativity" well. Clinical Depression is a biological cluster bomb to the brain, a paralysing, life-threatening condition that we should think of as the mental equivalent of a spinal cord injury ... not a "mid-life crisis" or emotional "funk". Aaron's death highlights an issue that has been in the forefront of the US newsmedia in recent months, mental health care (or lack thereof) in our society. We have been focusing on tragedies like the shooting of Gabby Gi
Why it failed: The suicide of Aaron Swartz is a tragedy. There have been many others who have "chosen" to end their lives, e.g. Sam Roweis (http://www.cs.nyu.edu/csweb/People/samroweis.html and http://samroweis1972-2010.blogspot.ca). I put "chosen" in quotes because one thing they have in commo
plg
- startupShut down2012
Post-Mortem of AWS Outage
[Self-post because it's not easily linkable] We would like to share some detail about the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) service event last night when power was lost to some EC2 instances and Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) volumes in a single Availability Zone in the US East Region. At approximately 8:44PM PDT, there was a cable fault in the high voltage Utility power distribution system. Two Utility substations that feed the impacted Availability Zone went offline, causing the entire Availability Zone to fail over to generator power. All EC2 instances and EBS volumes successfully transferred to back-up generator power. At 8:53PM PDT, one of the generators overheated and powered off because of a defective cooling fan. At this point, the EC2 instances and EBS volumes supported by this generator failed over to their secondary back-up power (which is provided by a completely separate
Why it failed: [Self-post because it's not easily linkable] We would like to share some detail about the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) service event last night when power was lost to some EC2 instances and Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) volumes in a single Availability Zone in the US Eas
dlgeek
- startupShut down2012
HN, I need to learn how to ship
(Using my favorite throwaway account.) The title says it all, HN. I can't ship. This isn't about shipping the first version of my nascent startup's web app, though. This is about completing anything in life, putting a big bow on it, and calling it done. I'm terrible about finishing things in all areas of my life, whether it's chores around the house, libraries I need to finish at work, or OSS bugs I've promised -- but failed -- to patch. I hate it, too, because it is a particularly flaky behavior characteristic of people who are "big talkers" or commit to doing too much. I don't want to be unreliable, but I really just struggle to finish things up. Has anyone solved this problem for themselves? Have you gone from someone who underproduces to one who knocks things out of the park? I'd love to hear your advice.
Why it failed: (Using my favorite throwaway account.) The title says it all, HN. I can't ship. This isn't about shipping the first version of my nascent startup's web app, though. This is about completing anything in life, putting a big bow on it, and calling it done. I'm terrible about finishi
fooboy
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: How do aquihires work?
As I understand it, an "aquihire" is an acquisition of a startup by a large company where the acquirer is not interested in the startup's product, technology or userbase, but only in its employees, who will presumably be shifted to work on the acquirer's own projects while the startup's work is abandoned. The impression I get from HN is that this is fairly common and explained as such employees being very valuable since they have proven the ability to create something. But what is the advantage of a (presumably rather costly - or does it happen only to failed startups with low valuations?) acquihire over simply "poaching" those employees? After all, the employees could leave the acquirer ASAP (especially if there is resentment over the product they had worked on being abandoned), and the founders and early employees (who have proven their ability the most) get a lot of money via their sh
Why it failed: As I understand it, an "aquihire" is an acquisition of a startup by a large company where the acquirer is not interested in the startup's product, technology or userbase, but only in its employees, who will presumably be shifted to work on the acquirer's own projects while the st
brazzy
- startupShut down2012
Facebook shuts down page of lead DADT repeal group based on fake complaint
Hello HN - Anyone have contacts at Facebook? They killed our page facebook.com/outserve on a false claim of IP infringement from a fictitious person. Any help from this group would be much appreciated. Thanks! -Ty Walrod OutServe Co-Founder http://outserve.org
Why it failed: Hello HN - Anyone have contacts at Facebook? They killed our page facebook.com/outserve on a false claim of IP infringement from a fictitious person. Any help from this group would be much appreciated. Thanks! -Ty Walrod OutServe Co-Founder http://outserve.org
tywalrod
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: I am shutting down. And starting up, again? What do you think?
Hey guys, I've been around enough for quite some time to see people excited about building new things and then some shutting the very same business down a year or two later. It's just a thing that happens and is most likely a smart call to make in most of these cases. Today, I made the decision to shut down my business. Something I've worked on for over 2 years right after quitting an insanely well paid job at Microsoft. I am running my bank accounts dry (there's something left, no worries) and did not succeed in pushing my revolution enough. I am starting a new project called urbanvisitor.com and I wanted to see what you guys think beforehand. Opinions are always to be treated with caution, but the last time, I was the only one who was 100% sure I'll succeed, so that didn't work out well. So quickly: I want to build a real-time scheduling/meeting slots application centered around the id
Why it failed: Hey guys, I've been around enough for quite some time to see people excited about building new things and then some shutting the very same business down a year or two later. It's just a thing that happens and is most likely a smart call to make in most of these cases. Today, I ma
mittermayr
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Finding work for a significant other
Hello! Long-time lurker - first time asker. Seeking a bit of advice wrt helping a significant other find a job. We recently relocated from Chicago to the Bay Area (around August of 2011). The decision to move was largely my own and I perhaps softened the blow of leaving 'home' a bit by assuring my significant other that she'd have no issue finding something here in the valley. She's got a rock solid resume and wonderful dotcom experience - it seemed like a no-brainer. In fact, I went so far as to convince her to quit a great gig back in Chicago (knowing she could work remotely) because she'd grown a bit tired of it after a number of years - and the West - if nothing else - still holds the romanticism of a fresh start (at least for me.) So here we are, six months in - and she's still looking for an opportunity. She's had a couple of interviews thanks to some of the folks funding our endea
Why it failed: Hello! Long-time lurker - first time asker. Seeking a bit of advice wrt helping a significant other find a job. We recently relocated from Chicago to the Bay Area (around August of 2011). The decision to move was largely my own and I perhaps softened the blow of leaving 'home' a
iwritecode
- startupShut down2012
Thank HN: Claim your personal Screenleap handle until April 30
Hey Hacker News, You have been really good to Screenleap since our soft launch here back in February and we would like to give back to you. We are launching user accounts with handles next week and wanted to give the Hacker News community first dibs on claiming their handles. For a limited time only (until midnight on April 30, 2012), you can claim your free user handle by signing up using our Hacker News promo at http://www.screenleap.com/signup?referer=hn A handle is a username link that can be provided to friends (i.e., http://www.screenleap.com/pg) as an easy way to initiate a screen session with someone. We only support public sharing (broadcasting) right now with handles but will be adding private sharing soon too. In addition, in the coming weeks we will be adding support for creating a friends list with the ability to quickly share your screen with a friend by clicking on their n
Why it failed: Hey Hacker News, You have been really good to Screenleap since our soft launch here back in February and we would like to give back to you. We are launching user accounts with handles next week and wanted to give the Hacker News community first dibs on claiming their handles. For
ttruong
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Can I help you be more awesome today? (No strings.)
Hello HN. I like this community a lot and want to see if there's anything I can do to make you a little more successful. No strings. To give you an idea of what I might be able to help you with, let me tell you a few things I've done to help others recently... - I'm an early-adopter and enjoy seeing new technology and ideas being put into action. If only to get access sooner, I'd be more than happy to critique and share my opinion on all things design, customer development, software, entrepreneurship, family, creativity, or productivity. - I'm participating with a team of other students in the Stanford Technology Entrepreneurship online course and helping people learn to apply the Business Model Canvas along with lean startup methodologies as well as attempt to bring our own product to market. (On the side, our team published an ebook that helped other groups in the course to effectively
Why it failed: Hello HN. I like this community a lot and want to see if there's anything I can do to make you a little more successful. No strings. To give you an idea of what I might be able to help you with, let me tell you a few things I've done to help others recently... - I'm an early-adop
mikegreenberg
- startupShut down2012
7 years and no success. I need help.
Hello HN, I'm a regular here, but for personal reasons I'll be using a throwaway account. For the last 7 years I've been trying the entrepreneur game. I've have failed miserably with 6 failed startups under my belt. For the last year or so I was working for a company that can no longer pay me and I'm for the first time in years without any income (last 7 years my income was extremely low since I was investing everything in my ventures). At this point I'm very frustrated and have no clue what to do. I'm not a hacker, I'm a marketing guy. I know about usability, product, copywriting, lead generation and all those fancy things we marketing guys must know. Yet somehow, I can't get clients for myself (I'm trying the consulting route for SMB's but no luck). I have two degrees, two masters, have travelled most of the world, yet I feel like a total failure. When it comes to building stuff and ma
Why it failed: Hello HN, I'm a regular here, but for personal reasons I'll be using a throwaway account. For the last 7 years I've been trying the entrepreneur game. I've have failed miserably with 6 failed startups under my belt. For the last year or so I was working for a company that can no
fffuuu1234
- startupShut down2012
Help I'm Losing My Writing Ability
Hello everyone; I don't know if this question is in the right place or not, but I think that most of you would have probably experienced this at one point or another in your life, so do offer some wisdom and advice. However, if the content here is unsuitable, please remove it. Anyways, here's the current situation that I'm facing: * I was able to write very well since young (ever since I begin learning English), and my writing ability was well above the average. My style of writing was considered original and unique to me. * I was able to compose essays and stories very fluidly and improvise plots and arguments in an ad hoc manner. However, this ability has recently deteriorated, and I find myself cracking my head open even for simple arguments and story-lines. * When I wrote in the past, my pen moved almost as fast as the sentence forming in my head. My pen just had a mind of it's own,
Why it failed: Hello everyone; I don't know if this question is in the right place or not, but I think that most of you would have probably experienced this at one point or another in your life, so do offer some wisdom and advice. However, if the content here is unsuitable, please remove it. An
haploredux
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Where would you go if HN shutdown for 1 month?
From all the talks about HN lacking in many areas for some users, I was wondering where HN folks visit for quality content/comment/userbase? Side question: Would you come back if it shutdown for a month?
Why it failed: From all the talks about HN lacking in many areas for some users, I was wondering where HN folks visit for quality content/comment/userbase? Side question: Would you come back if it shutdown for a month?
leak
- startupShut down2012
Show HN: Churches + The Internet
Hey HN, wanted to introduce FaithStreet to you all. This has been a huge undertaking for us as we've brought together a huge trove of poorly organized information over the last year and built a service that connects thousands of people to churches across the US. Link: http://www.FaithStreet.com/ If you have ever experienced a church website or considered attending a church, you may have already realized that its a space sorely lacking decent tech. We don't think that faith and technology are mutually exclusive, and the 7000+ churches who have signed up in the last two months seem to be coming around as well. Would love your feedback. Much respect for the community that is HN. p.s. On Tuesday, PandoDaily covered us. Here's a link if you're interested: http://pandodaily.com/2012/11/27/startup-faithstreet-lives-at-the-corner-of-tech-and-christianity/
Why it failed: Hey HN, wanted to introduce FaithStreet to you all. This has been a huge undertaking for us as we've brought together a huge trove of poorly organized information over the last year and built a service that connects thousands of people to churches across the US. Link: http://www.
glennericksen
- startupShut down2012
Show HN: I've created a site about Bone Marrow Donation
Hi HN,<p>I've posted a couple times here before (mostly within posts pertaining to Amit Gupta's search for a bone marrow donor) and I wanted to share a site I've been working on for the past 5 months or so that recently went live. I'm going on my fifth year of being an Acute Myelogenous Leukemia survivor, and while I didn't need a bone marrow transplant myself at one point it was a very real possibility. At that time I became aware of the lack of minority bone marrow donors and made a promise to myself to try to do something about it if I were to survive. This site is something of a fulfillment of that promise.<p>I don't know if this is explicitly HN-worthy, given that it's not a programmatically-impressive web app or a strictly technical exercise. But given the publicity that Amit's search for a donor has created for the cause, and some previous posts highlighting concer
Why it failed: Hi HN,<p>I've posted a couple times here before (mostly within posts pertaining to Amit Gupta's search for a bone marrow donor) and I wanted to share a site I've been working on for the past 5 months or so that recently went live. I'm going on my fifth year of being an Ac
danielna
- startupShut down2012
Freelance dev market
Hi everyone, I've been working for 5 years on oDesk.com. So far i am doing very well, but looks like i hit the limit: there is extremely little work (coding: Java, Actionscript, JS) priced over $35/h gross there, and while i am easily pitching customers on this kind of rates, i was unable to get anything more than that yet. But: overwhelming part of the projects i do are total nonsense. Like, i did 4 very different clones of the infamous chatroulette, last 2 years after the original one (while even the original one failed to take off), i did stupid looking Flash games for which there are zillions clones around, etc. Only 'real' work i can remember doing in 5 years was some rather complex scrapers for a guy who is in sports betting business (sure they are making him a ton of money and were fun to implement as well), and some distributed network analysis software for a well-funded Valley s
Why it failed: Hi everyone, I've been working for 5 years on oDesk.com. So far i am doing very well, but looks like i hit the limit: there is extremely little work (coding: Java, Actionscript, JS) priced over $35/h gross there, and while i am easily pitching customers on this kind of rates, i w
anovikov
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Tons of ideas, zero products.
Hi. I have a problems which I don't know how to solve. I consider myself a creative person and some time ago I had 2 ideas which I think have potential to succeed (I did short evaluation of those ideas: there is a market, there is no/very little competition, people I talked to say good things about my ideas). However, I don't know how to/where to start. My first problem is my personality: I always procrastinated a lot, I always had ideas which I dind't implement, very often I started project and abandoned it, I always had a lot of dreams and done just a few of them. Some time ago I decided to change this and I'm really doing this with my life. I procrastinate very seldom, I'm very motivated to succeed, I study a lot (I'm in college), every day I'm a better person. But I still can't find cure for my "not-starting"/"starting-and-abandoning" project problem. I really want to change this, I'
Why it failed: Hi. I have a problems which I don't know how to solve. I consider myself a creative person and some time ago I had 2 ideas which I think have potential to succeed (I did short evaluation of those ideas: there is a market, there is no/very little competition, people I talked to sa
maxvs
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Can I visit your startup in SF?
Hi there, My name is Max, I'm a cofounder at Kera, and we're from Toronto. We started Kera to teach the world how to use software. Cameron (one of my cofounders) and I are coming to SF the week after next (Oct 22-26) so we can make new friends and learn how companies like yours are educating and onboarding new users. We're also looking for advice about building our startup. If you're doing something interesting, have an awesome company culture, or just like hanging with Canadians, we'd love to meet you. Any referrals or introductions are more than welcome. You can find out more about Kera here (http://kera.io), and we can be found at @maxcameron & @camwest on twitter. Thanks in advance, Max edit: my email is max@kera.io
Why it failed: Hi there, My name is Max, I'm a cofounder at Kera, and we're from Toronto. We started Kera to teach the world how to use software. Cameron (one of my cofounders) and I are coming to SF the week after next (Oct 22-26) so we can make new friends and learn how companies like yours a
maxcameron
- startupShut down2012
Got a million but what now
I worked in oil and gas for 6 years. It paid well, and I have over a million in my bank account, I'm still 29 years old. I love reading and learning about startups, and it fits my personality so much better than O&G. I finally made the leap and left my job yesterday to focus full time on trying to steer my life in a new direction. My current plan is to learn enough about programming (Python and front end) to develop a prototype and try to get some traction. At some point I would like to acquire a co-founder, and try my hand at developing something that the world wants or needs. This sounded really good before I left, but the doubt level increased significantly after leaving my job. Am I crazy to think I can compete with all of these brilliant people? I really don't want to be damned into working at something I don't enjoy just for money, but I'm having a hard time seeing my way throu
Why it failed: I worked in oil and gas for 6 years. It paid well, and I have over a million in my bank account, I'm still 29 years old. I love reading and learning about startups, and it fits my personality so much better than O&G. I finally made the leap and left my job yesterday to focus
chamboo
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: losing faith in the startup where I'm employee #1
I'm very new to the startup world. A year ago, I left academia to join a startup as the first engineer employee. The skies were bright, we were going to change the world and become rich and all be happy together. Now a year later, things are way more gloom. We haven't raised any money, as of today we have effectively 0 active users, and our total revenue over the past year has been ~$100. Out of 3 founders, none is technical (the CTO is a very, very well connected industry veteran though), and they are all very unfocused and out of touch with certain realities (for example, they filed a patent for a silly tech idea right after incorporation and keep trying to implement that technology in products although it doesn't really solve anything). During meetings, I always feel like a killjoy by attempting to be realistic and focused and reserved about the brand new idea they come up with every
Why it failed: I'm very new to the startup world. A year ago, I left academia to join a startup as the first engineer employee. The skies were bright, we were going to change the world and become rich and all be happy together. Now a year later, things are way more gloom. We haven't raised any
tantrumpython
- startupShut down2012
Iran Shuts Down Major Websites and Https Protocol
I'm writing this to report the serious troubles we have regarding accessing Internet in Iran at the moment. Since Thursday Iranian government has shutted down the https protocol which has caused almost all google services (gmail, and google.com itself) to become inaccessible. Almost all websites that reply on Google APIs (like wolfram alpha) won't work. Accessing to any website that replies on https (just imaging how many websites use this protocol, from Arch Wiki to bank websites). Also accessing many proxies is also impossible. There are almost no official reports on this and with many websites and my email accounts restricted I can just confirm this based on my own and friends experience. I have just found one report here: http://kabirnews.com/iran-shut-down-gmail-google-yahoo-and-sites-using-https-protocol/202/ The reason for this horrible shutdown is that the Iranian regime celebrat
Why it failed: I'm writing this to report the serious troubles we have regarding accessing Internet in Iran at the moment. Since Thursday Iranian government has shutted down the https protocol which has caused almost all google services (gmail, and google.com itself) to become inaccessible. Alm
Sara70
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Help? Breaking into the App Store top 100.
I thought I would never do this. But here I am so I'm just going to get it out there. Last year I had a baby and quit my awesome job as a graphic designer for the Blizzard web team largely because I wasn't making enough money to keep living in Southern California if my wife was going to be able to stay at home with our newborn. We moved to Las Vegas and now live with my wife's father. I spent most of the past year starting Falcon Empire and making my first iPhone game, Beat Boxes, which I finally released late last year. Of course, nobody noticed. Despite what you're reading here, I'm terrible at self promotion. In desperation and ready to give up on my dream and go apply for a job at McDonald's for a while, I started giving my game away for free. I figured that way at least some people would get to play it and I won't simply have wasted the last year of my life. I thought maybe a couple
Why it failed: I thought I would never do this. But here I am so I'm just going to get it out there. Last year I had a baby and quit my awesome job as a graphic designer for the Blizzard web team largely because I wasn't making enough money to keep living in Southern California if my wife was g
alanfalcon
- startupShut down2012
Show HN: I'm a non-hacker "idea guy" and my weekend project took 1,670 + days
I am a non-hacker "idea guy" with zero discernible talent. Like most, the story starts with me doing things the hard way. I dreamt of a tool that would save me countless hours. Like most of my ideas, it was supposed to die in a couple of hours, but this one had some legs.... "If I needed this, surely others did too" kept looping in my head. Could I get this built? Could I build it myself? Nah...too lazy to learn how, but before I did anything, I had to promise myself one thing: No more ideas! If ideas were sit-ups, I would have a six pack instead of this tire. It was a constant mental exercise. Ideas would peep in, I would spend 5 seconds and if it wasn’t related to THE TOOL, I had to throw it out. That's it. Focus achieved. I've been idea sober for 1670 straight days. I was now ready to find the right people that are the exact opposite of me. Translated: People that actually do stuff. I
Why it failed: I am a non-hacker "idea guy" with zero discernible talent. Like most, the story starts with me doing things the hard way. I dreamt of a tool that would save me countless hours. Like most of my ideas, it was supposed to die in a couple of hours, but this one had some legs.... "If
sunpatel
- startupShut down2012
Ask HN: Early employee salaries for startups in The Netherlands / Europe?
I haven taken a break from my full-time job for a couple of months to develop an app prototype on the iPad for a startup in its initial phase. My break is coming to an end and we are are pretty happy with each other. I like the work: not just coding but also (with the "server" guy, I'm the "client" guy) selecting technologies, managing features / the project, etc. And they seem to like me and what I, together with the other guy, have accomplished the last two months. Now, I know my weak point is salary negotiations. There have been a couple of posts about this the last weeks but I also like to have some indications of salaries for the region I live in: De Randstad in The Netherlands. I'll be monitoring this thread and will answer any questions people will have.
Why it failed: I haven taken a break from my full-time job for a couple of months to develop an app prototype on the iPad for a startup in its initial phase. My break is coming to an end and we are are pretty happy with each other. I like the work: not just coding but also (with the "server" gu
throwaway1