good point. they’ll do it about anything but discuss the idea, and mods will downvote your comment instead of those distracting everyone from the topic. probably thats why this article was first posted on reddit and not hn.
definitely not by sitting around and asking on hn. not only is there too much overthinking around here but neither pail nor peter lurk around answering questions. its mainly wannabe office workers who somehow think that gaining points here gets them closer to becoming experts in anything.
instead do what you quoted - go out there, pick a field, do stuff in it and learn what you can either do better, different, or more of the same if the market allows. ideas come from ingredients and the more you have the more you can bake.
“they've already been implemented” - meaning validated by others. the notion that an idea has to be unique is silly. if every business idea worked that way we’d only ever have one jeans maker, one car maker, one social network and one bottle shape. ideas dont need to be “unique”. they do need to vary as different people have different expectations from similar products.
“wouldn't have a large market” - a billion dollar idea is not the only idea that should be chased. a corner shop owner can earn more than an office worker dreaming about becoming the next elon musk. as do thousands of nice products.