The bar for entry is so low when it comes to many types of startups today that the grand majority of "Show: HN" posts are completely unimpressive, unoriginal, and just plain boring. That is just the reality. This entire idea that people should be supportive regardless is ridiculous when the amount of people entering the market is enormous. Maybe getting great supportive feedback on mediocre projects isn't what HN is for anymore. IMO that is a good thing. The industry has evolved, so has HN, maybe you should as well.
And I still see great supportive criticisms, and general fluff "great project" on the ACTUALLY GOOD projects.
You mean in one place that offers very little (if any?) real sport competition? More people in Korea would be watching a successful South Korean soccer team then even the biggest of star craft 2 events. The market is small, the market is tiny. It only seems large because of the internet. In reality the market for spectator e-sports is very small (and beyond star craft it is pretty much non-existent). The only way e-sports will ever become a profitable market beyond niche is to engage it at the casual player with accessible leagues/ladders/ and tournaments for all. Blizzard kind of does it but they don't provide a good interface for it in my opinion. All others who try have failed pretty hard. Beyond sc2 e-sports have been declining and failing left right and center. And absolutely nothing that I see coming from game companies give me faith that this will change. Star craft 2 is a nice niche but it does not represent the e-sports market as a whole. That market is tiny, and largely ignored and at the current time requires real innovation. In my opinion the real money in e-sports (when it finally does get big) will not be spectating at all, it will come from little Johny paying 5$ a month to play in a very well run, exiting, competitive and fun casual league. Someone just needs to build it right.
If your not doing trivial applications like 37signals but rather more niche based applications it can be very hard to find areas to move into unless you have personal experience in that area. Most applications you see from startups are based around managment/collaboration/communication/helpdesk because although these are hard problems to solve it is fairly easy to become at least moderately knowledgeable in these spaces. There are TONS of needs for SaaS products, mostly to dethrone enterprise solutions. SaaS apps could exist for any level of business: accounting, procurement, logistics, managment, etc, etc. Building these and selling them can be very hard however. That is why people say build something for yourself. If you worked in procurement for 10 years I am sure you could make a great SaaS for it and solve many pain points, but you probably haven't.
If you don't have this experience well start asking people who do. There exist many niche blogs on enterprise software. Reading these will give the creative mind tons of ideas. Execution can be hard, and sales can be impossible though.
You say you don't want to up against 37signals, well look at it this way:
If you are going for the enterprise type apps the competition may suck, but it is there, big, and well entrenched.
If you are going for the 37signals type apps/helpdesk the competition is fierce and the apps are well made. You can compete because there is always room for a good product but you better be good.
When it comes to b2b if 37signals is your competition your not really in that bad a place. Many companies compete directly, and succeed in the space.
This all being said, I would look into analytic type software for improving sales/leads/conversions because there are many creative approaches yet to be uncovered and with apps like these the proof is in the pudding, and if the pudding tastes good people will buy.
Maybe it is because you are in Ottawa/Toronto? I really don't have any stats as to RIMs market in these areas but every time my BlackBerry loving friends make the point that they see people using it everywhere I always make the point that we live in Ottawa and that likely has a lot to do with it. I would venture to guess geography plays a big part in this. Still, BBM is a better experience then SMS.
Do people really think the value of something is 0$ just because they can get it for free? That is cost. The cost of me watching the latest blockbuster on my computer may be 0$ but I don't honestly believe it's value is 0$. You are right in saying that value is only what people think it's worth but I don't think people who pirate actually believe the content is worth nothing. The real mindset people have is if cost < value then screw value all together. This has always been the case.
Cost is becoming less of an issue online though, with simpler payments, content priced appropriately, and an increased "lock you out" if you try to get stuff for free.
This is such a fluff article. Why is it interesting that someone is attempting to "try really hard at something for a lengthy period time"? Looks like he is pitching for a book deal and a spot on Oprah. When you consider how much time 10k hours is I don't think it will blow anyone away that practice of that magnitude will bring success.
How much does exterior culture play in to this? What do South Korean kids do when they get off school? Wasn't Starcraft at first more of a rebellious act, and somewhat counter culture?
It seems to me that creativity is best built by providing multiple releases for it, and then allowing complete freedom over were one spends his free time. Certainly education plays a huge role in this as it defines to a large extent what a student does in his or her free time.
I would go so far as to say that the ideal education system would do away completely with homework, and instead focus on in class interaction based entirely around projects that are more meaningful then "due in two weeks, test after that". The classes I remember most at all levels of education where those which were either primarily open discussions or those which had large semester spanning group projects. Most people I know feel the same. A students free time should be their own, how they spend it should be inspired by education not framed around it.
Granted that seems slightly utopian, and I'm not really aware of a lot of the research that surely has been done around this subject.
It is a fascinating subject in my opinion, and one which has so many variables to it.
I think you may be romanticizing things slightly. While it seems like this may be the case, the reality is people who play like this are both rare and glamorized such that they attract others to the game. The glamorization of poker was nothing but a marketing ploy by online sites. Is there more to poker then money? Sure, but this could be said about industry that is primarily about money, to the point were it loses all meaning.
Sure poker teaches you a lot, but you could get the same thing running a lemonade stand. You have to realize that the "skills" poker teaches is nothing but marketing fluff. This is why you see people coming from other skills and going into poker. I haven't heard a lot about going the other way (of course I am sure it exists). The fact is it is just about money.
And I still see great supportive criticisms, and general fluff "great project" on the ACTUALLY GOOD projects.
Just building something isn't impressive anymore.