Recently friends of mine have been all a-twitter with Eric Sink's idea that micro ISVs are the way of the future. Ok, Eric doesn't quite say they're the way of the future. but he DOES have an interesting essay on the idea of one person companies.
Right, so said friends' favorite over-coffee conversation topic has been "what's a good enough software idea?". What will people buy? How in the hell could I set one of these cool things up? Which is really several different questions. Sometimes the person asking it is really asking "where's that magic lottery ticket number to set me up so I can live my life the way I want to?" Which is the stupidest question that ever was and is no good for the asker or the asked. However, the question "how do I actually get a small business off the ground?" is an interesting one. And the question "how do I know when I have a product worth releasing?" is another one.
Observation of various people who either work alone or run very small shops suggests a couple of things.
One. Your idea doesn't have to be new. For god's sake the world does not really NEED another bug tracking system. It might have room for another variation on a theme if it's priced just right, but it doesn't NEED one. If you're waiting for the idea that NEEDS to be done, you will never start your company. THere ain't no written invitations to create software.
Two. You can take a task you know you want to do and automate it so well you can package it to sell to people like yourself. This works, but it's not clear you're going to get other people to pay you for it. There's so much fun free stuff out there it just boggles the mind.
Three. Like most things. If you don't do it in small incremental steps, you're Not Going To Do It At All. Almost no one can take off a year to write the Great American Novel or the Great American Software. Slow steady and in small pieces is the way to go. Say you form a company today. Do the paper work to lay out where you think you want to go. Then write something small and shareware downloadable. Try it out. You making anything on that exercise? Then you know enough to make your next move. Going whole hawg is for the stupid. Or maybe the rich. The rich and stupid have other problems.
Four. Have a plan for keeping the lights on. Ok, the products you REALLY want to make aren't selling. What now? You can consult and provide services to others. You can write. You can attempt to be a wonk of some kind. Those are independent endeavors that go well with having your own software company. Sure. Are you willing to do enough of that to support the products you really want to write? What's enough?
And of course, five. The other thing that's true is this: nothing I've said in this post should be news to anyone who has seriously thought about starting a micro ISV. Or a tiny company of 2 or 3. See earlier comments about the rich and the stupid. They have other problems. And yes, yes, you can argue that if you have a BIG product idea, maybe nothing but a serious push to get first to market advantage will make your product a success. But people who want to write BIG products, don't actually want to run small companies. They want to write big products. And that, too, is a completely different enterprise with different risks.
As for me? Well, I think it might be time to set up the small company paperwork in order to try floating a trial balloon or two. Try the life out for size. That costs very little and sets me up to try ... well, writing what after all? That's another post for another time.
Posted by karen at September 21, 2004 10:19 AM