Untapped? Selling candy to nice people in an uncomfortable situation is an untapped market?

People are buying aren't they? And I reject the suggestion that he is somehow pressuring people into buying, if you've ever been on a subway that is rather implausible.

Some people are deathly afraid of people talking to them in public, especially if they are from a different social class.

I've had people try to sell me candy on the L before. I said, "no thanks" and that was that. I imagine this is the end result of 99.99999% of interactions between people on public transportation. (Someone stole my shoes once after he asked to read my newspaper and I gave it to him. That's the 0.000001% case :)

I meet panhandlers on a daily basis who pressure people in all kinds of ways.

If convincing people to spend real money on fake farms on Facebook counts as an untapped market, then this certainly should count.

And good point with the comment on me trying to redefine entrepreneur. What I should have said is i don't think he's an interesting entrepreneur.

You'd be amazed at the number of "uninteresting" entrepreneurs out there. Just because he's not in SV and his latest funding round wasn't featured in TechCrunch doesn't mean he's any less entrepreneur than any other business owner.

Besides, doing something because other people find it interesting is a terrible way to make life choices.

We're debating the relative importance of connotations of entrepreneurship; there's, say, a discrete (maybe multivariate) probability distribution of connotations, dictionary definitions are supposed to capture its peaks, and the debate is over where the "true" peaks are. I doubt most people would call the subway vendor a Steve Jobsian entrepreneur. But if he hired others to sell for him, took out loans to increase his inventory, and attached Sodoku puzzles and small pencils to his candy to give bored passengers something to do, more people would likely agree he can be called an entrepreneur. Nevertheless, I believe a high bar for innovation is not an essential component of entrepreneurship -- and the more interesting entrepreneurs are not necessarily more innovative. So the subway vendor's living between the cracks, he's breaking the law. Maybe that makes him more interesting! What types of people tend to strike up conversations with him? How often do policemen confront him? Which foods are more popular after a Yankees game? Interesting entrepreneurs may be engaged in very ordinary activities that afford them unique perspectives.

Incidentally, I love the NY subway for all its various distractions -- the breakdancers, the flashmobbers, and yes, even the panhandlers, because it's always interesting to observe how passengers react to them.

At least he makes a profit unlike 90% of SV's startups.

Well, fair enough. I do agree there.