Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what would you build and why?

Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by wheaties on Tuesday February 26, 2013 @02:53PM (#5288039)

1 year to talk to people in real businesses that aren't in tech and study their problem in depth.

4 years to create what they need.

Too vague? I don't know enough about enough things outside of tech to really build something that would actually help the rest of the world. (The only thing I can think of is another Skype-like company akin to Twillio but for video communication with a phone. That probably would fail until costs come down.)

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by 31reasons on Tuesday February 26, 2013 @03:18PM (#5288276)

I really liked the idea that you added problem search as part of the product development. Many times investors want to invest in you if you already have the idea. It would be awesome to think some investment funds to just search for problems in specific domains!

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by rajesht on Tuesday February 26, 2013 @02:58PM (#5288087)

thats a waterfall model, may be agile might be more useful :)

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by hackerpolicy on Tuesday February 26, 2013 @03:09PM (#5288202)

An interesting response, perhaps you're being downvoted for an English mistake?

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by paulsamways on Tuesday February 26, 2013 @04:37PM (#5288810)

More people should be doing this. You don't even have to move out of tech yourself, find a position in a company where tech is only ancillary, not the core focus. You'd be surprised just how many real problems are out there waiting to be solved.

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by gpjt on Thursday February 28, 2013 @03:56AM (#5297798)

You can do that, but it might not be fun. I spent 4 years in tech at A Big Financial Company and the one thing I learned was that I didn't want to work at a company where my work wasn't a core part of the business. I've heard that at Oracle they say (used to say?) that you build [stuff], you sell [stuff], or you are [stuff].

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Re:Ask HN: If you had 5 years of uninterrupted time, what wo... by paulsamways on Thursday February 28, 2013 @07:47PM (#5302109)

Won't disagree with you there! Though sometimes going outside your comfort zone can be a good thing.

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