"- People responded well to it. Your idea, which just got validated, is now also available for public consumption. This is troubling because the idea also has a stream of positive comments, making it that much more attractive."
You should add to that what REALLY happens when people respond to it. They start talking about it. They bury you in great ideas that never occurred to you. They sign up to be notified about your private beta. You are incredibly energized and motivated all of a sudden. You are no longer fearful that your idea will totally fall flat. Recruiting gets easier. Good developers who are interested in your problem/space seek you out. Investors (who know all of this) don't think you are a total noobcake. You don't have to invest time or money in stuff like NDAs or other secretive measures.
Stealth mode is 95% of the time totally ridiculous, with the risk of being out there totally eclipsed by the reward. There is the 5% case, I suppose, where you've truly invented something unique rather than just making something suck less.
I'm also absolutely FLOORED by your statement that the "...Nobody liked it. Your idea is probably unspectacular." scenario is not a good outcome. That's a spectacular outcome compared to pissing away months or years building something that you later realize nobody wants.
Awareness is only really valuable if you're in a position to capitalize on it. Has it been super valuable to RescueTime? You're still 3 "owner-operators", plus "the occasional contractor". It obviously hasn't solved your recruiting problems. From what I can tell, you've "closed" a "round" of YC funding. Got a real term sheet yet? Did awareness do it for you?
I'm not trying to be petulant.
For you guys, awareness may convert directly into users, and users to a shot at VC funding (though, if you're up and running already, god I hope not).
And on the flip side, in my field (security), there's an obvious need for secrecy; we're a bunch of cutthroat motherfuckers over here. So my experience doesn't translate to yours directly.
Just saying, the answers to questions like these aren't always straightforward.
All good questions. The big wins for us at RescueTime (I imagine this would vary by situation) were:
1) We got crazy excited and worked our asses off and ultimately set aside great jobs to work on this full-time. I don't know if we could've sustained the energy if we didn't have our users (and potential users) dragging us along.
2) We applied to YC. I honestly don't know if we would've done this if we didn't have such a great response to our "this is what we're building... coming soon!" page.
3) We got accepted to YC. I dunno if it mattered, but it certainly is easier to say "we're building something people want" when we've got a line of thousands of people who have signed up for the beta, contributed ideas, blogged about us, etc. Showing "love letters" from users was huge, IMO.
4) the product is HUGELY better than the original vision IMO, because we've been buried in several thousand emails from people who want certain things that never occurred to us or didn't want things that we thought were important.
For VCs and for internal morale/energy, traction wins. There is simply no substitute for being able to say, "people LOVE us" and being able to prove it. There is nothing that keeps you working harder than users applauding your featureset and clamoring for enhancements. At least for me.
Regarding funding beyond YC, we currently aren't looking for investment but we might be eventually. We have been approached by several investors. Ask me in a few months. :-) Either way, I think being out-there helps on this front, and stealth would hurt us.
Funny you ask. We just added a new one today for some new features we're planning for businesses. http://www.rescuetime.com/forbiz Very similar in style to our original one which was basically the site as it is, with the product tour (prototypes at the time), but without the sign up form.
"You should add to that what REALLY happens when people respond to it. "
On what do you base this claim? Can you, for example, point to several threads here where someone declared the plans of their startup and there was a strong, valuable response leading to favorable business results?
The "Don't bother with secrets" meme is something of a permathread, but there seems to be scant tangible evidence for what many people claim (either for or against keeping mum).
I think I can see the value of openness in my own personal experience (a couple of moderately successful startups). Of course, who knows how wildly successful I would've been had I been more paranoid? :-)
Thanks for the reply. I tend to think you are largely correct for certain groups and practices, though that's just gut feeling.
I read most of Founders at Work; I don't recall much indiscriminate broadcasting of ideas and intent, but it's been a while.
For myself I find it useful to kick around ideas with a small local group of developers and business owners. The collective Bozometer is very handy, and indeed people are good about suggesting things I would not have thought of.
I'm not so sure that scales well to the general Internet and infinite strangers, but I've nothing concrete to back that up. Just more gut feeling.
I agree with all of your (webwright's) points. However, I was trying to explain people's behavior rather than highlight what logically makes the most sense.
You should add to that what REALLY happens when people respond to it. They start talking about it. They bury you in great ideas that never occurred to you. They sign up to be notified about your private beta. You are incredibly energized and motivated all of a sudden. You are no longer fearful that your idea will totally fall flat. Recruiting gets easier. Good developers who are interested in your problem/space seek you out. Investors (who know all of this) don't think you are a total noobcake. You don't have to invest time or money in stuff like NDAs or other secretive measures.
Stealth mode is 95% of the time totally ridiculous, with the risk of being out there totally eclipsed by the reward. There is the 5% case, I suppose, where you've truly invented something unique rather than just making something suck less.
I'm also absolutely FLOORED by your statement that the "...Nobody liked it. Your idea is probably unspectacular." scenario is not a good outcome. That's a spectacular outcome compared to pissing away months or years building something that you later realize nobody wants.
(IMO)