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Ask HN: Teenager with an idea that I'm passionate about, should I pursue it?

11 点作者 austinprete将近 11 年前
Hello everybody! A quick background about me, I&#x27;m a 17 year old interested in programming. Recently I thought of an idea for a web&#x2F;mobile start-up that I&#x27;m really passionate about. I&#x27;m hesitant to disclose the full idea at this point because if it really is a good idea there are people on here who have far more resources and talent that could potentially build it much quicker than I could. Basically, it&#x27;d be a website&#x2F;apps that I believe could greatly aid the treatment of mood disorders.<p>Why am I passionate about that? Well, I&#x27;ve dealt with serious depression over the past few years that has almost taken my life. If the service that I want to create had existed I think my treatment could have been far more effective. In any given year about 10% of the US population (at least among adults), suffers from a mood disorder.<p>However, even though I&#x27;m very passionate about this idea, there are some major obstacles involved. Namely, my service would need to be HIPAA compliant in the US. The more I&#x27;ve read into that process the more I&#x27;ve been discouraged. Ultimately after I build an initial version of the service I hope to run a Kickstarter, but I&#x27;m not sure how I would go about achieving the funding I would need to run the site in production. I&#x27;m estimating the cost at a few thousand in the first year alone, potentially more depending on the popularity achieved.<p>So this is where I want opinions, if you had an idea for something that you believed could potentially benefit many individuals&#x27; lives, would you pursue it regardless of the obstacles, costs, and time involved? I guess in my mind this could be my chance to change the world, and I don&#x27;t want to miss out on that, but I don&#x27;t know if I&#x27;m being realistic.

10 条评论

stevep98将近 11 年前
My observation is that when I talked to friends about my amazing ideas, they are invariably less passionate about them than me. So, be prepared for lukewarm reception. Or worse, &#x27;devils advocates&#x27;, etc.<p>You might even be more susceptible to this type of reaction given your condition. So, be aware of it.<p>I would just do it anyway. Its worth it for the experience. A set of 4 or 5 solid projects from this age on a resume is likely to result in additional interviews, which might find you jobs worth an extra $10,000&#x2F;yr. So, consider it an investment in your future.
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atmosx将近 11 年前
&gt; <i>However, even though I&#x27;m very passionate about this idea, there are some major obstacles involved. Namely, my service would need to be HIPAA compliant in the US. The more I&#x27;ve read into that process the more I&#x27;ve been discouraged.</i><p>Out of experience I know that one quality that serial-entrepreneurs (e.g. Elon Musk) have is the ability to <i>fight successfully with the paperwork</i>. The laws are written, some make sense, others do not. Doesn&#x27;t really matter because you can&#x27;t change them. Most people are intimidated by the very sight of paperwork. Especially the kind that is written in lawyer&#x27;s language. You can only become successful if you <i>learn to read</i> this language. From what I&#x27;ve seen, it&#x27;s extremely valuable asset, no matter what kind of company you want to create.<p>Another thing I&#x27;ve noticed is that only 10% of the people you&#x27;ll ever talk about, no matter how they present themselves, really KNOWS what are they talking about. So keep your faith no matter what others tell you.<p>I would say, go for it. The experience of driving any such venture up to a point where you create <i>something</i> or you <i>stop</i> because you&#x27;re over your head, will prove extremely valuable anyway. It&#x27;s the kind of experience that you can&#x27;t buy with money.<p>Wish you all the best :-)<p>ps. If you pursue this path, make sure to write a blog post a let us know how it went in about 1 year or 2 from now.
sithu将近 11 年前
I&#x27;ve been giving your idea some thought, and would be happy to discuss further over email if you like (in my profile).<p>I don&#x27;t think HIPAA is the main problem you have. The biggest obstacle is whether any healthcare provider would be willing to participate. People in this area have little time, too much work&#x2F;obligations, are generally not tech savvy, have fixed workflows that they&#x27;re unwilling to deviate from, and even the smallest amount of friction in your product will make them give up.<p>If you&#x27;re going to do this (and you probably should if you&#x27;re passionate about it), then you have to think of a way to integrate seamlessly into existing workflows and minimize their time commitment. Your goal should be 5-10 mins per day, max, regardless of the number of people being &quot;monitored&quot;. Think about the incentives to get providers to participate. How much turn-around time is realistic? I don&#x27;t see how this will be an &quot;imminent suicide&quot; prevention system and there are already lots of hotlines for that, but it could be great to monitor mood over days&#x2F;weeks.<p>Perhaps have a single daily aggregated and anonymized email to a provider&#x27;s nurse at 7am (when most check their patient data) that updates them on all patients in the practice who are potentially in trouble. They click a link, enter a password, and see the non-anonymized data. Then the nurse can get on the phone and start calling people.
josephlord将近 11 年前
If it is what you are passionate about go for it.<p>You describe it as a web&#x2F;mobile start-up and later discuss the importance of it and the opportunity to change the world. I think it is worth being clear in your mind if this is a commercial project that you want to earn profits or a social venture (that may pay its own bills).<p>I would think about why you want to be secretive about it though. Even with businesses I think PG is largely right that secrecy isn&#x27;t often worth it, you need to show people how good the idea is before they realise it. See AirBNB etc.<p>If you tell people what it is you can get some advice and maybe even help. At the crowd funding stage at least you need to let people know what your plan is.
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austinprete将近 11 年前
Also, I&#x27;m aware that there are huge technical challenges involved in creating the service that I want to create. However, I&#x27;m fairly confident in my ability to overcome these if I put the time and effort in and am willing to learn. I already have an idea about how I&#x27;d go about creating what I want to. It&#x27;s just that in figuring all of that out I&#x27;ve realized that it&#x27;s going to be a very expensive endeavor. And if I do things wrong I could potentially break privacy laws, which could have very negative results.
JSeymourATL将近 11 年前
Answer to whether you&#x27;re being realistic? No, but so what.<p>It&#x27;s instructive to know that the most innovative leaders behind game-changing ideas in arts, science, &amp; business-- often pursued unrealistic goals. Many of them toiled &amp; tinkered for years.<p>Here&#x27;s a good read to keep you going&gt; <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Mastery-Robert-Greene/dp/014312417X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1403286483&amp;sr=8-2&amp;keywords=robert+greene%2C" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;Mastery-Robert-Greene&#x2F;dp&#x2F;014312417X&#x2F;re...</a>
ecohen16将近 11 年前
If you&#x27;re interested in discussing the crowdfunding aspect, I&#x27;m happy to help. I manage the Hardware, Design and Tech team at Indiegogo. Software is generally more difficult to crowdfund, as it requires a very active community to get that initial momentum. Strategy will be key to success, and it&#x27;s not going to be a walk in the park. But, if you&#x27;re passionate about it, it&#x27;s absolutely not impossible.<p>If you&#x27;re seriously considering this, shoot me an email at evan (at) indiegogo dot com.
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pskittle将近 11 年前
<a href="https://www.truevault.com/" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.truevault.com&#x2F;</a> , You may wanto check them out for hippa compliance.<p>Look asking for permission for pursuing your passion isn&#x27;t ideal. the best that can happen is you&#x27;re going to make it and realize your vision . The next best is you can learn way more than you would have by just thinking about whether to do it or not. Either way it&#x27;s going to be a fruitful experience.
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DanBC将近 11 年前
Where are you?<p>Would it be possible to create a MVP and show that to commissioners &#x2F; researchers &#x2F; etc in your country?<p>You might want to get good quality research to support your idea. Good quality in this context means a cochrane review, or information from NICE (the UK organisation) or something equally rigorous.<p>I would be keen to hear your idea. Please feel free to email me.<p>Have you seen the Australian website &quot;Moodgym&quot;? And there are similar other sites.
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nthState将近 11 年前
&quot;if you had an idea for something that you believed could potentially benefit many individuals&#x27; lives, would you pursue it regardless of the obstacles, costs, and time involved?&quot; - without a doubt in my mind
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