Secret sauce for startups?
In Geeking with Greg: Ruthless enough for a startup? Greg says:
There seem to be some dismal lessons in these stories. It appears the ideal startup will give away something that used to cost money for free (preferably copyright material and porn), use other people’s content and resources, appeal to the baser human instincts (especially vanity and sex), and spam massive e-mail lists at launch.
He uses Skype, YouTube, Facebook, HotOrNot and MySpace as examples.
I think there is something to this – give away something that used to cost money and do it using other people’s content and resources. Brilliant! The second half (appealing to vanity/sex and spam) is just about getting traffic.
P2P television is the next thing that fits this bill, in my opinion. Provide cable TV for free, using other people’s machines to distribute it.