Things are moving so fast in this “Web 2.0” world. It is more crucial than ever to get your ideas to market faster than the competition. Because there is competition. No matter how novel your idea is, you have to assume that there is someone out there (probably a large group of someones) working on the same thing.
I just ran into standpoint and Predict Wall Street, which in their own ways do a lot of what I had planned for my rateThings site. [My Abandoned rateThings Demo]
The two sites listed above are developed by smaller companies. Still Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, and Amazon will always be a threat to any new Web 2.0 application. Of course those companies are also potential partners (buy me out!).
The goal of sole-proprietorship-like projects like mine should be to fill a niche so small that other players are overlooking it. I’m not going to be able to build a recommendation system better than Amazon’s. I just don’t have the time or the resources. However, if I can focus on just the wine-drinker’s experience, I might be able to gain some traction with the site before bigger players get in the game.
Hopefully I can slip WineLog out to beta before I miss my chance.