Original Text[1]: Kevin Kelly[2] -.08.05 (translated by qingniu [3]).
Can you imagine how great it was to be an entrepreneur back in 1985? Pretty much anything you want at the time.comThe domain name is valid. All keywords – short, cool, you name it. All you have to do is apply, and it doesn't even cost anything. This great opportunity went on for many years. In 1994, a Wired magazine author noticed McDonaldscom still didn't apply, so with our encouragement, he registered the domain name and tried to sell it to McDonald's, but McDonald's ignorance of the Internet was comical to the point that it became a story in Wired magazine. Before that, I noticed abccom hasn't applied yet, so when I was consulting the top executives at ABC on the digital future, I told them they should get the brightest geeks in the company to rush to the basement to register their company's domain name. But they didn't do it.
At that time, the Internet was a completely open frontier. It's easy to be number one in a certain market category. Consumers are not demanding and barriers to entry are extremely low. Start a search engine! A ** shop! Beginner ** program available! Of course, this time and that time. In retrospect, it seems as if waves of immigrants have bulldozed and exploited every possible place, leaving only the most difficult and rough ground for today's newcomers. Thirty years later, the Internet is saturated, bloated, crammed with apps, platforms, devices, and enough content to keep us focused on for millions of years to come. Even if you manage to squeeze in with another tiny innovation, who will notice it?
However, if we think back to what we have learned from the Internet over the past 30 years, the richness is almost incredible. We have it: instant messengers to connect with our friends and family anywhere, news tailored to our ideas, zoomable 3D maps of most of the world's cities, encyclopedias that can be consulted by sound, movies on tablets that fit in your pocket, shopping stores that deliver the next day – just to mention 6 of the thousands. But, but ....That's the way it is. As far as the internet is concerned, nothing has happened yet. The internet is still in the initial stages of its initial phase. If we could drill into a time machine and go 30 years into the future, and look back at today, we would see that most of the great products that people rely on in their lives in 2044 were invented after 2014. People of the future will look at their holographic imaging panels, wearable virtual reality glasses, virtual shapes, and AI-powered interfaces, and, they'll say, oh, there's no real internet in your day (or whatever they call it).
And they were right. Because from the perspective of the present, the greatest products of the Internet in the first half of this century came before us. All these amazing inventions await dreamers in a frenzied, "no one told me it was unattainable" moment to seize this opportunity at their fingertips – like in 1984.comdomain name.
Because some old guys from the 2044s will tell you one more thing: can you imagine how great it would be to be an entrepreneur in 2014? It's a completely open frontier zone! You can choose almost any of the categories and then add some AI features to deploy it on the cloud. The market requirements and barriers are low, and it is easy to be the first. And then they say, "Oh, if only we had realized that there were so many opportunities sooner!" ”
So, here's the truth: now, today, 2014 is the perfect time to start an internet-based startup. Throughout the history of the world, there has never been a better time to invent and create things. Compared with now, there has never been a better period, with more opportunities, greater openness, lower thresholds, higher benefit-to-risk ratios, better returns, and broader upside. Now, right now, the people of the future will look back at the present and say, "Oh, how nice it would be to live in that era!" ”
Over the past 30 years, we've created an extraordinary starting point, a solid platform on which to build something truly great. But the coolest stuff hasn't been invented yet - although this kind of new, great stuff will not be the same as the existing stuff. Not only will it be "better", it will also be different, transcendent, and alternative. All this, you will see.
You may not realize that today we are really at the forefront of a completely open field, the best time in human history to start a business.
It's never too late!
Start a business