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I feel like I've watched the evolution of the Web as closely as anyone, and I can't predict what's going to happen with clients. Convergence is probably coming, but where? I can't pick a winner. One thing I can predict is conflict between AOL and Microsoft. Whatever Microsoft's .NET turns out to be, it will probably involve connecting the desktop to servers. Unless AOL fights back, they will either be pushed aside or turned into a pipe between Microsoft client and server software. If Microsoft and AOL get into a client war, the only thing sure to work on both will be browsing the Web, meaning Web-based applications will be the only kind that work everywhere.

How will it all play out? I don't know. And you don't have to know if you bet on Web-based applications. No one can break that without breaking browsing. The Web may not be the only way to deliver software, but it's one that works now and will continue to work for a long time. Web-based applications are cheap to develop, and easy for even the smallest startup to deliver. They're a lot of work, and of a particularly stressful kind, but that only makes the odds better for startups.

Why Not?

E. B. White was amused to learn from a farmer friend that many electrified fences don't have any current running through them. The cows apparently learn to stay away from them, and after that you don't need the current. "Rise up, cows!" he wrote, "Take your liberty while despots snore!"

If you're a hacker who has thought of one day starting a startup, there are probably two things keeping you from doing it. One is that you don't know anything about business. The other is that you're afraid of competition. Neither of these fences have any current in them.

There are only two things you have to know about business: build something users love, and make more than you spend. If you get these two right, you'll be ahead of most startups. You can figure out the rest as you go.

You may not at first make more than you spend, but as long as the gap is closing fast enough you'll be ok. If you start out underfunded, it will at least encourage a habit of frugality. The less you spend, the easier it is to make more than you spend. Fortunately, it can be very cheap to launch a Web-based application. We launched on under $10,000, and it would be even cheaper today. We had to spend thousands on a server, and thousands more to get SSL. (The only company selling SSL software at the time was Netscape.) Now you can rent a much more powerful server, with SSL included, for less than we paid for bandwidth alone. You could launch a Web-based application now for less than the cost of a fancy office chair.

As for building something users love, here are some general tips. Start by making something clean and simple that you would want to use yourself. Get a version 1.0 out fast, then continue to improve the software, listening closely to the users as you do. The customer is always right, but different customers are right about different things; the least sophisticated users show you what you need to simplify and clarify, and the most sophisticated tell you what features you need to add. The best thing software can be is easy, but the way to do this is to get the defaults right, not to limit users' choices. Don't get complacent if your competitors' software is lame; the standard to compare your software to is what it could be, not what your current competitors happen to have. Use your software yourself, all the time. Viaweb was supposed to be an online store builder, but we used it to make our own site too. Don't listen to marketing people or designers or product managers just because of their job titles. If they have good ideas, use them, but it's up to you to decide; software has to be designed by hackers who understand design, not designers who know a little about software. If you can't design software as well as implement it, don't start a startup.

Now let's talk about competition. What you're afraid of is not presumably groups of hackers like you, but actual companies, with offices and business plans and salesmen and so on, right? Well, they are more afraid of you than you are of them, and they're right. It's a lot easier for a couple of hackers to figure out how to rent office space or hire sales people than it is for a company of any size to get software written. I've been on both sides, and I know. When Viaweb was bought by Yahoo, I suddenly found myself working for a big company, and it was like trying to run through waist-deep water.


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