Free Idea Tuesday: Find a Founder
Through my travels, I’ve learned that Americans have an unmatched love for human interest stories. Nothing quite touches an American heart like a good story about a disabled person, a minority, a former felon or an underdog “football” team.
You can see this in the media and the blogosphere. If you have an inspirational personal tale (or a tale that relieves white guilt), coverage is a given. Look no further than TechCrunch’s repeated coverage of supposedly-precious kids who aren’t doing anything interesting but who are underage. Yes, if you’re a kid and you can install WordPress MU, TechCrunch would love to document your journey as you strive to, well, install WordPress MU.
There’s an opportunity here for a business called Find a Founder and although I’m not opposed to starting a US-based business myself despite the drawbacks, I’d like to give it away free because I’ve exploited Americans enough over the past 6 months and will soon be looking at distressed properties in California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida.
The concept is simple: most businesses are started by regular people. You know, people who don’t have a debilitating case of the clap, who didn’t arrive on the same yacht as Elian Gonzalez and who didn’t spend 20 years finding Jesus at Rickers Island.
For regular people, it’s hard to stand out. That’s where Find a Founder comes in. It recruits individuals with touching stories who can be “leased” as front founders for new businesses.
Starting a new Web 2.0 service? Your front founder is 11 year-old Corky Scoble, the son of a prominent Internet evangelist who has Down Syndrome and a love for Twitter.
Starting a new non-profit? Your front founder is Julie Allison, who lost her clitoris in a tragic bicycle accident in Central Park.
Starting a new hot dog stand? Your front founder is Garbage Chahal, a 30-something Indian immigrant who started off as a dishwasher at a Chinese restaurant when he came to the United States 10 years ago.
Starting a new construction company? Your front founder is Harvey Blodget, a former stock swindler who is rebuilding his life by building new homes that will sit empty.
You get the picture. With a front founder, your business is much more likely to attract the attention of media and blogosphere schmucks who shed a tear everytime they’re reminded that the real world is not an episode of Friends.
Of course, your business needs to have substance too if it’s going to succeed but paying a kid with a missing limb and an extra chromosome a few thousand dollars to be a front founder is a worthwhile expense since you’re guaranteed, at a minimum, shits, giggles, memories and a writeup in USA Today.
I hope to see this concept implemented ASAP. If you’re the wise businessman who decides to run with it, I’d be happy to volunteer Jason Ervin as the first front founder you make available. He’s a mraketr, prgrmamer, dsginr and niventr with dsylxeia who is full of great ideas and just needs a break. Can Founders Fund please give him a job? He’d fit right in.
Thanks Drama. I am so honored! You made my day! Maybe I will be lucky enough to have some actually call me so I can take your advice and invest in or start a newspaper.
Jason: I’m glad to help you out any way I can, short of donating a new computer or bailing out your family. Charity starts at home after all.
But I’ll give you the chance to earn some money. Here’s how: I’ll PayPal you $1,000 today if you can find any statement I’ve made personally advising people to invest in or start newspapers.
That’s right. You claim that I gave such advice so if you can find a record of me advising people to “invest in newspapers” or “go out and start a newspaper”, you’ll be able to pay your mortgage this month.
By the way, I know you live in the United States, where just about everything is falling apart, but in some countries, newspapers are doing quite alright. I guess that’s because people outside the United States still read.
“I was originally trying to find my idea that was identical to Facebook from when I was in college back in 2000. Yes, I said it. I had the idea for Facebook before Mark was probably in middle school”
Proof, if proof were ever needed, that ideas always lose out to actions… And that people who post stuff like “I could have invented XYZ if only…” are tw@ts.
Craig: we should be nicer to Jason. He’s apparently still learning that wealth comes from action and not ideas.
I offered our poor chap $1,000 by PayPal yesterday. All he had to do was back up his statement that I advised people to invest in newspapers and/or start them. He had all day to dig up the dirt and let an immediate opportunity for easy cash pass him by. It’s past midnight here and I see that he hasn’t done anything.
I only hope he was too busy searching for that email he sent in 1987 in which he described a service like Twitter.