He also says:

>I stay 2-3 years behind the trend. After the early adopters have left, there is this gap that can be filled by people who are willing to learn from the failures of the early adopters

That sounds great in theory, but can anyone expand on that? What are some specific examples?

Do pardon me if I'm being obvious or not addressing your question, but the following examples spring to mind:

pets.com, etoys, et al. -> zappos,

altavista, goto, yhoo, et al. -> goog,

broadcast.com, real media, "quicktime TV" -> youtube

These examples were all established a few years after the original players came in fully loaded with cash, hype, etc yet failed to solve or even identify underlying problems.

One way to get ideas is to visit your local library and go through all the technology magazines of +- 3 years ago.

+3 years ago?

There are many examples, the whole Japan growth in the eighties was based on this model. They took existing technologies and refined them. Stackoverflow is one example of redefining forums (they essentially killed a lot of programming forums). thesixtyone.com redefined indie music!