I have quite a few people I know who are on the "business side" of the entrepreneurial merry go round that quite often call me with their latest idea.
The remarkable thing is that no matter how many times I get back to them with a time estimate of 6 months - or a cost investment of $50k - $100k to get it live etc. the first sentence they always speak is "it's just a simple site that ... "
In fact it's not really limited to these guys. Everyone who calls me to get something done starts off by telling me how simple it is. "It's just this simple thing that ... " as if that's somehow going to make me realise that it IS simple and I can actually do in a weekend what I had thought would take months!!
My stepbrother used to do that. After politely turning down about his third "simple" idea, I tried a different tack and asked him to draw the entire app on paper.
After all, if it was so simple, it wouldn't take long to draw right? I insisted he include the appearance of validation messages, system generated emails and administration screens.
He didn't ask for my help again, but to his credit he did paper prototype another idea and got a guy to code it.
The remarkable thing is that no matter how many times I get back to them with a time estimate of 6 months - or a cost investment of $50k - $100k to get it live etc. the first sentence they always speak is "it's just a simple site that ... "
In fact it's not really limited to these guys. Everyone who calls me to get something done starts off by telling me how simple it is. "It's just this simple thing that ... " as if that's somehow going to make me realise that it IS simple and I can actually do in a weekend what I had thought would take months!!
If it's that simple, DO IT YOURSELF!