Sorry but that essay _is_ severely disjointed and unfocused. The prompt asked for a specific work experience/decision and you essentially produced a bootleg PG essay. This is coming from a Cornellian who is going the startup route after graduation so I feel ya on the story -- you just failed to play the game. Nonetheless, your professor is an idiot if that quote is indeed verbatim. Somehow, though, after speaking with my housemates who took multiple OB classes, I doubt it was.
May I ask what you are studying over there at Cornell?
I read your paper and the conclusion that you arrived at is reminiscent of an observation on young entrepreneurship in this essay: http://www.paulgraham.com/mit.html. Starting a startup while you're still in school means that there is still an escape hatch. Just as you realized in your paper, if you fail, you are still a student, or "no worse off than before."
While I agree about the disjointedness of the paper, I think a rational-decision making model is absolutely applicable in an entrepreneurial sense if approached correctly.
Good point. I don't really have a major, I'm just whatever random classes I find interesting or useful. I'm taking classes in business, education, English, comp sci, etc. I've taken enough classes to get an Applied Economics & Management degree if I want it, but I'm pretty ambivalent between doing that and just leaving it as interdisciplinary studies on my diploma.
Also, you're right about the PG essay. I've obviously learned a lot since that experience and will not be making the same mistakes next time.
Roaming random classes, learning what you find interesting? Sounds like you've got some young Steve Jobs in you. No flaw in that -- he went on to found some famous fruit company of sorts.
The website is actually down but here was the elevator pitch:
"Emoticomm is a digital introduction device. Our stick-of-gum sized device uses Bluetooth to connect people with similar desires. We use proven hardware and open source software.
It's a shame how many missed opportunities exist because of difficulty in initial icebreaking.
For example, imagine two strangers in an elevator with only 30 seconds to potentially establish a relationship. Our product will discretely alert them to common interests.
We're targeting venues such as conferences, trade shows, and cruiseships. Our goal is to create a more efficient social experience.
Our product is a digital icebreaker. Digital handshakes will lead to physical ones."
You can see two mockups here, one of the product and one of the GUI:
(The idea behind the GUI was that info in green boxes would be public, info in yellow boxes would be viewable by friends of friends, and info in red boxes would be viewable by friends only)
It was a decent idea but I guess I wasn't clued in enough to realize that I have no where near enough skills to pull off a hardware project. At least I learned a thing or two...
I briefly looked through your documents, but there are a few conclusions I can draw from the elevator pitch alone.
The aim of your product would be better suited as software for mobile phones. From the pitch, I can see no reason why a consumer would purchase the device if it provided no immediate gains. Getting use out of an Emoticomm would entail purchasing the device and waiting for it to reach mass market adoption.
P.S. I just threw the business plan and marketing plan online.
http://www.alexkrupp.com/biz_plan.pdf
http://www.alexkrupp.com/marketing_plan.pdf
They actually won a couple of business plan competitions, so they're not completely terrible if you want an example. Plus maybe someone will get a good idea or two.
I also have a provisional patent on the above designs plus some new business methods relating to advertising that is going to expire in a few months... *sigh*
I've never seen or heard anything about a business plan competition, but they seem like amazingly bankrupt ideas. It sounds to me like they're a bunch of middle-aged employees of big companies or universities who have never started a business telling you what's a good business plan. But I *highly* doubt that the winners of business plan competitions correlate at all with successful businesses (as you yourself are an example). For that reason, it seems like they'd be the exclusive domain of PHBs, or at least the administration of them would be.
