WorldOs: A Product Nobody Cared About
WorldOS was a P2P infrastructure provider. Lucas tried to productize a buzzword, but was not solving the right problem.
Lucas Gonze
March 16, 2018
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Hello Lucas! What's your background, and what are you currently working on? 👨
I was a programmer for about ten years, then a manager for another ten. My niche is the intersection of tech and music, and I’m currently working on data services related to music.
What was WorldOS about? 🤘
WorldOS was a P2P infrastructure provider. The time was 2003 when there was a new wave of P2P apps like Napster, Gnutella, SETI@home, and BitTorrent.
How did you grow WorldOS? 📈
I coded the first version on my own, then recruited partners to work with me. One was a business person whose job was fundraising and product marketing. The other was a designer whose job was making things look good.
The company was funded on my savings, which came from my previous business, which had made a nice profit on outsourced web development.
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Which was the problem with WorldOS? How did you realize? ⚠️
I was in a good early position on a largish tech trend but misunderstood that could lead to customer demand. I was trying to productize a buzzword.
What were the mistakes you made? 📉
I didn’t talk to customers nearly enough. My vision didn’t solve the right problem.
What were your biggest disadvantages? 🚫
In retrospect, I was building tech for tech’s sake. I thought I was being a hard-nosed realist, but in reality, I was making something because I thought it was beautiful. My illusions and vanity got in my way.
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If you had to start over, what would you do differently? ⬅️
There is an endless number of little things I did wrong, but few big ones. More school would have been useful - couple more years of computer science, accounting, sales training.
What's your advice for someone who is just starting? 📢
Cashflow is everything. As long as you can keep paying the bills, you are in a position to grow.
Be brutally honest about deals. Know the truth. You don’t have to tell other people, but you have to understand it for yourself.
Understand the self-interest of everybody offering anything. That goes double for people on the investor side.
Where can we go to learn more? 🕵️
You can learn more at my website.
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