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The Cult of the NDA

Posted by michael on from the all-hail-the-graven-image dept.

Anonymous Coward writes "After looking at hundreds of business plans during the tech boom of the late 1990's, and starting my own company two years ago, I've long been bothered by the near obsession with secrecy shown by many tech startups. This is especially striking considering how few startups are actually pursuing unique ideas. I finally wrote an article about this, The Cult of the NDA, where I argue that too much secrecy can actually hurt a company's chances. Open-source startups, anyone?"

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  1. Or, as a classic quote puts it ... by Beryllium+Sphere(tm) · · Score: 5, Interesting

    >I've found that for the most part, people like their own ideas, and just aren't much inclined to steal mine

    I can't remember who said this:
    "Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are actually good and helpful, you'll have to cram them down people's throats at gunpoint."

    Don Lancaster has made the same point about secrecy as the article did. There's only one smartest person in the world, the odds are overwhelming that it's not you, your idea will have occurred to someone else, and the way to make money is to kill bad ideas quickly.