• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Simplicity Rules

Adam DuVander on keeping it simple

  • About Adam

Ideas and their execution

August 18, 2005 by Adam DuVander

I have a lot of ideas. I don’t have a lot of time. Many of my ideas are never executed, which becomes readily apparent every month or so when a domain, purchased in a fit of excitement, expires. The founder of CDBaby has a very short and to the point statement about ideas and execution that harkens back to my secrecy pondering.

AWFUL IDEA = -1
WEAK IDEA = 1
SO-SO IDEA = 5
GOOD IDEA = 10
GREAT IDEA = 15
BRILLIANT IDEA = 20

NO EXECUTION = $1
WEAK EXECUTION = $1000
SO-SO- EXECUTION = $10,000
GOOD EXECUTION = $100,000
GREAT EXECUTION = $1,000,000
BRILLIANT EXECUTION = $10,000,000

In short, ideas alone are worth less than the amount of cash you have in your wallet. The author gives some multipliers and a brilliant idea with no execution ends up being worth $20.

Even more interesting to me is the good living that one person can make with middle-of-the-road ideas and execution. Not that I strive for mediocrity, but a hundred grand isn’t chump change.

Comments

  1. Richard Lynch says

    October 20, 2005 at 10:32 am

    You can make it even more apparent, as I do, by never letting those domains expire, keeping them around as cobwebs, promising yourself that “some day” you’ll get around to working on them again.
    🙂

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Simplicity Rules » Blog Archive » Releasing early versus releasing ready says:
    March 23, 2006 at 5:50 pm

    […] Well, we all have these things. It may be an idea for a whole product or a feature. Ideas are just about worthless. Sometimes I’ve tried to wait for a project to be perfect. When I realized I was going down that road with onBLOCK, that’s when I knew it was time to release. […]

    Reply
  2. Simplicity Rules » Blog Archive » No one funds ideas says:
    April 25, 2006 at 3:16 pm

    […] It’s a recurring theme in Simplicity Rules, as well as elsewhere, that ideas are worthless. Thomas Warfield, a successful shareware programmer, writes about the “pitches” he receives: Every few weeks or so, I get an email from somebody with a “Big Idea”. […]

    Reply
  3. Simplicity Rules » Blog Archive » Three reasons simplicity works for me says:
    July 10, 2006 at 9:59 am

    […] I can get from idea to execution quickly. […]

    Reply
  4. Simplicity Rules » Blog Archive » Take your ideas public says:
    August 25, 2006 at 6:55 pm

    […] Cambrian House values ideas at five to ten percent of the whole project. That might be high, but I like seeing it in terms of a percentage instead of the idea multiplier. […]

    Reply
  5. Simplicity Rules » Scaling an idea says:
    August 17, 2007 at 11:19 am

    […] I also believe that ideas alone aren’t worth much. Execution matters. […]

    Reply
  6. Simplicity Rules » Balancing the idea and execution says:
    January 23, 2008 at 11:24 am

    […] A couple years ago I found a really cool formula for determining how much an idea is worth. It proposed that ideas were just a multiplier for execution, which is where the real money is. […]

    Reply
  7. Simplicity Rules » My Big Changes at DuVinci says:
    August 11, 2008 at 11:24 pm

    […] I want to help others create on the Web. There are designers with great skills who want to learn to program. And there are bright business owners who can’t execute on their ideas. I believe anyone can learn to program. I’m looking forward to proving that. […]

    Reply
  8. Resolve to Finish Your Awesome Side Project | Simplicity Rules says:
    December 31, 2009 at 2:42 pm

    […] don’t get finished and languish in a half-complete state. Or worse, they become trapped as unexecuted ideas. It’s nobody’s fault. Life takes over, priorities are forcibly skewed. Side projects, […]

    Reply
  9. Kill Your Favorite Ideas | Simplicity Rules says:
    December 16, 2012 at 10:50 am

    […] Ideas are nothing without execution and a misplaced idea that you love can be a major barrier to executing. Assumptions are powerful when you don’t take a moment to question them. […]

    Reply
  10. How I Saved $39,420 by Not Buying a Domain Without a Prototype | Simplicity Rules says:
    October 14, 2013 at 12:04 am

    […] about every day I have at least one new idea. New ideas feel really good. With a new idea, everything is possible, nothing can stop me and there […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Simplicity Series

  • Designing the Obvious
  • Paradox of Choice
  • Laws of Simplicity

Copyright © 2025 · Elevate on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in