Many entrepreneurs, particularly the MBA set, start with competitive analysis. Sure, it’s a valid approach and you might find a gap in the market that you can easily fill or a product or service that could do with some improvement. But if Larry and Sergei did that before they started playing with the PageRank algorithm, they might not have gotten as far as the first keystroke.

Here’s a list of 98 social networking websites on Wikipedia – in case you’re looking at getting into that space.

Many of Einstein’s most original ideas occured to him outside of academia while at the patent office from 1903 to 1911, including his paper on electrodynamics of moving bodies which proposed the idea of special relativity.

When I chat with friends and fellow entrepreneurs, I’ll throw out an idea and the reaction is often a comparison to other ideas. “So and so is working on something similar” or “you should take a look at such and such”. So existing ideas and products are the departure point for our conversation.

If you’re a developer, your strength is in your ability write original code, not in your ability to analyze the market-place.

If you have an idea and you have the ability to implement it yourself, I recommend developing it somewhat before doing any competitive analysis or exposing it to your friends and family. Just take an extra week to play with it. You might come up with a completely original idea.