9
12 Comments

Is this a dumb idea? What do you think?

As many IH or creators, or people in general, a lot of times there's so many things to do that one can't really take the time to completely read a book without it taking so long that when you finish one chapter you barely remember what the previous one was about.

So, what If I build a platform where people that do have time to read, (or spend more time reading) are able to share their learnings on "x" book? That way people can still learn valuable things from what others have read.

(It will definitely bloom or sink depending on the community sharing their lessons and such)

What do you think?

Is it dumb?
  1. Yes, it sucks!
  2. No, it has potential!
Vote
  1. 3

    You can reverse this model. People post the problems that they need to find solutions and against which other people recommending a book along with a note on why it is relevant to solving the problem stated.

  2. 3

    I saw many services offering the short content of many books - this works perfect in a case when you don't care about reading and content itself but just worry about the outcome.

    But I believe many people (book worms like me) prefer to read books to feel the author's language and not to miss any details so I usually love the reading per se.

    But there is another problem related to the books and may be you could look at it.

    Even after reading the whole book (or just its digest) people always need to think how to apply new knowledge? (Else there is no point to read books except fiction ones).
    If you ever try to apply your knowledge you may find it hard.
    So, to me, the solution could be a community where people share their methods to applying the concrete knowledge, share their tips/tricks, as questions etc.
    Let me know if it doesn't make any sense.
    Thanks!

    1. 1

      Yea, makes sense. The idea was more in terms of the community, not really an app that would summarize things. More like you said, a place where people can share the things they learned.
      One thing that I was thinking about is that, it is sort of like a social media, it will really depend on the users' input for others to come in. So, it becomes sort of like the egg & chicken question.
      It probably will need more thought to tackle the right angle and the find the real problem that it would solve. After all it was just a random idea.

  3. 2

    There are so many things out there which helps you know about what book is about and yada yada but we read books because we enjoyed reading it recently I started reading "5 secs rule" I really enjoyed how author come up with it and use in her life

    1. 1

      Yea, the idea was not really of a summarizer but more of a place where people share what they personally learned. But I see what you are saying.

  4. 1

    How about you get the person to set a deadline with a penalty fee if they don't hit it ala https://gofuckingdoit.com/ by @levelsio?

  5. 1

    I would do some market research on similar ideas. There are few sites offering "summaries" of the books. I have used in the past. I understand you want users to submit content, but still would be good idea to check if such concept already exists?

    1. 1

      Yea, I didn't think of it as a summaries generator. But I can see why it might look like it. The idea was more sort of like a place/community where people can share their personal learnings from "x" book.
      I wouldn't call it a social media, but I guess it can fall somewhere in that range too.

  6. 1

    This sounds like a subjective spark notes. First question is who is the target audience? People who enjoy reading will read the books and people looking to get some facts will likely google it or check out Spark Notes. That brings me to another question, how is this different from Spark Notes?

    1. 1

      Oh, I wasn't aware of Spark notes. From a quick glance, I feel like Spark Notes it's a bit more "educational/academic".

      I guess the idea's concept could also be just replaced by a subreddit.

      The target market could also be readers that might want to see what others have learned from the same book. Not necessarily people that don't have time to read.

      I guess the idea would fall more into a community category rather than a SaaS that offers a specific solution to a specific work issue.

      1. 1

        Yes, it sounds like a community would be best suited for this. The first subreddit that comes to mind is r/books. It sounds a bit like your idea is a digital version of a book club, correct? I think communities like subreddits fit that niche especially since I'm not sure what the incentive to pay would be.

        1. 1

          Yea. There would be no insentive for the community to pay as the idea was for it to be free for everyone.
          I think in regards to monetization, it could be either donation based. Or it could be sort of like affiliate based, with the books selection database linked to Amazon or something like that.

Trending on Indie Hackers
How I grew a side project to 100k Unique Visitors in 7 days with 0 audience 47 comments Competing with Product Hunt: a month later 33 comments Why do you hate marketing? 27 comments $15k revenues in <4 months as a solopreneur 14 comments Use Your Product 13 comments How I Launched FrontendEase 13 comments