idea!

Don’t worry about people stealing an idea. If it’s original, you will have to ram it down their throats.
– Howard Aiken

At some point ideas don’t matter. They do and yet they don’t. There are many reasons why people won’t share their ideas. Sometimes we think the idea is not good enough, or not original enough or worse… we think someone will take our idea and, godforbid, make money!

What is an original idea anyway? What is a truly original idea? Aren’t most “original” ideas simply older ideas augmented in some form or manner?

I like sharing ideas now. As silly, foolish or unoriginal as they may be. And even if I think the idea will make me a thousandaire, I have no issues sharing it. Though I think at some point I would have had issues. But for some reason I don’t anymore.

I think ideas are for everyone’s taking. If I didn’t come up with it, someone else would have (or already has). So in the long run, it may not even matter who exactly came up with it. Everyone remembers the Wright brothers though, because they actually flew a plane. I’m sure lots of other folk were coming up with ways to fly.

Ideas in and of themselves aren’t much at all. The follow-through is what really matters in the end. At some point, I need to pony up and follow-through.