Ben Dean and his partner Dhwani Bafna, entered the 2012 #PitchTech4Dev competition. Not only did his team win second place in the competition, but they went on to actually develop and test their app. The following is a reflection from Ben on his experience with the competition and his efforts to take OurCommons from idea to reality. Click here to learn about #PitchTech4Dev and enter your own team for the 2013 competition: http://pitchtech4dev.wordpress.com/application-2/.
OurCommons: A Kickstarter for Under-Funded Public Services
By Benjamin Dean (LinkedIn)
Last year, at about this time, I arrived all bright eyed and bushy tailed at Columbia dreaming of entrepreneurial greatness. Brimming with new ideas and desperate to show some of them off to my new peers, I took part in the inaugural mobile app competition, run by the New Media Task Force.
The first challenge was finding someone to join me in the competition. Dhwani Bafna stepped up to the plate and, unwittingly, agreed to put up with my stubbornness and irreverence. We tossed some ideas around, not really finding any common ground, until eventually the pressures of midterms meant that the only option was to go with an idea that I had found the time to write down.
Pitching an idea called ‘Our Commons’, the basic idea was to create a Kickstarter for local neighbourhoods in India. In my international travels, I had noticed that public services are typically underfunded and underdelivered because government officials either pockets the tax revenue that should be spend on public services or simply don’t have an incentive to provide public services people want. We wanted to change this situation, by allowing citizens to identify common public service problems they have and contribute funds towards collective solutions via a mobile phone.
In the competition, we were beaten by the idea for a monster app that would teach children about nutrition.
Paul Graham points out that at the start, good start-up ideas look like bad ideas. I can definitely attest to the fact that half the judges thought my idea was a bad one. The other half probably thought it was novel enough to deserve a pat on the back – but that monster app had way more potential!
At the after party, one of the judges told me that I reminded him of Russell Brand. It was probably the most constructive feedback I’d gotten from him that day – even if Russell is best known for his heroin addiction.
The happy ending is that it doesn’t matter if the judges think your idea won’t work or that you look like a former heroin addict. I just got back from a summer in Venezuela, where I actually piloted the idea in one of the largest slums in Latin America. A nomination just slid onto my desk for a social innovation award, based on the work. The first step in this journey, for me, was pitching the idea in front of a bunch of my peers. You should do it too! It’ll show that you’re able to take the plunge, start building a following, persevere and start making a change in the world.
Read more about Ben Dean’s experience piloting his app on his blog: http://blog.bennydean.com.