r/startup

I was reading an issue by Pratham Mittal, in his newsletter and kept on thinking. that some people are just naturally wired to build, take risks, and start things… while others aren’t but then you also see people who become great founders after years of working, learning, failing. so now I’m confused, is entrepreneurship something you’re born with… or something you can actually develop over time?

Hi, I am a second year law student at an ABA accredited law school in the US and want to get some hands-on experience working in a startup setting. If you are looking for legal assistance to draft memos, do research, or for compliance matters, I would love to connect!

alright guys, I need some real advice on idea validation

I think a lot of people have encountered this, but I really don't know how to solve this kinda questions

I created a project that helps me, it has an idea and a nice user experience at least

Every AI tells me it's great (even when I ask it to be honest), but no one uses it and no one is interested, and I'm confused about the real usefulness of my product

Am I really that delusional, or am I just presenting it incorrectly?

If anyone's interested, this is mapmind.space. This isn't self-promo, since there's no payment involved. I made it open source, and even then I still can't figure out if it could be useful to anyone.

I'd be very grateful if someone could evaluate an idea as a user and tell me about any mistakes of positioning

Also, has anyone encountered something similar?

I’ve been playing around with a bunch of AI tools lately and something feels a bit off.

A lot of them report crazy ARR numbers super early, but when you actually use them it doesn’t always feel like something you’d rely on long term. More like “this is cool” than “this is essential”.

I’ve tried stuff like ChatGPT, Cursor, runable, some no-code builders etc and they’re definitely useful, but most of the time I still end up doing some manual work anyway.

Not saying it’s all hype, just feels like we’re still figuring out what actually sticks vs what’s just early excitement.

Curious what others think:

are you actually using any of these tools daily in your business?

have you seen real ROI from them?

or are most still kinda in the “nice to have” phase?

Hey everyone 👋

We're a team of three people — a mathematician, a financial analyst, and a business analyst — all with Private Equity backgrounds and decades of institutional stock investing experience.

For years we had the same ritual: want to analyze a stock? Open 5 tabs. Pull up financials. Cross-check analyst ratings. Dig through insider transactions. Run a valuation model in a spreadsheet. Read the latest news. Repeat for every. single. stock.

At our firm it took us days to do all this, but the partners expected us to work like in 20th century.

So we built TradeMates (www.trademates.co).

Try it right now — completely free, no signup, no credit card, nothing.

Just type a the stock name or company name and you'll get:

• Investment Score (0–100) — with a full breakdown of why, not just a number
• Fair value estimate — are you overpaying or getting a deal?
• Bull / Bear / Base scenarios — what could go right, what could go wrong
• Concrete action plan — exact buy zones, stop-losses, and position sizing
• Portfolio fit check — how this stock fits with what you already own
• AI chat — ask any follow-up question about the stock in plain English

How does it actually work? We don't just dump raw data into ChatGPT and call it a day. TradeMates runs a proprietary 7-factor weighted scoring algorithm that cross-references real-time fundamentals, technicals, valuation models, insider activity, analyst consensus, earnings quality, and market sentiment — all at once. On top of that, our custom-trained LLM synthesizes these signals into a single, coherent verdict. Think of it as having a quant, a fundamental analyst, and a market strategist debating in real time — except they agree in 30 seconds and give you a clear answer. We use enterprise level APIs which cost several thousand dollars per month to get the financial data. The exact same APIs which we used at the PE firm.

Every single score explains itself. You'll never see a number without knowing exactly how we got there. No black boxes, no "trust us bro."

How free is free?

• First analysis: instant, no account needed
• Sign up (takes 10 seconds): get 2 bonus credits + 2 free analyses every single day
• No credit card. No trial. No "free for 7 days then we charge you." Just... free.

What we're NOT: We don't sell stocks. We don't take commissions. We have zero conflicts of interest. We're independent, self-funded, and built this because we needed it ourselves.

We'd love for you to try it, break it, and tell us what sucks. Seriously — roast us. That's how we get better.

🔗 trademates.co

Made with ☕ in Munich 🇩🇪

I sell handmade jewelry on Etsy and Instagram. For the past year I was paying a freelancer $300/month for product videos and social content. She did good work. Really talented. But turnaround was 4-5 days, revisions took another 2, and I kept missing the window when a new collection dropped.

Two months ago I said screw it and started learning AI generation. The learning curve was brutal. First two weeks I was producing garbage, weird lighting, bracelets with wrong bead counts, voiceovers that sounded like a robot reading a funeral speech. I almost went back to the freelancer.

What eventually clicked was finding the right workflow. Phone photos of new pieces, run them through AI image gen for styled backgrounds, turn the best ones into 10-second video clips, add music. I ended up using HeyVid because I got tired of juggling Runway and Midjourney separately but thats not really the point of this post.

The point is: I now produce 5-6 content batches a week instead of 2. Same-day turnaround. My IG engagement went up just from posting more consistently. And my content budget dropped from $300 to about $30.

But heres what I'm conflicted about. The AI content is fine. It's good enough. Gets engagement. But it doesnt have the creative eye my freelancer had. She'd suggest angles and concepts I never would've thought of. The AI gives me exactly what I ask for, nothing more.

I'm also painfully aware that I just cut someone's income by $3600/year. She was understanding about it but I still feel weird.

I guess the takeaway is: AI made me faster and cheaper but not necessarily better. For where my business is right now, faster and cheaper wins. Ask me again in a year.