In 2012 I had an idea called Grabea (Grab an Idea) for a platform that allowed people to post an idea onto a feed and the public could vote on those ideas.  If you posted an idea and it got enough votes, then it would go to the next level where the public could then submit why they are a good fit to join the company.  You, the idea owner could accept those people onto their team based on what they wrote. Think of it as a pre-Kickstarter.  In 2012 I wrote up a bunch of documentation, mocked up the idea on a whiteboard, made some wireframes, and even designed a mobile app and basic homepage for the website.  Here is what it looks like:

When I saw Godaddy launch their new app Flare yesterday, I was not only shocked because of the similarity with Grabea, but because I had come up with this idea four long years ago.  Godaddy essentially has created the same platform that I came up with almost half a decade ago, allowing people to submit their ideas, and allowing the public to vote on those ideas in order to validate them.

Not only is this validation for my original idea, but it also shows that it was a good idea in the first place.  Obviously I didn’t have the time or the resources to build it, which Godaddy has plenty of. Kudos to them.  This isn’t the first time a big company released an app that I had previously come up with and it certainly won’t be the last.  In the meantime, I am in the middle of building a new film collaboration platform called BitFlicks, and from the looks of the response I got on Flare after I posted it, it’s another good idea.  This time I should be able to release it before another billion dollar company does! 🙂

Oh and if you are wondering if I really did come up with this 4 years ago, here’s a screenshot from my Dropbox folder and also showing you the original white board designs and how it says 4 years ago…