Try to kill your startup idea

Your friends will validate your idea for free. This page helps you try to kill it instead, so if it won't work you find out cheaply.

List what has to be true, score each assumption, and test the riskiest one this week, even if an easier one is right there.

What you type stays in your browser.

What has to be true

Each assumption's danger score is how fatal it is if wrong, times how weak your evidence is. Both run from 1 to 3. If the assumption is wrong, does the idea die, force a big pivot, or is it survivable? Is your evidence a pure guess, a few anecdotes, or data you collected? A score of 6 or more means test it first. 3 to 5 means test it soon. Below 3, park it.

For each one, write the cheapest test you could run this week. For the marina idea that might be calling 10 marinas and asking how they took their last booking.

Kill criteria

Decide now what result makes you drop the idea. Decide after seeing the data and you'll talk yourself into keeping it. Make it a number you can check. When you're done, copy the whole thing as Markdown.