Most all problems I see are just resource limited in some respect (occasionally its something humanity just doesn't know how to do yet, that's where the edges of science are). It's not something brand new that's never been done or explored, some prior work typically exists.
When someone says "can we..." or spills their idea they've often identified a real need but they often don't seem to do any sort of analysis further than identifying a demand signal. Chances are, you're not the first person to observe the problem and an opportunity to capitalize on it and there may be good reason no one has yet (its economically infeasible given current understanding, resources, and value people see in it).
The trick is to hold their hand and walk them through a feasibility analysis. Given infinite time and money, I'm confident I can arrive at pretty much any solution or at least a useful approximation that's an improvement on where we currently stand, so we start there and walk backwards. How much time do we really have, how much money do we really have. What's your appetite for risk within those bounds. Let's start talking about some tradeoffs of what you want to see and what I think we might be able to actually achieve.
When someone says "can we..." or spills their idea they've often identified a real need but they often don't seem to do any sort of analysis further than identifying a demand signal.
In my experience, they've identified a want. Either their want or a want they think the market has.
It's not until further analysis do they / you / we get to root need(s). This is why (allegedly) so many "IT projects" fail. The client got what they wanted...not what they needed.
When someone says "can we..." or spills their idea they've often identified a real need but they often don't seem to do any sort of analysis further than identifying a demand signal. Chances are, you're not the first person to observe the problem and an opportunity to capitalize on it and there may be good reason no one has yet (its economically infeasible given current understanding, resources, and value people see in it).
The trick is to hold their hand and walk them through a feasibility analysis. Given infinite time and money, I'm confident I can arrive at pretty much any solution or at least a useful approximation that's an improvement on where we currently stand, so we start there and walk backwards. How much time do we really have, how much money do we really have. What's your appetite for risk within those bounds. Let's start talking about some tradeoffs of what you want to see and what I think we might be able to actually achieve.