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- Startup Ideas #421: Dashcam Conversions, Marketing Roles...
Startup Ideas #421: Dashcam Conversions, Marketing Roles...
Plus The 7 Day Project that Sold for Millions
Welcome to Half Baked, the newsletter serving up startup ideas as surprising as Elon Musk’s cofounder leaving xAI 😱
If you want to read any previous editions of Half Baked, you can check them out on our website.
Let’s goooo 🚀
In today’s edition:
💡 An innovative product for all the motorists out there
📈 The new class of marketing roles going viral right now
🛠️ How to make your own AI assistant with Google
🤑 The 7 day project that sold for millions
🍻 An app for all the short kings out there
🚘️ Dashcam Conversion Device
eyePhone
Available domain: Dashvue.co
The Problem: Dashcams are proven to protect drivers from false insurance claims, road rage incidents, and hit-and-runs, yet over 75% of drivers worldwide still don’t use one. Why? They’re expensive, clunky, and it’s yet another device to manage. Meanwhile, the average person has a phone they carry everywhere with them and about five unused smartphones collecting dust in their drawers. So why not build a mount to turn a mobile device into a dashcam? Here’s what we’re thinking…
The Solution:
In a line: A simple plug-and-play dock that transforms a current or old smartphone into a high-quality dashcam in seconds
Product:
📲 Plug your current or spare phone into the dock, download the companion app, and mount it on your dashboard.
🎥 App automatically records high-definition, looping footage with crash detection and instant cloud backup.
🛰 GPS tagging, speed logging, and AI-based incident detection to highlight only the important clips.
🔌 Dock provides continuous charging, heat protection, and auto-start when the car powers on.
Business Model: Sell the physical dock at a one-time price + optional $5–$10/month subscription for cloud storage and premium AI features.
End Goal: Sell to a dashcam giant (Nextbase, Garmin) or auto tech platform (TomTom, Ring/Amazon) for a 6–8x revenue multiple.
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😵 Bad Passwords Kill Startups
As a founder, you're used to taking risks. But some risks just aren’t worth it - like leaving your company exposed to weak or reused passwords.
That's because just one leaked password can nuke your business. It’s not worth the risk.
That's why smart teams (and even dumb teams like ours) use 1Password, the industry leader in password management. It keeps your credentials safe, your team in sync, and your business protected.
Take big swings with your product, not with your security.
📢 New Marketing Roles
The Trend: Marketing has changed. CEOs are becoming influencers, brand accounts are acting like people, and “being interesting on the internet” is now a full-time, well-compensated job ($8k for vibe tweeting? Sign me up!). That’s because we’ve now reached a point where every single company has realized they need owned media, since a solid X account or the personal brand of CEO is about 1000x more effective than traditional PR. It’s finally time for the chronically online, meme-obsessed people (like myself) to shine.
Opportunities:
Executive Ghostwriting Platform: Match CEOs and founders with ghostwriters specializing in LinkedIn, keynote scripts, and op-eds.
C-Suite Personal Brand Dashboard: Create a SaaS tool to track and optimize executives’ online presence, engagement, and sentiment.
🤖 How to Make Your Own AI Assistant with Google
The Tool: In a world dominated by ChatGPT, Google is quietly improving Gemini and their other AI products at a phenomenal rate. So here’s how you can create your own personal assistant using Gemini.
Step-by-step:
Go to Gemini, click Explore Gems" and New Gem
Give your Gem a name and write its instructions (what it should do, how it should act)
In the Knowledge section, upload up to 10 PDFs or images your AI can reference.
Test before launching then launch your assistant
🗃️ Unlimited Storage for Unlimited Ambition
Founders, what if your laptop died just before a big pitch? What if malware wiped your deck hours before a demo? What if your co-founder lost key files mid-fundraise?
Total Drive from Total Security gives you truly unlimited cloud storage so you never have to worry.
Back up everything, decks, docs, and designs, so nothing slows you down. No quotas. No caps. Just peace of mind while you build the future.
Get started today and get 80% off.
🖼️ The 7 Day Project that Sold for Millions
The Idea: Back in 2009, 21-year-old computer science student Alan Schaaf was sick of the awful image hosting people used on Reddit. Slow load times, dead links, ugly ads, the works. So, during a week of procrastination at Ohio University, he built a free, fast, ad-free image host as “a gift to Reddit.” This was the beginning of Imgur.
The Execution:
Feb 2009: Alan built the MVP in one week using HTML, CSS, and PHP. He posted it with the now-legendary headline: “My gift to Reddit: I created an image hosting service that doesn’t suck.” The link blew up.
Mid-2009: The site hit 1M page views in first 5 months, fuelled entirely by word-of-mouth on Reddit. Alan covered hosting costs with donations.
2010: Alan Introduced a $25/year “Pro” accounts for heavy users. Still a one-man operation.
2011: Alan moved to San Francisco to turn Imgur into a full-time business and starts running ads for free users and hires first employees.
2012–2013: Expands beyond Reddit, adding accounts, comments, and upvotes to build its own community. Traffic skyrockets.
2014: Imgur raises $40M Series A from Andreessen Horowitz to evolve from an image host into a social network.
2015–2020: Becomes a cultural hub for memes, viral content, and “Imgurian” in-jokes, serving hundreds of millions of monthly users.
2021: Imgur was acquired by MediaLab for $10M - $20M.
The lesson? Start small, solve one problem brilliantly, and let the internet do the marketing for you.
🔍️ Founder Finds
🛠️ AI Tool: Find people (like investors) in your network using this tool
🚨 Raise Alert: A Google veteran has raised $8M to bring AI agents to group chats
📚 Must-Read: Why getting a job is so incredibly painfully hard in 2025
🏷️ Founder Discount: Lovable is now 50% off for students. Yeeoowww.
💬 Founder Quote: "Most big ideas start out looking small and weird.” Garrett Camp (Uber, StumbleUpon)
🔦 Reader Spotlight
🧬 Living Well Daily: Joshua and Lola have just launched their daily longevity newsletter. Make sure you subscribe!
🫴 Rōmy: Howard Freeman is working on an innovative solution that helps small to mid-sized nonprofits discover new major donors
📝 MindNote: Tomya Mateo is building an AI-notetaking app offers a customizable and intuitive way to keep your ideas, thoughts, and memories organized and accessible on the go.
🎨 ColorPal: Mazaher Muraj is working on a user-friendly tool empowers designers to effortlessly auto-generate and customize color palettes
🧹 Epitech Integrator: Jennifer Williams is working on providing a user-friendly data cleaning and transformation tool tailored for small businesses and individuals
P.S: If you want your startup or project featured, click here!
🍺 Drunk Business Idea: Get Taller App
Ever felt insecure about your height? Ever felt the humiliation of a friend casually resting their pint on your head mid-conversation?
Introducing Taller™, the app that makes you…brace yourself…taller. Using our cutting-edge Height Optimization Protocols™, we’ll have you looking NBA-ready in no time.
Taller™ – because being “fun size” isn’t always fun.
Vote
👋 That’s All Folks!
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