You really gotta walk back that excessive, exuberant, irrational optimism, Sparky.

Well, there are incubators that support some shiny new thing, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instagram but they tend to Do One Little Thing Well, a la Unix, and then sell their soul for rock-n-roll.
But we think about IT here. There are also business in the Real World http://www.groundedcoffeeshop.com/ but both of these examples underscore your broader point, if I may radically restate it: economic activity of consequence is a top-down, not a bottom-up affair these days.

I'm willing to commit to a definite maybe.
BHO owns a substantial chunk of his woes, but it's not an open-and-shut case that we'd've gotten into reform mode in the counterfactual case of a GOP administration.

Unlikely to be an equal revenue stream.

The cost would seem proportional to the users.
As far as running the business, just let me sharpen my AWS knives a little more. . .
Of course, in our post-capitalistic era, just having a good business plan is necessary but insufficient to protect you from Big Oligarchy and Big Government, assuming you could pry them apart with a crowbar. If you offer a viable alternative, look for "something really, really unfortunate" to arrive with an innocuous name like "Net Neutrality", or something.

Finding stuff I am looking for. I would put 'finding stuff I am looking for' on the top of the feature list for a search engine.

So, how much are we willing to pay as a subscription to make up the lost revenue?
Or do we just expect the vendor to eat the opportunity cost?

Yeah, your sig is a hoot.

Ah, fucking hell, almost nothing new is new but if they can put satellites up at 6.6 million dollars a pop that is certainly new.

How many people come up with their own products that are really built from nothing into something that others want to use? The answer is: not many. Anybody who is able to start a company and bring a product up and succeed in all of this without losing their sanity, health, all the money and family in this world is a fucking hero as far as I am concerned.

I know, right? You're the only authentic one here, and the rest of us wander in circles.

http://pjmedia.com/eddriscoll/2015/04/17/boing-boing-meets-the-mob/

I'm sure you understand much more, yet strike an ignorant pose. Tiresome.

Your nostalgic 1A notions are totally going to get you sent to Room 101, mister.

s/through/thought/

If you look at the Law of Armed Conflict (and I don't think it's changed since I studied it) the right of self-defense of a military unit is absolute, and obviates any Rules of Engagement that may have been tacked on locally.
If you're taking fire, whoever is firing has agreed in advance that it's OK for your unit to return fire.
That's not quite the same thing at the individual level, especially looking worldwide.
However, anyone interested in legislating all that away should, in my opinion, check their privilege, apply their law to themselves, and doff their security details.
I'm guessing that would sober up a few of these [gerund] [noun]s.