[esk]

In fact, if you're solving "NASA problems", being the first solver even has some potentially crippling disadvantages—nimble competitors can learn from your public mistakes and build off your public successes, all for a lot less time and money than it took you.

Solving a problem can be a lot easier the second time—what had been a tortuously long and painful process for you is often significantly easier for a competitor who had the benefit of watching.

You'll also also have this issue if you're the first to solve an easy problem, but I believe it's less exaggerated.

[sparsevector]

This is true for some things. For example, UI design can be a long and difficult process for the first mover but easy for competitors who can just lift the design. However, it's not so easy to lift, say, the design of a distributed file system from its public interface.

[wccrawford]

I totally agree. Just knowing that a problem -is- solvable is a huge advantage on a 'NASA problem.'