[codewright]

You haven't read "Lean Startup" yet you're leaning on it as a source of authority?

And you sign your comments as if we can't see your bloody username?

I have read Lean Startup and guided the development of products based on it so let me tell what (some of) Lean Startup says:

1. Make the simplest possible thing that could validate your hypothesis (a well formed one) against the market.

2. Use real data and principled hypotheses backed by data to guide product iteration once you've established a market response to one of your MVPs.

The key part being here - MAKING the thing.

What the book doesn't say is, "sell ice to eskimos, hire outsourced coders, hope for the best".

I've worked at startups dictated by salespeople or their sales process, it was a goddamn mess.