A media business is driven by the ability to deliver a well characterized audience, and the value those characteristics imply to advertisers.
The challenge is not a media property with no eyeballs. The challenge is what audience can you gather to sell to your advertisers. If they are undifferentiated then you have to have millions because they are not of much value. If it's presidents of Fortune 500 firms then you only need an audience of a few hundred to be able to make a lot of money.
So I would suggest it's not "people" but a well characterized audience at an acquisition cost that allows you to mark them up to your advertisers who will in turn make more money from the purchases your audience makes.
The YC mantra of "make something people want" gets interpreted in ways that cause a lot of startups to overlook the value of a niche focus.
The challenge is not a media property with no eyeballs. The challenge is what audience can you gather to sell to your advertisers. If they are undifferentiated then you have to have millions because they are not of much value. If it's presidents of Fortune 500 firms then you only need an audience of a few hundred to be able to make a lot of money.
So I would suggest it's not "people" but a well characterized audience at an acquisition cost that allows you to mark them up to your advertisers who will in turn make more money from the purchases your audience makes.
The YC mantra of "make something people want" gets interpreted in ways that cause a lot of startups to overlook the value of a niche focus.