but anything innovative, new and unseen - never post *that* on internet

but anything innovative, new and unseen - never post *that* on internet, that would be very naïve and even stupid

I disagree -- I can't really explain why any better than Daniel Cook did so in his blog entry "why you should share your game designs".

I often hear from would-be developers that they're concerned about their ideas being stolen, but I never see any actual examples of it really happening in practice. An idea is just a starting point, and even if it actually catches someone's attention to the point that they want to work on it rather than pursuing their own ideas, it's pretty unlikely that they'll produce exactly the same (or even a particularly similar) game.

It's also worth noting that feedback from friends and family isn't always honest -- even if they try their best to make it so -- because they have an emotional attachment to you. It's also likely that you have surrounded yourself mostly with like-minded people, and feedback from the differently-minded can be invaluable.

Obviously different people are comfortable with different levels of sharing and you should stick with whatever you find comfortable, but many people find feedback to be invaluable, the stealing of ideas seems to be very rare, and I think everyone can agree that whatever your comfort level you need to stop short of "stupid paranoia" (link from Tom Sloper's list of "stupid wanna-be tricks").

I work in an office building that houses over 10 different games companies inside it, probably working on about 20 different products. When I bump into staff from other studios at lunch or in the corridors, we always talk about our own projects and the new and innovative ideas that we're putting into them. Everyone's too busy with their own cool ideas to steal mine, and my own ideas have actually become more refined by the feedback I've gotten from these other devs.

I disagree with this "ideas are dime a dozen" , "its execution, not idea" thing.

Ideas may be dime a dozen but good ones are not, so if you are after "yet another X with cool Y feature" , go ahead. But if it's an idea good enough that talking too publicly means competition by your own hands, it is wiser to keep to yourself until certain point.

I think that certain point for an indie is somewhere between post GDD and beta/prototyping part.

This is not a game design topic. Moving to Business.

Ideas may be dime a dozen but good ones are not

That's another one I see pretty frequently but which doesn't seem to actually be backed up by much actual evidence. There are loads of really good ideas out there presented by people with no ability to actually implement them, and many of the lesser ideas could easily be refined into good ideas in the hands of people with a good understanding of practical limitations.

Sure, you absolutely need an idea to produce a good product, and some ideas are better than others, but in the end there are a huge wealth of ideas -- most of them with plenty of potential -- floating around out there, and it's only those who are able to successfully execute them who bring quality products to market.

Ideas may be dime a dozen but good ones are not

That's another one I see pretty frequently but which doesn't seem to actually be backed up by much actual evidence.