Market Timing & Relevance: The Factor You Can't Fully Control

Market timing receives 10% weight in Proof of Usefulness scoring — the second-lowest weighting in the framework. This is a deliberate choice that reflects a specific analytical judgment: timing is real, consequential, and mostly outside founder control.

Penalizing teams heavily for factors they cannot meaningfully influence would make the framework less honest, not more rigorous. The 10% weight acknowledges timing without allowing it to dominate an evaluation that should primarily measure what teams actually built and whether it actually works.