Sunday, April 29, 2007
Testing iFilm Embed Player
Labels: embed player, ifilm
Saturday, April 28, 2007
$149 for shorts?!?
They took another chunk out of my wallet, but I love it. (of course, they couldn't get me for those shorts... this time :-) )
If you're in Venice, CA, you absolutely must stop by Enda King.
1419 Abbot Kinney Blvd
Venice, CA 90291
If you're in Venice, CA, you absolutely must stop by Enda King.
1419 Abbot Kinney Blvd
Venice, CA 90291
Labels: abbot kinney, enda king, ryan michael, venice
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Best Homepage Design - Facebook
How many times do you see a homepage that is perfect?
Despite being massive and having 100s of goals and owners, Facebook has somehow kept their homepage laser-focused.
Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you.
Despite being massive and having 100s of goals and owners, Facebook has somehow kept their homepage laser-focused.
Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you.
Labels: facebook, homepage design, simplicity
Kurt Vonnegut's Dead... So It Goes...
I love the expression "So It Goes"... great 2-page summary of 15 things Kurt Vonnegut said better than anyone else ever has or will.
Read it.
Or, if you don't... Why don't you take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut? Why don't you take a flying fuck at the mooooooooooooon?
Read it.
Or, if you don't... Why don't you take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut? Why don't you take a flying fuck at the mooooooooooooon?
Labels: avclub, kurt vonnegut, the onion
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Movie Trailer for 'Fish and Teeth' by Gwenaelle Gobe
A little french friend of mine (we call her Goonie / Gounie / Gobe / or GoubieHead) just released this trailer for her new movie 'Fish and Teeth'. I've seen parts of it, and I truly think it is fantastic -- check it out -- if you'd like to see the full movie, let me know -- I think we can twist some french arms to make that happen. Oh, and check out some of her other work films and illustrations and the official Fish and Teeth website.
Labels: fish and teeth, gwenaelle gobe, mermaid, movie, trailer, vampire
Attention and Sex presentation, by Scott Berkun at Ignite Seattle
I'm assuming that my title attracted you to this entry. Well, please take my word for it, grab a cup of coffee, and sit back and watch this entire clip. It is a 5-minute presentation given at the last Ignite Seattle event. I've told several people about the presentation, because it stuck with me after that evening. It talks about the importance of 'focus', especially in this interrupted world in which we're all immersed (blogs, twitter, email, RSS, etc.).
His short presentation chronicles the last 150 years and the shortening ADD attention span, and ends with a reminder about the importance (nay, necessity) of focus in our daily work lives. Truly, very little deep thought can be accomplished without it.
Thanks to Brady Forrest at O'Reilly Radar for posting this for me!
His short presentation chronicles the last 150 years and the shortening ADD attention span, and ends with a reminder about the importance (nay, necessity) of focus in our daily work lives. Truly, very little deep thought can be accomplished without it.
Thanks to Brady Forrest at O'Reilly Radar for posting this for me!
Labels: focus, ignite seattle, oreilly, scot berkun
Saturday, April 21, 2007
Fight Poverty by Honoring an Empowering Woman in your life
I remained involved with a fantastic organization called Unitus - they work to alleviate poverty by using a venture capital model to increase access to microfinance.
As part of their efforts to increase awareness of microfinance and their innovative approach to alleviating poverty, on Monday they're launching a really creative campaign called "Empowering Women".
The idea is to encourage you to honor an 'Empowering Woman' in your life (maybe your Mother... good time, since Mother's Day is rapidly approaching :-) ) with a contribution that will help Empower Women who are lifting themselves out of poverty.
I encourage you to get involved -- it only takes a few minutes. Please consider a donation (any amount helps... even $5!). In addition, your emails, blog posts and video blogs are all incredibly beneficial.
Here are tributes to my mother and wife.
We're trying to spread the word -- one of our first posts was from Seth Godin -- that means a great deal to us, especially given the great work he does with Acumen Fund and other organizations -- thank you, Seth!
Some other great posts that have appeared from friends:
* Chris Pirillo, for Ponzi
* Jeff Barr, for his amazing wife Carmen
* Devin Thorpe, for the lovely Miss Thorpe
* Tim Stay, amazing person and Unitus Board member
Labels: acumen fund, empower, empowering woman, empowering women, microfinance, mothers day, poverty, woman, women
Friday, April 20, 2007
Amazon.com Should have RSS Feeds on Product Detail Pages
I was recently checking out some pages on Amazon.com and realized that it would be really useful if I could subscribe to an RSS Feed for one of their product/detail pages.
This would allow me to be notified (via my RSS Reader, or email, actually), regarding changes such as:
- price
- reviews
- in-stock
- pictures/videos
- discussions
Come on Amazon -- why not give this to customers? They'd love it!
This would allow me to be notified (via my RSS Reader, or email, actually), regarding changes such as:
- price
- reviews
- in-stock
- pictures/videos
- discussions
Come on Amazon -- why not give this to customers? They'd love it!
Labels: amazon, amazon.com, rss
Startup thoughts from Web 2.0 Expo - Act Like There's No Acquiror
Many of the startups at Web 2.0 Expo seemed like they were built to be acquired. One of the speakers made a wise recommendation -- "If you're considering a startup, act like there's no acquiror out there."
That will force you to think about building something that can generate value for customers that, over time, will be something they'll be willing to pay for.
That will force you to think about building something that can generate value for customers that, over time, will be something they'll be willing to pay for.
Labels: acquisition, startup, web2expo
Startup thoughts from Web 2.0 Expo - Power of Personal Recommendations
There are a ton of websites trying to solicit user-generated content. I continue to wonder why people are so giving on sites like Wikipedia, and seem to be less willing to offer their expertise at places like CitySearch, Judy's Book and Yelp. It seems like these sites would be much more likely to generate meaningful input if they empowered users to directly ask their friends for recommendations, and then populate the database with the responses. For instance, if a neighbor asked me for a contractor that I recommend, I'd be happy to provide their name, phone number and website (if they have one), along with some description of why I recommend them. However, it would be even more useful if this information was then made available to others in my network. And, if I'm willing, it could be shared with the broader community.
I'm not sure if anyone does this, but I think there's an idea there.
I was reminded of this when reading Seth Godin's recent post on Rapport.
I'm not sure if anyone does this, but I think there's an idea there.
I was reminded of this when reading Seth Godin's recent post on Rapport.
Labels: advice, personal recommendations, rapport, user generated content, web2expo, wikipedia
Startup thoughts from Web 2.0 Expo - Copyright Law Basics
I attended a great talk by Fred von Lohmann, a Senior Intellectual Property Attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He gave a great introduction to the must-do's for any websites that solicit User Generated Content.
Obviously, you can do more research on these topics with Google, but I'm blogging this just for ease-of-finding for myself in the future. Enjoy.
Get On An Island
1 - Register a Copyright Agent (costs <$75)
2 - You must have Notice and Takedown rules
3 - Have an Infringer Termination Policy
Stay On The Island
1 - "Red Flag" knowledge
2 - Direct financial benefit + Control
Obviously, you can do more research on these topics with Google, but I'm blogging this just for ease-of-finding for myself in the future. Enjoy.
Get On An Island
1 - Register a Copyright Agent (costs <$75)
2 - You must have Notice and Takedown rules
3 - Have an Infringer Termination Policy
Stay On The Island
1 - "Red Flag" knowledge
2 - Direct financial benefit + Control
Labels: copyright, copyright agent, eff, electronic frontier foundation, fred von lohmann, infringer termination policy, intellectual property, notice and takedown, ugc, user generated content, web2expo
Startup thoughts from Web 2.0 Expo - Exhibitor Booths
I really enjoyed the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco earlier this week. Here are some messages that stuck with me from the 4 days of talks.
While walking around the expo (exhibitor booths), I was struck by how few of them bothered to make it easy for attendees to quickly get a sense for what problem they solved. Many not only didn't display their name, but they had no 5 word description of their value-add! Also, the popular companies were easy to find, because of the crowds around their booths (reminded me of P.T. Barnum's quote "nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd").
This led to a few ideas for exhibitors:
* If you aren't a well-known brand, make sure you have a 5-word explanation for your company easily visible at your booth
* It's a little smarmy, but consider 'hiring a small crowd' to hang around you/your booth, to attract other visitors. As the crowd builds, they can wander off a bit, and then come back. This allows the actual visitors to get to your representatives.
* Obviously, have an easy handout for people -- a single half-sheet card that quickly lays out benefits, with URL to get freebie
While walking around the expo (exhibitor booths), I was struck by how few of them bothered to make it easy for attendees to quickly get a sense for what problem they solved. Many not only didn't display their name, but they had no 5 word description of their value-add! Also, the popular companies were easy to find, because of the crowds around their booths (reminded me of P.T. Barnum's quote "nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd").
This led to a few ideas for exhibitors:
* If you aren't a well-known brand, make sure you have a 5-word explanation for your company easily visible at your booth
* It's a little smarmy, but consider 'hiring a small crowd' to hang around you/your booth, to attract other visitors. As the crowd builds, they can wander off a bit, and then come back. This allows the actual visitors to get to your representatives.
* Obviously, have an easy handout for people -- a single half-sheet card that quickly lays out benefits, with URL to get freebie
Labels: booth, conference, exhibitor, expo, web2expo
Monday, April 16, 2007
It's Not About the Startup Idea
Just read a great post by Paul Graham of YCombinator fame (he probably did something else too :-) ). Talks about the fact that it isn't about the 'quality' of the startup idea. Instead, the "main value of your initial idea is that, in the process of discovering it's broken, you'll come up with your real idea."
He then recommended that instead of saying what your idea IS, you should instead pose is as a question, "could we accomplish this idea/goal?". That changes the way you think about it and instead of proving your idea wrong, it allows you to expand your thinking.
Go find an intolerable problem and nurture the feeling that "it must be possible to solve it" and question how you would do so -- Paul posits that "simple as it seems, that's the recipe for a lot of startup ideas."
I'm really enjoying Paul's essays.
He then recommended that instead of saying what your idea IS, you should instead pose is as a question, "could we accomplish this idea/goal?". That changes the way you think about it and instead of proving your idea wrong, it allows you to expand your thinking.
Go find an intolerable problem and nurture the feeling that "it must be possible to solve it" and question how you would do so -- Paul posits that "simple as it seems, that's the recipe for a lot of startup ideas."
I'm really enjoying Paul's essays.
Labels: idea, paulgraham, startup, ycombinator
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
This is some f***** up s***.
Coldplay thinks REM's Nightswimming is the greatest song ever written
I'm not sure if I agree, but I sure do love this song:
Labels: coldplay, music, nightswimming, REM, video
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Don't bother me for awhile... I just got an Apple MacBook Pro!
I did it. Finally. It's my first Apple since the Apple Macintosh that I owned in college (1988-1989?). I admit that I was waiting to see what Microsoft shipped with Vista. I really wanted it to Wow people and make things interesting. But I'm not surprised that they didn't. Paul Graham's essay Microsoft is Dead was the final kick in the ass for me -- I instantly knew that I needed to make the shift, to hell with the minor inconvenience of learning a new system. And, funny, the last thing that happened with my Sony Vaio before I headed off to the Apple Store? It froze in Outlook. Ha!
How's this for an Apple upgrade?
Photo from Flickr - gesteves
How's this for an Apple upgrade?
Photo from Flickr - gesteves
Labels: apple, macbook pro
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Are you willing to bet nothing that you're right?
Dave just pointed out a site called BluBet -- basically, it allows you to 'Bet the World' on pretty much any topic, and you can create topics of your own. Some of my bets are here. What this enables is an active market on collective wisdom -- it's genius (and obviously, builds on The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki). And what makes BluBet great is how invisible they've made the experience. See what I mean -- go open an account and get your free $10,000 of 'betting credits' and then click around and make some bets. Awesome.
Labels: 500hats, betting, blubet, collective wisdom, dave mcclure, james surowiecki, mcclure, surowiecki, wisdom of crowds
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
You Know You're a Geek If ...
- You've used the glow of a cell phone or PDA as a flashlight
- You've typed quietly to secretly surf / blog so as to not wake your spouse
- You look forward to defragmenting your hard drive
- You like to uninstall programs from your computer
- You read 100's of blog posts but not the good ones... Those you flag for later, but never get to them!
- You call someone to tell them to read an email that you just sent them
Anyone have others for the list?
And, yes, I've done all of the above...
Labels: geek, nerd, you know you're a geek
You Can't Pay Someone to Care
I'm not sure if this is an original thought or not, but I didn't want to do a Google search to find out that I am again, unoriginal. I was thinking today about the fact that "You Can't Pay Someone to Care".
You can pay a person to do a job, and you can reward them for doing a great job. You can pay someone to work overtime, and to work on weekends. You can even pay them to do something they hate.
But, you can't pay them to care. They either care, or they don't. And if they don't care, you're screwed, because they're going to create so many hidden problems for you that you're kidding yourself by keeping them around.
Do them a favor. Do the other employees a favor. And, most important, do yourself a favor.
Amputate them from your organization. Remove them from your life. Fast.
Oh yes... and if you don't care about what you're doing... change it!
You can pay a person to do a job, and you can reward them for doing a great job. You can pay someone to work overtime, and to work on weekends. You can even pay them to do something they hate.
But, you can't pay them to care. They either care, or they don't. And if they don't care, you're screwed, because they're going to create so many hidden problems for you that you're kidding yourself by keeping them around.
Do them a favor. Do the other employees a favor. And, most important, do yourself a favor.
Amputate them from your organization. Remove them from your life. Fast.
Oh yes... and if you don't care about what you're doing... change it!
Labels: employee morale, employee motivation, pay
