235 karma · joined April 20, 2010
I'm MUCH more likely to book a place that is reviewed well, and I am sure that my reviews play a role in the renters decisions to accept me, as well.
In fact, I'll be looking for an apartment with with an extra room, specifically to rent on Airbnb. Not just for the monetary aspect, but I've met some incredible folks over the past few weeks. The model just works.
Facebook just recently changed the way Facebook pages operate, and you can now embed a media within an iframe. http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/462
I say keep FB (because, as you say, people will be checking for it) but throw in an intro video and some links to a CV and past work, and you'll be able to make the experience that much richer.
These past two weeks I've been stuck in the grind with a mountain of projects, just growing tired of clients and growing scope and blah, blah blah.
Seeing your enthusiasm is helpful to me. It reminds me why I started in the first place. I do love what we get to do, and I hope you file what you've written away and look back on it from time-to-time to remind yourself why you're doing what you do.
Merlin Mann and Dan Benjamin have a great podcast out called "Back to Work" (http://5by5.tv/b2w), and Merlin had a great part around 20 minutes of episode 4 where he talks about getting bummed by deadlines, and by how much work he has to do, and how hard it is, and then he says:
"Then I caught myself and said 'waaitaminute', I dick around on the internet for a living and write about whatever I want. Oh my God, I am so not allowed to be that sad about this. If I can't figure out how to be happy doing what I'm doing, I might as well give up."
Good reminders. Thanks for posting, and for your enthusiasm. :)
It seems trite to say, but I believe that it's all about doing it. The most useful thing I've found (and I do this not just with design, but with programming) is to find something I like, and then re-create it. I'll see a shot on dribbble (http://dribbble.com) and decide to create something similar from scratch, by playing around in Photoshop until I get it right (or close). If I get stumped, my last line of defense is to look up a tutorial on the look I'm trying to achieve.
I would never publish anything I've created through this method, but the act of purposeful creation gives me tools and techniques to use down the road.
I'm a big fan of using a staging server that I'm in control of for changes to sites. We'll agree on a scope for an individual project or revisions, then I'll make the changes on my server and send you a link. If the changes are to your liking and the scope has been met, I'll bill you. Upon receipt of payment, I'll upload the changes to your live site, and we'll start again ad infinitum.
I went into the whole situation telling them "I've been through this before, and I will absolutely work hard, but not at the expense of my work/life balance". They agreed, and we got to work.
Sadly, they were shocked after about a week when I actually followed through and refused to work through the night, every night (we would definitely pull all nighters when it was necessary, but they wanted me to pull 12-14 hours a day every day as the sole technical co-founder). This issue became a large reason why I ended up needing to leave the team, regrettably.
Do you know right now that you need a balance between your work and your life? Sure you do! If it's your first time in the start-up game, will you actually put that into practice? In my case (and I would be willing to guess that a lot of you are the same), the answer is no. Some lessons must be learned the hard way, and this was one of mine.
A high-level summary of micro-finance is the issuing of small loans (often just $100-$200) to small groups of 3-4 extremely poor people. The borrower then uses that previously unattainable capital to purchase supplies and equipment to open their own business.
A classic example would be a poor woman in rural Mexico. Her husband works in the fields and they make just barely enough to get by and feed their kids, there's no capital left over even in a good season, and therefore no way to get ahead. If someone were to offer her the opportunity for a micro-loan, she would have a chance to overcome that barrier of extreme poverty.
The lender of the micro-loan would have the woman find another two or three of her friends, and they would form a borrowing group. The borrowing group puts together their aggregate financial needs, and a loan is issued to the group. The purpose of the group is accountability and camaraderie, and receiving additional loans is contingent on every member paying back their loan on time The group will meet together once a week with the lender and pay back a small portion of their loan plus interest over the course of 6 to 8 months.
Upon receiving the loan, the woman would buy a large pot, supplies, ingredients, and a table, and begin making and selling tamales out of the front of her house. She'd make enough to cover her own living expenses and pay off the weekly loan repayment amounts, while improving her own quality of life and gaining confidence.
This extends credit to people who would have never qualified under the existing banking system, and I have story upon story of people's lives who were absolutely changed by what we would consider an absolutely trivial amount.
I don't do this for a living, but I firmly believe in it, and will be putting that belief into practice within the next year.
Some micro-finance organizations include: 1. Grameen Bank - http://www.grameen-info.org/ 2. Kiva - http://kiva.org (started by PayPal alums) 3. MicroPlace - http://www.microplace.com/ (backed by PayPal)
For further reading, see (Microfinance) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microfinance and (Banker to the Poor) http://www.amazon.com/Banker-Poor-Micro-Lending-Against-Pove...
Go do some good. :)
If I were the Diaspora team, I'd print out every piece of negative press and post it up on the wall in front of me. Then I'd make a pot of coffee and get to coding, using my "bad press" wall as my motivation to beat the hell out of the naysayers with a fantastic product a few months down the road.
The number of stories where the underdog or unknown in the start-up world surprises everyone and creates something unbelievably successful is staggering. I guess that's why I can't help but root for them. The odds are stacked against them, for sure, but that kind of pressure has brought forth some world-rocking products, and it's not my place to declare something dead before it's even been born.
That still counts for something, right? There's got to be a way to still make a point and not look crazy.
I had the experience (that I imagine a lot of people share) of being hired by a non-technical founder in a start-up, who then wanted to micro-manage and give input on every minute decision that went into the building of the UI, even to the detrement of the user experience.
It's got Expense Tracking, Invoicing, Cash Flow visualization, a 30-day trial, and is only $18/month afterwards.
(Note: I'm not affiliated at all with FreeAgent, I just think it's a quality service. :)
"One of his [Conway's] investments was a podcasting startup called Odeo run by Ev Williams. Odeo failed, and Williams took the unusual step of returning his investors' money.
"I thought that was a magnanimous gesture," Conway said. "I decided to set that money aside and invest in whatever Ev did next."
It's really the ideal situation to be in a position to be able to return an Angel's money, but Ron's comment seems to sum up why he's a good person to know. He strikes me as the quintessential investor that lots of people talk about, one who invests just as much (or more) in people as in their ideas.
Looking just at my employment history at face-value, you could determine (taking the article's definition of dedication and commitment) that I was not truly dedicated to the long-term success of the companies I've been involved in.
The real story, of course, is that there's a lot more beneath the surface. Instead of blowing me off, ask me about the extent of my dedication to each company. I'm absolutely convinced that I've sacrificed, failed, and subsequently learned more in 5 years of "hopping" than the majority of "dedicated" employees who spend the same amount of time in a single job.