This posting is a placeholder from some interesting links I've recently come across that offer something in the spirit of motivation, inspiration, lessons-learned, etc.
A nice write-up:
Thursday, March 29, 2012
2012-03-30 Thursday - Entrepreneurally Thinking...
This posting is a placeholder from some interesting links I've recently come across that offer something in the spirit of motivation, inspiration, lessons-learned, etc.
A nice write-up:
Friday, March 23, 2012
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Thursday, October 27, 2011
2011-10-26 Thursday - America's new CIO
Steven VanRoekel recently spoke about his vision for the future of IT in government:
http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/americas-new-cio-wants-to-disrupt-government-and-make-it-a-startup.php
A few notable items from the article:
http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/americas-new-cio-wants-to-disrupt-government-and-make-it-a-startup.php
A few notable items from the article:
Defense Department’s human resources management system. Dubbed the “Defense Integrated Military Human Resource System,”...was meant to take seven years to develop. Instead, it took 10, cost $850 million and had to be scrapped after 10 years of development in 2010 because it ended up being useless.
“Going forward, we need to embrace modular development, build on open standards, and run our projects in lean startup mode,”
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
2011-11-19 Wednesday - Startup Resources
A friend recently mentioned that he will be launching his own consulting practice, and I thought there might be some benefit to sharing with him and others some of the links to various resources I've collected over the years...
Start-up Resources
Inspiration
Marketing Resources Here is a list of 15 press release distribution sites, a mix of free and paid options, for you to explore. 1.1888PressRelease.com: A free and paid service that provides a number of options, including distribution outlets, visibility and tracking statistics. 2.24-7 Press Release: A free and paid service with varying formatting and distribution options. 3.Business Wire: A paid service (requires membership) that will distribute your press release to geographic, trade and industry media, and search engines. 4.Express Press Release: A paid service that includes distribution to state-based sites, industry-specific blogs and a PR forum. 5.i-Newswire: A free service that will allow you to submit one release per week to a global audience. 6.Media Syndicate: A free service that focuses on distributing press releases for small and medium sized businesses. 7.PR Leap: A paid service that distributes releases to all major search engines, newswires and websites. 8.PR Newswire: A paid service (requires membership) that will submit your release to a number of outlets, including newsrooms, bloggers, financial portals, social media networks, web sites, and search engines. 9.PR Urgent News: A free and paid service that allows up to three live links, targeted keywords and a thumbnail image with each release. 10.PR.com: A free and paid service that provides an option that includes a full company profile in addition to distributing your release. 11.PRBuzz.com: A paid service that distributes press releases to online news sites and blogs. 12.PRLog: A free service that allows you to include HTML links in the press release body, creates a PDF version of your release and allows you to submit to specific categories. 13.PRWeb: A paid service that distributes your site to numerous sites and lets you track and analyze results. 14.SBWire: A paid service that allows you to submit releases for geographical and industry targeting. They also distribute your releases via RSS to numerous third party sites. 15.The Open Press: A free and paid service that distributes press releases to numerous websites, blogs and RSS feeds. Customer Survey Resources Networking Resources Finance Resources Taxes Insurance
Supplies
News Sources Contracting Opportunity Resources
Accounting Resources
Legal Resources Communication Resources
Service Resources
Publishing/Printing Resources Government Resources Staffing Resources |
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
2011-09-28 Wednesday - Starting a Small Business, Part-1
A friend recently asked me for advice on starting a small business (a small retail shop)
This is the initial guidance I offered...
Step-0: Initialize
Register to obtain a business tax id with the IRS
Starting a Business
Step-1: Legitimize
Register a Doing-Business-As (DBA) with your the State's Department of Commerce
Step-2: Publicize
Setup a web site you can create a very nice looking (and free) web site via http:sites.google.com you can also create a free gmail account Alternatively you could pay for a domain name - and get an email account setup with your domain name. Yahoo hosting and professional email are what I use - about $12.95/month for the hosting, and $19.95 for the professional email service.
Step-3: Electrify
Register with one or more Crowdsourcing Fund Raising Services: A few possibilities:
http://www.kickstarter.com/
http://33needs.com/
https://www.profounder.com/
https://www.microplace.com/
http://www.dreambank.org/
http://www.advertactivist.com/
Step-4: Internalize
Schedule an appoint with a SCORE counselor http://www.score.org/
There are many aspects to running a business - SCORE counselor's can help provide much needed wisdom.
Step-5: Monetize
Setup Bank Accounts - look for a bank that offers a no fee checking account
https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/no_fee_checking_main
Other possibilities include local credit unions
- there's a good argument for setting up a business checking account.... - as soon as you have the account, ask them about setting-up a line of credit - or - obtaining a business credit card. This will allow you to start building the credit history for your company tax id.
http://www.inc.com/financing-a-small-business
Inc.com article: An Easier Way to Apply for Loans
[see: http://www.boefly.com/]
Step-6: Stabilize
Identify merchandise supply channels:
- http://www.craigslist.org - http://www.ebay.com
- local thrift shops Identify some low-cost high-margin mark-up items to sell in your own shop...
Step-7: Energize
Setup Referral Revenue Streams Identify other merchants with whom you can create referral agreements For example, someone comes into your shop and needs some help painting their house, fixing a plumbing problem, etc. You should have already established relationships with a list of merchants and service providers (who would be willing to pay you a referral fee)
Create a Facebook page for your business
Create a LinkedIn profile for yourself [search out the various LinkedIn groups that may be aligned with your business interests]
Find or create a local meetup.com group that is focused on your business interests (collecting antiques? trading merchandize? etc)
Step-8: Quantify
Assess Your Market visit other consignment shops visit thrift shops visit auctions and flea markets ask questions find out what products sell fastest find out what sells slowest find out what has the best mark-up / margins find out what can go wrong with your business model
Step-9: Organize
Setup a Customer Relationship Management service account Once you actually have sales, You can probably use something like SalesForce.com or SugarCRM.com to manage email marketing campaigns and managing customer contact info https://www.sugarcrm.com/sugarshop/product/professional http://www.salesforce.com/crm/editions-pricing.jsp?d=70130000000s0AL&internal=true
If you don't already have Microsoft Office, you can download the free Open Source Open Office suite of tools
If you need a good email client, Mozilla Thunderbird is an excellent choice.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
2011-09-22 Wednesday - How to FAIL at LinkedIn networking
Dear Clueless LinkedIn Spammer:
In the spirit of being a Mentor - here's a little feedback for you:
a) I clearly state on my profile that I only accept invitations to connect from people that I have actually met.
b) therefore, you clearly didn't read my profile very thoroughly
c) I don't know you - so how could I be a person that you trust?
d) You didn't provide any background or context on how we might know each other
e) You didn't provide any background or context on who we might mutually know
f) You didn't provide any background or context on why I might want to accept your invitation
g) You profile indicates that you are a ceo - and yet - you only have three connections - and no recommendations.
h) You did not display a photo on your profile
i) Your profile does not indicate your background or experience
j) Your profile does not indicate your education
k) Your profile does not indicate your interests
l) Your profile does not indicate any shared groups
m) You claim to be seeking a business alliance - or selling a service - but your use of a (yahoo | gmail | facebook) email address leads me to suspect that you are not serious about your profession
n) Your email initial contact did not include any contact information | no signature block | no title | no phone/fax | address
o) You either didn't send me any literature about your service (actually that's a bad idea - don't flood my inbox with crap PDFs - or worse - huge PowerPoint decks). Better - would be to include a linked to a document you've uploaded somewhere on the net
p) Curiously, although you have over 200+ connections - not a single one of them has posted a recommendation. And you are trying to sell me on buying your service?
q) You either don't have a web site -or if you do - it looks like a generic template - with no thought leadership / white papers posted.
r) Where is the list of articles that you've published - how will can I discern what value you might bring to the table?
s) Where is the list of clients you have serviced in the past? Testimonials?
t) You either don't have a blog | or you have a single [or no] posting
u) If you're LinkedIn profile says you are in the U.S. (say, Tustin, CA) - but I subsequently track your IP to somewhere else (say, Bangalore, Karnataka in India) - then you are really not getting off to a very good start in establishing credibility. In fact, my assumption would be quite the opposite.
v) If your reaction to this list is defensive, or in anger - then you need to look more closely at what you are doing, how you are doing it - and perhaps why you are doing it.
Monday, August 29, 2011
A THINKING MAN’S GUIDE TO VOYAGES SOUTH
A THINKING MAN’S GUIDE TO VOYAGES SOUTH~the many facets of Caribbean Cruising
http://sail.vedamind.com/www_freecrusingguide/2011/07/24/a-thinking-mans-guide-to-voyages-souththe-many-facets-of-caribbean-cruising/
Sunday, August 28, 2011
2011-08-27 Sunday - 10 Actions to Revitalize Microsoft Shareholder Value
Microsoft (MSFT) closed at 25.25 on Friday, August 25, 2011
Here are 10 actions I would suggest to the Microsoft Board of Directors to revitalize shareholder value.
1. Fire Steve Ballmer and replace him with an industry outsider.
2. Cut 10% of the workforce immediately
3. Target a 30% reduction of the workforce over a 2-3 year period
4. Eliminate low-margin products/divisions
5. Break-up the company and create some spin-offs
6. Create a new Linux/Cloud Services Division
7. Create a new Enterprise Open Source Services Division
8. Create a new $5B Micro-cap Start-up Angel Investor funding initiative
9. Implement an "UP or OUT" Annual Review process.
10. Hire me as a Shareholder Value Creative Consultant
Here are 10 actions I would suggest to the Microsoft Board of Directors to revitalize shareholder value.
1. Fire Steve Ballmer and replace him with an industry outsider.
2. Cut 10% of the workforce immediately
3. Target a 30% reduction of the workforce over a 2-3 year period
4. Eliminate low-margin products/divisions
5. Break-up the company and create some spin-offs
- Microsoft Office
- Microsoft Small Business
- Microsoft Consulting
6. Create a new Linux/Cloud Services Division
7. Create a new Enterprise Open Source Services Division
2012-04-12 Update: Wow. Today Microsoft announced 'Microsoft Open Technologies', "a new wholly owned subsidiary"
8. Create a new $5B Micro-cap Start-up Angel Investor funding initiative
- Quarterly Demo Contests
- $500K each to [0-3] selected winners
- Over time, create 10,000 new start-ups, of which Microsoft shareholders would retain significant ownership.
9. Implement an "UP or OUT" Annual Review process.
10. Hire me as a Shareholder Value Creative Consultant
Friday, August 26, 2011
2011-08-26 Friday - CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge
Today I registered for the CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Contest
http://milliondollar.cnbc.com/
Starts: September 19, 2011 at 9:30:00 ET
Ends: November 25, 2011 at 4:00:00 ET
http://milliondollar.cnbc.com/
Starts: September 19, 2011 at 9:30:00 ET
Ends: November 25, 2011 at 4:00:00 ET
Friday, August 12, 2011
2011-08-12 Friday - Weekend Reading Links
Java run-time monitoring, Part 1: Run-time performance and availability monitoring for Java systems
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/j-rtm1/index.html
Java run-time monitoring, Part 2: Postcompilation instrumentation and performance monitoring http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/j-rtm2/index.html
Java run-time monitoring, Part 3: Monitoring performance and availability of an application's ecosystem
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/j-rtm3/index.html
The Art of ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE PROGRAMMING
http://www.arl.wustl.edu/~lockwood/class/cs306/books/artofasm/toc.html2011-08-12 Friday - Faster Isn't Always Better
I received an email today...which reminded me of Aesop's fable of the Tortoise and the Hare.
http://www.bpminstitute.org/roundtables/past-round-table/article/pmi-mortgage-insurance-co-s-roadmap-to-business-agility.html?m=e&s=dcevent&c=wspreview&k=bpm&v=all
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Mortgage-insurer-PMI-Group-apf-2378822000.html?x=0&.v=4
...from which one might draw a conclusion that going "faster" maybe isn't always such a good idea?
What if by adopting a Business Rule Management System, they were able to be more agile - and thus make fundamental changes to their core business model "faster"?
Which eliminated the benefit of a slower pace - that would have allowed more contemplation of a suggested change.
And as a consequence of that - they destroyed shareholder value, employee careers, and killed their company?
Technology isn't always the right answer.
Sometimes, technology can simply be a weapon that magnifies your mistakes - to the point of being the instrument of your destruction.
http://www.bpminstitute.org/roundtables/past-round-table/article/pmi-mortgage-insurance-co-s-roadmap-to-business-agility.html?m=e&s=dcevent&c=wspreview&k=bpm&v=all
"Case study about how PMI used rules management and process management to achieve business agility i.e. better, faster and cheaper changes to achieve business results. Also discusses how IT collaborated with business as facilitator and enabler."
...which reminded me of this recent news item...
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Mortgage-insurer-PMI-Group-apf-2378822000.html?x=0&.v=4
"Mortgage insurer The PMI Group Inc. warned investors on Thursday that it may be unable to continue selling new policies and could shut down."
(...)
"Like other mortgage insurers, PMI has been able to sell profitable policies in recent years, but the gains from those sales hasn't outpaced losses from policies sold during the bubble."
...from which one might draw a conclusion that going "faster" maybe isn't always such a good idea?
What if by adopting a Business Rule Management System, they were able to be more agile - and thus make fundamental changes to their core business model "faster"?
Which eliminated the benefit of a slower pace - that would have allowed more contemplation of a suggested change.
And as a consequence of that - they destroyed shareholder value, employee careers, and killed their company?
Technology isn't always the right answer.
Sometimes, technology can simply be a weapon that magnifies your mistakes - to the point of being the instrument of your destruction.
Saturday, July 09, 2011
2011-07-09 Saturday
Chanos: China Bubble Ready to Burst
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POGX8_UDhh4&feature=related
China is the biggest Bubble in History
China's Ghost Cities and Malls
Waiting for Gravity to Hit LinkedIn
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/09/business/gauging-if-linkedin-signals-a-social-networking-bubble.html
Auditors: Army's huge SAP project 'at high risk'
Robotic "Singularity Drive System"
http://robogames.net/symposium/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POGX8_UDhh4&feature=related
China is the biggest Bubble in History
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8E0VzbuP7M&feature=related
China's Ghost Cities and Malls
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPILhiTJv7E
Waiting for Gravity to Hit LinkedIn
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/09/business/gauging-if-linkedin-signals-a-social-networking-bubble.html
Auditors: Army's huge SAP project 'at high risk'
http://www.itworld.com/software/181379/auditors-armys-huge-sap-project-high-risk
Robotic "Singularity Drive System"
http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/diy/youve-never-seen-a-drive-system-like-this-before
http://robogames.net/symposium/
9th annual games will be Fri-Sun, Apr 20-22, 2012.
http://robogames.net/events.php
Thursday, May 26, 2011
2011-05-26 Thursday - My response to Cody Willard's Trillion Dollar post
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/cody/2011/05/26/facebook-apple-and-google-will-each-be-worth-a-trillion-dollars
Here's my reply of why not:
1. Competition
2. FTC
3. Legislation
4. No "moat" - see #1
5. Lack of a product that consumers "need". Want? perhaps...for a season...
6. Is Facebook more of a business - or more of a fad? I'm inclined to vote fad...you know how those end, don't you?
7. Saying "a Trillion dollars" is easy. Reaching it? Not so much.
8. Natural selection. These companies live in a vibrant business ecosystem. There are predators out there too. The ant is everywhere - and a very efficient biological machine - but they don't rule the world either.
9. Things that rocket up - usually crash hard
10. The Meeks Dark Energy Conjecture: the internal politics of an organization will begin to tear itself apart as it approaches a market cap equal to the combined market cap of GOOG, AAPL, and IBM.
Note: Today's combined market cap is roughly $679.02B
AAPL - $310.76B
IBM - $201.86B
GOOG - $166.70B
"I read an article today that took my $100 billion price target for Facebook a bit further and predicted that Facebook — not Apple and not Google and certainly not Exxon or GE — would be the first trillion dollar company. And why not?"
Here's my reply of why not:
1. Competition
2. FTC
3. Legislation
4. No "moat" - see #1
5. Lack of a product that consumers "need". Want? perhaps...for a season...
6. Is Facebook more of a business - or more of a fad? I'm inclined to vote fad...you know how those end, don't you?
7. Saying "a Trillion dollars" is easy. Reaching it? Not so much.
8. Natural selection. These companies live in a vibrant business ecosystem. There are predators out there too. The ant is everywhere - and a very efficient biological machine - but they don't rule the world either.
9. Things that rocket up - usually crash hard
10. The Meeks Dark Energy Conjecture: the internal politics of an organization will begin to tear itself apart as it approaches a market cap equal to the combined market cap of GOOG, AAPL, and IBM.
Note: Today's combined market cap is roughly $679.02B
AAPL - $310.76B
IBM - $201.86B
GOOG - $166.70B
2011-07-28 Update:
Geoffrey B. West, “Why Cities Keep on Growing, Corporations Always Die, and Life Gets Faster”
http://blog.longnow.org/2011/07/26/geoffrey-b-west-%E2%80%9Cwhy-cities-keep-on-growing-corporations-always-die-and-life-gets-faster%E2%80%9D/Saturday, May 14, 2011
2011-05-14 Saturday
I'm reading some very diverse material this weekend.
Edward Thor's e-book: Beat The Market
http://www.edwardothorp.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/beatthemarket.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelly_criterion
The original manuscript written by J.L. Kelly, Jr. in 1956, "A New Interpretation of Information Rate"
http://www.racing.saratoga.ny.us/kelly.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Petersburg_paradox
SymPy: A Python library for symbolic mathematics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sympy
http://sympy.org/
http://code.google.com/p/sympy/
http://planet.sympy.org/
mpmath: Python library for arbitrary-precision floating-point arithmetic
http://code.google.com/p/mpmath/
Edward Thor's e-book: Beat The Market
http://www.edwardothorp.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/beatthemarket.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelly_criterion
The original manuscript written by J.L. Kelly, Jr. in 1956, "A New Interpretation of Information Rate"
http://www.racing.saratoga.ny.us/kelly.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Petersburg_paradox
SymPy: A Python library for symbolic mathematics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sympy
http://sympy.org/
http://code.google.com/p/sympy/
http://planet.sympy.org/
mpmath: Python library for arbitrary-precision floating-point arithmetic
http://code.google.com/p/mpmath/
Sunday, April 17, 2011
2011-04-17 Sunday - The Wisdom of Greenspan
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-17/greenspan-says-bush-era-tax-cuts-should-be-allowed-to-expire.html
So let me see if I've got this right:
Greenspan says that if we simply increase taxes, that won't work - and if cut back on spending - that won't help much either. But, if we stick it to the people who can least afford it, well, everything will work out just fine?
I would suggest that eliminating waste and fraud and useless bureaucracy - and ending land wars that we have no business starting - might be good places to start....before raising taxes. I have no problem paying taxes, raising taxes, etc. - I just happen to believe that there are miscreant monkeys mismanaging the affairs of our collective national financial house.
Before assuming that Greenspan is some kind of an expert on economics - it might be enlightening to review a few of his more incorrect thoughts on the housing bubble.
Another article today notes the following: "the amount of marketable debt outstanding has risen to $9.13 trillion from $4.34 trillion in mid-2007".
Greenspan said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” today, calling the economic crisis “imminent and dire.”
Greenspan said it will be hard to rein in the budget deficit because data show that if a disproportionate amount of the change come from tax increases “it won’t work,” while the impact of cutting back on spending is “almost insignificant.”
So let me see if I've got this right:
Greenspan says that if we simply increase taxes, that won't work - and if cut back on spending - that won't help much either. But, if we stick it to the people who can least afford it, well, everything will work out just fine?
I would suggest that eliminating waste and fraud and useless bureaucracy - and ending land wars that we have no business starting - might be good places to start....before raising taxes. I have no problem paying taxes, raising taxes, etc. - I just happen to believe that there are miscreant monkeys mismanaging the affairs of our collective national financial house.
Before assuming that Greenspan is some kind of an expert on economics - it might be enlightening to review a few of his more incorrect thoughts on the housing bubble.
Another article today notes the following: "the amount of marketable debt outstanding has risen to $9.13 trillion from $4.34 trillion in mid-2007".
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Saturday, February 19, 2011
2011-02-19 Saturday
I'm still in the desert...abiding here for a little while longer...thinking of a place that I once called home...
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