After a great deal of consideration, here's my take...
It's not about removing the complexity. It's about putting the complexity in the right place.
Those of us who work to create great things find ourselves in a constant struggle between simplicity and complexity. However, this struggle is an illusion. True simplicity is a manifestation of complexity.
]]>My heartfelt sympathy goes to his family, friends, and colleagues.
May his memory serve as a lighthouse for us all.
]]>Try to rest easy in the knowledge that you are handling this whole thing with a grace that few others could match. That does not make this suck any less, but it does make it easier for you, your children, and your spouse. As you mentioned last night, I've got a story for everything. What I've learned as I've been beaten down by the boxer that is life is that time is the most precious "thing" we have. It seems so obvious (and cliché), but time will relentlessly march on, whether we like it or not. The most important thing you can do for yourself, and your children, is to find a way to genuinely live a happy life.
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus is credited for saying "No man ever steps in the same river twice." To oversimplify, what he is saying is that change is a constant component of what it means to be human. As you and your family pass through this time remember that today is the beginning, not the end. Live for today. Be conscious of tomorrow. Don't worry about yesterday. Allow yourself to be happy and happiness will return.
Peace my friend. We are here for you when/if you need us.
Today Google released what they call the "Personal Blocklist" as a Chorme Extension (download it from here). This tool allows individuals to block specific sites from showing up in Google search results. It's unfortunate that Google did not provide a way to input a list of sites to be blocked in bulk, but I'm sure someone will augment the Extension in short order.
In the meantime, here is a handy list of sites that I will be search for and blocking ASAP.
Let me know if you find this list useful, and please help me add to the list.
Thanks.
]]>In the process of this work I have become interested in the "discoverability" of data that currently lives within ones social stream/graph. For the sake of this conversation let's accept the following definition of "discovery"...
Part of the pre-trial litigation process during which each party requests relevant information and documents from the other side in an attempt to "discover" pertinent facts. Generally discovery devices include depositions, interogatories, requests for admissions, document production requests and requests for inspection.
The formal procedures used by parties to a lawsuit to obtain information before a trial is called discovery. Discovery helps a party find out the other side's version of the facts, what witnesses know, and other evidence. Rules dictating the allowable methods of discovery have been set up by Congress (for federal courts) and by state legislatures (for state courts).
All the conversation around privacy, particularly with respect to Facebook, tends to focus on non-descript fears, a.k.a. FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt). However, as I have begun to investigate this matter more deeply, I have concluded the number one reason NOT to allow your social stream/graph to be publicly accessible comes when we consider what happens if you are every involved in a legal matter where a "discovery" demand is placed on you.
Apparently, on 26 May 2010, the US District Court (see See Crispin v. Christian Audigier Inc.) ruled that some content hosted on social networking sites will be precluded from discovery only to the extent that those communications were not available to the general public (see http://goo.gl/ykazG). This is huge news and should be taken VERY SERIOUSLY by anyone that uses Facebook or any other social networking site. This is particulary important now that Facebook is all about your location, etc.
Let me pose the following as an example...
You allow Facebook, Foursquare, Google Latitude, etc. to track your every move because you like letting all of your friends know where to find you. (I would encourage you to reconsider this personal policy, but that is not the point of this posting.) If you do not setup your privacy settings correctly, all of this location information would be "discoverable" in a court of law. I don't know about you, but this fact alone should make everyone strongly reconsider just what they really want shared publicly.
I am very interested to hear what other people think of the "privacy question" from this perspective.
]]>My most useful career experience was about eight years ago when I was trying to break into the world of VC-backed startups. I applied to hundreds of jobs: low-level VC roles, startups jobs, even to big tech companies. I got rejected from every single one. Big companies rejected me outright or gave me a courtesy interview before rejecting me. VCs told me they wanted someone with VC experience. Startups at the time were laying people off. The economy was bad (particularly where I was looking – consumer internet) and I had a strange resume (computer programmer, small bootstrapped startups, undergrad and masters studying Philosophy/mathematical logic).
The reason this period was so useful was that it helped me develop a really thick skin. I came to realize that employers weren’t really rejecting me as a person or on my potential – they were rejecting a resume. As it became depersonalized, I became bolder in my tactics. I eventually landed a job at Bessemer (thanks to their willingness to take chances and look beyond resumes), which led to getting my first VC-backed startup funded, and things got better from there.
One of the great things about looking for a job is that your “payoff” is almost always a max function (the best of all attempts), not an average. This is also generally true for raising VC financing, doing bizdev partnerships, hiring programmers, finding good advisors/mentors, even blogging and marketing. I probably got rejected by someone once a day last week alone. In one case a friend who tried to help called me to console me. He seemed surprised when I told him: “no worries – this is a daily occurrence – we’ll just keep trying.” If you aren’t getting rejected on a daily basis, your goals aren’t ambitious enough.
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The first problem I tackled was that of digital video editing and compression in the days where CD-ROMS were the content delivery medium of choice. Next, I turned my attention to the challenge of helping companies, large and small, make the transition from the analog economy to the digital economy. In the early days of the Internet it was not obvious how best to use this new communications tool. I found OpticNerve, Inc. for the purpose of providing comprehensive marketing, sales, user interface, and application design/prototype consulting to businesses primarily in the technology sector.
In the mid-1990's I became very interested in the concepts and challenges of security on the Internet, particularly focusing my attention on the complexities of email. I identified some key security problems within SMTP that ultimately resulted in the development of the Sender Address Verification (SAV), Silverlisting, and other concepts related to the security of email communications. The result of this work culminated with the creation of Sendio, Inc. Sendio's mission was to "Secure email one inbox at a time."
The Sendio experience was a wild ride. I took the company from zero employees, zero customers, and zero revenue to 40 employees, 600+ enterprise customers (over 125K protected inboxes), 98% customer retention, and ~$3M in gross annual revenue of which nearly $1.5M was recurring. While at Sendio I raised ~$9M in venture capital, traveled throughout North America working with partners, and spoke with thousands on the topic of Internet security.
For the last 18 months I have directed the majority of my attention towards understanding the compelling synergies between the Internet, social media, and mobile computing. Since my departure from Sendio I found Killer App Factory, Inc. Through KAF I have been speaking, writing, and consulting on social/mobile/Internet convergence and have been developing mobile (iPhone/Android) applications.
I am a creator of things and the companies required to bring them to market. I am a hands-on person with deep, current, and relevant expertise working at all phases of corporate development. I am a sales, marketing, product development and business development person by day, and a software engineer by night.
]]>"Tell me about yourself."
I am a skilled and successful sales person. I am a technologist, an inventor, a philosopher, an entrepreneur, a musician, a son, a father and a husband. I have published articles, have performed on stages to the applause of thousands. I have created businesses from nothing, and have watched them return to the nothing from which they were created. I am, clearly, a person blessed with many gifts. However, does this really tell you "about" me?
When I think about "me," I believe I am primarily defined by what I know (or think I know), and, conversely, by my internal voice that is always pushing me to know more. My "superpower," it turns out, is not all that I know, but a deep internal appreciation for that fact that I know almost nothing.
The following words from Napoleon Hill, published in his book "Think and Grow Rich" (which I am in the process of re-reading) are remarkable for many reason and, in a sort of scary way, are perhaps more relevant today than they were in 1938 when they were first published.
THERE are two kinds of knowledge. One is general, the other is specialized. General knowledge, no matter how great in quantity or variety it may be, is of but little use in the accumulation of money. The faculties of the great universities possess, in the aggregate, practically every form of general knowledge known to civilization. Most of the professors have but little or no money. They specialize on teaching knowledge, but they do not specialize on the organization, or the use of knowledge.
KNOWLEDGE will not attract money, unless it is organized, and intelligently directed, through practical PLANS OF ACTION, to the DEFINITE END of accumulation of money. Lack of understanding of this fact has been the source of confusion to millions of people who falsely believe that "knowledge is power." It is nothing of the sort! Knowledge is only potential power. It becomes power only when, and if, it is organized into definite plans of action, and directed to a definite end.
This "missing link" in all systems of education known to civilization today, may be found in the failure of educational institutions to teach their students HOW TO ORGANIZE AND USE KNOWLEDGE AFTER THEY ACQUIRE IT.
--Napoleon Hill [1938] - "Think and Grow Rich"
Can you say Google? Microsoft? Bing? WolframAlpha? iPhone? Android?
Who would have thought that Napoleon Hill, back in 1938, was writing the business plan for the current information age.
It's not what you know. It's not who you know. It's how you organize what's known.
I can't tell you I completely understand the subtleties of Hill's words, but I'm sure going to try to figure it out.
]]>If anyone was wondering just how important mobile Internet convergence really is, just take a look at what has happened over the course of the last 6-weeks as a result of Google I/O and the release of Android 2.2 (Froyo) and Apple's WWDC 2010 and the release of iOS 4 and the iPhone 4. It does not require a great deal of insight to see just how important mobile devices and the operating systems that power them have become. Just a few short years ago the concept of mobile operating systems could not have been farther from the consciousness of mainstream users. Sure, phones became "smartphones" when the PalmOS found it's way into a phone many years ago, and Windows, Symbian, Blackberry, etc. have been running on phones for a very long time.
But look what's happened in the last 3-years since Apple launched the original iPhone:
While this is all great trivia, I think most people are currently missing the really important story. Sure, great devices (hardware) are essential for the Internet to truly become mobile, and great operating systems are required to power these clever new devices. However, upon closer inspection I have concluded the single most important component of the current mobility revolution is not iOS (iPhone OS) or Android, but is Webkit.
Webkit is the underlying engine that powers the web browsers from BOTH Google (Chrome) and Apple (Safari), and not just on the desktop, but specifically on their respective mobile platforms. Based on this fact, it seems clear to me that developing native iOS or Android applications should not be the goal/objective for the vast majority of organizations. Of course there are some classes of applications, specifically graphic intensive games, that require "native" power. However, most great applications and utilities are not games, but are productivity enhancers. In almost all cases, organizations would be much better served focusing the majority of their attention on the function of the application(s) and implement using HTML5 tools. Thanks to the power of HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript it is now possible to create "web" applications that are easily 90% as fast, powerful, functional, and attractive as their native counterparts. This approach, going web vs. native, facilitates platform independence as opposed to platform dependence (lock-in).
Forgive me iOS (Apple) and Android (Google), but it's Webkit that's really the key to everyone's success.
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