Web 3.0 or something completely different

As people are sucking up anything associated with *Web 2.0* one realizes there there truly is born one sucker every second. It’s like this craving to belong to something that people talk about, to be associated with the *new* and with the *future*.

When Flickr started in 2004 it was merely as a way for one of the engineers to share his photos with his friends. He solved a problem that was important to him. And if a problem is important to solve for one person the solution is often welcomed by many.  And it took off.

The difference between cool idea is: I got this problem I’d like to solve cause it matters to me and The market for women is under served online.  Hmm, I’d like to vote for number 1 – as do many.

So what comes first? The category or the innovation? We’ll I’m sure that there are many that could claim the Web 2.0 expression as a natural progression of Web 1.0 (big surprise!). But does that really matter? The key thing is to solve important problem and then what history decided to name it us, at least in the present time, very unimportant.

Bought the iPhone

Yes, I got sucked into buying the new 8GB iPhone about 10 days after it’s debut. My plan was just to try it out, claim that it was a miss and then return it sans 10% restocking fee. Gotta say that my plan went out the window as soon as I turned it on.

The iPhone is truly awesome. It’s the phone+iPod+mobile mail+browser I’ve dreamt about for 10 years. It’s pricey but worth every cent. It’s my new interface against the world – world wide. It makes the Crackberry look ancient and Neanderthal.

It’s the last piece that will make me 100% mobile and a complete road warrior. I like!

Crazy Great Times

Nine months into my new gig things are starting to really heat up. We had a fantastic web and client release last week that so far have gotten great reviews from our users. That makes all 24/7 work worth it.

We have also announced our expansion into Europe which is my old home grounds. Europeans will love our service since publisher’s over there are even stoggier then here in the US.

And there are tons more good stuff in the pipe which will keep me busy for the next few months. But that’s life in a startup. You make a bet, break the rules and work smarter and faster then the current incumbents to win. Anyone that’s not living on the edge is just waisting space and time.

2 Months Later

I cannot believe that I haven’t written a post for almost two months. That didn’t even happen when I semi-retired last year. We’ll I’ve been busy as hell, working on getting our client and web releases out as well as charging ahead on what’s next in the product pipeline.

It’s been a very productive and creative period. I’ve rediscovered the earlier Genesis (1969-1975), Rush and Judas Priest thanks to my buddy Sam. I’ve had friends and family swing by almost every weekend and I’ve been reading up on things (scrum, French politics, 70s progressive rock, the Inklings et cetera) as well as getting my Netflix on. I even think we went down to LA for a crazy weekend in May. Hard to remember.

The Clash is Live

Man, three weeks after the launch of Black Sabbath we are rolling out The Clash. That is hyper speed and supremely impressive. I’m starting to feel the right kind of urgency and focus as we had back in the early days of the Internet.

I once in a while run into other folks that work at new startups (post bust) and most of them are doing 9-5 and justify that by now it’s different. No way – if you want to survive and grow in a cut-throat marketplace you have to run faster, better and smarter than any of your competitors. I don’t buy the 9-5 story – any company that foster that kind of mentality will die.

It’s all about speed, execution and teamwork!

My Nocturnal Adventures

One of the first thing that one of my old Yahoo! managers said when he came onboard was that he wanted people to be committed, not just engaged. Then he told the story about the chicken who is delivering eggs but survives and the pig the sacrifices himself to deliver ham. The chicken is only engaged but the pig is committed. You get it.

That story took me back to my college years when we used to stay up all night to get our university magazine ready for publishing or when we planned new projects during the weekends. The use of the night-time was showing true commitment to the current mission at hand.

These nocturnal adventures continued as I ventured into the mid-90s startup world of Stockholm. We stayed up until the work was done. When you are committed, there are no rules when you should go to work or when you should quit. You keep charging ahead until you are either done or dead tired. Then sleep and repeat.

So as I have slowly getting used to being back in the startup world over the past few months I’ve also started to use nights and weekends for work. Our future is like an unpainted canvas and as any artist knows: creativity never sleeps.

So this past Saturday I woke up at 2am in the morning and realized that my head was full of ideas. I grabbed a coffee, the laptop and got to work. That was one of the most creative sessions I’ve had over the past few years. My commitment – I realized – came from being trusted, empowered and accountable for my work but also from really caring about the outcome.

I think the nights and the weekends are crucial to the success of a startup. That’s when you get time to look back at the past week, get overall perspective and think about the future. If you live in an entrepreneurial network – as I do – it’s the best time for sharings and learnings. It’s also the best time to get work done.

Black Sabbath

It took eight weeks, most weekends, night and days to get here but it was all worth it. A new milestone is reached in time for this long weekend. It’s count down, clean up and release party on the agenda for today.

And it’s live!

New Ripping Software

MediaFork is a new DVD ripping software based on the good old Handbrake code. It’s still Handbrake but tigther and more devloped. And available for Mac, Win and Linux.

Note: Having problems with getting the forked media files to work on the iPod. Reverting to good old Handbrake.

Get Your Apple Rumor On

You really have to love the Apple rumors. This time there are whispers about a special event on February 20. So here is my wishlist:

1. Early delivery of the Apple TV
2. A bigger, horizontal screen for the iPod (120GB)
3. Cheaper movie prices ($5.95 would be disruptive)

Book Widgets Are The New ISBN Identifiers

I authored my first book a few months ago, about our sabbatical in Argentina. It’s a 40-page, hardcover dynamo story about the Missus’ and my photographic experiences in Buenos Aires with surroundings. The reviews have been raving – both from mother and mother-in-law.

As most people on this globe, I’ve dreamt of being published. You know having an ISBN number, being found on Amazon et cetera. So I subscribed to their Merchant Pro service for an introductory price of $19.99 per month and started to upload my book with all associated data. Now, I thought I would be properly exposed to their 29+ MM users world wide and the dream of infinite richness would be reality.

I learned that I didn’t have to have an ISBN number but did realize that I had to add 50% on top of the production cost of my book to get to break-even. Furthermore, how would people find my future bestseller? There is no way that I could compete with the bigger publishing houses and their relationship with Amazon for potential readers eyeballs and wallets.

That’s when I realized that my blog will probably deliver more sales than Amazon, just by adding a promotional module in the sidebar, linking to my Blurb Bookstore. That’s cause my blog is my community, where I interact with friends and family. They are the most likely book buyers of my literary and photographic musings. They are my long tail!

If they like my book, then they will probably recommend it to their friends and family. That means that my URL at Blurb is more valuable than mine at Amazon but it’s much cheaper – it’s actually free. That means that I only need to sell a fraction of books to make the same profit. And over time, my audience will grow and I’ll finally become filthy rich.