Netizen

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Manhattan?

"Where do you live?"

What do you do? Where do you live? When you go to an event, those are some of the first questions people who don't know you ask you. They can be nice ice breaker questions. They open up the conversation.

Where do you live? That can also be a question asked by someone who really prides himself/herself in knowing the names of many different neighborhoods in the city. When I was new in the city, I did not realize that. I'd say I live in the city. Then I started saying I live in Brooklyn. People would say, where in Brooklyn? I'd say near Prospect Park. And people would get impressed. Wow, we have a Park Slope dude over here. I did not live west of the park, but south.

Cultural diversity is my favorite thing about this city. People from every little town on earth live here. How do I know that? People from every little town in Nepal live here. I know that. And Nepal is the poorest country on earth outside of Africa. So I am extrapolating that. People from every little town from every country must live here. I think that is true.

I had a whole bunch of audio cassettes of Hindi music with me when I came to America late in 1996. My next door neighbor in college - Luke Payne - once asked me, "Can I ask you something? Why do you listen to the same song again and again?" And the dude was a music major.

Do all Chinese faces look the same to you? Then you must not be Chinese.

You have to have my global perspectives to see the texture of Queens. Black might be a race, but brown is not a race. It is not even a race.

When I was living in Brooklyn, I was living in Little Bangladesh. When I went grocery shopping, people would start talking to me in Bengali, which I understand a big chunk of, but can't speak back. They just assumed I was Bengali.

"Are you from India?" I have never replied to that question with a no anywhere in the US. I am half Indian, I was born in India. Wtf! It is just that I grew up in Nepal.

But in the "heartland," when you get asked that question, there is usually a follow up question.

"Are you a Patel?'

"No, I'm not."

"Are you a doctor?"

"No, I'm not, but I am very smart."

No, thank you. There is no town in America that does not have at least one Indian doctor. And Patels own motels all over the place. I once saw a huge billboard by the interstate highway in Tennessee: "Motel, run by Americans!" That does not happen all that often. My people pretty much have the motel business covered.

Where do you live?

That is sometimes a class question. Are you rich enough to live in Manhattan? Or do you live in the outer boroughs?

I have a healthy feeling about money, but money does not even begin to grasp the cultural diversity of New York City, and there Queens rules. New York City is the Amazon forest of humanity, and Queens is a big part of it.

The Dying Languages, In New York New York Times The chances of overhearing a conversation in Vlashki, a variant of Istro-Romanian, are greater in Queens than in the remote mountain villages in Croatia that immigrants now living in New York left years ago....... the languages that make New York the most linguistically diverse city in the world. ..... languages born in every corner of the globe and now more commonly heard in various corners of New York than anywhere else. ...... New York is home to as many as 800 languages — far more than the 176 spoken by students in the city’s public schools or the 138 that residents of Queens, New York’s most diverse borough, listed on their 2000 census forms.

Digital Dumbo: Here I Come

Dumbo. Directly under the Manhattan Brooklyn overpass. At first I did not know the full form name. But it was a great sound, like Yahoo, or Google, supposedly meaningless, but a great sounding name. I thought some of the techies in town came over to this semi vacated part of the city, drove away the rest of the inhabitants, mostly homeless people, and took over. That is what Dumbo feels like.

Dumbo is special in the NY tech ecosystem. I am not aware of another geographical locale quite like it. There are some very cool office spaces around town, some of which look like abandoned artist spaces. But Dumbo is the only place that is not one office, or even one street, but an entire neighborhood, although it is not that big of a neighborhood.

Ignite, Set It On Fire

Come to think of it I lived in Brooklyn for my first few years in the city. I lived south of Prospect Park. That is quite a distance from Dumbo. But a few times I walked from Times Square to where I lived. I'd start out around midnight, and be home by dawn. That is a great way to experience summer in town. It is much better than throwing up on a subway platform or inside the train: I have done both. And no, I was not drunk during those walks. The truth is I am not much of a drinker. One beer for one evening is as far as I prefer to go. Like last night, the MeetUp people had an entire refrigerator bulging with free beer - free for us, a bunch of money for them, but hey, they are a profit making dot com, who cares; yes they exist, profit making dot coms - but I took just one. (FourSquare Office, Dropio Technology)

A few days back I had an email from the First Round Capital guy Charlie; I am on his mailing list for cool tech events in town. Two events for the week looked at me. Sam Lessin was speaking at the MeetUp headquarters on Tuesday, and it was a MeetUp that sounded really, really cool, but I had never heard of. And there was this Digital Dumbo thing for Thursday that looked so great and fun, but there were no spots left. I shot a quick email to Sam. Can you get me in? Since it was taking place at the Dropio office.

Thursday, April 29th
7:30PM Digital DUMBO #15 Drop.io On In

While our application lives in the 'clouds', we set up people-world headquarters in DUMBO in ye-olden-days of 2008. Now in the spring of 2010 we are prepping to roll out the next generation of rich media file-sharing... Join us to celebrate

RSVP: http://digitaldumbo.eventbrite.com/

Drip.io HQ
68 Jay St #413
btw Water & Front
Brooklyn, NY 11201

Date: April 29th, 2010
Time: 7:30 - 10pm

When I brought that up with Jacob, the other Dropio speaker at the MeetUp, he taught me the secret way to get into the Dropio office. He casually mentioned it was like a cocktail for people who worked in Dumbo. I tried to unlearn the secret way and said, "In that case I will not come. I don't work in Dumbo." Hacking a site is one thing. But hacking a site's office, um, wait, I don't even hack sites. But thanks, Jake.

Social Media Week: The Best NY Tech MeetUp Ever

Charlie has blocked me from leaving comments at his blog. I retaliated by hyperlinking his name Charlie to the most famous Charlie video on YouTube: 2010: Location, Random Connections, The Inbox, Frictionless Payments. Charlie bit my finger, Charlie blocked me on his blog.

And today I have a Facebook email from none other than the guy who runs the show, the organizer of Digital Dumbo. How cool is that? And the guy read about my interest in Digital Dumbo at my blog. That is even cooler. People who read my blog are, by definition, cool. Andrew Zarick is now officially cool.

Not having read up on it, not having been to one event yet, this is what I have to say about Digital Dumbo. Everyone who works at any tech company in Dumbo should be able to attend. Heck, everyone who works for any tech company anywhere in the city should be able to attend. I guess what I am saying is turn Digital Dumbo into a block party in Dumbo. May would be a great month to start in that direction.

Digital Dumbo Block Party. Get the city involved. You want jobs? Buy me beer.

Digital DUMBO| Facebook
digitaldumbo on Twitter
Digital DUMBO #15 Drop.io On In - Marketing - Design- Eventbrite
Digital DUMBO
Digital Dumbo #12: One Year Anniversary Sponsored by Carrot...
Digital DUMBO Drinks
Dumbo NYC, Brooklyn » Archive » Digital Dumbo Drinks #2 (26Feb2009...
Dumbo NYC, Brooklyn » Archive » Event: Digital Dumbo #14 (DumboNYC..
Digital DUMBO Hosts Its First Event, Bringing Over 100 Digital...
» Twestival YVR to Digital DUMBO NYC – we've got you covered
Digital Dumbo - A Digitally-Anthropomorphic Social Elephant
Blood, Sweat and Fear: David Skokna at Digital DUMBO - HUGE
Digital Dumbo - Yöshi Sodeöka
Invoke: Twestival YVR to Digital DUMBO NYC – we've got you covered...
Twitter / @digitaldumbo/Digital Dumbo Agencies
MediaPost Publications Just An Online Minute...Digital DUMBO Gets...
Brooklyn Heights Blog » digital dumbo
HUSH | Backdoor » The After Party: Digital Dumbo, Lucky #13
Digital DUMBO #15 Drop.io On In Mixer
DUMBO Named New York's Digital District | NBC New York
Digital DUMBO| Andrew Zarick
Brooklyn Cupcakes at Digital DUMBO| Brooklyn Cake
Digital DUMBO Drop.io On In - NYC Calendar | Guest of a Guest< Digital DUMBO Drinks
Brooklyn's DUMBO Neighborhood Becoming The Home for New York's...
Anna Zach @Digital DUMBO on Vimeo
Digital Dumbo Stream Discussion
NYConvergence: Outside.In, Carrot Creative Host Digital DUMBO Drinks
Flickr: Digital DUMBO
Digital DUMBO #7 | The JAR Group
DUMBO Digital District of New York | AD60
Digital DUMBO #15 Drop.io On In: Thursday, 4/29 at 7:30pm at Drop...
space150 - space150 Sponsors Digital DUMBO #8
Why Digital DUMBO Matters? | Andrew Zarick
HUSH Studios vs. Digital Dumbo on Vimeo
Carrot Blog — Recap: Digital DUMBO Drinks #4
Digital Dumbo #15 - Drop.io On In | Small Business Complete
foursquare :: Digital Dumbo #14 #NYDD :: Brooklyn, NY
NYConvergence: Carrot's Germano: DUMBO is NYC's 'Digital District'
Digital DUMBO #14 « Christopher M Kennedy
Digital DUMBO #14 Sponsored by Invoke at The Dumbo Loft in...
HUSH | Backdoor » 365 Days of Digital Dumbo
Paint The Town Red - Hootsuite Creators Host Digital DUMBO #14
foursquare :: Digital Dumbo #14 #NYDD :: Brooklyn, NY
Digital Dumbo #11 Purple Sangria Digital Festivus - Society of...
Digital Dumbo #11 Purple Sangria Digital Festivus - Garysguide...
Cupcakes Take The Cake: Kumquat Cupcakery For Digital DUMBO
“How do you fit a mountain into a teacup?” -Digital Dumbo
Digital Dumbo | NBC New York

The Jack Dorsey Story

I came across this post on TechCrunch linked to from Fred Wilson's blog. It is really something. Jack (@jack) is the guy who invented Twitter. The first tweet is like the first phone call. The post is worth the read.

The guy is from the Midwest. He grew up in St. Louis. A guy who went to the same high school as me in Kathmandu and the same college in Kentucky lives there now.
He started out at Missouri State.
He taught himself programming early.
He has a thing for New York.

".....One night, I couldn’t sleep, I just had to write a prototype script. It would sit on a server, take incoming emails, broadcast them out to a list, and also record them in a database that I could view on the Web.” That was the first glimmer of Twitter......But for a variety of reasons, dNET did not get traction in the market, and so Jack embarked on a period of freelance programming before joining a podcasting start-up called Odeo, primarily to work with Evan (a.k.a. @ev) Williams, formerly of Google....... The very first tweet was an internal one that Jack sent out at 12:50 p.m. on March 21, 2006: “just setting up my twttr.” A few minutes later, he tweeted innocuously: “inviting coworkers.” This was the beginning of the Twitter revolution....... Jack and his colleagues lugged big plasma screens across the country and set them up in the hallways of the conference to display the live Twitter chatter about the conference sessions in action, one at the registration desk and one at the exit from the main conference room.......“We were really good at getting the right friends in. We had a lot of high-powered, vocal bloggers using Twitter at South by Southwest. They were talking about it non-stop at the conference. And the press happened to be watching, too. And it just blew up.”....... I was really surprised by the velocity.....“We weren’t really ready to take money right away, but we got a note from someone. We went to meet them for breakfast at the top of this hotel in San Francisco and had a pretty good conversation. We were still kind of forming the company and whatnot. When we got back to the office thirty minutes later, we found a scanned image of a check for half a million dollars in our inbox.”.......It was not where he comes from, but ‘Is this guy fun to work with? Is he going to challenge us? Is he smart?’ This person was going to take a seat on the board.”.......Fred Wilson says he likes to think of himself as the entrepreneur’s consigliere..... The beauty of being a venture capitalist is we’ve seen all these issues a lot of times......... “Fred had our phone on priority dial, so he could reach us at any time.......He is very engaged and whenever we need something, we call him up. He is excited to do anything for us.” Jack points out that Fred isn’t just focused on big-picture strategy, but also on the nitty-gritty features of Twitter as an avid user. “We listen to what he thinks and what he needs from the product,” says Jack. “And that has been a great way to get into the relationship and for both of us to trust each other more. As we worked on the product together, we began to learn, ‘Oh, this is how Fred is, and this is how Jack is.’ We began to learn each other’s faults. And that couldn’t really happen any other way.”........ I want a VC who is always thinking a few steps ahead of me....... “We had a lot of conversations with people down in the Valley,” Jack said. “At the end of the pitch, the person across the table would say, ‘Well, we’ll let you know fairly soon, like in an hour or so. We just want to talk internally, but we’re really excited.’ We didn’t react well to that. We wanted to be questioned, we wanted to be challenged, and we wanted to see some of their thinking around actually developing this product.”....... Jack found more of those challenging VCs on the East Coast than on the West Coast. “I think it was just an attitude thing,” he said. “I found the East Coast to be a little bit more aggressive. They say what they mean in the hopes of just moving on right away. On the West Coast, people were a little bit more laid back. If they thought we were going down the wrong path, they wouldn’t necessarily say it, but they might make it known in an indirect way. I just didn’t appreciate that at all.”........“We turned down a bunch of VCs,” Jack said. “We saw a name, but there wasn’t enough behind the name immediately. A VC has to show me right away that I can trust them. It’s hard to do. But when it’s right, it’s right. And we were very fortunate in it being right with Fred. He was very aggressive, in a good way, in a thinking way. He had no subtlety at all. But more importantly, he was a day-to-day user of our service and he obviously loved it. He came to the pitch with a bunch of requests for features and lots of questions about why we had done what we had done........ During their courting period, Fred showed Jack he could provide more than just money; he could contribute to the product’s vision and direction to help lead the company to success. If your VC doesn’t show you that passion for your product and your own personal success, as well as an ability to add value during the due diligence process through their strategic or product insight, then he and his firm may not be the right business partner for you. As Dorsey put it to me, “When selecting our VC partner, I knew I was hiring a boss I couldn’t fire.”....... The entrepreneur is your client. It’s a very weird relationship because the entrepreneur is not exactly paying you, even though they really are paying you. But they absolutely can’t fire you. In fact, you can fire them. So it’s among the weirdest kinds of service relationships that one could come up with.”.......the best entrepreneurs don’t focus on the money, they focus on their dream for the business......Are you done? If you are, then exit. If you’re not, keep going for it.”...."

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

FourSquare Office, Dropio Technology

FourSquare

So I checked into the FourSquare office near Cooper Union at precisely 4:16 PM. I walked in and there was no receptionist just three rows of people, mostly guys, staring at their screens. I caught a glimpse of Naveen (@naveen) from a distance. The guy I had met in the elevator walked over to me and said I needed to email Evan, and that he was out for a few days. He was the one who handled job applications.

4:16 PM @ FourSquare

I emailed Evan once I got back, but one very likely scenario: I never hear from FourSquare. They are hot, they must be getting a firehose of resumes daily. They might not even actively be looking. Oh, well. But I will give it a few days before I come to that conclusion.

I am suggesting thinking of the behavior of a large number of people approaches science and has to be given the same respect as coding. They might not bite. I carried on that same meme to my conversation with the MeetUp CTO Greg a few hours later. MeetUp has a great team of techies as it should, but it does not officially have a team of sociologists, and psychologists and group dynamics specialists in house. I have always wondered why. I have seen that as a gap to be filled.

Dropio

The NYC Tech Talks MeetUp was at the MeetUp headquarters. I showed up a little early. It was scheduled to start at 7 PM. Sam Lessin, the founder of Dropio, and his team member number two, Jacob, both took turns talking. (It is entirely possible Jacob is not on Twitter.)

That thing between Twitter and Blogger is Tumblr. Similarly the NYC Tech Talks MeetUp meets a need that the much larger, much more general NY Tech MeetUp does not. I really appreciated the lack of bar background noise after the talk was over. You could actually hold conversations, and talk to people in normal tones of voice. The MeetUp has been put together by the MeetUp CTO Greg. (@gwhalin)

Sam (@lessin) and Jacob did not have five minutes. They must have talked for over an hour. They used a whiteboard. That made it more intimate than a PowerPoint presentation. They answered a ton of questions. I asked Sam a question, "So you build the architecture, and scale it out, then what do you do next? What do your product teams spend most of their time on these days?" Analytics, he said.

Later one on one I asked Jacob about this Digital Dumbo event on Thursday at the Dropio headquarters. He said it was like a cocktail party for those who worked in Dumbo. Then, I said, I'd not be interested, I thought it was a more general tech event.

4:16 PM @ FourSquare

Not Union Square Ventures

I am in a job mood and I have decided to show up at the FourSquare office later today. 4:16 PM sounds like a good time to show up.

FourSquare HQ
36 Cooper Sq
at E 6th St
New York, NY 10003

Marketing Director
Business Development Director
Jobs: Everything Else .... Dying to join foursquare and a rock star in an area not listed above? Send your resume to jobs@foursquare.com anyways with a note on how you can help!

I am not a developer/coder although I think you should check out my LinkedIn page to see all the languages I have picked up along the way, only two of which I was ever formally taught. Some of my strengths I have talked about here: Union Square Ventures Job Opening: I Am Applying. Fred Wilson thinks I am "overqualified" for Union Square Ventures, or at least for the two open positions, so I must be just right for FourSquare, I figured, the hottest tech company in town.

I Have Been Quoted In Fast Company
2010: Location, Random Connections, The Inbox, Frictionless Payments
Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius
Dennis, Fred, Scott: Tweet Boom Tweet Boom
4/16: I Found Myself A Party: Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night
If The Tweet Is The Atom, What Is Location?
The iPhone, Nexus One, Or Droid?
Silicon Valley Vs. New York City
The Foursquare Rap: Badges Like Us
Location! Location! Location!
Social Media Week: The Best NY Tech MeetUp Ever
Craig Newmark, Dennis Crowley, Jennifer 8 Lee: Koreatown
Dennis Crowley: I Underestimated Him

What can I do for FourSquare?

I see FourSquare going IPO, (Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius) and I see the intermediate steps. I see FourSquare in the big scheme of things: Fractals: Apple, Windows 95, Netscape, Google, Facebook, Twitter.
I am outstanding when it comes to group dynamics.
I am not a coder, but I could pick up some of the language fast, enough to be able to deal with coders. Teams of coders need big picture people like me.
I would be good at tactics, strategies, negotiations, deals. FourSquare needs this more than most things right now to grow to new heights.
I have a thing for digital fights. "I believe in being nice, but that does not apply to my enemies." Larry Ellison. Sometimes you need that, like when Yelp decided to copy FourSquare. I liked how Dennis came swinging back.
Reference: Fred Wilson.

I Just Became Friends With Anu Shukla
Anu Shukla Has Found The New Frontier In Advertising

Monday, April 26, 2010

I Have Been Quoted In Fast Company

This morning I had a DM - direct message - on Twitter from Shane Snow. (bio)(@shanesnow): Hey great meeting you the other day. Did you see your quote in the fastcompany story last weekend? Anyway, stay in touch!

I remembered this guy vividly from Fred Wilson's blog yesterday, but we have met? I shot him a DM: We met? I am quoted? Where? Send me the link. Thanks.

Fred Wilson: A DJ

Then I am thinking to myself, wait a minute. Is this the same guy I talked to at the FourSquare party?

4/16: I Found Myself A Party: Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night

I went to the Fast Company website and did a search on FourSquare.

Foursquare vs. Gowalla: Inside the Check-In Wars | Fast Company
Foursquare Steps Up its Location-Based Content With Zagat, HBO
Foursquare Adds Another Big Partner: Conde Nast's Lucky Magazine
Playing Foursquare: A Mobile Social Game That Makes Friend-Finding...
Foursquare Offers Analytics to Businesses, Enables Easy Customer...
Gowalla + Foursquare + Brightkite + Yelp + Google Maps=Checkin...
From Addiction to Apathy: The Five Stages of Foursquare Use | Fast...
Twitter Gut Checks Foursquare With "Points of Interest," Adds...
Foursquare Goes Mainstream, Teams With Bravo TV | Fast Company
Foursquare's Digital Graffiti, a Legally Nerve-Wracking Taste of...
Checking in at Foursquare's Hot Tubbin', Rooftop, Rock Star Moment...
Foursquare Makes Geotagging Generous, Points to Charity's AR...
Foursquare's Celebrity Mode Allows You to Avoid DJ Pauly D Like an...
Wall Street Journal an Foursquare: Geolocating City Newsrag...
Is Foursquare Poised to Rule Local Advertising? | Fast Company
foursquare| Fast Company
Foursquare Vows to Stop Those Cheating "Armchair Mayors" | Fast...
How Foursquare Can Steal Local from Twitter | Fast Company
Tweetsii Taps Twitter Locations, Mashes-Up Gowalla and Foursquar...

Kevin Rose was at the same party? If I had known I'd have stayed on longer and I'd have made a point to say hello to the guy.

Checking in at Foursquare's Hot Tubbin', Rooftop, Rock Star Moment...

"Paramendra Bhagat, an entrepreneur and Foursquare user at tonight's party says he started using Foursquare in February, when user activity started picking up dramatically. "When people say Foursquare is the next Twitter, I believe it," he says."

Not Union Square Ventures

Union Square Ventures Job Opening: I Am Applying

2010: Location, Random Connections, The Inbox, Frictionless Payments

I am not suggesting all four spaces carry equal weight; they don't. Location carries more weight than all the rest put together. 2010 is location's year. By now that is conventional wisdom. I can see why, and I buy into it. But these strike me as spaces to watch for this year. One of the other three might claim 2011 as their year. And I am open to adding other spaces to the list if I can find them, read up on them, imagine them. This list of four is by far not exhaustive. Charlie (@ceonyc) had a blog post a few weeks back (my comment) that ranked high on my vision grid, and he talked about some spaces he would like to see action in as an early stage investor. And he does not even touch upon these four spaces. So what you are looking for impacts what you see. There's plenty of exciting stuff happening in many directions. The 2010s will be what the 1990s should have been but weren't. We will dream big again, only this time there will be less fluff. Real businesses will get built. Old industries will get reinvented. New industries will see light of day. These are exciting times.

(1) Location

I'd be rooting for FourSquare even if it were half the size of Gowalla, but it makes it easier to root for because it is crushing the competition. But like the Google and Amazon people will tell you, don't spend too much time looking in the rear view mirror. Focus on customer feedback more. Grow.

Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius

The mobile web is bigger and is growing faster than the old web. Location is key to the mobile web. FourSquare has itself a sweet, sweet spot. All the best to Dennis (@dens) and Naveen. (@naveen)

(2) Random Connections

Chatroulette Is For Real

We could have had Mark Zuckerberg, but instead we lost him to the Valley. We should try better with Andrey. We want people all over the world to be able to meet random New Yorkers. There's the fun in sharing.

(3) The Inbox

ReadWriteWeb: Gmail Becomes an App Platform: Google Adds OAuth to IMAP ....Syphir, which lets you apply all kinds of complex rules to your incoming mail and then lets you get iPhone push notification for your smartly filtered mail.
Rapportive - an incredible GMail contacts plug-in.
Your Inbox as Platform: Google Calendar More Closely Integrated With Gmail

Everything is email, if you think about it. When I first started blogging, I was like, great, I no longer need to flood people's inboxes. All I have to do is send them a link to a blog post. Facebook is email. People who don't know you don't email you, and people who email you are only one click away if you want to know the latest in their lives. No need to call them up, or ask them. Twitter is the ultimate email. Eric Schmidt even called it that, but he was a little miserly in the description. A poor man's email? I am poor, everyone is poor by Eric's standards, but hey! FourSquare is email. I am emailing you my location.

Don't give up on email. Email is here to stay. There is so much that can be done with the inbox. I am glad some startups are looking into it.

For now all I want is about four different inboxes. Inbox 1, emails only from individuals whose addresses I have saved. Inbox 2: emails from those people that are going out to more than me. Inbox 3: emails from mailing lists I have subscribed to. Inbox 4: everyone else.

(4) Frictionless Payments

Venmo is my FourSquare in this space. I take hometown pride in Venmo. But then supporting FourSquare and Venmo is like supporting Obama. (Jupiter And Obama) It helped that the guy was outstanding. I get the impression Venmo is also a leader in this crowded space. It was listed in Time magazine as one of the top 50 sites of 2009, along with Drop.io, another hometown goodie. (@lessin)

It is like this, there was barter trade back in the days. Then they had coins, some coins were as big as cart wheels. Then paper money. Then plastic. Then PayPal. We are about to hit the next phase. That is where Venmo comes in.

In my homevillage in Nepal growing up, I saw rice used as currency. Farm workers got paid in rice. Vegetable vendors would give you vegetables for rice. And it was pretty smooth, as in frictionless, enough to give Kortina a run for his money. (@kortina)

What I am telling you, Kortina, is rice as currency is pretty cutting edge, and there was major trust involved.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Fred Wilson: A DJ

Image of Fred Wilson

Yesterday I called Fred Wilson a DJ. (Fred Wilson: DJ) Today my suspicions have been further confirmed. His blog post today is Nice Analogy. This dude who is the most visible venture capitalist in New York City, and perhaps the most loved VC among all the local entrepreneurs he has never invested in and likely never will since he can only invest in so many per year, this guy is a serious music fanatic.

Shane Snow: Tech StartUps Vs Rock Bands "....I started 3 different bands in college. In each one, we dreamed of making it big, landing a record deal, and having hot Japanese chicks scream our song lyrics at us when we toured Asia.....and having geeky Rails programmers whisper as I pass them in the hall at NerdCon...."
Fred Wilson: Nice Analogy
Harry DeMott: More On The Middle Class
The VC And The Music Industry: Not As Different As You Might Imagine
New York Times: Ticketmaster Joins Live Nation, And An Industry Quakes "....bands are making the bulk of their income from concerts....Alliances shift, backs are stabbed and most people have at least three agendas, only one of which they will discuss candidly....“When the Internet came about the artist realized, well hang on, you can’t steal a ticket for a seat, so we started to lean more toward, I don’t really want a record deal, I want to be aligned with somebody who can help me sell tickets. But then I want a company that can use that music and that seat to get ancillary revenues” — from things like food, beverages and sponsorships — “to help me survive.”" ...... “The ticket was underpriced 40 years ago” ...... Azoff was part of the defiant counterculture but was fluent in the language of contracts and comfortable mixing it up in corporate suites. He also had great intuition about how to psychologically size up both foes and friends, and he could sweet-talk and charm as convincingly as he could erupt in rage..... For years, neither promoter nor ticketer has considered fans as the first priority.....

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Farmville Has Not Been Loading For Me

Over a week back I called Steve Jobs a Pied Piper. (The iPad Is No Laptop Killer) My farmville game has not been loading since. Did Steve Jobs get someone to mess with my Flash?

I got started with Farmville in December. I was reading about it a lot. Finally I gave in. Obviously I started the poorest farmer in my neighborhood. Soon I was the richest. I was hooked to the game. I entered the fray out of business curiosity, and I ended up really appreciating some of the social aspects of the game.

I Just Became Friends With Anu Shukla
Anu Shukla Has Found The New Frontier In Advertising

Then not long back a friend of mine who I did not know had more points than me befriended me and now he was the richest farmer in my neighborhood. I was working hard to win back my title, and that is when the Pied Piper episode happened.

I tried the usual remedies like uninstalling and reinstalling Flash. No effect whatsoever.

I am thinking perhaps I attained Farmville nirvana somewhere along the way, and there is nothing more left to do for me at Farmville. That is an explanation I could live with.

In the mean time I have focused my energies on blogging and actively commenting at other people's blogs. That also feels like farming.

Farmville Farmer's Market: My Idea

Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius

Dennis, Fred, Scott: Tweet Boom Tweet Boom
4/16: I Found Myself A Party: Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night
If The Tweet Is The Atom, What Is Location?
Location! Location! Location!
Craig Newmark, Dennis Crowley, Jennifer 8 Lee: Koreatown

First there was talk that Vinod Khosla wants to pump 10 million dollars and above into FourSquare at a 80 million dollar valuation. Vinod Khosla, mind you, raised half of all money all VCs raised last year. He is a top dog in the game. (I Just Became Friends With Anu Shukla, Anu Shukla Has Found The New Frontier In Advertising)

Then there was talk Yahoo wants to buy FourSquare for over 100 million dollars, some figures put it at 125 million. More recently there have been reports other big fishes are also looking, namely Microsoft and Facebook. These stories are relevant whether they are true or not. It is entirely possible the different players are exploring their options. Feelers might have been sent out. Formal talks might or might not have happened.

I think selling FourSquare would be a mistake. Selling Hotmail was not a mistake. Sabeer Bhatia sold it to Microsoft for 400 million. But Hotmail was pretty much a finished product. FourSquare is nowhere close to being a finished product. I could argue it has not even started to start. And if it is about money, waiting a few years makes money sense too. Sell for more in a few years if you really, really want to sell it. But I am going to argue against that as well.

For me it is not about price. I am not saying don't sell to Yahoo for 125 million, but if they give you 200 million, then maybe. I am saying don't sell it, period. Google buying Facebook would have made no sense. Facebook could not have digested Twitter and instead would have ended up with constipation.

I can't think of one company that could buy and digest FourSquare and do the location space justice. Facebook could not do it, Twitter could not do it, and I am not even thinking about any other name.

The mobile web is bigger than the old web and also is growing faster. With the mobile web, location is key. Where you are when you are playing with your smartphone is so very important. And for FourSquare location is not an afterthought, location is the beginning point, and that makes all the difference.

FourSquare should be flattered by all the attention. Things have not always looked this rosy for FourSquare or its two founders. So they should take all this attention as ways to boost their self-esteem.

But flat out saying no might also be a bad move to make. The attitude should be, selling to you would be injustice to the location space, but let's work together, let's see if we can add the location feature to your many web properties wherever they make sense, and pay us for that instead. I think that would be the smart thing to do.

FourSquare has only a million users. That is nothing. The FourSquare team knows better than to wallow in all of the buzz. It is always safer to stay focused on the fundamentals of the business. Buzz comes and goes, ask Twitter. Twitter is in a better shape as a business today than ever before, but it does not have the buzz it had a year back.

FourSquare should use all this offer talk to expand its user base. Google expanded its user base dramatically by becoming the search engine for web properties like Yahoo and AOL. FourSquare should make similar moves. Create location space where it does not exist, and inhabit that space. It makes a ton of sense to talk to the big dogs in town. Cut deals.

2010 is location's year and FourSquare has the clear lead in that space. I see FourSquare never getting sold. Just like I never saw Facebook or Twitter getting sold. FourSquare has IPO potential, not now, I don't know when precisely, but it has IPO potential. If I had my way, Twitter would go for an IPO this year, before Facebook. (Twitter Should Go For A Netscape-Like IPO) I can see FourSquare going IPO somewhere in the mid 10s.

FourSquare is a business. For a business it is about money. The big money is in going IPO. FourSquare has reached that rare threshold for a tech company that it will never have any problems raising money ever again. That gives the FourSquare team the luxury of superb execution.

FourSquare will not get bought. FourSquare will buy. It could makes its first major acquisition later this year or early next. Stay tuned.

Fractals: Apple, Windows 95, Netscape, Google, Facebook, Twitter

Fred Wilson: DJ

Image of Fred Wilson

When I first came across the FredWilson.FM web address, I "accused" Fred of flashing a vanity URL. If FredWilson.FM is not a vanity URL, I don't know what is, I said.

Fred Wilson: VC

A little later I started following Fred on Tumblr, and ends up he is quite a music man. I was not surprised. Books, movies, music are mind food. We are in the middle of a fundamental transformation akin to the one from an agricultural to an industrial one. We are heading toward a decidedly post-industrial age where mind food plays a pretty central role. Fred, owing to his vocation and interests, has a front seat to much of that change. He had to have had a huge appetite for mind food all along.

Fred Wilson's Insight

I also figured Fred might help me go one layer beneath the top layer I have stuck to for the most part. (Tumblr: Casey, Nina, David, Fred) There was this promise of richness, novelty, discovery and plain good music, although our tastes are slightly different. Some of the songs on the list are a little too soft for me, and when I say soft, I am not talking lyrics here, I pay attention to the lyrics only much later into liking a song, I am talking about the tempo of the musical rhythms; but I like all kinds of music, I could even name you a few country songs that got me truly excited. (Lady Gaga) I don't like all songs on Fred's list, although I'd be hard pressed to skip any. But I like most of what I hear. (I'll Be Gone)

Fred Wilson: A VC

So earlier today for the first time I ventured over to FredWilson.FM, and the site is a treasure. There are 881 songs liked enough by Fred that he was compelled to share. And I really like the streaming concept. You turn the music on and go do something else. 881 songs, how many days of music is that? I think I just listened to about 20.

Fred Wilson

I went over to the Streampad site that supposedly powers FredWilson.FM and FredWilson.FM is prominently displayed on their front page. I am not surprised. I guess Fred is a celebrity user of the service. If Fred Wilson is using it, it must be a good service. Good marketing. It is a good service.

Fred Wilson: VC

I wonder if during my second visit to FredWilson.FM I can go to say song number 46 and start from there. Or do I have to begin at the beginning again? I know I can skip songs, but having to start at the beginning and then skipping one song at a time would take away from the experience.

Fred Wilson's Insight

One feature that is lacking or that I did not discern during my first 10 seconds at FredWilson.FM is the shuffle feature. I want the system to jump randomly from song to song. Then repeat visits would be more likely. But even now I am definitely coming back. Something in me wants to listen to all 881 songs over months. No pressure, no hurry, just something to end up having done some day.

Fred Wilson: A VC

Now that I have found it, I realize I have been looking for something like FredWilson.FM for a while now, a good music collection of mostly never heard before music that I can simply turn on and listen to end to end. Now there is a link to FredWilson.FM from my private homepage that is my jumping point to most of my daily web experiences. That is not to say I will be visiting daily, but I'll be back.

Fred Wilson

(Update: 40 tunes down.)

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

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