It’s another one of those Sunday mornings where time is tight but I feel like I have an eternity to lounge around. The music that immediately came to mind was the background music Tyler Gillies (git home) used for one of his first screen casts at Victus Media showing some late night hack productivity. Looks like Tyler is heading to Europe next week for a mobile web development conference, safe journey!
Tag: victus media
I shit you not, it’s December 2010
Wild Web Projects and Attention Black Holes turn into Time Warps
It feels like only yesterday I was harping about how cool it would be if social communication platforms advertised serendipitously to the browser and not just page context or a single search. But that was the summer of 2009, and I experienced my first hit of raw building fanaticism. I had no idea where to begin without a shred of web dev experience.
Failing faster, Life waits for no founder’s triumph
Alas poor Yorick!, I knew him Horatio
You put everything you have into building a prototype. You put everything you have into marketing that symbol. You put everything into finding kindred spirits who share your passion for building solutions. But your first product falls on deaf ears. All that enthusiasm hits a wall of apathy, and your team gets its first bitter taste of failure. (more…)
Don’t just follow me, See the world through my eyes
Trey Ratcliff shares more beauty than I could have imagined, and he does so with only a single eye
Update twitter has released a version of this concept by sharing follow views
State Propagation with Multiple Databases
Open isn’t always free
Social sites have popularized content sharing over large centrally controlled networks^. The Freemium media model is nothing short of attention jiu jitsu. Initially a young service induces early adoption and experimentation while refining its perceived social utility. The value of the service rises as the network grows and members create content and communicate through the new medium. At varying stages of maturity web companies monetize visitor attention, and charge engaged clients and creators for premium services.
If you can’t beat them, join them
I took that advice quite literally this weekend. After spending much of my life working in an industry that’s behind the times as far as Internet policies go*. I decided the best professional path for me is one that converges with my long term startup goals. Admittedly, we’ve struggled to zero in on a market we can best serve with a critical value product at Victus Media. I need to get stronger, faster, and hyper connected to have a shot at success. I want nothing more than to be a founder first, and I’m not afraid to knuckle down and take a different road to get there.
Learning from Competition
While doing marketing research for GarageDollar this week I visited several map based sale update sites and twitter accounts. Most were graveyards of activity, a sign that their creators gave up due to a lack of discovered/perceived market, or conceded the market to a few winners. This is par for the course with startups and new businesses. It takes concentrated effort, a super network, and fantastic luck (or timing) to successfully breathe life into a novel social pattern.
Limitless Options, Limited Time
Just about every person I communicate with that has an entrepreneurial bone in their body, is able to perceive new value opportunities. They train themselves to look for problems or pain points. The more time spent seeking, the better they get at recognizing patterns of unmet need in diverse markets. Each proposed solution embodies the designer’s individual expertise and style. The limiting factor on bringing these ideas from abstract notions, to concrete prototypes is restricted resources. Each of us has only enough time to cultivate and pay critical attention to one big idea at a time. It’s not as restrictive as it first sounds, because that Big Idea is subject to drastic change as you gather more intelligence.
First Impressions of Sitting a Web App on CouchDB
As promised, I’ve jotted down scattered notes on my first experiences with CouchDB, with ample reliance on references. At this point I have very limited practical experience with CouchDB and more RTFM time, so this post will focus on a little of the theory behind the design.