Sat.Jul 03, 2010 - Fri.Jul 09, 2010

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Top Eight Reasons Startups Don’t Get Money

Startup Professionals Musings

Yesterday I received a discouraging note from an entrepreneur with a patent and a medical software application who couldn’t find a dime of investment, and was grousing that seed funding just wasn’t available anymore. After exchanging a couple of notes, I concluded that she was more likely a victim of item #1 on my reject list, rather than a drought on seed funding.

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The Entrepreneur's Guide to Customer Development

Startup Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, July 5, 2010 The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits have written a new book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development , which builds upon the foundational work of The Four Steps to the Epiphany , while improving accessibility, updating the ideas, and making it more actionable.

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Matt Mickiewicz, Founder Of Sitepoint, Flippa & 99Designs, Tells His Story

Entrepreneurs-Journey.com by Yaro Starak

Press play to begin streaming the audio or right click the text link and choose save as or save link. Download the MP3 [ 30 Minutes - 40 MB ]. Matt is the co-founder of one of the very first online forums I spent some time on, SitePoint.com , which today is a massive web community and information site. Sitepoint became a near-daily visit for me when I was focusing on buying and selling websites.

Founder 90
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How to Attract Talent to Your Start-up

www.inc.com

); Login or signup Welcome | Logout Member Login Login using: Use your Inc.com account: Forgot login ? Create an Inc.com account: Home Magazine Blogs Ask Inc. Tools & Research Guides Inc TV Events Newsletters Subscriptions RSS ); STARTUP Writing A Business Plan Running A Home-Based Business Naming a Business How to Incorporate Financing a Small Business Buying a Small Business Franchises RUNNING A BUSINESS Success Stories Growth Strategies Office and Operations Legal Issues FINANCE Basic Account

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Building Healthy Innovation Ecosystems for Your Projects

Speaker: Nick Noreña, Innovation Coach and Advisor, Kromatic

Every startup and innovation project exists within an ecosystem that either helps or hurts that project. As innovation managers, we need to keep a pulse of that ecosystem and make sure we're helping those innovation projects we're managing every step of the way. In this webinar, Nick Noreña will walk through an Innovation Ecosystem Model that he and his team at Kromatic have developed to help investors, heads of product, teachers, and executives understand how they can best support innovation in

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Seven Entrepreneur Disciplines You Can Acquire

Startup Professionals Musings

Many people believe that good entrepreneurs are naturally born, rather than trained or experienced in the art of business. I believe there is a natural born component required, but often I tend to agree with Peter Drucker, who said “It’s not magic, it’s not mysterious, and it has nothing to do with genes. It’s a discipline, and like any discipline, it can be learned.

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Founder personalities and the “first-class man” theory of management

Startup Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, July 9, 2010 Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# theory of management At any given time, something like four percent of the US population is engaged in some form of new-company-creation. And that narrow definition of entrepreneurship doesn’t count all of the managers inside established companies who are effectively engaged in the same process of building an internal startup (see What is a startup?

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Nature versus Nurture in Entrepreneurs

Steve Blank

Taking Sides. Are you are born with innate entrepreneurial talent or can you can be taught to operate like an entrepreneur? Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures, Jason Calacanis , founder of Mahalo.com, and Mark Suster of GRP Partners, have all weighed in on the nature side – you’re born being an entrepreneur or you’re not. Vivek Wadhwa , Director of Research, Center for Entrepreneurship at Duke, the Kauffmann Foundation for Entreprenuership and others have the opposing view – you can teach peo

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Every Entrepreneur Must Avoid Big-Company Habits

Startup Professionals Musings

I hear many executives and professionals in large corporations talking about their dream of jumping ship, and becoming an entrepreneur. What they don’t realize is that the longer they wait, the more big-company habits they are acquiring, which will make their eventual decision harder and entrepreneurial efforts less and less likely to succeed. Certainly, the longer they wait, the greater the variety of excuses they will find for why now is not the time.

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No deal for the Deal Architect

deal architect

I felt like screaming like the man in the movie Godfather who wakes up to find the head of his horse, Khartoum in bed. I opened a package and all it had was a scalp – the top of a. Tags: Industry Commentary.

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8 Media-Pitching-Tips for Fast and Free Publicity

Rembrandt Communications

After optimizing your site for the search engines and pursuing other marketing-efforts, it’s time to use the “power of the press” to boost sales, awareness and credibility cost-effectively. But how do you pitch your story to a reporter? Here are eight quick-tips to help you through the media process: 1. Know Your Targeted Media-Members. Before [.].

Media 164
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Excited to Co-Found a New Micro VC Firm

Genuine VC

I thought I would share a quick update on my blog about my professional plans. With the support and encouragement of my Venrock colleagues, I am pleased to share that I am moving on to co-found a new Micro VC firm focused on seed internet investments. I am excited to remain on the Board of Directors for Venrock’s portfolio company BlogHer. I believe that the company is dramatically changing the face of women’s-focused media with an authentic & powerful community of bloggers, and

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Stop Grieving Startup Failure, Start Another One

Startup Professionals Musings

Your startup is gone, it’s never coming back, and you are in mourning. An entrepreneur whose business fails grieves similarly to anyone who has lost a loved one. The pain of losing a business is not only about a significant loss of income, but can send an entire identity into turmoil. Most entrepreneurs define themselves by their business projects. They calibrate self-worth by what they accomplish or do not accomplish.

Startup 229
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Fortune or People Magazine?

deal architect

I was reading Fortune’s 50 smartest people in tech and had to stop and check the cover a couple of times to make sure I had not picked up another of Time’s consumery publications Fortune has for decades faithfully cataloged. Tags: Industry Commentary.

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Sawyer on Why Bilski Really Means That Software Companies Should Leave the US

Feld Thoughts

My friend Sawyer was as disappointed in the outcome of Bilski as he was in the ending to LOST. In fact, he asked if I’d change his pseudonym to Joseph Adama of Caprica but I vetoed this over extreme nerdiness. Nonetheless Sawyer let loose on Bilski and helps clarify both his perspective on why the Supreme Court took such a milquetoast approach as well as what one of the unintended consequences of their action – or lack thereof – will be.

Software 132
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8 Media-Pitching-Tips for Fast and Free Publicity

Rembrandt Communications

After optimizing your site for the search engines and pursuing other marketing-efforts, it’s time to use the “power of the press” to boost sales, awareness and credibility cost-effectively. But how do you pitch your story to a reporter? Here are eight quick-tips to help you through the media process: 1. Know Your Targeted Media-Members. Before [.].

Media 100
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When Startup Founders Start to Flounder

Startup Professionals Musings

Once you are able to achieve some real “traction” with your business (paying customers, revenue stream), it may seem the time to relax a bit, but in fact this is the point where many founders start to flounder. All the skills and instincts you needed to get to this level can actually start working against you, and you fail to scale. Investors often say that successfully navigating the early stages of a startup requires lots of street smarts, guts, and luck.

Founder 228
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EMC buys portfolio company Greenplum – more behind the story

BeyondVC

Congratulations to Greenplum and Scott Yara, Bill Cook, and Luke Lonergan in particular! It has been quite a roller coaster ride over the last 10 years and there were a number of times we stared at the abyss only to come back stronger. This is a story of great people and incredible perseverance. The great news is that we leveraged two strong trends early on - the era of big data and the need for cheaper and better solutions and the fact that hardware is a commodity and the value is in the softwa

Portfolio 109
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The New Polymath

Feld Thoughts

Tonight’s book is The New Polymath by Vinnie Mirchandani. Actually, it’s the book I read the last two nights as it was too much to get down in one night. I’ve been promising Vinnie that I’d read his book ever since he sent me the galleys a few months ago. I tossed the PDF up on my Kindle which, when I got around to it, was unreadable because of the tiny font and the way the Kindle scaled the PDF to fit the page.

Framework 110
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Fast Company’s Influence Project and Reputation Racketeering

This is going to be BIG.

Fast Company wants to know who has the most online influence. They’re trying to measure it using a big social media ponzi scheme where you get a unique link that you get others to click using all your various social profiles. The more clicks you can garner, the more influence you have. Therefore, the person who not only has the most time to waste and can also waste the most collective time of others gets to be featured in their magazine.

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Five Clues To Web 3.0 Opportunities Here Now

Startup Professionals Musings

Can you believe all the talk these days about Web 3.0? I’ve been doing some research to assess how much of it is reality, since I have to admit that I seem to have missed the clues to the transition to Web 2.0, and I’m determined that it won’t happen again. After some work, I’m still convinced that much of the Web 3.0 buzz is hype, but things are changing on the Internet, and bits and pieces of Web 3.0 are appearing.

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EMC buys portfolio company Greenplum - more behind the story

BeyondVC

Congratulations to Greenplum and Scott Yara, Bill Cook, and Luke Lonergan in particular! It has been quite a roller coaster ride over the last 10 years and there were a number of times we stared at the abyss only to come back stronger. This is a story of great people and incredible perseverance. The great news is that we leveraged two strong trends early on - the era of big data and the need for cheaper and better solutions and the fact that hardware is a commodity and the value is in the soft

Portfolio 109
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Debugging and Source Code Tools

Feld Thoughts

More from our friends Nate and Natty at Everlater – this time on debugging. One of the most important techniques we used when learning how to code is debugging. It allowed us to do two things: fix our own code when it was broken and parse through others’ code to better understand how they were doing things. From a backend perspective, debugging is essential.

AJAX 110
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Give it away! Give it away! Give it away now! Why e-mail newsletters are cool, but not if they’re paid.

This is going to be BIG.

Matthew Ingram asked the question today of whether or not people should start an e-mail newsletter. At the same time, two of the most awesome people I know, Mike Galpert and Amanda Peyton , are using Sam Lessin’s letter.ly to create paid e-mail newsletters—effectively nailing the coffin on what were sometimes sparsely updated blogs. I get it. I get why people like Jason Calacanis wanted to stop blogging (even though he really can’t).

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Scaling up: Gerson Lehrman Group Announces Bloomberg Partnership

VC Cafe

G erson Lerhman Group (“GLG&# , but not to confuse with the hedge fund), the world’s largest monetized expert network, and Bloomberg Professional Services announced a high-value collaboration, enabling Bloomberg Professional clients access to more than 50,000 select GLG Council Members through the Bloomberg terminal. According to the GLG-Bloomberg partnership page , Bloomberg Research clients will be able to combine trusted sell-side and independent research reports with human expert

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I’m In Logo Love: FedEx Logo Design

crowdSPRING Blog

“I’m In Logo Love” is a new series on the crowdSPRING blog. Periodically, we’ll pick a logo we’d like to take home from a bar and tell you why. And if you think it’s a bit strange to have a crush on a cleverly designed logo, get in line – my mom has already lectured me on this topic. Today’s post was guest written by Marc Köhlbrugge.

Design 94
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Standing Cloud Launches Business Edition

Feld Thoughts

In March I wrote about Standing Cloud ’s public launch of a free service to test drive open source applications. As reported today in TechCrunch, Standing Cloud has now launched it’s Business Edition , a service that enables users to also host applications on any of four cloud providers. As with the free edition, they have made it remarkably easy to get started: you register (including providing payment information), select your cloud provider and application, and go.

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Making Things, It’s Where Innovation — & Humanity — Starts

Gregg Fraley, Author of Jack's Notebook

I was in London for a meeting last week and due to my “on time&# compulsion, arrived quite early. I was killing some time window shopping, and I spotted a linen walking hat on display at a men’s store and on impulse, went in and bought it. I had a nice conversation with the clerk [.]. Tags: Creativity and Self-Expression Entrepreneurial Innovation Inspirational Pop Culture Trends, Futurism, and Research Creativity Gregg Fraley homelessness london making something making things social

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You’re already an expert!

Start Up Blog

This is a guest post by Jared Shay , who recently decided being employed was for chumps and started walking his own path. He blogs with his brother Xavier about personal development and being awesome at two-shay.com. The advice “everyone has something of value to give&# used to crop up all the time in my morning feeds, and it used to annoy the hell out of me.

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I’m In Logo Love: FedEx Logo Design

crowdSPRING Blog

“I’m In Logo Love” is a new series on the crowdSPRING blog. Periodically, we’ll pick a logo we’d like to take home from a bar and tell you why. And if you think it’s a bit strange to have a crush on a cleverly designed logo, get in line – my mom has already lectured me on this topic. Today’s post was guest written by Marc Köhlbrugge.

Design 94
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These Are Not The Droids You Are Looking For

Feld Thoughts

One of my favorite quotes of all times is “these are not the droid you are looking for.&# The only “misdirection&# line I’ve ever heard that comes close was Swordfish – actually, it wasn’t a line, it was the whole movie. Or maybe just Gabriel. Or maybe Halle Berry. I can’t remember anymore. My partner Ryan sent this around today.

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Pecha Kucha, Innovation Stimulant (Coming to London Suburbs)

Gregg Fraley, Author of Jack's Notebook

Pecha what? Pecha Kucha (sounds like “peh-cha koo-cha&# ) is a pithy presentation format, 20 slides, 20 seconds each. You have six minutes and 40 seconds to get your point across. People all around the world are doing Pecha Kucha. My friend Simon Strong of Human Zoo is organizing a series of Pecha Kucha events in the [.]. Tags: Innovation Public Speaking Trends, Futurism, and Research Farnborough Gregg Fraley Guildford High Wycombe Human Zoo london Oxford Pecha Kucha Reading Rhyme Not R

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Divide & Conquer

Growthink Blog

My 10 year old son and 8-year old daughter tend to get along pretty well. But, there's still times where they're at each others' throats. The other day was one of those days. So, my wife and I used our usual plan - divide and conquer. The divide and conquer plan is pretty simple. She takes one of the kids. And I take the other. The fighting stops instantly as our kids are separated, and each of our kids gets one-on-one time with one of their parents.

Metrics 75
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Focus On Your Core Business Or You Will Fail

crowdSPRING Blog

Too often, startups risk getting misdirected by the media and customers to add features and functionality to a product or service that turn out to be collateral to the core business. I believe this is happening with Gowalla and Foursquare , among others. Both services have become media darlings, and both are obsessed with adding features to already confusing products.

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Grumby

Feld Thoughts

One of my favorite things about the month I spent each year in Homer is reading. We don’t have a TV here and, other than going out to dinner for some extra fresh halibut, Amy and I end up spending almost every evening at home reading, writing, or knitting (well – she knits). I usually consume about a book a day (a few take me two days – so it ends up being five a week, or about twenty over the month.).

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How Yaro Started Making Money Online – The Complete Background Story

Entrepreneurs-Journey.com by Yaro Starak

Press play to begin streaming the audio or right click the text link and choose save as or save link. Download the MP3 [ 46 Minutes - 21 MB ]. You may have recently watched the split-up video segments of my presentation at the Hive networking event recently. The audio on that presentation wasn’t good, however I was also recording it via a clip-on microphone input to an Edirol audio recorder.

Audio 77
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An experienced coach has seen your movie before.

Berkonomics

Business coaches come in all sizes and shapes. You’ll have a relative willing to devote time, a school friend with business experience, professionals who charge for the service, investors with a reason to promote your success and more. But by far the best coaches are those that have lived through the process you’re going through and built successful enterprises in your same industry.

Warrant 71