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(6) What are your top 5 pieces of advice for entrepreneurs? – Quora
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#3. Build early and often. Alex and I lived by this in grad school and with dodgeball. We’d roll out half-baked features a few times every week and were more worried about getting stuff in the hands of users than making sure it was perfect or actually worked. We do the same kind of stuff with the foursquare prototype at SXSW 2009 (giving ourselves a deadline by which the thing HAD to be working – at which point we still though people would laugh as the idea of “life as a game”) and we still do it now – hacking on things internally to see how they “feel” long before they’re launched.
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Yes. If you’re thinking of doing anything in an emerging space - RFID, near-field presence, iPods that trade files on the street, connecting strangers in a room – just find some way to hack it together. Even if it’s not ideal, your thinking will be advanced enough so that when the iPhone 5 with built-in near field RFID and 100 hours of battery life comes to market, you’ll have the foundation in place (both tech & your understanding of what works / what doesn’t) to make your ideas a reality. (and if you are thinking about this space, use our API – it’s pretty advanced in terms of “who’s with whom” and “personal history” – we build this stuff because we needed it, and built an API so that other people could use it too
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#5. Hire the best people you can find. This was kind of easy in the early days of foursquare – we hired our friends who were really passionate about the stuff they were building (most had other location+mobile+social side projects or startups). We have a superstar team not just because their resumes are so strong, but because they’ve been passionate, thinking about and tinkering in this space forever. Those are the people you want to surround yourself with.
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Momento Is Perhaps The Perfect Passive Diary App
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To me, one of the most interesting thing about Foursquare is the History tab. It transforms the service from a “where you are” app, into a “where you were” log. In a way, it’s sort of like a diary. I wish Twitter was better at this idea as well. Because what I tweeted a year ago says something about how I was feeling, or what I was doing back then. In fact, a lot of the web services we use on a daily basis would be perfect for this type of passive diary writing. And that’s exactly what Momento, an iPhone app, makes happen.
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It’s another of the anti-social social apps, like OhLife and the newer Path, which seem to focus more on what experiences mean to you (or a very small group of friends), rather than to strangers and the larger web as a whole.
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Foursquare Testing Version 2 Of Their API. “It’s 1000x Faster”
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The Seven Principles You Need to Know to Build a Great Social Product
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This isn’t touchy feely stuff. Neither I nor the prospective people who may use your social product care about your features, your game mechanics, or how amazing your application will be when there are millions of people on it. I’m selfish with my time and you’ve got seconds to hook me in with something new. And I’m not alone.
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It’s not always obvious upfront what should be your best in the world focus and enshrining the wrong thing can be a problem. However, it is much worse to build a social product without guiding principles. When you are focused on the one thing your social product is going to do better than everyone else, all you need to launch is your one thing and no more.
Ask yourself and every member of your team what you are best in the world at every week. Even better, define it, agree on it, print it out, blow it up, and put it on the wall. This should be the filter by which everyone is making product decisions.
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But equally important – especially in a world of infinite supply – is what makes us feel different and special. People want scarcity. People want exclusivity. This doesn’t mean your social product should be limited to a niche. Frontierville was built for mass appeal – so that I could play with ALL of my friends – but it still finds ways to bring uniqueness into its social experience via neighbors, customization of your plot, and collections.
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It goes back to the issue of infinite supply. If there is an infinite supply of points, badges, and levels because they exist on every single social product out there, the minute you use them without being thoughtful, you are losing your shot at exclusivity and scarcity. A better approach is to figure out what makes people feel unique and special on your service independent of any specific game tactic. Then, selectively cherry pick the features that reinforce your emotional reason for existence for people. For uniqueness to work, you have to lead, not follow.
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Once you have the critical features defined, there is typically one interaction that is clearly the most important to get right. It’s the interaction that if you get right means someone comes back and, if you don’t get it right, you can’t realize your full potential.
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You want your social product to feel like it is a living and breathing party, not expensive furniture you’re not supposed to sit on.
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7. Develop relationships, not features. Today, we have multiple personalities and different types of relationships with people in the real and virtual worlds. If you are going to design a new social product, it’s not enough to just offer a feature, like photos, videos, or events. You need to look at how the relationships on your social product will be important and different from the relationships you and others have already on Facebook, LinkedIN, and Twitter.
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For a new social product, you need to think about how your social product expands, deepens, and changes the relationships people have today online and in the real world. This isn’t easy to achieve. The best example of a social product doing this well is Quora. Originally seeded with Facebook’s social graph, it has quickly differentiated itself by showing you people you may care about because of their thoughtful commentary, experience, and expertise displayed on topics that are important to you.
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As I think about what’s going to be created, discovered, invented, and re-imagined with social software in the next six months let alone the next five years, I can’t help but be excited. These principles shine a light on the first few feet in front of us, but, with every new social product success there will be new ones. As Alan Kay timelessly put it, “the best way to predict the future is to invent it.” I, for one, can’t wait to see what’s next.
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Serendipity is really just an informed calculation based upon any number of our individually unique interests, habits, location, the time and date, and prior knowledge. This level of relevance is, of course, what the emerging personalized Web hopes to achieve for each user, whether for recommendations (GetGlue; Hunch), marketing and ads (Rapleaf; Facebook advertising), or news and content (my company, TrapIt).
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Archive for November, 2010
My daily readings 11/30/2010
November 30, 2010My daily readings 11/29/2010
November 29, 2010Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/28/2010
November 28, 2010-
a submissive’s musings: formspring.me #62 <span class="“> – Annotated
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Is it necessary to always say “being used” don’t you think that cheapens the act?In a way i don’t think it matters what words different people use to refer to different things – if someone chooses to say ‘fuck’ or ‘screw’ rather than ‘making love’ or ‘sleeping together’ it doesn’t change the fact that it’s sex. But in another way the words we use to describe different acts show how we feel about them and how they affect us, and for me as Sir’s slave it is important that He uses me and that i am of use to Him because that’s my role, that’s our dynamic, that’s what we both need. So while it may seem ‘cheap’ to you, it feels natural and right to us.
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Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/24/2010
November 24, 2010-
Hacker News | Give Me Something To Read – Best of 2010 <span class="“> – Annotated
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I absolutely love Give Me Something To Read and Longform.org! There are a lot of great articles that didn’t make it to this list, so check out the archives on both websites — the articles are (mostly) timeless.
Instapaper and GMSTR/Longform.org are streets ahead of casual games like Angry Birds for my commute.
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Keep project and personal metrics closely tied – rahfeedback’s posterous
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Amazon Web Services Blog: AWS Start-Up Challenge 2010 Finalists
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Hacker News | Websockets are awesome (you can see everyone’s cursor)! Please donate yours
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/23/2010
November 23, 2010Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/21/2010
November 21, 2010-
I Have Seen The Future, And It Looks A Lot Like Bump (Without The Bump) <span class="“> – Annotated
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You can see why. Apple doesn’t want users downloading songs from iTunes and immediately beaming copies to their friends, and Bluetooth is a battery hog and security threat. But there are other solutions, such as an HTTPS-like certification mechanism. The existing restrictions have all but eliminated a whole genre of apps that could have been: for instance, only a tiny handful
of multiplayer games allow Android and iPhone users to go head-to-head, and I’m sure GroupMe would love to form groups out of Bluetooth mesh networks connecting every enabled device in a given room. -
NFC opens up a whole cornucopia of possibilities. Phones serving as credit cards, keys, and ID are the most obvious, and least imaginative. Interestingly, NFC can also be used to automatically authorize Bluetooth connections. Next year we’ll see the emergence of a whole new category of apps and startups—and, hopefully, some new unexpected left-field brilliance. Developers, start your engines.
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Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/20/2010
November 20, 2010-
Twitsper, Group Tweeting App, Could Change Twitter As We Know It <span class="“> – Annotated
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You do this on Twitsper through pre-set lists. The creator and others on the list have the ability to send tweets back and forth that only they can see by using the app, which the developers hope will one day be integrated into Twitter itself.
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Wilson Vs. Doerr. Bubble Vs. Boom. East Vs. West. Android Vs. iPhone. Facebook Vs. The Web (VIDEO)
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/18/2010
November 18, 2010-
Twitter “Screwed Up” With Developers, Founder Says: Tech News « <span class="“> – Annotated
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In response to a question from the audience about Twitter empowering people to publish and act as journalists, Williams — who founded Blogger and later sold it to Google — said that “lowering the barrier to publishing” has been something he has spent most of his career on, and this is because he believes that “the open exchange of information has a positive effect on the world — it’s not all positive, but net-net it is positive.”
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雷军：员工痛哭网盾遭360拦截_互联网_科技时代_新浪网 <span class="“> – Annotated
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正是那次对话，让我决定帮助傅盛。这些年，我见过不少有能力的人，但是真正有决心和毅力的，真正有创业精神的，我看到的，只有傅盛一个。过去三年，我一直在做天使投资，敢拿20万创业的人只有傅盛。绝大部分人都是选择在哪家大公司打工，业余时间几个人搞个小项目，拿到投资了再出来。傅盛的决绝和执着深深打动了我。至于后来，有人总是说，傅盛是我从360挖出来的，在这里我澄清一下：在傅盛离开360之前，我还不认识他。
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为什么我们选择傅盛做新公司的领头人呢？因为傅盛是一个具备互联网精神的人。什么是互联网精神？我觉得最核心的有三条：
第一条，极致。我的另外一个投资团队，在凌晨两点给我发了一个短信，说“我终于明白啥叫‘极致’了，极致就是把自己逼疯，把竞争对手逼死，这叫极致。”
我们常常抱怨，我们做了一点功能，对手就复制了。那么我就想问，你能不能做一个产品对手完全就复制不了呢？iPhone到今天已经发布了3年零3个月，全球至今没有任何一个手机厂商的产品赶上了iPhone，去年我无比期待的诺基亚5800XM，只玩了15分钟，就丢到垃圾筒了。今年我又无比期待诺基亚的N8，刚上市，七千块，买了一部，30分钟，垃圾筒。
第二条就是用户口碑。我们经常说“好的产品会说话”，光满足用户需求，这还不够，要超越，要引导。
第三点，快。速度上是不是比竞争对手更快，是不是能更关注用户的反馈，小步快跑，快速迭代的开发方法，这都是互联网精神所特有的。
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The Importance of Abandoning Crap – Modern Nerd <span class="“> – Annotated
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I have always been fickle: flitting between phases for more than 20 years; purchasing the most expensive thingamijig to pursue each new craft; being careful not to startle those close to me by using it more than once. Imagine my delight, then, to hear Ira Glass attest to the importance of giving things up:
“Not enough gets said about the importance of abandoning crap.”
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Abandoning your dwindling hobby, business, relationship, blog, or other pursuit is tricky. Sometimes, though, giving up can be exactly the right thing to do. The thing to take-away from Glass and Godin is this: killing a failing project isn’t an act of destruction — it’s a powerful creative force:
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Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/17/2010
November 17, 2010-
Keen On… Marc Davis: Why Social is Changing Everything (TCTV) <span class="“> – Annotated
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There are few people who have thought as long and hard about the impact of this third wave on both the web and the world as Marc Davis
, the former Chief Scientist at Yahoo! Mobile and now a Partner Architect at Microsoft. Davis’ core argument is that we are moving from what he calls a “web of pages” to a “web of people.” The web and the world are “becoming one,” Davis believes, thereby making this third wave one of the most significant cultural, political and social events of the early 21st century.Social entrepreneurs should listen carefully to Marc Davis too. His vision of the economics of attention and trust reveal the emergence of a 21st century social economy that will be fundamentally different from the 20th century industrial economy. And, as Davis notes, much of the core infrastructure of this new social economy – such as a viable banking system for personal data – has yet to be built. So the entrepreneurial opportunities in this third wave are immense. Facebook, Zynga and Twitter are just the beginning. The best is yet to come.
Why social is changing everything
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Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
My daily readings 11/16/2010
November 16, 2010-
Path Takes Photo Sharing The Wrong Way <span class="“> – Annotated
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Buzzy stealthy startup Path, which was founded by ex-Facebooker Dave Morin and Shawn Fanning, finally launched its mobile app tonight. It is a private photo sharing iPhone app similar to Instagram or PicPlz, except that it makes sharing photos more difficult than it needs to be.
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There are times, of course, when you don’t want to share a photo widely with the world. But those are the exceptions. A better privacy model would be to make photos public by default and allow for a private mode with certain photos to be shared only with select individuals or a core inner circle. Public sharing allows for more serendipitous connections. But then Path would be just like every other mobile photo-sharing app. I’ll give it credit for going its own way.
Path doesn’t seem interested in making anything other than visual connections. You can’t even comment on someone else’s photo. It is oddly passive for a social app. You put up photos, see other people’s photos, and that’s it. No discussion allowed.
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Schmidt: Gingerbread Sooner, Chrome OS Later <span class="“> – Annotated
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As for Chrome OS, well, it’s not the news we wanted to hear. November was supposed to be the big debut, but that’s looking mighty unlikely, as Schmidt put the release at sometime in “the next few months.” No holiday release then, I suppose.
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Android Gingerbread Supports NFC: Tap Your Phone To Pay With Your Credit Card <span class="“> – Annotated
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You may not have heard of NFC before, but it’s a very exciting technology (and it’s actually been around for a while). The gist of it: new Android phones will have a chip that let you tap your phone against special sensors to complete a specific action. That sounds vague, but it’s got plenty of practical applications. One of them involves credit cards — you’ll be able to hook up your credit card to your Android phone, and conduct transactions simply by tapping your phone against a sensor.
There are plenty of other possible uses too. Tap your phone against a location-aware sensor, and it can check you into whatever venue you’re standing in, without having to bother with opening app on your phone.
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Center of Public Integrity’s new HTML5 effort for reading long-form online – Editors Weblog
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
