The streets are paved with Pyrite

March 31st, 2012 § 0

Because only fools think it is that easy to find gold.

**Disclaimer … In no way am I a miner and I do not intend my statements about mining further or digging deeper to interpret true into mining**

I am writing this blog post after some reflection and a ton of chance meetings since moving to Silicon Valley a few short months ago.

I arrived back in December.

Me though, I was different from all those other people moving here on a whim. They were chasing hopes and dreams, but me, I was surely chasing destiny.

I had been accepted as part of a team into YCombinator. And that I thought had surely made me special.

I was destined for greatness. There was no way I could fail. After all who hears the bad stories that come out of YC?

That is the attitude of someone who is destined to fail.

And what makes that so hard to say is that I now know I am talking about myself.

I did not fail in most senses. Truth is I have it better than most people my age. At 25 I have never really worked a “real” job, yet I make really good money to do what I love. I play with computers, I write software and I help people. And for some odd reason people pay me to do that. It’s honestly a pretty good feeling.

So I really only failed in the sense that I thought I was different. I thought I was immune. You see when people tell you the streets are paved with gold you really WANT to believe it.

You go to great lengths to do so. Even when deep down you know it’s not true.

The truth is the streets are paved with Pyrite. It looks like gold and if you’re willing to keep digging further below it you might actually find some. but if you’re content to stop when you hit the pyrite and pretend its gold then ultimately you’ll end up the fool.

The valley is a place full of hard knocks and crazy tales. On every corner you meet the guy who is going to be the valley’s next billionaire. I think its not out of line to say I have already met one or two of those people as part of YC last cycle. But just remember for everyone heroin tale you hear about. There are probably 10,000 who came but did not conquer.

You are not immune and you are not special.

I think it is important that you hear that, and that you listen. The only thing that will separate you from everyone else that moved here with the same dreams and goals is your work ethic. And if you aren’t ready to work for it just leave now. Save yourself the time, save yourself the heart ache. This road is not easy and its damn sure not always fun, but the end is even better than all the stories they tell if you make it there.

The truth about me is I did not have enough to lose. My Aunt probably said it best last week at dinner when I made a joke about being out of work after the recent split with my company. She just looked at me and said

“Zach, you’re the wealthiest unemployed person I know.”

Sadly, that was a point I had not yet thought of. Although she probably was not kidding. The truth is I had very little to lose in coming here.

My girlfriend came with me. She was putting much more at risk than me. She left a school and friends she knew for an unknown place and an internship with a company which at the time really only existed on paper.

I was the lucky one here. I even got a fortune cookie a few weeks before I left that said this:

Lucky

Now that was only a piece of paper stuffed inside of what some would call a funny shaped sugar tart, but in my case it probably was the truth.

The reality is that I’ve worked hard and earned what I have, but most of the struggle was too long ago, I don’t remember much of the suffering I went through to get here and I thought by the time I moved to the Valley I was different, I was a “Chosen One”.

The truth is no one is “Chosen” and everyone who makes it does so not by being the best at what they do but by working their asses off.

You can get to the valley in lots of ways, whether you’re accepted into YCombinator or get in on a late night greyhound only to sleep on the streets with your macbook pro.

The one thing that matters is that you know what’s in store for you.

It’s a long hard road, but it’s a damn fun ride.

Get ready for ups and downs. Get ready for twists and turns. One day you’ll be on top of the world and the next you’ll feel like the whole world is on your shoulders.

But you’ll get so much further if you just remember this one thing.

The streets … They are paved with Pyrite. Because only fools think it is that easy to find gold.

So you want to apply to Ycombinator …

March 29th, 2012 § 0

First of all let me start this by saying I was a member of the W2012 cycle of YC … That’s right, I said “WAS”.

Through the roughly 3 and a half months I spent either knowing I was a part of or actually attending the dinners, office hours etc. at YC I can honestly say I learned. I learned a lot.

In this blog post I will give you some tips on what to do to get noticed. What to do to get accepted. and what to do to do what I could not … FINISH.

TL;DR … just don’t bother going any further, if you lack the dedication and commitment to reading a single blog post about applying to something that will literally change your life, you simply aren’t cut out to be accepted anyhow.

1. Know your Co-founders. Know them so well that their parents would be ashamed to sit through a knowledge competition about their own child against you. This is far and away the MOST important aspect of going through YC.

Going in we thought companies never had founder problems, truth is lots of companies do, in fact it would be nearly fair to say a majority of companies do. But knowing your co-founders will resolve most of this fairly quickly and rationally. If you are thinking about applying with people you kind of know, or are casual acquaintances with just stop thinking about it. Would you get married to that semi-hot chick you’ve been on two dates with? Yea me neither. So why would you start a company with some person you get a good “vibe” from but have only met a few times or never really seen all facets of their personality.

Part of me truly wishes there were more obvious larger consequences for this. With sexual partners there are STD’s which sometimes cause people to think twice. I so often wish that business partnerships had the same obvious consequences.

The truth is the consequences of a bad business partnership are probably worse. They cause more stress and more hard feelings than most personal (or sexual) relationships ever would. You walk away and whether or not you “win or lose” does not really matter. You are emotionally battered and bruised. Nothin can compare to this feeling so unless you’ve been a part of a bad business relationship you probably won’t understand this. But if you have, just know you’re not alone, it hurts and it sucks, but others have been through this too.

2. Know your strengths and have clearly defined roles.

It’s great to have a killer idea that is going to make billions of dollars, but what is much more important than that is knowing the strengths of yourself and everyone else on your team. Ideas change, markets change, businesses change, but people … they rarely do.

So if you have the perfect team for that great new photo sharing app that everyone is surely to dump instagram for because your mom told you it was fantastic still take the time to figure out what everyone on your team is best at. Know that one person will negotiate, one person will represent the company to investors etc. if the others dont have the time or are not available. Know that one person will write the code and own it, even the code of the others who are contributing.

Truly knowing what everyone on your team’s strengths are is something that will be a great strength in the bad times. You will have a time when a trying situation comes up. You need to know who schmoozes best via email and can make up for that poorly worded comment one of you let slip in a meeting because you were working on a few hours sleep. Those little things are the ones that can make or break you. They can lose you a million bucks but they can make you a billion depending on how you recover.

3. Know your market and where you fit into it.

if you think you are going to unseat facebook as the biggest and best social network on the planet that is fine but you better damn well know why and how you plan on making that happen. You cannot simply just say you are better. you ACTUALLY have to BE BETTER.

If you’re going to start with some sort of viral marketing campaign that’s great, they work … but how are you going to retain those signups after they’ve gotten there. what is going to keep their attention and make them choose you.

Got all of that info for me? Great now condense it all into two sentences.

Yep that’s right. 2 sentences is about all you’re going to get to make your impression on YC. So they better be well formed, well thought out and you damn well be ready to defend anything you say within them.

4. Stand out

This seems like a simple concept but few people do it. You only have so many ways to make people remember you. Do it in a clever way and get noticed. For us, I bought clever domain names (it also helped that we had a rather stellar crew on our application) for others it was viral twitter campaigns.

For just about anyone applying I would recommend doing what we did. Reach out to YC founders you know and dont know. If you don’t know them try to get to know them. have a skype chat or buy them a beer. ask for a recommendation from them to pg or one of the other partners. Even if that rec is as simple as hey i met so and so and he seems like a smart guy with a good grasp on what it takes to run a company, you guys should bring them in for an interview.

Those recs go a long way with the partners and are a huge part of the reason we got the interview in the first place.

5. Be confident, not arrogant

One of my favorite phrases is “If you cannot dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with Bullshit.”

That however, will not work on YC partners. These are some of the smartest men and women you are likely to ever step into a room with and they don’t fall for tricks. If you’re the best at something then that is great, you’ve accomplished something and you should be proud to say it. But if you aren’t, just be forthcoming.

They expect you to have faults and will not exclude you because of those you disclose. The only flaws you will be punished for in life are the ones you try to hide. That holds true when applying to YC as well.

Arrogance can quickly be aligned with being an “asshole” and lets be honest, noone likes an asshole.

6. Be Committed. If you aren’t, its probably obvious

You’re doing yourself and lots of other applicants a disservice if you apply to YC and you aren’t committed to what you are doing. It’s a big part of the reason I am not re-applying this cycle.

Everyone should be 100% committed to their idea or at the least their partners and the idea of building a business with them. If you aren’t ready with or without YC to start building something great for yourself and by yourself. You aren’t really ready to apply and you should probably not waste your time or theirs.

Now, with all that said, if you’re still ready to apply then good luck!

shoot me your application if you want a fresh set of eyes to look over it ill be glad to help where I can.

If this post has made you think twice about your application it does not necessarily mean you don’t have what it takes to be a part of YC it probably just means you need to think about what exactly you are doing more clearly and be honest with yourself.

Maybe now is not the time to apply, perhaps next cycle would be better? Maybe you should get another year of experience at that programming job you just took before making the leap.

Maybe you just aren’t cut out to run a company (it takes a strange person to love this). Honestly no one knows except for you, but take your time and don’t waste theirs. Realize that what you are making is a decision that truly can affect the rest of your life, or at the very least the next few years of it.

We’re measuring success the wrong way

September 24th, 2011 § 0

Like many of us that spend way too much time on Hacker News I have recently begun to feel a bit of concern for how success is viewed.

Today so many people talk less about the small successes like Patio11′s bingo card creator in favor of those founders who hit home runs or who sold a company.

As someone who sold a company, let me just tell you. You are measuring success the wrong way.

I’m 24 and I made something happen once. Does this make me a superhero? Nope. Many people are surprised to hear that I do not think I am even a particularly good programmer. Chance and Circumstance are the two words I would use to describe an exit for most people.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that I suck at my job or that everyone who sells something is incompetent. What I am saying is simply this.

Winning (in code) should not only be measured by those who do something huge. It’s the small victories that allow great things to be born. And many of those things come from something with much smaller ambitions. Having a sucessful app that pays your bills and allows you to chase your dreams is just as powerful as an exit.

You may not drive a Lamborghini or dine in the finest Restaurants in NYC but make no mistake about it. You ARE a success.

Lately when I talk to people they always seem to think I should feel like some sort of greater being or that I should cast myself as a mentor or someone to look up to. In reality, I look up to those that are trying to create something just as much as they think they should look up to me.

It’s HARD to go out on your own take a risk and put yourself on the line when that’s all you’ve got.

I’ve been at hard places in life, I have chosen between toilet paper and toothpaste (seriously, and dont ask)

And I know what it’s like to be in their shoes. Those guys are a success story.

Failing is what all entrepreneurs do before they succeed. The guys you’ve never heard of know that you only haven’t heard of them YET.

So here’s to you and your success story! Be proud of yourself and what you’re doing. Chase your dreams and live a little. Life is short, if starting a company or having something all your own is something you’ve always dreamed of make that jump.

One way or another you will become your own success story. The truth is those of us that have failed can tell you that we learned a lot more from our failures than our successes.

If you enjoyed this post you should follow me on twitter @zbruhnke or Subscribe to my blog

Interesting iPhone 5 video

August 10th, 2011 § 0

So I saw this little screen cast tonight on the newest page of Hacker News and immediately thought it may get taken down and paid to go away before most of the world got to see it. That being said I did what any self respecting hacker would do, downloaded to my hard drive, saved to my dropbox and S3 accounts and I am now choosing to share that exact video with you guys. enjoy!

Now honestly after watching the video a few times through it seems pretty obvious it’s a fake video and more than likely not what the actual iPhone 5 looks like, but it is fun to speculate.

So what do you guys think? What will/should the next gen iPhone look like?

Sorry Apple! if its any consolation, I am sure I will be one of your first iphone 5 customers ;)

Why something as simple as a survey could save Groupon

June 3rd, 2011 § 0

So admittedly this title is a little bit unfair, Obviously Groupon is still very much alive and it will probably be a hot stock when its recently filed for IPO hits the market in the near future, but it certainly will not be because I purchased it (nor would that make a significant effect).

In the wake of the announcement of their S-1 filing and their subsequent release of a balance sheet the blogosphere has been sent into a frenzy of “Why groupon is hemorrhaging money” and the like, so I thought I would take a different approach.

Instead of looking at how much Groupon is spending or where they could be saving or even analyzing their balance sheet at all I will make a humble suggestion that would get Groupon at LEAST one more customer (myself) and a chance at tapping markets they probably have not touched yet.

While the daily deal is a fun concept for many out there it doesn’t exactly work for a guy like me because I am not necessarily interested in what store in Shreveport, LA has cupcakes on sale today nor will I care about the offer of 20% off at Sephora next week.

BUT what if Groupon were to give me a simple survey upon signup, and (hopefully) even continue to just watch the kind of deals I have chosen to buy as a customer after I had already signed up and only sent me deals I would be interested in. Facebook has already proven that this method is effective in advertising, so why wouldn’t it work here?

I would love to know if Best Buy was offering a new plasma at 30% off or if a popular app is on sale in the “App store” (Dear Apple, App store IS a generic term, but please don’t sure me if you do not agree)

That’s actually the reason I subscribe to AppSumo and not Groupon. It’s because I want deals that are catered to ME not just anyone who lives in a 20 mile radius of the nearest tire store selling hubcaps for $25 off their usual price today.

There are several reasons I think this business model is better, but I’ll break it down into two fundamental purposes for this blog post.

1. More people are compelled to sign up if they are only getting deals that are truly relevant to them and not necessarily tied directly to their geographic region (lots of us like to travel, hell I’m sure cheap AA frequent flier miles would be a big ticket hit for a site like Groupon) it essentially allows them to reach each consumer with a more potent message, not just a “one size fits all” deal of the day.

2. It opens up to even more merchants who are probably less likely to use Groupon now because of this new found ability to provide specialized audiences. I am a geek, my friends are geeks and if I get a geeky deal of the day from groupon and post it on facebook my geeky friends are likely to follow my lead and do the same. (simple math, err reasoning, oh heck lets just call it common sense at work here) Not to mention it allows for multiple deals in every city each day opening up the already monumental revenue streams.

I’m sure this seems too simple to help to some people reading this post.

Andrew Mason may read this post one day and laugh while collecting the Billions of Dollars he is sure to be worth if Groupon’s success continues.

But its my opinion on the issue for what its worth and at face value. take it as just that.

At the end of the day I’m just one guy, raised in a middle class American family trying to slowly make my dent in the universe, this article probably won’t do that for me but maybe someone will take note and take my advice.

If there is one thing I have learned in business so far it is that there is only one way to acquire customers, And that way is one customer at a time, even if your business is Group Buying :)

Text my gate operator to open? I think so (Thanks Twilio!)

May 20th, 2011 § 0

As some of you know I have a project going on but with it hanging in the balance because of a “sort of” competitor’s site failing I have taken to doing some things for fun, doing a lot more toying around with API’s and general tinkering with code.

One of those things happens to solve a problem for my Dad’s company.

The back story goes like this … My Dad is old school, he’s what most people would call a Man’s Man he buys Rugged Phones and only has internet at his house because I “borrowed” his neighbors with the help of aircrack-ng and repeated it in his house. he does not believe in having a data plan on his phone at all but has recently taken to text messaging. However we own a company together which sells access control products of all types and he often finds himself helping customers troubleshoot operators all over the southwest region if they can’t figure it out. He is kind of the “go to guy” in the area.

In my curiosity I wondered if I could somehow build an app with the Twilio API that lets him send commands to gate operators when he was out on a job site. That curiosity led to my first proof of concept and an idea for a budding potential business.

Basically it works like this, Dad will send a text to a designated number and based on the content of the message (obviously using arrays here) it can respond by initiating a POST action on the REST API and calling the operator to perform said action.

The Really unique part about this vs others you have probably recently read about? It does not use the Arduino open source protyping platform, but simple DTMF tones meaning no hardware installation on the users part and less upfront costs!

So far I only have this working with Doorking systems and it still needs alot of tweaking before an initial beta release, but I would love to hear some feedback from some of you who may or may not find it useful. As someone who has lived in several gated communities I know I would love it, it elminates the need for me to have to buy a remote (which are often overpriced by the communities in order to turn a handsome profit) and also lets me in without having to roll down my window in the rain if I am using a code because I do not have the remote with me.

What I plan on having in place eventually is a way to add systems to the arrays via text message (you have to know the master code to program these systems which is what keeps this secure) and to program any feature you could program in with the downloadable doorking software without access to a computer or having to access the server Doorking has setup to dial into the phone systems.

I’d love to hear what you think about this project and whether or not you think its useful … feel free to use the Contact form on this site or just drop a comment below.

Your website is not a project … and your project is not a startup

March 19th, 2011 § 0

It seems like in recent weeks there has been quite a bit of debate on one of my favorite sites (Hacker News) about what comprises a “startup” and what is a “project”.

This topic is increasingly popular as of late because it seems like everyone who has ever built a website in the past few months wants to call it a “startup”

Let’s lay a few things to rest right now. Your website that you threw together in a couple of hours, that is NOT a project, and it certainly is not a startup.

A project is something that is ongoing and takes time and goals to complete. You may launch the project in a short amount of time, but it will be something you continue to work on as time progresses. A project will never be something you simply throw up on the web and rarely tinker with, I am honestly not sure what you should classify that as besides a waste of server space, but it should never be thought of as a project.

In the same sense just because you are working on something on an ongoing basis and trying to release or already have released an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) that does not mean you are running a startup, in fact most startups would probably consider that an insult. A startup is a small up-start (hence the startup name) company who’s founders very likely are still working themselves into the ground and are living and breathing their work on a daily basis. They have probably released an MVP already and work on it continually. The founders do not have day jobs typically. They have dedicated their lives for better or worse to this business and are drawing their paychecks (or in many cases, lack thereof) directly out of this new company.

As someone who has worked on all three phases of this spectrum I think I am uniquely qualified to make these comparisons. I have sold one company that I would’ve considered a startup, I have had several websites past and present, and I am almost always working on multiple projects.

If someone asks me what I am doing for a living I typically answer “just playing” although that is much to my Dad’s dismay since I do own a local small business with him as well. If you were to go to my Linkedin you would see that I mostly identify myself as being a tech and/or database consultant. Since I have spent the better part of my adult life in and around databases i will be the first person to tell you there is almost nothing you cannot equate to a database and likewise there is very little you can build without them.

Currently I am working on a “project” which I have slowly began to devote my time to however until I am fully committed and have additional funding secured for it I will still consider it just a project.

Please use caution when throwing around these words in the real world. People get offended. Some even become violent, often times its not because they are onerous so much as they know what it means to dedicate their life to something and when another person compares that level of dedication with something they threw together on a friday night after a few beers, I hope we can all see why that could be a bit frustrating.

So when you are done reading this article I hope you re-consider what it is that you are actually doing the next time you launch a website, start a project, or even build a startup. For your sake and all of ours, please know the difference, because chances are if you don’t then more than likely you will fail to accomplish what you want from that endeavor.

What are you working on? what do you consider it? l’d love to hear your thoughts on this article

Why a Hacker without work is like a Lion without food

February 10th, 2011 § 0

First of all let me start by apologizing to all 13 of my readers (I kid, I kid) for this post taking so long, I have been doing a lot of … well, not working lately and so the blogging sort of fell to the wayside as well. But with the holidays over and real life back in full swing I expect I will be doing much more blogging in the weeks and months to come.

For those of you who clicked on this title looking for an insightful post I certainly hope not to disappoint. This is one that has been a long time coming.

All too often as a computer programmer (hacker,techie,or whatever else you’d like to call me) I run into people who claim to be developers, video game programmers and all around tech gurus yet when i ask them where they are working I seem to hear one answer way too often. “I’m looking for a job right now”, or “I can’t really find anything in the field I want to be in”.

Why is this a problem some might ask? That’s where the title of the post comes back into play. The answer really is simple.

If you are a hacker, you should be HACKING … End of Story!

I don’t care if you are still in school, have been out of work for two or three years or just got laid off yesterday. You have one of the most valuable skills man is capable of possessing simply because you do not NEED to have a “job” to create cool and useful things, you do not need high powered super computers or overly expensive equipment, all you need is the desire to create something useful and the ability to sit still long enough to make it happen.

Probably my least favorite phrase among the friends I have made that work for the larger tech companies are statements like “I am still a very junior programmer”. If you are the person making those statements you may want to stop reading now since I very likely won’t sugar coat this enough for your tastes. If you continue to feel that way and you continue to only work on the very junior tasks given to you at the office you will ALWAYS be very junior.

However some of the best programmers I know have not even graduated college yet and many probably never will. They didn’t become senior engineers or rockstars because they are mad geniuses (though some really are). They did it because they knew one thing above all else. They were capable of creating things greater than themselves.

The Lion is the king of the jungle for one reason, It is capable of nearly anything it puts its mind to. As a hacker you should see yourself the same way. If you want something added to your favorite program don’t write the company an email, figure out how to do it yourself!

If you are out of a job build an iPhone or Android app and put it in the app stores, build something for your friends or automate a daily process. It is these things that will ultimately land you that senior role or transform your confidence and help you become the person worthy of envy instead of the envious one.

Confidence is key in programming. Every successful programmer has made mistakes and will continue to, learn from your debugging process and do not be afraid to fail. In the end you may even look back at how naive you were to believe something would work, but the first time it does the only thing you will regret is what took you so become so blinded.

One final thought I will leave you with on this post is one that came from a top tier Angel investor in the recent past directed at me after almost an hour long series of prodding questions in which he was intending to break down my idea and I just would not let him. It is a phrase I will never forget:

“Zach, you know why I like you? You are too arrogant to fail.”

Now while they can certainly be taken in many different ways, The one I preferred to interpret was that while talent is important, persistence and the belief in your idea goes a very long way. You can teach lots of things, but desire is not among them, sometimes just wanting it bad enough can propel you farther than anything else.

So Now I’ll challenge you, are you out of work? go forth and build something, become the king of the jungle and not the Mayor of your couch on your local foursquare.

Android vs iPhone – an Apples(no pun intended) to Oranges comparison

November 6th, 2010 § 1

Ok so to be fair, I am writing this post more in disgust of the current “Android vs iPhone” craze filled debate than anything. As an avid reader of several news aggregators including reddit and Hacker News I feel that almost daily now I am subjected to some sort of variation of which system is better and why, or some blogger who thinks he is writing breaking news with things like “Android overtakes iPhone”.

NEWSFLASH: Android is an open source operating system made to work on several different brands of phones over a wide range of carriers. Apple is ONE company, with ONE phone. This is an apples (no pun intended) to oranges comparison and one that frankly, I am tired of reading about daily. So let’s just settle this ordeal once and for all.

If Android at some point did NOT surpass iPhone as the number one operating system it would have been considered a FAILURE. By the very nature of these two systems, it NEEDED to be the most used operating system for mobile on the planet. While that is a noble concept for Apple, the reality is they make ONE phone, their one phone has made the most significant impact on the market of any product in probably the last 10-15 years, however to believe that it could keep its spot at the top of the market would be insane. with the number of manufacturers and carriers looking to get a leg up it was always only a matter of time before someone or some thing came along to take this title away from Apple, and that should be OK in their eyes too!

Now on to settle a bit more of this argument:

Mr. jobs, it can easily be said that neither of these systems, Android or iPhone is “open” though your argument was probably compelling to some, it was scientifically unfounded and amounted to little more than marketing speak. BUT that is OK … Apple is known for its secrecy and withholding of products. In fact, exclusivity is probably one of the things that has helped apple grow into the behemoth it has. Going after the core business of Microsoft in the mid 90′s would have meant certain death for Apple, instead you wisely chose to go a different direction, point to a target market and aggressively pursue them. You accomplished this and both companies were allowed to thrive.

The Android vs iPhone debacle should be seen no different, I think it compares easily to the Windows vs Mac of the 90′s. Android is going to be widely used because of its whorish tendencies (meaning they will basically give it to anyone who has ever had the intention of building a mobile phone). and the iPhone will always remain a factor in the market because of its fan base, exclusive nature and features which people have grown to know and love.

Does this mean that Apple will fail because their phone loses market share? Absolutely not! does it mean that Android will be the ultimate winner in the battle? Absolutely not! (though they will certainly champion themselves as such). The truth is both of these systems will come out a winner in the end for the same reasons that Apple and Microsoft have been able to co-exist in the desktop market all of these years. Competition is healthy, but sometimes in the heat of battle people tend to lose sight of things. Just because these two are in competition does not mean they are in DIRECT competition. Are they competing for some of the same users? Absolutely … Are they doing it on the same scale? Absolutely not!

So in short, Steve, if you’re reading this just stick to what you do best. Keep getting people excited about the products you guys are shipping out of Cupertino and the people will keep buying them. There is no need to give an argument for “Open vs Closed” or even consider yourself in direct competition with Android unless you plan to start selling licenses of iOS to other phone manufacturers.

And to Mr. Schmidt and the gang of googlers out there just keep up the good work and keep in mind, there is always room for competition in every market. Without competitors your products would not be even minutely as good as they have become and you would probably have some “suits” from the SEC knocking on your door and talking about “Monopoly” … and not the kind that comes to us from our friends at Parker Bros.

What do you think? Do you consider Apple and Android in Direct competition or do you agree with me?

Are you tired of listening to the iPhone vs Android battle of are you just getting warmed up to it? looking forward to the comments surely to come.

Curb your television intake – Increase your productivity

October 24th, 2010 § 8

At first glance to many of you the title and contents of this post may be obvious, to others it will probably seem absurd. But I am writing this post for myself as well, almost as a reminder for myself and for my productivity. Television has been ever-present in the lives of my generation. With affordable cable packages offering hundreds of channels there is almost never a time where there is nothing to watch on tv. But with the ability to sit in front of the television comes a slew of problems that affects many of us in a less than desirable way.

The so-called “television trance” has been talked about for decades but very little has been done to prevent younger generations from becoming dependent on it. Parents and Grandparents often use the television as a form of baby sitter for their young ones, unfortunately this has become an accepted practice and the children who have a television habit by the time they reach pre-school is at alarming levels. What we should all do is set a limit for ourselves and for our children (if you have children, obviously I do not) and maintain that limit in order to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

All too often I have found myself with the TV as background noise while working only for it to catch my full attention and eventually be sitting in the recliner watching it with my undivided attention minutes later. This has led to a devastating drop in my productivity in the past and I had to make a conscious choice to change it. In the weeks since I have spent a considerable amount of times doing other things I enjoy such as running, writing and reading. While running is not the most intellectual thing you can do, for me it creates an escape of sorts from the real world. You should find something that you like to do which can take your mind off of everything for at least 30-45 minutes a day, I feel like this is healthy and some of my clearest thoughts come to me in the shower after a long jog. Writing and reading obviously help me do other things that enrich the mind and fill the void that television sometimes fills if we let it.

I am not like most people you will ever meet (in fact, I am probably the only person like me you will ever meet if you have the opportunity to do so) but I feel that this policy can help people of all types and certainly is not limited to a small group of individuals. You see, almost everyone has bad habits, and simply by acknowledging them as such you are well on your way to fixing the problem (no this is not going to turn into a self help novel lol). it is important to figure out what types of activities you enjoy and make it a priority to do those types of things. Most people won’t like the things I do to curb my tv habit and vice versa, so set your own plan and be prepared to stick with it.

For instance, I am of the belief that you should only read books that teach you something. Being a bit of a pessimist to me that means all non-fiction books are a waste of time, and while I am almost certain there are thousands of people out there willing to give me examples of how they learned something reading a non-fiction book however I will not be convinced. When I read a book I do so with a clear purpose, to understand the topic at hand significantly better than I did before reading. This obviously will not apply to all people (maybe not even MOST people) but it works for me and finding that which fits your individual personality is the only way to ensure success.

I found after cutting my tv intake down to just 7 hours a week (with saturday college football being the exception) that my productivity has sky rocketed … it allows me to spend more time at my computer developing and working on my code base, all the while generating all new and enlightening problems for me to fix. Problem solving, at least so far seems to have been the best thing about kicking the tv habit for me, I feel like I get to learn infinitely more than I did even when I was in school by simply generating and learning how to fix the problems generated by my work. The only way you can get to a place where where you are not dependent on the television, and critical thinking will make an entry into your everyday life is by making a conscious effort to make that happen.

I challenge all of you reading this post to cut down what holds you back, and make your life the next success story.

Tell me what keeps you from accomplishing your goals. Is it a different habit? a dead-end job? A dismissive family? what did you do or will you do to overcome it?

Use the comments section below or the Contact page to tell me your story!

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