Category Archives: Web/Tech

Risk and startups

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Paul Graham has a fantastic recent post in his blog.  This is the kind of advice I wish I had heard when I was 21.

Yet, I can’t complain because the euphoric environment of 1999 allowed me and my partners at SelectMinds to take the plunge into startup world, when I was just 28.  It’s one of the best decisions of my life.

When we started SelectMinds, the reaction from my peers, most of whom had chosen more traditional corporate paths, tended to be "how can you handle the risk". Even then, I did not really thing what we were doing was terribly risky.  At the end of the day, all we were risking was the opportunity cost of mid-management salaries.  It was not a bet-your-kids’-college-account-along-with-your-house type of risk.

I hear a common perception when the topic is startups: Comfort with risk is the most important characteristic for an entrepreneur.  I disagree.  I think the most important characteristic (or skill) is comfort with ambiguity.  If I had to characterize my experience in a startup environment with one word, ambiguity would be the choice.

Dr. Amar Bhide has a wonderful book that looks at this issue.

Search problems (or I love del.icio.us)

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Blogging my previous entry today, I wanted to research the topic.  I remember reading about the concept in the past year or so, but can not remember where.  So, I went to Google and searched on the string "Balance Sheet Insurance".  It returned 146 links.  I scrolled through the first few but they were all on the topic of "balance sheets of insurance companies", which, coincidentally, happens to be a popular topic these days.  It, of course, has nothing to do with the concept that I was researching.

My fall-back in similar situations is to think of other search strings.  In this case, no alternative came to mind.

That is when I realized why I love del.icio.us (and tagging) so much:  It gives me the ability to categorize concepts in my own lexicon.  I would have tagged the article I read "balancesheetinsurance".

To give it a shot, I did go to del.icio.us, and tried the tag.  Unfortunately, no such tags exist yet.

The problem there is that del.icio.us is nowhere near the popularity and usage of Google or Yahoo!, and lacks the critical mass to be a mainstream search tool.

When it gets there, it will make our lives much easier.

Distributed Journalism

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When I woke up this morning, NY1 was reporting on the two explosions at the British Consulate in New York.  I saw this as an opportunity for an experiment.  I immediately went to Flickr and discovered that a user has posted a set of 5 photos.  In fact, there were more photos of the aftermath (the closing off of Third Avenue) on Flickr, than the CNN, FoxNews and NY Times websites.

This is a great example of the effects of blogging supercharged with the right tools.  If Vimeo had been as popular as Flickr, I bet I could have found a video clip, as well.  If I were AP, I’d be worried.