It's depressing to watch a mean, lean, fighting machine of a company deteriorate into mediocracy. In Silicon Valley we call this process the “bozo explosion.” This downward slide seems inevitable after a company achieves success--often during the years immediately following an IPO. The purpose of this article is to prevent, or at least postpone, this [...]
My buddy, Brad Fitzpatrick, drew this cartoon in response to the “abhorrent” article that I wrote called “How to Suck Up to a Blogger.” We're missing a caption. I KNOW you guys can come up with some great stuff. Please submit your idea as a comment! Oh yeah, click here to see the outtakes (ala [...]
Here's another MP3 recording. It is my reading of Chapter 7: The Art of Raising Capital from The Art of the Start. It covers some of the same material as my blog entries, but sometimes hearing is believing. Download raising.mp3
There's a great article called “How they named companies” at the Day2Day Activities blog. How do you like this for irony? Volvo- From the Latin word “volvo,” which means “I roll.” It was originally a name for a ball bearing being developed by SKF. I'll never look at a Volvo without thinking about this irony [...]
You may find this hard to believe, but I recommend that you read this post, “Spread Firefox but don't be a fanatic,” from the Firefox marketing community web site: http://www.spreadfirefox.com/node/19663 It begins with this: In my opinion it's ridiculous to have “loyalty” to a company. I base my evaluation of products only on their own [...]
Blogging has flipped traditional PR on its head. It used to be that ink begat buzz. Life was simple then: you sucked up to the Wall Street Journal, one of its reporters wrote about your product, and the buzz began. (Here’s a collection of great speeches about the state of the art of blogging, courtesy [...]
Many people have asked questions about how I write my blog entries. Some think that I am simply copying and pasting from my books. Others, ironically, have asked when I'll publish my blog entries in a book! I'd like to explain what I'm doing for many of my entries. It starts around 10 pm when [...]
I don't usually act as a newsbot, but New York Magazine has two very interesting articles about blogging in the February 20th issue. Forget Brett Hull and Mark Messier, Arianna Huffington is my new hero. Blogs to Riches The Haves and Have-Nots of the Blogging Boom. Two years ago, David Hauslaib was a junior at [...]
I admit it: I’m a user-group junkie. I got my first taste of user groups when I worked for Apple—speaking at their meetings was one of my great pleasures. Their members were unpaid, raging, inexorable thunderlizard evangelists for Macintosh and Apple II. These folks sustained Apple by supporting its customers [...]
Here is a loop of the Winter Olympics. The content of this loop changes everyday, so please keep it running. http://snipurl.com/winterolympics The pictures in the loop are from Getty Images. They are some of the best action shots I've ever seen--although I'm from Hawaii, so what do I know about winter sports. :-)
I have a theory (as opposed to a dream) that Heaven is a three-class Boeing 777. You can sit in a narrow seat that doesn't recline and eat chicken-like substances next to a screaming baby in coach class. Or, you can sit in a slightly wider seat that reclines slightly more and eat a beef-like [...]
I'm participating in a charity fundraising event called “Get in Their Shoes.” This is a description of the program: “The Get in Their Shoes Campaign is a call to action by successful business leaders, athletes, entertainers, and politicians to rally youth and aspiring leaders to lift themselves out of their limiting circumstances by proactively interviewing [...]
iStockphoto announced today that it has been acquired by Getty Images. This is just super cool news. I LOVE iStockphoto. Most of my blog entries has an iStockphoto photo in it--unless I took a picture of a laptop. :-) Did you ever wonder how I get a picture of a man sitting on a toilet? [...]
I'll get lots of flak for saying this, but since I'm accustomed to flak from my Apple days, I'll say it anyway: Sales fixes everything. As long as you have sales, cash will flow, and as long as cash flows, (a) you will have the time to fix your team, your technology, and your marketing; [...]
Today's loop celebrates a perennial favorite childhood character: Curious George. The new Curious George movie starts on February 10th. This loop enables you to meet the characters, view the picture gallery, watch the trailers, download wallpaper, get the video game, and order the soundtrack. Even if you're not into Curious George, it shows how to [...]
When I went through the security line at San Francisco International Airport this morning, I noticed this laptop with an Apple sticker pasted over its Dell logo (click to enlarge the photo if you don't believe me). I thought this was very funny, so I asked its owner why he did this. He explained that [...]
Here is a loop of the Super Bowl ads. Click on a frame to watch the ad you'd like to see. http://snipurl.com/superbowlads I loved the Leonard Nimoy/Mr. Spock one. Previous great ads are viewable at: http://snipurl.com/previousads
I just found out how easy it is to include an MP3 in my blog, so here’s my first shot. This is a recording of me reading Chapter 3 of The Art of the Start: The Art of Pitching. "Pitching," in the context of this reading, is the process of reaching agreement—when seeking an investment, [...]
Because of my recent post about schmoozing, you might think I'm a warm, fuzzy, and kumbaya kind of Guy. Most of the time I am, but I have strong feelings about email etiquette and what it takes to get your email read--and answered. As someone who gets dozens of emails every day and sends a [...]
“It's not what you know or who you know, but who knows you.” Susan RoAne. The Guy Kawasaki Theory of Schmoozing version 1.0 was ad hoc: get to know the people that you need for a specific deal. It was short-term and focused.Version 2.0 is ad infinitum--maybe even ad nauseam. It's taken me twenty years, [...]