I just read an interesting report called Doing Business in 2006: Creating Jobs. The World Bank published the report, and you can download it here. Here’s a description of the report: Doing Business in 2006: Creating Jobs is the third in a series of annual reports investigating the regulations that enhance business activity and those [...]
This is a list of the top ten postings as measured by links. It can always be at the top of the blog as a navigation tool. Please vote below. 419 The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint 250 The Top Ten Lies of Entrepreneurs 155 The Top Ten Lies of Venture Capitalists 135 The Art of [...]
I’ve read a few articles about suggestion for Father’s Day gifts, and I am not impressed. These articles miss the point of Father’s Day: To blow away the other fathers when you compare gifts—not necessarily because of the cost of the gift but because of the insight it shows into the male psyche. I submit [...]
Gina Smith, the co-author of the upcoming autobiography called iWoz, provided me with a copy so that I could read it and provide a blurb. The book is slated for shipping in November, 2006, but there’s nothing wrong with a little pre-release publicity. After all, it will probably be out BV (Before Vista), and everyone [...]
"I already have a meeting at lunch." This isn't a lie if you consider talking to people on the bench between shifts a "meeting." What can I say? One of my great joys in life is playing hockey, and some of the best games are at lunch time during the week. So if I tell [...]
In a manner of speaking, I’m running out of lies to tell. So far I’ve taken care of entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, engineers, and marketers. The target of this posting is “corporate partners.” (You might find a previous posting, “The Art of Partnering” interesting.) These are the large, infinitely rich, and high brand-recognition companies that supposedly [...]
Have you ever cleaned out the pockets of an old pair of pants and found a couple of twenty dollar bills all crumpled up, just waiting to be spent? Sometimes you can get the same feeling by receiving an unexpected email. For instance, a few weeks ago someone from Audi USA sent an email to [...]
I've been tweaking my blog for the past few days. Just wanted to let you know: Check the siderail under my picture. My buddy Mike Johnston wrote a script that displays my Technorati rank plus the number of links I need to get into the top ten. I've found out that caring so blatantly about [...]
By popular demand, here are the top ten lies of marketers. Actually, it was too hard to stop at ten, so this list is a dirty dozen. As my mother used to say, "How can you tell if a marketer is lying? His lips are moving." 1. "Our PR firm says it can get Walt [...]
After a several month hiatus, I would like to return to my top-ten lies series. So far, I've covered entrepreneurs and VCs, Today's topic is the top ten lies of engineers. 1. “We're about to go into beta testing.” This is a meaningless statement because it doesn't matter when you go into beta testing--what matters [...]
I've been a blogger for a whopping 100 days, and it's been a delightful and educational experience. Some readers (Omer Trajman, in particular) asked me share my observations about my blogging experience, so here goes: 1. The more popular a person thinks he is in the blogosphere, the thinner his skin and the thicker his [...]
This is the flip side to The Art of Driving Your Competition Crazy. It's meant to help you avoid being driven crazy by your competition. This isn't a top ten--it's only a top five because the key to maintaining your sanity is to keep things simple. 1. Delight your customer. As the old saying goes, [...]
Please send ideas for topics and questions that you'd like me to cover here. I need to know what you want to know. I can't say I'm qualified to do them all, but like my mother used to say, “You don't get if you don't ask.” I could also use about 5,000 links in my [...]
I made the Technorati 100 today. Thanks, everyone, for your linking, comments, and evangelism! I only need 5,000 more sites to link to be in the top ten! (This is a picture of David Sifry, Technorati's CEO, giving me a tshirt to commemorate breaking into the top 100.) Guy
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 [...]
Much to my delight, dozens of you have posted your picture to my loop of blog readers. In your honor, I am presenting the first and last “Guy's Blog's Loop's Photo Winners.” (You know I love top ten lists, but I couldn't reduce the number of categories.) I didn't plan to select “winners” when I [...]
By popular demand (okay, two people asked me to do it), here are the top ten ways to attract the interest of venture capitalists. There's no guarantee that if you do these ten things that you'll raise millions of dollars, but this wishlist will get you in the game. Before you even start addressing the [...]
(Since I've antagonized the venture capital community with last week's blog, I thought I would complete the picture and “out” entrepreneurs to begin this week. The hard part about writing this blog was narrowing down these lies to ten. Luckily, my partner, Bill Reichert, had already documented this list of the top ten lies of [...]
Venture capitalists are simple people: we've either decided to invest, and we are convincing ourselves that our gut is right (aka, “due diligence”) or there's not a chance in hell. While we may be simple, we're not necessarily forthcoming, so if you think it's hard to get a “yes” out of venture capitalist, you should [...]