Just watch this…
[youtube=http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=3c-Ijky95dc]
McCain has to defend Obama. And Steal a microphone from an uninformed citizen.
I am Officially a Googler 
Infographic: The Seven Deadly Sins of Mobile Marketing This infographic was made to represent poor SMS marketing campaigns, but is relevant for mobile marketing in general
Contextually Relevant Mobile Ads See Impressive Clickthrough Rates According to EMarkete, contextually relevant ads are seeing significantly higher clickthrough rates in mobile.
Facebook Has Surpassed 300M Monthly Mobile Users. What Does This Mean for You? A research study that is about to be published by Enders Analysis points out that Facebook is now seeing more than 300M Monthly Active Users (MAU) on their mobile applications.
An Interesting Funder’s Point of View
I read an interesting post on the Ycombinator forums today about Yossi Vardi, who is the biggest Angel Investor of internet start-up`s in Israel today. Considering Israel is thriving with young and reputable strart-up companies, the money man behind them is definitely an interesting person to take cues from. He states:
“When I hear a pitch by an entrepreneur I look for a few things in them. First, they have to be very talented. I’m not interested in good or great entrepreneurs. I want them excellent. They have to be nice people, since some investments don’t ripe in early stages. I always tell my wife that in case the investment fails in early stages, at least we gave a “scholarship” to a good guy and not to some idiot. Moreover, they have to be focused on the arena I like which is the internet. If they meet those criterias, there is a good chance I will invest in them. What exactly they are doing is less important. Business plans are a wonderful part of science-fiction. They are developed for people who love sausages and don’t know what are they made of. How can one conduct a ‘due diligence’ on something that is only in his mind.”
What I find interesting here is that:
a.) He looks at his money and his investments as scholarships. He is giving someone he truly believes in an opportunity and even if it does not work out he is happy because he gave that person a chance to learn a valuabe lesson. I love that!
b.) He doesn`t care about the business plan because the business plan is always going to change. Anyone who has been part of a startup before knows that what you originally plan out never sticks. All too often I speak to young entrepreneurs who havea great idea and get hung up on the idea of getting the business plan done. This is not to say that the business plan is useless. Outlining and organizing your thoughts is essential to keeping yourself sane and making sure there are no holes in your idea. However, investors and entrepreneurs alike must know that situations change and ideas evolve. The great entrepreneur can think on his toes and adapt given positive opportunity or even tricky situation.
The first step is to truly prove your greatness, get an unreal demo together or a killer team that you know will inspire anyone, don`t just sit there trying to cram all your thoughts into a set number of pages.
This is a guy who knows what it takes to run a company and build a great success. Business plans always change and sometimes the idea is a winner and sometimes its not. However, if you put your eggs in the basket that is being held by the guys and girls who are truly passionate, smart and hungry for success you wlll always come out on top; even if the eggs break.
Thoughts?
And this is why Dion shouldn’t, won’t and never will be Prime Minister
A friend of mine called Mark McKay shared this video with me today. I dont really even need to say anything else … watch the video, especially if you are Canadian!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xbs7wXvh2Q]
Yes the question could have been more direct and less ambigious. however there is no way this man should be running our country at a time like this. None of the leaders inspire me to vote based on their qualities, but Dion has definitely inspired me to vote based on his serious lack of qualities.
Find any song from any commercial ever…. Ad Tunes.
Ever seen a commercial and thought “what song is that” or “wow catchy tune”….
Well last night was just the last straw with me. After three commercials I had enough. I needed to know who these bands are.
I have discovered songs and bands before using Boolean strings that Lary and Sergey would be proud of (namely AtomicTom).
But this site takes the cake. Check out Ad Tunes and see what I mean. Enter search terms related to the ad, say GM, AT&T, Nintendo, or whatever… Powerful tool.
The Loneliest Organism on Earth
I am fascinated to find out what kind of scientific breakthroughs are going to come about from studying Desulforudis audaxviator. Any predictions?
Check out the article in Wired, http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/10/one-organism-ec.html.
Late night TV is good for you
I was up watching The Colbert Report last night. It’s usually good for a few laughs, but ever so often something of use is given. Ok so not to become overly political, but the new fall TV season have yet to really dive deep into story lines, production on the follow up to “The Dark Knight” has yet to begin so this election has become a hobby of mine.
The coolest, and (claims to be) unbiased poll tracker out there is FiveThrityEight
Their mission is to “Most broadly, to accumulate and analyze polling and political data in way that is informed, accurate and attractive. Most narrowly, to give you the best possible objective assessment of the likely outcome of upcoming election”
Neat stuff. Obama has an 89% chance of winning.
iPhone Steals Lead Over Kindle
In lieu of my previous post commending Vodaphone on their recent mobile ebook strategy, I think it is important to draw light on some interesting statistics that were recently brought to my attention. We know that Citigroup has estimated the total Kinde sales for 2008 to be somewhere around the 380,000 mark. Well, as of yesterday a company called Stanza has reported the sales of their ebook reader for the iPhone to be at the 395,000 mark and this is apparently increasing by 5,000 downloads a day. I always believed that the Kindle would be the tool that truly spurs on the e-book revolution. However, I may be wrong! The iPhone and smart phones in general may in fact be the real instigaor here. If smart companies like Stanza can whip together beautiful iPhone applications like they have done there is serious potential for an increasing number of people to move towards the e-book format.
I am one of those 395,000 people and can say that I love their application. The form factor on the phone does make it hard to read the books at times, however if they were to integrate Spreeds technology into their platform, they could have a seriously killer application. I am very excited to see how this and the host of other e-book reader (that I am sure are currently waiting to be accepted by Apple) progress in the market. Maybe Amazon is wrong. Maybe people don’t want yet another device to carry around. Maybe people are happy enough reading their books on their phone while on the go and reserving the physical copies for when they get back to their home libraries. Only time will tell.
I Wish We Had Vodaphone Here in Canada
I read a very interesting article yesterday about how Vodaphone is releasing a new mobile book strategy. Apparently the guys over a Vodaphone believe the same thing that we do; ebooks, especially ebooks on the mobile, are the way of the future. They have announced a partnership with a company called GoSpoken. The team over at GoSpoken have have signed on a number of major publishers including Penguin, Random House and HarperCollins to distribute their content in a mobile optimized format. Vodaphone obviously saw this as a major opportunity to add yet another revenue stream to their service offerings, however their foresight is to be commended. Imagine never having to take another book with you on vacation and when your done the book you are reaing, no more annoying trips to the book store, simply point your browser to the Vodaphone distribution site and you will have a new “paper back” to read in seconds. A serious tip of the hat to both Vodaphone and Go
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly in the U.S. Election
Just a few things that came across my plate today.
The Good: This is a pretty funny flow chart of Palin’s Debate. It will put a smile on your face even if you have no interest in politics.
The Bad: I read today that only seven states have election day registration. This is showing up at the polls to register and vote. SEVEN! – not to mention that the states have power to regulate voting for a federal election.
The UGLY: Palin says Obama is Mr. Cooper and hanging with Terrorists. Obama releases a micro-documentry about McCain and his involvment in the 1980′s savings and loan crisis. Honestly how the heck does someone like this get nominated…
If the world could vote…
It goes without saying that the United States is the elephant in the room when it comes to global politics. While the ~305 million Americans only make up 4.5% of global politics, each and every one of their votes has far reaching implications. Citizens of nations across the world, my fellow Canadians included, frequently believe that the outcome of the current US election will have a greater impact on their lives than their own second rate domestic talent shows (but more on the Canadian election in a later post).
What if the whole world was, in fact, able to vote in the US election? Where does global opinion sit on the McCain/Obama debate? This website, www.iftheworldcouldvote.com, is seeking to answer the question. Through a viral email campaign, they have succeeded in polling 126,835 global citizens, living in 180 different nations, on how they’d vote in the government election.
I’m not sure if the results are surprising, but they certainly are lopsided. To date, 87.6% of respondents favour Obama. Obviously, this is not a demographically representative sampling, as it skews towards nations with internet infrastructure and invidviduals with the motor skills to type. However, it is interesting to look at the splits between countries.
While I don’t think it is extremely relevant that 100% of the 2 participating residents of Burkina Faso support McCain, it is interesting that his support seems to be strongest in former Eastern Bloc countries (Poland, Czech Republic, former Yugoslavia) and unusual Middle-Eastern bedfellows (Iran, Israel).
The economist is also hosting a global vote at http://www.economist.com/vote2008/?source=hpevents, based on an electoral college system that assigns a set number of votes to each region, based on their population size. Under this system, a whopping 99.8% of the global population would cast their votes for Obama, with the only dissenting members of the electoral college being Greece and Macedonia.
So what’s the point? While the numbers can’t be trusted, they certainly give the impression that everyone loves Obama, everyone loves change, and everyone loves liberalism. Everyone, that is, but a meaningful proportion of the American population which may yet scuttle the dream of an African American President. Ain’t democracy a bitch that way?
