Daniel Rubén Odio-Páez Sharing my experiences as an entrepreneur to help you take the leap

SOMAcentral Startup Space in San Francisco

Sun, 18 Jul 2010 12:05:31 -0700

PointAbout just signed a lease for office space in San Francisco.

We’re just getting one office to start, so we have a presence out here. The place we picked is SOMAcentral, a brand new startup-friendly space right next to the AT&T Ballpark, in the SoMa district of San Francisco.

I was so impressed with the space and the concept that I wanted to share it with other entrepreneurs. Here are some pictures of the space, and I even made a video. Here are the deets:

• Six month minimum term, then month-to-month
• Everything is included except telephone. But utilities, internet, taxes, base rent, etc. is all included. Most people use their cellphones or get a VOIP phone.
• Offices with a window view are $1,500/mo (those are going fast)
• Offices w/o a window view are $1,000/mo
• Bullpens are $1,000/mo
• There is a parking garage in the building which I believe is $225/mo, and one across the street for $175/mo. I believe the building is working to get a group rate on parking.

You could probably fit 4 to 5 people in an office comfortably and up to 8 or 9 if you were willing to squeeze. Some of the larger startups are getting an office + a bullpen across from the office.

If you’re interested in the space, fill this form out and I’ll connect you to the person handling the leases:

(Video of SOMAcentral & neighborhood is below the contact form)

Here are some of the startups currently in SOMAcentral:

Got My FoundersCard Today

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:00:15 -0700

Just got my FoundersCard today. FoundersCard is a new program that gives entrepreneurs some love via discounts from lots of brands. (If you’re a founder and you want to apply, you can use my charter member discount code “FCVIP” to cut the $495/yr membership fee down to $100 in the first year, through the end of July. Click here for deets.)

Having come from the corporate world 10 years ago, where everyone is telling you what a star you are, I can definitely say that being an entrepreneur can be lonely. Not lonely in a bad way at all, but in a “you have to pat yourself on the back” way because until you get some traction, there won’t be anyone else around you that’s as passionate about what you’re doing as you are.

So it’s wonderful to have a group dedicated to giving founders some love.

Hacker News iPhone App Live

Wed, 7 Jul 2010 17:47:08 -0700

I’m a huge Hacker News fan, in fact so much so that I created a Hacker News iPhone app using AppMakr, a tool that lets anyone quickly make an iPhone app for free.

You can downoad the app from iTunes Here.

Here’s a bit more about the app, and about the tool I used to make the app. I’d love your feedback via email or in comments below on what else you’d like to see in the app.

The Hacker News app uses Push Notifications from Urban Airship, which is integrated through AppMakr. So the author of the app can send out a notification to everyone who’s downloaded the app. PG, if you read this, the push notifications are all yours to use; I don’t plan on sending too many out unless it’s something really significant.

AppMakr uses RSS feeds to populate the app with content. The difficulty with Hacker News is that the site links to external stories. Luckily, I found a killer feed from Readable Feeds by Andrew Trusty, which is based off a script from Nirmal Patel. This is really just an awesome example of one technology building on top of another.

Andrew, Nirmal - the HN iPhone app is counting on your stuff, so I’ll keep my fingers crossed that it doesn’t have any downtime! :)

We just added GeoRSS feeds within AppMakr, and I put it to good use within the Hacker News app. I used MetaCarta’s RSS GeoTagger to turn any locations mentioned in a Hacker News story into a pin on the iPhone app. So, building on Andrew & Nirmal’s RSS goodness, MetaCarta extracts any locations, turns them into a lat & long point, and then AppMakr drops a pin wherever in the world the story is taking place.

AppMakr also recently added in media RSS functionality, which displays as a picture gallery. I used a Flickr tag to create the media RSS feed. Pretty sweet, the tags I used were “Paul Graham” and also “Y Combinator” in two separate galleries.

There’s a great Hackers & Founders Meetup, which offers an RSS feed. I threw it into AppMakr for Meetup functionality.

Twitter also offers both RSS feeds for specific accounts, as well as for search results, both of which I put into the app.

I also included a “wildcard” section, where I’ll rotate in any feeds that the HN community would like to see in there. If you have a feed you’d like to suggest, please email it to me (make sure to send me the RSS feed, not the website URL).

I’m one of the co-founders of PointAbout, the company that created AppMakr. Here’s a bit more about AppMakr:

We launched AppMakr in January 2010. Since then, it’s been used to build over 8,900 iPhone apps. We recently launched the App Quality Index algorithm, which lets us predict whether an app will be accepted or rejected by Apple with 90% accuracy. We also recently made it so you don’t need to own a Mac to create an iPhone app - by using AppMakr, the process is completely web based, yet the app is fully native, works offline and all that good stuff.

AppMakr has been used by the likes of Newsweek, National Geographic, The PGA Tour, The Havard Business Review, Seth Godin, Guy Kawasaki, US Congress, Maclife, Inc 500, along with smaller publications like RacerX , WTOP and literally thousands of others to make apps. There’s even an Australian Fire Brigade that built an app with AppMakr called CF Alerts to warn its populace of impending fires.

Our traffic & traction has been pretty astounding to us. Here’s a graph since we launched in January showing both session & user base growth: (yes the actual #’s are removed; if you’re an interested Angel investor or VC please contact me directly!)

AppMakr User Base Growth (end users, using the app):

AppMakr Session Growth (although it tracks user base growth closely, it’s an independent number). A “session” counts as the app being opened by a user.

We often get a lot of people asking us if apps (and mobile in general) is a real true growth area, or if it’s just a fad. I like to answer that question with these two slides:

UPDATE: Based on a comment by my bro, Sam on the HN site, “it would be nice to have the option to pull up a browser in case I wanted to navigate around on the source site.”

Yep you can do that now. Just hit the little arrow button on the top right of a story, and you can view in browser, share in email & Twitter, or, of course, share in Facebook. Wouldn’t want to forget that one ;)

Here are screenshots:

Playing a Computer like an Instrument

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 16:47:09 -0700

Most everyone uses a computer. But a few of us, well, we play a computer like an instrument.

If you’re on a computer for 10+ hours per day, this blog is for you.

By “instrument” I mean we know the in’s & out’s of the device. We know how to eek out maximum performance from it. We’re the people who others just look at in wonder when our keys fly across the keyboard.

If you’ve ever found it excruciatingly painful watching others use a computer because of how slow the person is, then you know what I’m talking about.

These are just my tips, but really, I’m writing this because I want to know about your tips. I want to know what saves you time and makes you more productive. So please post comments below.

Knowing how to play a computer like an instrument is a real, tangible skill. All these little tricks add up to big time savings - or more likely, to massive productivity gains.
 Most everything here is geared towards Mac users, but many will have PC equivalents.

Keyboard Shortcuts: If you’re not using these, then you might as well not bother with the rest of this post. Being a keyboard maverick and treating the mouse like the devil is a foundational step you need to learn first. I’ve written about the importance of keyboard shortcuts before. They’re kinda like flossing - if you’re not in the habit, it’s hard to get in the habit, but once you do it, you wonder how anyone gets along without doing it, and you get kinda grossed out when others don’t.

Text Expander: This tool allows me to save snippets of text, and reuse them anywhere on my computer. It’s invaluable.

I use it for my signatures and for blocks of text I’d otherwise have to rewrite.

Mail Act-On: If you’re a Mac Mail user, Act-On lets you get through your mail much faster. Instead of manually dragging each mail message into a folder, you can assign keyboard shortcuts to automatically place messages into folders. For example, I’ve set CTRL+V to put mail in my inbox into a non-inbox folder. I don’t have to manually drag any email over, and I can select multiple messages at once. It’s great.

Quicksilver: Quicksilver is sick. It’s my constant companion on my mac. People often ask me “why not just use spotlight?” Here are a few reasons: 1) I find it’s usually faster. 2) It learns my most common searches. 3) It offers a cut & paste history of the last 20 items via a plugin, which I use constantly. 4) Quick resizing of images.

If you really want to become a Quicksilver maverick, watch these videos:
• QS Video 1
• QS Video 2.0
• QS Video 3.0

Here’s a video showing off not only Quicksilver, but many shortcuts I use:

iShowU: If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth a thousand pictures. This program is a screencast program. I use iShowU many times daily to clearly explain issues, problems, suggestions, ideas and more. I can then email or post these videos on Vimeo. In fact, here’s a screencast I sent to 37 Signals about a problem I was having in Highrise. It’s so much easier to show a video than to have to explain something with words.

Widemail: If you’re a Mac Mail user who migrated over from Outlook, you might miss having the message reading pane on the right side instead of below the email. And with the Mac’s wide screen, I find it’s a much better use of screen real estate to have the reading pane on the right. Enter Widemail, a free plugin that allows for this (surprisingly, Mac doesn’t have an option for a reading screen on the right. Here’s what mail looks like with Widemail installed (not not my mailbox, just one I randomly found on Google Images)

All Controls: The Mac, by default, doesn’t let you tab between all control boxes, so you have to enable “all controls” in order to be able to really use the keyboard. For you keyboard mavericks out there, this’ll be basic, but many of you probably didn’t even know this setting existed:

And here’s a video showing the difference between having this selected or not:

Witch: This plugin is a required add-on for any power users. It allows you to switch only only between applications (like ALT+TAB does) but between open windows within the same application.

Cinch: This little utility will automatically resize my active window to fit the entire screen. There’s not much I miss about Windows, but the Mac’s squirrly behavior in maximizing windows was one of them. Cinch fixes that for me.

Here’s a video of Cinch in action, so you can see how it works.

These are some of my favorites, how about you? I’d love to know what makes you even more productive on a computer. Please leave your comments below.

Dropbox: This is a great tool to host files in a way that they’re accessible across multiple computers. Many people know this, and if you’ve never heard of Dropbox, you can watch a video of how it works. But many who use Dropbox don’t know about its public folder option. Check this video, and then here’s the file I referenced in the video.

Finder Sidebar Shortcuts: This is one of the easiest and most useful shortcuts I’ve got! Drag any folder into your finder sidebar to have it always be accessible. Check this video out for details:

Honorable Mentions: Other tools I love: PDF Pen, a way better pdf manipulation tool, Highrise and Basecamp by 37 Signals, Unfuddle for bugs & tickets, the Vimeo Desktop Uploader, Omnifocus for task management (syncs very well with the iPhone), Yammer, a business-grade Twitter client for internal company communication, SplashID for password management, WhatSize for freeing space up on a computer, GoToAssist for screen sharing & support, and Carbon Copy Cloner to make exact clones of your hard drive, which are bootable. Even if you back up using TimeMachine or similar, I’d still highly recommend cloning your drive once a month as a failsafe.

This is just my list; I’d love to see yours. Please provide comments below! What helps you play your computer like an instrument?

Motorcycle Stunts at the Pier in SF

Sun, 13 Jun 2010 19:45:58 -0700

My wife and I were walking along the pier in San Francisco when suddenly, two motorcycle stuntmen started doing tricks in the empty lot next to us, right along the Pier.

I later found out one of the guys, Jason Pullen, is a professional. This is all he does. He has sponsors. And he’s truly amazing. The things he does with a 650 pound Harley are unbelievable.

And it just made me think of my post about 80/20 vs. 1000/100, where I speculated that by focusing intensely on one thing, you can achieve phenomenal results. Jason is a shining example of that - he does things on a motorcycle that just continue to freak you out, even after he lands his tricks successfully time after time. In fact, he didn’t wipe out once in the 15 minutes we watched him.

Video and pics are below.

At Apple Worldwide Developer Conference

Mon, 7 Jun 2010 17:30:48 -0700

I’m here this week at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), at the Miscone Center in San Francisco, CA. The conference sold out in 8 days, and this is the first time PointAbout has been able to send a representative.

This morning, Steve Jobs gave his keynote in which he introduced Apple’s iPhone 4. But what hit me the most was how well Jobs captured the impending wave of mobile that’s going to be hitting all of us in the upcoming years.

I’ve been drinking the mobile kool aid for 2 yeras now, so I’ve been living it, but there are some trends Jobs pointed out that mean that mobile will be affecting all of us in very significant ways. Namely:

• Sensors which allow the Internet (also known as “all of humanity’s knowledge”) to interact with the mobile user in innovative ways. These sensors in the iPhone 4 include gyroscope (new), proximity sensors, compass, GPS and accelerometer.
• FaceTime, Apple’s new ability for users to make face-to-face phone calls
• Full HD recording and editing of videos, right from the iPhone

Amazingly, Apple has shipped 100,000,000 mobile devices (iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch) and paid $1 Billion to iPhone developers. This wave is just starting, and PointAbout is in the middle of it. Here are pics I took of the WWDC keynote.

Talk at TJHSST for TjStar Event

Sat, 5 Jun 2010 11:59:23 -0700

In 1990 I was a Freshman at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science & Technology. 20 years later, this past week, I came back to give a talk about the past, current and future impact of mobile in our lives. It was a fun event.

We covered both mobile trends and my “tips for your next 20 years” for the students.

Here’s the video - it might take a few seconds to start playing

Here’s a transcription of the event:

"Daniel - 00:00: So, My name is Daniel. I'm TJ, i graduated in 1994. That means i was a freshman here exactly 20 years ago. So i'm gonna talk today about impending mobile revolution. On the topic called: ""Do's and dont's in the next 20 years."" Cause i figured why not to take opportunity to tell you guys on what to focus in next 20 years.

Daniel - 01:00: And let me also just say, i'm very honored to be here. Because i'm from TJ, you guys are from TJ.

Daniel - 01:16: First of all this is definitely a PG-13 rated talk. Is anybody in here under 13? Everyone is at least 13. I mean emotionally and physically 13. Good.

Daniel - 01:33: Lets talk a bit about today. I'm gonna talk for 60 minutes. Then there will be some questions afterwords. You may ask questions while i'm taking as well. We'll get the questions answered at the end.

Daniel - 02:11: So this is me back in 1994. I still have hair. I just want to point out I'm the co-founder of mobile technology company. Where we make iPhone, Blackbery applications. [UNINTELLIGIBLE]. Lots of other publications as well.

Daniel - 02:57: So we're based in DC. There's a lot of cool technology companies in DC. So what am i up to? I just got married recently. That was literally 2 weekends ago. And then we went on the honey moon.

[UNINTELLIGIBLE]

Daniel - 04:21: So what does any of this have to do with mobile? Well, the farting noises i just made were from the iPhone app called iFart. Who in here has heard of iFart? iFart is unbelievable. This guy made an app, he sold it for a dollar and literally sold million copies. Does anybody know what million times one is? It's like a lot of money, right.

Daniel - 04:57: How amazing is it that somebody who had anything about farts makes an iPhone app and makes a million dollars? And most unbelievable thing is technology they used to make this app. Something that anybody in this room can use. Anybody in this room can have an idea and make an app and make million dollars out of it. And that's what really big deal is. That's a small part of really big deal. Things like iFart, the whole iPhone app revolution is an example. It's just like when the internet started, when i was in collage using the first browser, the Mozaic browser. And it was a lot just, like, stupid stuff. A lot of games and weird pictures. And now the internet is a really big deal, like, we live our lives on it, we're connected by it. It's not just fun and games, what it is is not just that anymore.

Daniel - 06:06: And mobile, now today, is what the internet was 10 or 15 years ago. It's things like iFart. Its very easy to dismiss it just being a fad or a trend and not all that important. But it's a really big deal. I'm gonna talk today why it's such a big deal. You guys are just, i can't even tell you in how incredible position you are in. Because you have the brains and access and the ability to capitalize on trend of this. Remember, the stuff i'm gonna show you guys today, most people won't even realize any of that. Mobile was my life. For most people mobile just means just calling somebody, maybe texting or maybe using an app. But most people don't see what's under it. What's coming in 10 or 15 years. How mobile in 10 years or maybe even less time is going to be even more significant then internet is today. Think about how internet effects everything we do. Do any of you stand to be doing someday anything that hasn't got to do with the internet?

Daniel - 07:22: Besides being out camping or something. But even camping, you'll probably going to try and get directions to go camping using Google Maps or something, right. Mobile is a lot bigger then that. And you guys are in this very unique position and the reason that i took time of my day to come here today and to talk to you is, because, if i can influence even one of you to do something in mobile and to drive that trend. And if i can even just show one of you, at least one of you, how amazing this wave is gonna be. And influences you in wanting to do something in your career that has to do with this, then i will feel great.

Daniel - 08:02: So lets talk a little bit about what mobile is going to be and i'll back it up a little bit and talk about what it is today. And i'll talk about tips for the next few years. Is that good? Alright.
This is a very indicative graph of the trend lines that are coming sometimes in 2013. and 2014. Mobile usage is going to surpass desktop usage. More people will be accessing the internet, also know as all the humanities knowledge, from their mobile devices instead of desktop devices. Very significance happens right back here and most people don't see it coming. Most people think of the phone as something to call with, as a way to access all the humanities knowledge from their pocket.

Daniel - 08:56: This is actually a graph of the internet, it's 5 years old. Some really smart people, much smarter then i'll ever be, traced all of the connections. It's probably 10 or 15 times bigger by now, because it's 5 years old. We're, like, right here. That's up. The productivity that internet has given us, all the humanity knowledge, is just amazing. And our ability to access it is confined to this, right? When you guys have kids, when you're standing up here and you have kids i bet that your kids are going to be like: ""Hey mom, dad, how did you spend all day looking into a box?"". Like, all the humanities knowledge and you're looking into, like, it's a little window. The internet is all around us. Like right now, right here, if i wanted to know who built this and when it was manufactured, has anyone ever been hurt by it, can i get a good deal on it if i wanted to buy it on e-Bay. All that information is out there. But i'm an analog game. Human beings are not digital. You don't have the ability to just access that information just by touching. So we have to depend on these things in order to get to what we really want. But the mobile device liberates us from this box. The mobile device gives us better access.

[END]"
"Can I get a good deal on it if I want to buy it? Buy it on ebay

All that information is…is out there. But I’m an analogue being. A human being. We aren’t digital we don’t have the ability to just access that information just by touching so we have to depend on these things in order to get to what we really want which is to know about something like this. But the mobile device liberates us from this box. The mobile device gives us better access. Its still very inverted access. If I want to learn about this I got to take a picture of it with my phone. My media server can decode that and allow me to recognize it and compare this to others- that sort of thing. It’s still very imperfect but it’s a lot better than using this one here and that’s where the big advantage is that this- this thing- thing allows us to access all humanities knowledge from wherever we are and probably at all times but right now its still just this device and we have to look at this device in order to get access to that knowledge, and that’s going to change and you guys and people like you are going to be the ones that affect that change.

Let’s talk a little more about what that change can look like. Let’s see if I can keep this up. You guys seen Minority Report? Let’s see if we can watch a quick clip.

So that is a TED talk and you can watch it on a much better buffered version of it later on your computer if you’ve never seen TED talks they’re really awesome. So, to take away from that is that the design special was great but the reality is that it’s happening on most devises. It’s happening today, right now. Obviously this is very early so nobody is really using this yet but in five years this is university in itself. A little bit more imagining on what’s coming. We have some real designs that we’ve made to show what is not quite possible today but will be in very short order and I’m going to walk through a couple of them.

So here is one, this is- the idea is that you take external sensors and that’s one of the big trends is that right now the mobile device is just your phone but sensors are starting to be built into clothing or into rooms and yards. This is things like YouTube and wi-fi accessible to the phone. When you pair sensors to the phone you start getting the ability to access sensors on the phone and get a sense of what’s going on.

So imagine you’re on a ski trip and your jacket has an avalanche sensor and that sensor can communicate with your phone and your phone can process the data and it’s telling you that there is an avalanche or something like that. So that’s the idea behind this one. Lots of other social media and tools built in the phone, its got a databases, its got a compass, things to stay oriented, so you can do things like find….

Another idea is called, Find love. So you’re in a bar and your profile is being broadcast in some kind of safe way you know so that your teacher doesn’t look and you don’t have a problem. But your teacher doesn’t want to be in the same bar or place that you are. Obviously there is a lot of privacy issues that have to be figured out for something like this to happen. I think that’s very risqué way of skipping along but I think you have every right as well. So that’s called Find Love. The app doesn’t really exist it’s just an idea

And then the last one I’ll show you builds on this concept called augment of reality where you can actually augment your reality around you by using your mobile device. So imagine an app where you are playing a game, your fighting aliens that only exists on the phone but the camera on your phone is acting as your lens and so you’re at the mall or in your neighborhood and you’re cheating, fucking, fighting aliens that don’t really exist. Because that’s what you see. Other people see just a neighborhood street you don’t hurt aliens.

Here’s another example of what augmenting of realty can look like. It’s actually a really old example but it gives you a really good idea of what it looks like. Have any of you guys seen the GP windmill of reality? No? okay. Lets try this. See if this works better one than last time. So this isn’t using mobile specifically but this is augment of reality. So what’s going to happen here is that we’re using this little marker. This is a marker. This is a specific shape that the computer is going to recognize- the camera on the computer- and because I’m going to show the shape its going to....

This is augment of reality so what everyone else sees is just a marker but what you guys see is…

So this is a marker and you can play around with this as well just Google GE augment of reality. It’s a great example of augmenting reality. It’s not just a sheet of something that is happening when you start playing games and things like this so you can do and hear on your mobile device So augmenting reality is a very very exciting opportunity that we haven’t really done much with yet.

That’s some of the imagination of where mobile is going. Lets talk a little about where mobile is today. I’m going to give you guys a very quick overview of mobile today and when I’m done your going to know more about mobile than ninety-seven percent of the US population.

You can be at a cocktail party and talk about how great mobile is. First of all, there are two main types of phones. There are what’s called feature phones which are also flip phones or dumb phones and there are smart phones like the iphone. Smartphones are comprised of twenty percent of the majority. I imagine you guys, are you guys allowed to bring cell phones into school? Yea? Really? That’s awesome. You can’t text? You’re not supposed to. For the purposes of this conversation no texting happens in school.

So when we talk about mobile a lot of people say I want to do something mobile but really they’re saying they want to do something in one of three main areas. And just understanding what we call the mobile pyramid this slide alone makes you scarily smarter than most people- this slide alone makes you smarter in mobile than almost everybody. When somebody says ‘I want to do something mobile’ what you should ask is ‘what do you mean? SNS, mobile web, or what?’ and they’ll probably look at you like, ‘What did you just ask me?’ Because they won’t know the difference. But there is a difference. SNS are things like text, help, to 1,2,3,4,5, to don’t anybody hate me. That’s the lower part of the pyramid. It’s the lowest part because it’s got very wide distribution almost any phone can participate in a campaign like that but it has very shallow functionality. There is not much richness in the experience it’s just a hundred and sixty…. Mobile web is in the middle that’s just using a browser to access the web on your phone it’s a very inconsistent experience because even the mobile ericsson which is a feature phone has a browser."
"Daniel:...[xx], that's the lower part of the pyramid. It's the lowest part because it's got a very wide distribution. Almost any phone can participate in a campaign like that, but it has very shallow functionality. There's not much richness in the experience. It's 160 characters, [xx].

Right? Mobile web is in the middle. That's just using a browser to access the web on your phone. It's a very inconsistent experience because even [xx] Razor, which is a feature phone, has a browser. It's not a very good browser. Right? So most of your phones that you guys probably own have browsers.

But every phone tends to render a mobile website differently. So mobile web can be tricky. And we don't spend a lot of time with mobile web, or [xx]. We spend most of time with apps, which is at the top of the pyramid. And it's at the top because it has the narrowest distribution.

It's only Smartphones, which is 20 percent of the market. But it's very rich functionality. Things like [xx] augmented reality and the ability to reach down into the phone and find out latitude and longitude of the phone, where is the phone located. And use that to provide [xx] experience through the app.

A lot of the excitement that we're talking about today is in this top level pyramid, this is where we spend a lot of our time. One thing: if you are interested in getting involved with mobile, where is the biggest opportunity? I think [xx] that it is in the fragmentation that is coming to mobile apps.

And I'm not going to spend a lot of time talking about this because [xx] technical details. But the idea here is that there are a lot of big companies that are trying to do really big things in mobile. So you guys [xx] Apple [xx] ...Microsoft has not done very much yet, but they have tons of cash and they're not going away.

[xx] just got purchased. Does anybody know who purchased [xx]? [xx], right? So it's going to be interesting to see what happens with wireless. So in the Internet world 10 or 15 years ago it was all about Apple versus Microsoft: two main competitors with one of them having the dominant market share [sic]. In mobile, it's not [xx].

Right now, it's the iPhone. But all these other companies that are [xx]? I didn't even put [xx], Google. That's like the biggest [xx], ever. And so this idea of fragmentation: if I'm a business owner and I want to make a mobile app right now it's easy, I just get an iPhone. And our apps [sic], PointAbout, the company that makes these apps, start at $25,000.

And that's a little small project. [xx] big projects that are several hundred thousand dollars. That's OK when you're just talking about one platform, the iPhone. But as a business owner if I had to spend one-hundred or two-hundred thousand dollars, six times, that wouldn't work. And so there's this fragmentation issue, this movement [sic], that a lot of people don't see yet.

But if you want to do something innovative in mobile, help individuals and businesses figure out how to practice fragmentation. Alright, I'm going to talk a little more about fragmentation in a minute. Because PointAbout is doing one thing to try to solve it, that I'll show you. But let me just show you a couple more trends [sic] about the size of mobile.

This is was the adoption curve for a lot of consumer electronics items. You can see the Blackberry's down here and this is not the total number. This is just how quickly they were adopted. The Nintendo Wii was adopted very quickly, the iPhone was adopted more quickly than all of them, and, in fact, the iPad was adopted -- has been adopted -- twice as quickly as the iPhone. They sold a million units in 30 days, it took the iPhone 70 days to [xx].

[xx], that's exactly right. So the iPad, which this graph was made before the iPad came out, isn't even on anymore. [xx] adopted very quickly. This just shows the growth of mobile Internet. Remember mobile Internet is the middle part, the middle pyramid. Right? But mobile Internet is growing very quickly. [xx] basically [xx]. Alright. So real quickly about PointAbout, what we do. We focus on the top two parts of the mobile pyramid.

Mostly the top part, but we also do some mobile web. The way that I describe our business is that we do two things: the analogy that I use is we build custom [xx]. These are high-end, expensive, very functional applications. And then we [xx] service that [xx]. Which is called AppMaker, which gives anybody the ability to make [xx].

And so I'll start with AppMaker which is the [xx]. On January 4th, we launched App Maker to the world. It's [xx], so A-P-P-M-A-K-E-R. And we made 6,300 iPhone apps in the past 5 months or so, nobody has ever done that before. Our goal is to be the YouTube of mobile, meaning that we want to do for mobile what YouTube did for video.

You guys may not remember but before YouTube, it was really hard to put a video online. You had to shoot with a camera, then you had to export it. You had to load it, you had to make sure that it wasn't too big of a file to [xx]. YouTube came along and said, ""Hey, just a couple minutes of YouTube will take care of this."" Right now with mobile, it's the same thing. Like, has anybody in this room made an iPhone app? [xx]. OK. Has anybody in this room uploaded video to YouTube?

Right? That's the difference. And AppMaker is our attempt to do for mobile what YouTube did for video. So it's been used by ""National Geographic"", ""Newsweek"", [xx], [xx]. U.S. Congress made an app using AppMaker. AppMaker is free. So that means that any of you guys could go home today and make an app using AppMaker. Like [xx]. You could make an app [xx] tonight [xx].

The reason we made AppMaker was to solve this fragmentation, that I just talked about. If we can convince people to put their content into AppMaker, then we can build for the iPhone. We can build for Android, we can build for [xx], we can build for [xx]. And the user is the [xx]. And then the [xx] business, I'll go through this quickly. But, for example, we made the [xx] for [xx]. Made the iPhone and iPad [xx], [xx], [xx], AMCO [sic], ESRB, which is the game rating agency.

[xx]. ShopLocal, [xx], [xx], [xx], etc., etc. OK. And here is the slide that I want to use to kind of wrap up all of this [xx] view about mobile. This is the [xx] that [xx]. Which is that one of our clients is a large car manufacturer that you definitely know. And we were talking to one of the senior strategists at the manufacturer who was quitting, because the car manufacturer didn't get it. He was actually leaving his job because he was so frustrated.

And what he said to me was, ""The car manufacturer thinks that the mobile device is a nice-to-have in their car. That when somebody buys a car it would be nice for them to be able to connect up their phones [xx]. But what my employer doesn't get,"" this is the strategist for the car manufacturer talking. He said: ""What my employer doesn't get is that the reality is that the car isn't the nice-to-have, but mobile is."" Like, you use the car to drive, you need it to drive. But people have their phone with them all the time.

They'll sooner go back to the house to retrieve their phone that they forgot, than their wallet. Like, you guys know that? Right? Like, if you leave your wallet at home, you say [sic], ""I'll just borrow some cash from someone else."" If you leave [xx], what if my boyfriend or girlfriend is trying to call? Or my parents? OK, or my parents...

[laughter]

So this guy's quitting his job because he's like, ""The car manufacturer doesn't get it, he thinks that the phone's the peripheral. But the phone is actually the hub and the car is the spoke, the phone is what everything is going to be built around."" And so the sensors that are going to be created in the jackets to have the [xx] sensors built in, are going to be connected to the phone. Or appliances that are dumb today [sic], are going to be hooked into the phone.

One example is Steve Jobs, in one of his Apple keynote addresses showed [sic] a blood pressure monitor. You know, where you wrap it around and pump it? It was connected into an iPhone. So you could take your blood pressure and then..."
"Daniel:...the centers that are going to be [xx] in the jackets to have the [xx] sensors built in, are going to be connected to the phone. Or appliances that are dumb [sic] today, are going to be hooked into the phone. One example is Steve Jobs, in one of his Apple keynote addresses, showed a blood pressure monitor -- you know when you wrap it around and pump it? It was connected into an iPhone.

So you could take your blood pressure and then it could be submitted to the iPhone, and the iPhone could send it to your doctor, it could post it on Facebook -- I don't know if you would want [sic] to do that, but it could. You could go anywhere you want with that, right? [xx] blood pressure is.

But that's the power of the mobile device, is it liberates content [sic], it liberates data. Right? So a lot of appliances today being able to be hooked into a [sic] mobile device. Things like spaces that you're in becoming smart to what you want in your profile [sic] because you have your phone on you and your phone's communicating with the space.

OK? So mobile is the hub, everything else is the peripheral [xx]. Alright, enough about mobile? You guys kind of get where it's going? Is anyone inspired to do something in mobile? Just raise your hand [xx]. Alright, let's talk a little bit about Daniel's tips for the next 10 [sic] years. First of all, so I went to UVA. Let's see, what is this? This is like, June, so you guys are already [sic]...

Are there seniors in here? I can't believe you're actually in class.

[laughter]

Audience Member - Male: [xx].

Daniel: Thank you. So you guys already know what colleges you got into? Is anyone going to UVA? Alright, one for one. Let me tell you: TJHS is so much harder than UVA. Seriously, it's going to be like a breeze. So I went to UVA, I was [xx] at UVA, which is a great, great program.

And I really enjoyed my time at TJ [sic]. Like, this was a very special, magical time, and I'm really glad that I came [sic] here. One thing that I would say to you guys is -- follow your hearts. And I know it's so cliche to say that, it's so dumb to say that [sic]. But I've grown up watching my friends do the things that their parents wanted them to do, and I know what that pressure looks like.

I never had it myself, but I've had friends who have had parents that have wanted them to do specific things. And let me tell you: it doesn't work. You end up being really unhappy [sic]. I have friends now in their thirties that wished that they had followed their hearts when they were in their teens. And I just -- I can't tell you how big a deal it is to go do what you want to do.

So do what you love, seriously. Don't let other people tell you what you should be doing. You're the only one that's going to get the chance to live your life. Another thing -- this is not a part of dating, so outside of dating -- ""no"" equals, ""Tell me why to say 'yes'."" Except for dating.

[laughter]

Every other aspect: no is usually not a no. If you accept ""no"" easily from people, you're going to be able to do things that other people haven't done. If it were easy, everybody would be doing it. So, when somebody says ""no"" when you're trying to effect a change, or do something innovative, when somebody says ""no"", just realize that you just haven't given them a good reason to say ""yes"" -- outside of dating.

Alright? So it does not include the opposite sex, just in terms of trying to innovate and effect change in the world. Do not take ""no"" for an answer. It goes along with ""have no fear"". Seriously, we are driven by fear. You should recognize that everybody is driven by fear.

When you're at a stoplight and it's turning red, and you're in the intersection, and you're trying to decide, ""Wait [sic], should I go? If I go than I might run a red, I might get a ticket. But if I don't go, the guy behind me might [xx]."" Those decisions are all based on fear: like, what's the least worst outcome?

Right? Like, we are driven by fear. It affects a lot of the decisions that we make in our lives. Don't [xx] by fear, or at least acknowledge when you are, and accept it for what it is. And then... Alright, I'm not going to confuse [xx] ...exhaustive. But you guys who have [sic] have seen ""the"" movie? Yeah, ""Avatar""?

So, be like the Na'vi. And what I mean by that is that the Na'vi in this movie ""Avatar"", recognize that we're all connected, and that we all share the same [sic] energy force such that our decisions affect those around us. No, seriously. I know it's like totally [xx], but I'm telling you. Right?

You're going to be up here in 20 years talking to people. Seriously, you're going to want to be saying these same things. Like, we're all connected, our decisions affect those around us, we're not -- you know, in the US, we're raised to be very individualistic people, with our own space. And we don't often get the opportunity to really stop and think about how our actions affect others but they do, and just recognize that. Deal with it.

And last thing: become a subject matter expert in something. It doesn't matter what you pick. SME: subject matter expert. You could be an expert in beetles. Like if you know more about beetles than anybody else in the world, there is somebody out there that's going to want to talk to you, and you [xx] ...being a subject matter expert, in whatever it is. Choose something that you're passionate about and just become the most knowledgeable person about that thing.

OK? Is that cool [sic]? Alright, guys, it's been a real pleasure. Let's do some [xx].

[applause]

By the way, I had a video to show, but I'm just going to skip it. It's not a [xx], so [xx], [xx] later. Yes?

Audience Member - Female: [xx].

Daniel: OK. So the question is, different service providers like AT&T and Verizon -- how do those organization affect things like Mobile web. Yeah? OK. Well, just to clarify the question, Android is not specific to Verizon. It is on Verizon, but Android... Here's the thing about Android. What we often say and point out [sic] is that it's probably going to end up being Android versus iPhone, in a lot of really big ways -- it already is.

Android isn't growing very quickly. There's a [xx] report, which is an analyst [xx], which says that Android is going to outsell iPhone by 2012. In fact, that's already started happening in some cases. So the idea is that Android is an open-source operating system built by Google. It is being implemented by multiple carries, which is what you were asking about -- the different carriers [sic] -- [xx] different price points.

We think it's going to be like PC versus Mac. There's more PC's in the world, but, arguably, the experience is better on the Mac. And iPhone versus Android is like that, as well, where they may be more Android phones, but Apple -- what Apple showed the world was the value of this ecosystem. So it's not just that Apple made a beautiful piece of hardware, which they did. But it's that it uses iTunes, it syncs well, you can put your music on it, you can put your apps on it, it's easy to just press a button to buy music or to buy apps.

Our credit card is already on file with Apple. There's this ecosystem that Apple created and they blew everybody else away with it, nobody was ready for that. Nobody was expecting that [sic]. And so, specifically, to answer your question about carriers, it is a huge problem. Because I was [xx]. You know, it's like, because it's on AT&T's network and AT&T is more of a [xx], [xx]. And that is not a problem with Android because Android is [xx], multiple carriers.

But what I imagine is going to end up happening is that the iPhone [xx] ...Android already is. So I don't know if that exactly answers your question, except to say that it's a lot like the Internet back in the day. The connection is [xx]. But as an active developer [sic], we have to do a lot thinking about [xx].

OK, another question?

Audience Member: [xx].

Daniel: So the question is, why [xx]? Or, why do you think privatization is such a big issue? There are a lot of [xx] game console [xx] game consoles [xx] just making Playstation games. Or XBox games? Right?

Audience Member: Yeah.

Daniel: So I think the only way that I can really answer that question is to go back to what our goal [xx]. Which is -- our mantra is -- we want to do for mobile what music did for video [sic]. You're absolutely right. Especially you guys, [xx] app developer, [xx] make a very good living. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of million dollars a year. A very good living just making apps, just for the iPhone, or just making apps for the Android.

But that's not what we're setting out to do. We're..."
"Daniel: So I think the only way that I can really answer that question is to go back to what our goal as a company is. Which is -- our mantra is: ""We want to do for mobile what YouTube did for video."" You're absolutely right. Especially you guys, or an app developer, you make a very good living.

We're talking about hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars a year. A very good living just making apps for the iPhone, just the iPhone. Or, just making apps for the Android. But that's not what we're setting out to do, we're trying to do something much bigger. Our goal is to solve what we perceive to be a [inaudible] problem, that we don't think that a lot of people would recognize that [sic].

Which is that in a couple of years, as Android continues to gain in market share, this fragmentation issue is going to be affecting both business and individuals that want to reach, not just the people in [inaudible], but everybody who is in mobile. So our vision is bigger. Although, you're right, in the sense that you can do very well with just focusing on one platform, just like making a game for XBox.

Our vision [inaudible]. Yes?

Audience Member: [inaudible]

Daniel: So the question is, ""What comes after apps?"" Right? And the way that I would answer that is: when you're thinking about specific apps like the iPhone -- right? -- and you mess with one app and play with it for a couple hours. Or whether it's... There's this thing called the [inaudible] and you can [inaudible].

But, at any rate... So, yeah, that's fine, it can be a little bit of fun. But, really, why is it that big a deal? New apps that are coming out, why are they that big a deal? What's next? But if you look beyond that, it goes more into, ""What can you do with a mobile device?"" Like, for example: I just started seeing a new wave of apps come out that to me shadowed [sic] what the Internet did.

Where at first the Internet was just a lot of fun, not professional, not the business world. Weren't [inaudible] our lives. Now, it is. And I just started seeing apps come out, like an app for the company called US of A [sic], which allows me to deposit a check just by taking a picture [inaudible]. So, and I don't even have to send the check in anywhere, you just throw the check away.

I take a picture of the front, I take a picture of the back, using my iPhone, and I'm [sic] done. And it's that now we're talking apps that I'm using at least a couple times a week, that I can't live without. And next it's going to be thing like augmented reality, or I need to send my blood pressure to my doctor, or things that are just my daily life run on a mobile device.

So at PointAbout, we're not so much focused on the fact that it's an app or it's mobile web, but we're more focused on: ""How is it that mobile is going to affect the way that I live my life or interact [inaudible]"" ...absolutely. That's exactly what ""Newsweek"" is doing. They're charging $2.99 for their app.

They made it using AppMaker and [inaudible] money. So the question is, ""There are a lot of app making services on the Internet, how is yours different?"" Right? Yeah. Well, first of all, there are a couple -- there are two or three services like AppMaker that really have made traction. There's a lot of people that are trying to do this, but don't have traction.

So app makers weren't -- Mobile Roadie [sic] is another that focuses on the entertainment industry. One of the main differences is we have a ton of traction. So AppMaker and Mobile Roadie are the two main ones. [inaudible]. We have made more apps than anybody in history ever has made. Like, nobody has ever made 6,300 apps [inaudible].

It usually takes eight weeks to make one app, but we've made over 6,000 in five weeks. So the traction we've gotten is tremendous. I mean, if you're following Tech Bunch [sic], or CNET, or just [inaudible]. But it really comes down to the functionality of the tool, which is that you do not need to have an [inaudible] to make an [inaudible], which usually you do.

You do not need to [inaudible], which usually you do. So it opens up this opportunity for anybody. Like, I actually made an app for TJ using AppMaker. It took me 10 minutes. TJ has a lot of great RSS feeds [inaudible] ...app for TJ and published it. But if any of you wanted to do it [inaudible]... literally... What's today, Wednesday? Thursday?

[inaudible] day it is. By Monday of next week, TJ would [inaudible] ...iTunes [inaudible]. [inaudible].

Audience Member: [inaudible]

Daniel: What platform is AppMaker? AppMaker is a web service. It makes iPhone apps, today. We're working on also making Android apps, iPad apps, all the other ones that I showed you. [inaudible].

Yes? The question is, ""If we stop fragmentation, we stop competition?"" Now, it's not that we want to stop fragmentation. We think it's a beautiful thing, it's a huge opportunity. We want to embrace the fact that there is fragmentation and make it so that if you want to make an app, you can come to AppMaker and we can make an app across all these different platforms, versus you having to go and spend a lot of money on each one.

So, [inaudible] will still be out there. We're not erasing fragmentation or stopping fragmentation, we're leveraging it to [inaudible].

[inaudible] ...question. There are new iPhone terms of service that just came out that state basically [inaudible] being able to create native apps. [inaudible] terms of service. [inaudible] says that apps have to [inaudible] who is the [inaudible] ...and the question was specifically about [inaudible].

[inaudible] we've got a very good relationship with Apple. We've published so many apps that we have [inaudible]. They know us very well and [inaudible]. And, at the same time, Apple is very nervous about a tool like AppMaker because it means that Apple will be dependent [sic] on how good AppMaker is for [inaudible]. Apple is very careful about the image that they project in the world, [inaudible] to you.

So, that is an ongoing dialog that we have with Apple every day. How can we turn AppMaker into a tool which we both seem to [inaudible] ...so that you, or you, or anybody, can come make an app. [inaudible]. Right? And so we've been adding things like instant notifications into the apps. So, like let's say that you're the captain of the lacrosse team?

You could make an app for the lacrosse team that has lacrosse information about TJ's lacrosse team. It has maybe an international lacrosse [inaudible]. Maybe it has lacrosse news? And you can also had instant notification. So [inaudible] ...basically like a text message pop up that says, ""Hey, there's a lacrosse game tonight. Come see us play.""

Things like that that are very specific to native apps. Those are the things that [inaudible] build into AppMaker, so the apps [inaudible]. And by the way, how much time do we have? [inaudible] until two?

Audience Members: Yes.

Daniel: Alright. So I'm going to do Q and A until you guys don't have questions anymore. OK? But we'll definitely stop at two. I mean, I don't mind letting you go early. Although, [inaudible] OK. But, I don't mind... But if you guys [inaudible] ... is there an adult in the room? OK, we'll do questions for a few more minutes and then [inaudible].

Yes?

Audience Member: [inaudible]

Daniel: If I made an app, how would I get it onto the iTunes store? There is a service called iTunes Connect. When you have an Apple developer account, you can access iTunes Connect. It's the backdoor into iTunes and that's where you upload apps. So [inaudible] with AppMaker, is you get an Apple developer account, but you don't actually have to use [inaudible].

You load your Apple developer account into Apple, you make an app using AppMaker, and then you upload it to iTunes using [inaudible] which [inaudible].

So is [inaudible] person using AppMaker [inaudible] themselves? [inaudible] you don't [inaudible] the app yourselves. AppMaker does all of it for you, it's completely a self-service tool. So you log onto appmaker.com, you use [inaudible] environment to create your app just by dragging and dropping. You could build. AppMaker builds the Apple background, it spits out a published app.

[inaudible]. It's a lot of fun. I can't do it, but I think it's pretty cool [inaudible]. [inaudible]. Right? [inaudible] ...have some fun with it [inaudible].

[inaudible].

So the question is, ""If you jailbreak your phone and you are going to [inaudible], if you jailbreak your phone, is that [inaudible]?"" I mean, it's a small part of what the majority is doing that, to me, a little bit of this craziness on the fringes is never [inaudible]. Like, I'm not [inaudible] the ones that promote [inaudible].

There are people who worked long and hard to make apps possible, to make them exist in the first place. But having people that think creatively and are pushing others to do things in an interesting way, to me, a little bit of that innovation is always good. OK, guys. It's been a real pleasure.

[applause]"

WSJ Social Media Event

Sat, 22 May 2010 01:10:29 -0700

Great event by The Wall Street Journal on social media. Especially good was Harry Gold’s presentation from Ovrdrv (the first presentation I captured in the video below). Ovrdrv won “2009 Best Use of Social Media” for their Harley Davidson Mosaic. Try typing in “John1” on the mosaic page to see what happens, under “find photos with a code”. That is a “one” next to John, not an “L”).

Start with the Why... not the How or the What

Sat, 8 May 2010 20:08:47 -0700

My PointAbout co-founder Isaac just shared with me a truly inspiring TED session by Simon Sinek on why the Wright Brothers were successful, and how that secret is shared by all great leaders: Start with the Why, not the How or the What.

This is a transformative 8 minute TED video that I hope you’ll enjoy and share with those you care about:

Princeton Entrepreneurs Network panel on 5/11

Fri, 7 May 2010 11:52:18 -0700

The Princeton Entrepreneurs Network will be hosting a panel on entrepreneurism on May 11th at the Cooley Godward Kronish offices in Chinatown.
Come join us, it’ll be a great event. I’ll have video of the panel posted here afterwards. Here are event details:

The First 500 Days: IT Startups
PEN-DC is kicking off the spring season with an evening focused on the world of early stage technology startups. Interested in learning from the entrepreneurs? Considering whether to take the plunge? Looking for an opportunity to network with peers? Join us for our panel discussion and networking event!

Date: May 11th, 2010. 6:30-8:30 PM

Speakers
Camilo Acosta ’06 – Root Orange.  www.rootorange.com. Regional domain names – ex. lease a premium domain (telephones.com) locally.

Brandt Squires – Logik.  www.logik.com. eDiscovery (finding and sorting electronic records in court cases and other settings) processing with proprietary software. Previously at LivingSocial.

Daniel Odio – PointAbout.  www.pointabout.com. iPhone, iPad, and Android apps either custom-made or through DIY software called AppMakr. Also involved in several networking roles in DC area (www.1410Q.com networking space).

Moderator - Josh Girvin (Novak Biddle)

Location
Cooley, Godward, Kronish
777 6th Street, NW
Suite 1100
Washington, DC 20001

Theme
Common theme of speakers is early stage technology startups

Target Audience
Early stage startup entrepreneurs
Would be entrepreneurs who need a little push to “take the plunge”

Event Goal
Connect at least one “would-be” entrepreneur with the people, resources or courage to “take the plunge”

Example Moderator Questions:
Where did you get the idea for your company?
When did you know that you had something worth quitting your day job?
Who did you approach for initial funding?
How did you know how much to raise?
How long did you operate before taking a salary?
When did you decide to spend money on defending IP?
Format
6:30 pm begin
30 minute networking/welcome period
45 minute panel discussion led by moderator (with ~3-5 minute intro from each panelist)
15 minute Q&A session
30 minute networking

Admission
$10 pre-register at http://pendc.eventbrite.com/

Disruptathon mobile event recap

Thu, 6 May 2010 22:02:28 -0700

Kudos to Pete Erickson for a spectacular Disruptathon event at Teqcorner in McLean, VA today. PointAbout was a sponsor of the event.
The thing I love about Disruptathon is the voting power it gives the audience through iPod Touch devices. Attendees can also download the Disruptathon app from the iTunes AppStore on their own devices.

A partial video of the event is below (battery died about 70% of the way through - sorry). A more professional video will be uploaded shortly, and I’ll link to it here when it’s up.

Video is ~56 minutes long and may take up to 30 seconds to start playing.

Social Matchbox Event Rocked!

Tue, 4 May 2010 15:38:54 -0700

Congrats to the folks at SocialMatchbox for putting on a great DC startup competition.

My favorite presentation was by Ben Slavin of HelioGraph. A truly simple, “why didn’t I think of that” business concept that he’s already gotten a lot of traction with. I love Ben’s mantra along the lines of “80% of the functionality for 10% of the cost,” referring to companies like Akamai that have completely missed the small to medium sized business market for website optimization.

Here is the event, presented in two videos, parts 1 and 2. The videos are long, so they might take up to 30 seconds to start playing.

NFTE Dare to Dream Gala + Mobile Genius

Wed, 28 Apr 2010 22:11:06 -0700

I just got back from the annual NFTE “Dare to Dream” gala, an event put on by the Network For Teaching Entrepreneurship, my favorite non-profit, as it consistently produces tangible results by teaching kids how to run profitable businesses. Here’s the trailer to a recent movie about NFTE kids.

NFTE did something so simple at this event with a mobile giving campaign, it’s absolutely genius. I don’t think most people in attendance caught it, or the significance of what NFTE did.

As anyone who’s ever tried to run a mobile giving campaign and secure a short code knows, setting up a “text to give” program can be difficult, lengthy and costly, to say the least. There are some platforms out there like Mobile Commons that make it easier, but still, it’s a process to set a mobile giving system up, which makes it prohibitive to do for a single event. One has to really commit to the process and treat it like a campaign.

But NFTE figured out how to do it for $0 cost, and it can be set up literally in under an hour. Want to know how?

You can see from the screenshot at left that they put a mobile phone number up on a big screen to receive pledges. The first thing you’ll notice is that this is not a short code, i.e., “2653” for “Coke” or “62262” for “Obama”. Instead, it’s a regular phone number.

What NFTE did is so simple, it’s genius. They just used a regular phone number and asked people to text in pledges to that number. You could even use your own cell phone number to set this up. Then, they transcribed those text messages to the big screen (manually is my guess; maybe they copied & pasted).

This way, NFTE had an immediate way to recognize the people who were texting in donations, in real-time, thereby driving a cycle of giving among the audience.

So, then, how does NFTE actually get the pledge? My guess is they simply call the phone number the next day that sent the text message and ask for it!

Yes, it’s that easy! Just have one or two volunteers call everyone who texted that number and say “we’d like to collect your pledge from last night. Can you please give me a credit card number?” or similar. This part is just speculation; maybe someone from NFTE will comment below to confirm or clarify.

It’s so easy, it’s embarrassing. In the industry, we’ve all been trying to figure out how to make the short code process simpler & cheaper, and NFTE came in with an elegant, simple solution. In fairness to the short code industry, this approach doesn’t scale. I.e., it would be very hard to do a nationwide “Donate to HAITI relief” type campaign this way. But then again, who knows? And it’s a great way to test mobile giving in a real-time environment without having to set up any infrastructure, which I love. Plus, you can do this at any event!

By the way, I just donated $50 to the cause. Will you match or beat it?

Please show your support for NFTE, even if it’s just $5 by texting your pledge to them at 202-390-5921. Then tweet about this; let’s see how much money we can help them raise to support such a great cause. Leave a comment with your donation amount below to encourage others to join in.

Lastly, here is a video of Cynthia, the NFTE host MC’ing this donations segment the night of the event. Hats off to NFTE for a great, simple & elegant execution of what’s typically a hard & expensive thing to pull off. Go ahead, text them a donation to show your support, like I did.

Using a QR code to board a flight

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 18:30:18 -0700

Today I checked in to a Delta flight using my mobile phone and was surprised to see a QR code pop up (this one specifically was an Aztec-type QR code).

Typically I never have a printer around when I need one, to print a boarding pass, which has made checking in with a mobile device pretty useless.

But with this QR code, I was able to go through security, and also check in, just by scanning my phone. No printer required. The video below shows the experience.

Want to try it yourself? If you have an iPhone, just download this app called NeoReader, and then scan the code at right on this screen. It’ll take you to the webpage of this blog. I built the QR code using this QR code generator.

Thanks to Patrick Donnelly for a quick QR code education!

The Art of Enterprise Web Analytics

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 10:45:21 -0700

Another stellar event by The Web Manager’s Roundtable in DC:

Here’s the setup: The Art of Enterprise Web Analytics with renowned industry expert Andrew Edwards. Edwards will lead a discussion that will help you make better decisions about the viability and ROI of web initiatives by using web analytics across internal, external, mobile and social platforms. It will also be very beneficial for those who want to improve the way they deliver analytics reports to internal and external constituents.

Video is below. As always, since it’s 90+ minutes, it might take 30 seconds to buffer & start playing. Please pardon the first few minutes of unstable camera as I tried to find a suitable recording platform. Enjoy!