Office Mushroom

Is it time to Earn or Learn?

This week I've been lucky enough to spot a tweet by Mark Suster, resurfacing an older article he published at www.cloudave.com - Is it Time for You to Earn or to Learn?

Working on my own project over the past few months, I've often asked myself this question. Seems like my answer is painfully easy - right now I have a burning desire to solve this problem (online identity theft, if you must know), and being that I'm consumed by it to the point of loosing sleep thinking about it, I guess I have no alternative.

It is time for me to just do it.

When I'm trying to recruit companions to this great undertaking, I'm often puzzled by their approach.
They all LOVE the idea, the model etc. and ALSO want a secure job, good salary and benefits, equal equity share, no vesting, no investment required on their account, big titles, no commitment until serious funding comes in, etc. etc.

I wish I could just give anyone whatever they wanted and see this project come through.
I also wish people would make up their mind.

Do they want to see the problem solved? Do they want to be a part of the solution?

Do they want to learn or earn?


BTW (if you have no time to read the article)
- in the cited article, earn roughly relates to joining a startup early, while learn relates to joining late when there's less risk and also less reward potential.

"Why wasn't I informed?"

In his great post "Why wasn't I informed?" Seth Godin starts with a distinction between innocent ignorance and darn thoughtlessness (my terminology in both cases).

http://www.flickr.com/photos/visionshare/

He concludes with "The rules are now clear: no one is going to inform you, but it's easier than ever to inform yourself. Before you spend the money, the time or the attention of your friends, look it up."

We could argue that it's not that easy. We are swamped with too much information.

(Organizations have many a tools to alleviate this issue. Also a new term: Big Data, to help market these tools.)

© Copyright Rodney Burton 

In any case, it still is your responsibility to do your best to be informed before taking action, so if you do want to make information useful, you need to stand up, look around, see what's going on.
If it still is worth a shot - set course and dive back in - do the actual work.

powered by Fotopedia

All this is fine (and trendy, motivating etc.), but there are times when we DO want the information to find us. When we are in some sort of danger, disadvantage, or distress. When our privacy is threatened, our perspective compromised.

We want that whoever holds the relevant piece of the puzzle will have a sense of morality/responsibility to use it for our benefit.
Hoarding every aspect of every thing we do must come with some sort of liability.
Cheating Coaxing people into buying more is a nice excuse, but the right to take advantage of tracking and analytics should be earned.

Right now,  (virtually) nothing stands in the way a big data aggregator from becoming a self serving ministry of truth.

Would you give your credit card number to a caller from undisclosed number, if you initiated a purchase online?

I wanted to sign up for a mini-convention re startup funding. 

The speakers seemed interesting and the date fit. 

When I called the organizers, I got to their voice mail. 

Naturally, I couldn't complete my registration in a VM. 

Left them a message to call me back.

They did - a few days later, from an undisclosed number. And immediately asked for my credit card number for registration fee.

I told them I'd be happy to provide it, but being that they call from an undisclosed number a few days after I contacted them, I cannot be sure it is actually them and not someone that happened to hear my VM. I would however like to call them immediately to their advertised number, and give them the credit card number.

Fine they said.

I called back - got to the VM.

Left a message saying this is weird and I would like to talk to them.

A few days go by, and then the whole thing starts over.

I told the nice lady that called that I cannot give the number to whoever may be calling me from a private number, and would like to call her. 

And then I experienced a nice deja-vu.

This whole thing happened for several more times.

Every time I asked if they may have some secure form online, a way to call them, or a way to pay on arrival. Anything that would make sense.

They suggested I call back… (we know how well that went).

Finally, on the last re-run of this z-grade sitcom, as the lady called I asked her if she was aware that they are supposed to be a business development center - and yet they seem to be in grave need for development. 

They have a service I want, I'm more than willing to pay for it, and for some reason they won't provide a proper way to complete the transaction. In the real world, giving your credit card number to an unknown caller is not a very safe or smart thing to do.

In the first couple of talks, this may have been a simple misunderstanding, but now it seems like their overall service level is very poor, and this is before they got my money…

This thing that started as common prudence, turned out to be a litmus test for their service level.

They failed.

I thanked her and asked her to stop calling me (at least until they got their act together).

After the whole thing was over, I asked some of my friends what they would do - especially if they would give their credit card number to an unknown caller. Their answers provided many versions of a resounding no (some examples: NO!!! , no! , WTF? , Hell no! and R U STUPID?).

Guess I may not be totally wrong here.

Are we all (on our way to be) Hell-Banned?

This day and age is all about personalization.
Custom search, news, ads etc.
In his talk at TED, Eli Pariser claims that we might be jailed, hell-banned from the world itself by a tailor-made smoke-screen.
Have we grown so accustomed to custom that our window to the world has become our own private show of Wag the Dog?

Are we going to need an error to save us from our perfect algo-life?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WALL-E

Start making predictions (S.Godin)

In a recent post seth asks "are you a scientist"?
Scientist can analyze a situation (within their domain) and provide some predictions.

The Loopweaver

The fun thing here is that there's no real definite answer to many things. 

You may get a cold shower when presenting your idea to someone who'll go out of her way to explain to you exactly why your new venture cannot possibly succeed. She may even be right. Probably, at least according to the way things are...

It's important to listen well, to all critics alike, and take their input as a valid option.

by lakewentworth

It's up to you to make it happen your way. 

Actually, let me rephrase this so that it may have some more resonance: 

It is up to me to make things happen my way.

My Handpresso - a story of fine print, borderline creative solutions and mainly - tenacity.

When I first saw this gadget - the Handpresso - I realized it would only be a matter of time (and price) until I had it. The combination of fine coffee, DIY-like and outdoors won me over. 

Initial price was quite a turn-off (Official price 99 Euro), but then came a coupon deal from one of the (too many) coupon sites - that made it possible. Only 200 shekels (= about 40 Euro) for a machine. Street price in Israel was higher at the time. In this price I can get two machines - one for me and another as a present for loved ones. Two for one - the coupon dream come true! The coupon site mentioned that this coupon is good for {spoiler alert} either the coffee pods or the ground coffee versions of the handpresso machine. I grind my coffee (and mix it with spices, and slightly roast it, and all sorts of silly stuff) - so I'm into the ground coffee model.

xkcd

So I bought two coupons, and called the store to arrange for a pickup. "Do you have the ground coffee model?" - "We only have the model for coffee pods - not ground coffee - at the moment, please call again next week". This same line repeated itself - every week - for almost two months. As time was running out on the coupon validity, I became a bit less polite and asked the store owner if they were ever going to honor their coupon. Maybe they should search their store, warehouse, or other branches for my type of machines? So they found one. ONE! I went there to pick it up, and the store manager said it was the only one they have:

By Amazona_dufresniana_-two_captive-8a.jpg: TJ Lin [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0) or CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

me: When are you going to bring more? 

store manager: We aren't. 

me: Excuse me? 

store manager: You can take the model for coffee pods.

me: But I want the one for ground coffee.

store manager: We don't have it.

me: You can't force me into buying a machine I do not want.

store manager: That's what we have.

me: So what do you suggest I do with my coupon?

store manager: I don't know.

me: Can you refund it?

store manager: No.

me: Can I buy other store goods with it?

store manager: No.

me: So you basically say I am to burn it up?

store manager: No, you can take the coffee pods machine.

me: But I don't want it!

store manager: That's what we have. And you should notice that your coupon is about to expire.

me: What? Now you're seriously trying to force me into buying something I don't want.

store manager: There's nothing we can do.

me: I want to speak to your boss about it.

store manager: I am the store manager.

me: Are you the general manager?

store manager: No, there's the chain manager.

me: chain? You have only two stores.

store manager: That's our chain.

me: So I want to speak to your chain manager.

store manager: He may be unavailable.

me: Listen, I really do not want to take it to the next level. This thing could seriously hurt the store's reputation, not to mention the coupon site's credibility. If you cannot honor your coupon, give me my money back!

store manager: I cannot do that. Here's the number of the chain manager.

So the chain manager was unavailable, for hours on end.

California State Motto

And then I had an idea. I called the store manager and asked:

me: If I bought something at your store, haven't used it, and returned it the next day, would I get a refund?

store manager: It would depend on how you paid for it.

me: If I paid cash?

store manager: You'd get store credit.

me: And if I paid in credit card?

store manager: You'd get store credit.

me: So I'd get store credit in any case?

store manager: Yes

me: (breath, regulate pulse, continue)
me: So what if I took that coffee pods machine, and return it to you immediately. Would I get a store credit for the machine's price?

store manager: (VERY long pause)

store manager: You mean you'd take the coffee pods handpresso machine, and come back, and ask for a refund?

me: Almost. I'd hand you the coupon. You'd hand me the machine. I'd hand it back. You'd issue me a certificate for store credit. I'd turn around, buy some goods, and immediately use the credit.

store manager: (yet another VERY long pause)

store manager: Ok.

MySpaceAnimations.com

So the next day, first thing in the morning, I was back at the store. Took the machine from the shelf, gave it to the manager, with the coupon. He then told me that they had a special discount on the machine, and that he can give me a credit for 145 shekels. I looked at the sticker price - 400 shekels...

I paid 200 for the coupon.
This time I got a bit upset and told the manager that now he's really pushing it, and demanded to talk to the chain manager. Again, the story of the unavailability of the top dog, but I quietly explained that I'm not moving away from the counter until I talk to the chain manager, and that things might get extremely loud in the store if I didn't get the guy on the phone, immediately.
Extremely LOUD… 

So they got him - but he was driving his motorcycle (sound's lame, doesn't it?) and then he was on his way to the elevator, so he asked that I wait a few minutes.
So I waited. And then we talked.
He said that he is the manager and the lawyer of the chain. "Good", I said, and told him the story, in a very brief way, and explained that as the manager AND the lawyer of the firm, he must be well aware of the possible implications when a store attempts to trick a customer like that.
He said that no one is trying anything, and that of course I should get my money's worth, and that if I only wait for a while he'd see what he can do. I told him that I'm sure that as the manager AND the lawyer of the chain, he CAN do it.
Two minutes later, the store manager said that I can take  200 shekels worth of store good, so I did. 200 shekel's worth of coffee beans.

Was I happy?
Not really. I got less than I should have, went through some hassle,  and didn't get what I initially wanted.
Was the store happy?
I don't know (or care). The store got more than it should have, less than it wanted.
Lessons learned?
The fine print is there for a reason. It is used loosely when the sun is shining, to the letter when things go south. Hope for the best - prepare for the fine print.
Was I satisfied?
Yes. I did get the one machine, some coffee to use with it, found one creative solution and one semi-hidden inner tasmanian devil.

http://animal.discovery.com/mammals/tasmanian-devil/

I love tasmanian devils!

(and on special occasions - venting)