So if sharing online is about validation, what if the objects being shared are for sale, and you stand to benefit from their sale? Does money always ruin it?
There is a lot of sharing and curating going on of objects that are available for sale somewhere. See Svpply, Fancy, Pinterest, large swaths of ..
Posts on Business
Sharing vs. Selling
22 Jan 2012
Onboarding Inspiration
13 Nov 2011
I collect screenshots of details I come across and like, on the desktop or phone, in an “inspiration” folder on Dropbox. But I haven’t found a good way to capture great onboarding flows yet other than blogging about them.
Here are two standouts that kind of smacked me in the face.
04 Sep 2011
If you start from successful startups, you find they often behaved like nonprofits. And if you start from ideas for nonprofits, you find they’d often make good startups.
–from a Paul Graham classic that’s worth reading in its entirety, repeatedly, and keeping handy in your Instapaper account.
Consider the Albatross: Foraging and Activity Feeds
14 Aug 2011
I came across this post on Quora on “Lévy-flight personalization” and optimizing Quora’s activity feed for novelty-seeking users. Its inspiration is the albatross, a long-range ocean forager that’s larger than you think.
Lévy flights are seen in the behavior of many animals. It’s the pattern that emerges when an animal darts around randomly ..
Data Hunt: Entrepreneurship Around the Planet
14 Dec 2008
Bubble chart of nations sized according to new business density. Source: 2008 World Bank Group Entrepreneurship Survey.
Good data on micro-enterprises and entrepreneurship around the world is hard to come by. There’s the World Bank’s Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Database, but it has more caveats than a prescription drug commercial. Different governments operating in ..
Suggestions for Companies Planning on Launching New Products with Weblogs
05 Mar 2003
Be open and honest about it. Get “meta” about it. If everyone on the internet is talking about your new campaign, mention this fact. Mention the surges in traffic you experience. Show that you share the same reality as your readers.
Make fun of yourself and your new campaign.
Read Cluetrain first.
Text Sells
26 Feb 2003
TEXT SELLS on the web, because people go online in the active pursuit of information, and flashy imagery too often distracts rather than informs. Ad-like images get tuned out by users, but text can’t help but get read (try looking at a page of text without reading). Google was one of the first to really ..
