Sur le même thème que "10 questions to ask after getting a startup job offer [Silicon Valley Users Guide]"

Reader asks Valleywag about company t-shirt etiquette [Silicon Valley Users Guide]

An old joke about San Francisco's economy is that half the people are in the business of selling t-shirts to the other half. Any Valley denizen quickly accumulates a wide assortment of corporate logos in their laundry. But be careful which company's brand you're sporting around the office. I work for a fairly large ad network that competes with Google Adsense. A couple of days ago, a new employee was sportin' a Google shirt and I was a little upset. What's the protocol on this? People have brought in embroidered bags from the likes of eBay and Yahoo, which is understandable because the logos are smaller and bags have more utility than a t-shirt. We also have our own company shirts available. So what are the rules? Can you represent your previous companies and what if your previous company is a competitor? The first rule is, wear something nicer than a t-shirt. A pressed, button-front shirt or blouse, for instance. Haven't had time to do laundry? Light sweaters over a wrinkled shirt have saved many a morning. In fact, keeping a light sweater at the office (along with a full change of clothes tucked in a drawer) can save many, many embarrassments, from inappropriate logos to coffee stains are a romp in the janitor's closet. If you have to wear a t-shirt, be a team player. If you're going to wear a shirt from a previous employer, make sure it's not a direct competitor or a company with better pay and benefits — with turnover what it is in the Valley means managers are constantly on the lookout for disloyalty. Though if you actually have a job offer from the competition, feel free to play it up for a raise. Other acceptable options would be companies that have tanked, startups you know are hot but your boss hasn't heard of (as long as they aren't challenging your business), something from Threadless, an independent local artist or designer or a concert souvenir from either a new and hot or ironically old band. That is, if it were acceptable to wear a t-shirt to work. [lien] [EN]

The Nation's C.T.O. Woos Silicon Valley

Aneesh Chopra, the nation’s first chief technology officer, wants to make a very dear friend of Silicon Valley. Mr. Chopra took his initial step on that quest on Tuesday night, when he addressed Silicon Valleyites during a stump speech hosted by the Churchill Club at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. He delivered the expected lines about the government trying to work better with industry and used phrases like “blogs and wikis,” “collaboration” and “visualizations” to get across the point that the Obama administration has mastered Valley buzzwords. The talk presented a vague outline for Mr. Chopra’s priorities in the coming months, which include using technology to improve education, health care and the government infrastructure. To the last item, Mr. Chopra remarked, “We as a nation spend nearly $5 billion on I.T. just within the federal government itself. How do we ensure that our procedures or action strategies further the cause? How do we leverage our buying power to promote game-changing innovation?” Mr. Chopra presented a handful of technology systems that seemed to be working to the Silicon Valley crowd, plucking examples from his time as the head of Virginia’s technology systems and new projects on the cards for the federal government. Many of these anecdotes started off with Mr. Chopra talking about his “very dear friend” so-and-so who had initiated a given project. His repeated use of this phrase – I counted at least six times – had two people next to me joking about what a personable character Mr. Chopra must be. Murugan Pal, one of the very dear friends, co-founded a nonprofit group called CK2 that is trying to cut the cost of textbooks. According to Mr. Chopra, the organization had some luck creating a science textbook for Virginia in short order when a group of college professors and teachers agreed to help create the text for free. Now other states can access this text as well, which includes more up-to-date information than many traditional textbooks, Mr. Chopra said. The project is somewhat similar to the Curriki program backed by Scott McNealy, the Sun Microsystems co-founder, who seeks to create free, updatable textbooks and course material. Mr. Chopra pointed as well to a dashboard that shows where the federal government spends its technology infrastructure money, allowing people to monitor the spending behavior. And he promised that the Citizen and Immigration Services agency would have a better Web site by late September, allowing people to learn more about the status of things like their green cards. “Customer-friendly may not be at the top of your list of words to express how this agency operates,” Mr. Chopra said. Still, he argued that the immigrant workers were “hungry” to do better and should soon have tools to help them provide people with better information like how far along they are in the green-card process. Mr. Chopra also backed the idea of government-backed contests to encourage fresh ideas. The Defense Department has used such contests to make progress in the field of robotics vehicles, offering cash prizes, for example, to the winners of various races. Most intriguing, however, may have been what Mr. Chopra didn’t say. When pushed by an audience member to elaborate on the government’s stance toward open-source software, Mr. Chopra dodged the question. “I have no problem with people purchasing Oracle, or Microsoft or you name it,” he said. The big problem with software purchases is that 0 cents of every dollar go toward customizing the applications. He pointed out that Virginia needed to make a homemade system for snow plow accounting. Mr. Chopra is pushing for government bodies to share their customization work so that other states, for example, could pick up the snow plow accounting system without needing to do the work themselves. “We are trying to create a culture of shareable intellectual property,” Mr. Chopra said. That said, I spotted Brian Behlendorf in the audience and had a chat with him after the speech. Mr. Behlendorf helped develop the Apache Web server, one of the most prominent open-source applications of all-time that is used to deliver most Web pages. He was also an executive at CollabNet, a company that provides tools for open-source software development to corporations. Mr. Behlendorf is now working as a contractor for the Open Government program, which is headed by Mr. Chopra and said he spent much of Tuesday showing Mr. Chopra around Silicon Valley. So it would seem that the open-source crowd has a friendly, well-placed ear in the government. The audience pushed Mr. Chopra to explain how Washington would create more jobs in Silicon Valley and make better use of the innovation pouring out of the region. One audience member commented that Silicon Valley types believe Washington is the place where good ideas go to die. “Not on my watch,” Mr. Chopra replied. [lien] [EN]

The Digerati Life Interview with Silicon Valley Blogger

Here’s my interview on blog talk radio with SVB from The Digerati Life. In this show, we talked about a variety of things including1) The Silicon Valley Scene 2) Personal Finance can be really different for someone who lives in Silicon Valley (or any high cost area) 3) Our beliefs that being a “supermom” is a myth 4) Relying on just your “paper portfolio” is not a wise thing for retirement planning 6) Time and Stress Management It was great talking to SVB – so grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the show. [lien] [EN]

LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman needs Ted Dziuba's guide to weight loss [Silicon Valley Users Guide]

In today's Los Angeles Times, reporter Jessica Guynn calls LinkedIn founder, Facebook investor and PayPal veteran Reid Hoffman "Silicon Valley's biggest social networker." Guynn means that just the way you'd think, reporting that Hoffman gains about 10 pounds per year, refuses to see a trainer and "doesn't step on scales." Some might deem Guynn's language rude, but since Hoffman's unhealthy-seeming weight is exactly the kind of thing everyone in the Valley won't admit they talk about, we're rather glad she called attention to it. Fortunately for Hoffman, Persai cofounder Ted Dziuba is ready with an intervention. Lately, Dziuba's been writing servicey items about coder life on TedDziuba.com instead of eviscerating TechCrunch-covered startups on Uncov. A recent post is perfect for the rotund Hoffman. But at 725 words, "An engineer's guide to weight loss," the busy Hoffman will never take the time to read it. Below, a slimmer, 100-word version Hoffman can squeeze into his schedule. Dieting and exercising suck. You are not going to have fun. The science is simple: eat fewer calories than your burn. Start quantifying. I use FitDay to track calories. Run a 1,000 calorie per day deficit. Go easy on the drinking. Take up smoking — a zero-calorie alternative. Eat one serving. Drink more coffee, an appetite suppressant. Low-fat ice cream has around 120 calories per half cup. After two weeks, your stomach will shrink. Step two is exercise. It's awful. Use an elliptical machine. Treadmills make you run. One hour per day, hard. You should be close to vomiting. Easy, huh? (Photo by mandj98) [lien] [EN]

Why Silicon Valley just won't shut up about FriendFeed [FriendFeed]

"Cathy Brooks is a typically unapologetic Silicon Valley Web addict," writes Brad Stone in the New York Times. "Last week alone, she produced more than 40 pithy updates on the text messaging service Twitter, uploaded two dozen videos to various video sharing sites, posted seven photographs on the Yahoo image service Flickr and one item to the online community calendar Upcoming." Usually, when one identifies a friend as an addict, an intervention is in order. But Stone, who seems to have spent so much time in San Francisco's tech circles that he's gone native, suggests more technology instead: Specifically, FriendFeed, which gathers all of this online activity in one place, making it marginally easier for Brooks's benighted friends to keep up with her online logorrhea. Brooks is employed by Seesmic, a videomail startup, so some of the "two dozen videos" she made could arguably be seen as all in a day's work. But the rest? The mainstream readers of the Times must wonder what people like Brooks do all day. One supposes they could sign up on FriendFeed to find out, but they, unlike the people of the Valley, have real jobs. Brooks, for her part, makes no apologies for her online chattiness: Her website sums up her career from a first-grade report card: "Cathy likes to participate in any project, so long as she gets to talk." In that, she has found a community of like minds. "The question from our standpoint is, how you find signal in the noise?" asks Peter Fenton, a VC backer of FriendFeed at Benchmark Capital. That assumes that there is any signal. Such is the complaint of Michael Arrington, who bemoans his 954 unread Facebook messages, and demands that Facebook make changes to accommodate him. Has it ever occurred to Arrington that he is, in the argot of product managers, an "edge case"? Entrepreneurs desperate for coverage, and aware that he never reads email, are trying a new way to reach him — and Arrington, in his compulsive neophilia, actually tries out the new medium, for a while. He then quickly tires of it, and throws a tantrum. Catering to such a person's whims is no way to run a company. Is information overload really anything more than a self-inflicted disease of the Valley? I doubt it. But to the extent it is, Facebook is far better poised to solve the problem than a startup like FriendFeed. The Times mistakenly reports that Facebook is playing catch-up in gathering up its users' online activities from across the Web. Balderdash. It's just done a lousy job of marketing its ability to do so. The technology behind Beacon — the Facebook feature which ruined Christmas for some Facebook users, by revealing their online purchases, and has gotten Facebook sued for allegedly violating a Blockbuster video-renter's privacy — is now being used to report posts to Twitter, Digg, Yelp, and Flickr. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg botched Beacon by presenting it as an advertising technology last fall. His recent spin that it was a technology meant for programmers, not Madison Avenue types, hasn't taken hold. It's likely Facebook will have to drop the Beacon name altogether before it successfully revives the technology. But Facebook's News Feed is the most logical place to gather together the sum of its users' online activity. The users, after all, are already there. FriendFeed might make a logical acquisition for the likes of Microsoft, Yahoo, or most likely of all, Google (its founders are all ex-Googlers). But a radical paradigm for the future of communication? Sorry, Zuckerberg got there first. (Photo by Brian Solis) [lien] [EN]

Frontline, Silicon Valley’s Wireless Startup, Folds

Frontline Wireless, the startup backed by an elite group of Silicon Valley investors, has closed for business, according to a statement from Mary Greczyn, a spokesman. Last month, the company had an initial application with the Federal Communications Commission to bid on a nationwide block of spectrum in the upcoming auctions. The closure was first reported by RCR Wireless News. Bidders were required to make upfront payments to the F.C.C. by Jan. 4 to be able to proceed with the bidding. The block of frequencies that Frontline had expressed interest in required a payment of $128 million. Ms. Greczyn declined to say whether Frontline paid the deposit. Last fall, Frontline complained that the commission was setting the minimum bids too high for the spectrum. A person who was involved in the company said that Frontline tried in recent weeks to raise the money for the bid but couldn’t. “It was a funding issue,” the person said. He spoke on the condition that he not be identified because of Commission rules meant to limit collusion among bidders in the auction. Frontline was started by Reed Hundt, the former F.C.C. chairman. And it was backed by L. John Doerr, the venture capitalist with Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, James L. Barksdale, the former chief executive of Netscape Communications, and K. Ram Shriram, the former Netscape executive who was also an early backer of Google. The company was profiled by John Markoff last April. Frontline had said it hoped to build a network that served local public safety agencies and also linked to a new generation of Internet enabled wireless devices. Blair Levin, a telecommunications analyst with Stifel Nicolaus, said investors have not been as eager to put money into wireless startups in this environment than they have in the past. And the F.C.C. has put particularly strict requirements on the spectrum Frontline was interested in, forcing it to build the network quickly. The result, he said, is that the winners in the auction are likely to be AT&T, Verizon, and possibly Google. [lien] [EN]

Six Apart executive fails to job-hop, follow other Silicon Valley rules [Anil Dash]

What's wrong with Anil Dash? As of today, the New York blogger, Six Apart's vice president of evangelism, has been at the San Francisco-based blog-software company for five years. Dash, the company's first employee, is one of its largest individual shareholders, but he's mostly vested by now. Why stick around? In Silicon Valley, the custom is to job-hop, to continuously optimize one's career for maximum gains. In staying loyal to Six Apart cofounders Ben and Mena Trott, Dash is betraying one of the industry's unspoken rules. No wonder so many of the ruthless careerists who populate tech companies find him grating. The concept that one might be vested in something other than stock options is alien to them. [lien] [EN]

Silicon Valley afraid to ask "Where's my bailout?" [Meltdowns]

The Wall Street bailout act failed to pass. One imagines the well-padded VCs of Sand Hill Road smirking: "How sad!" Congress will surely have another go, with more lobbyist-written provisions and earmarks to grease the wheels. It all seems so far away from Silicon Valley, the mostly debt-free innovation machine. But if investors here had any sense, they'd be padding the halls of the Capitol, palms out. What is a stake in a Web 2.0 startup if not a toxic investment, waiting to be written off. And why aren't the pension funds and college endowments marking to market the fliers they took on venture capital? Conspiracy theorists too paranoid to read Snopes.com believe that Facebook is secretly run by the CIA anyway; why not rescue Microsoft and the other investors who bought in at a $15 billion valuation, and make it official? (Photo by Laurel Fan) Read More: Washington Mutual's last spam to customers , The fake crisis that's killing startups , Wall Street chaos sends Valley lurching for double espresso , Clintonista Sheryl Sandberg backs Bush's Treasury Secretary [lien] [EN]

Coping With The Recession In Silicon Valley

We’ve got the recession in full swing in Silicon Valley and our region, along with many others, is experiencing job losses left and right. So how are we coping with things right now? Over at the US News Alpha Consumer blog, Kim Palmer has begun a new series called “Recession 2.0, Do You Feel It?”, where she’s asked a few bloggers to share their latest thoughts on this financial slowdown. Well, I just turned in my article yesterday on how we’re dealing with the recession here in Silicon Valley, and it’s now been published. Coping With The Recession: Income Check In that article, I wrote with some detail about the adventures (and travails) of two self-employed people who have 2 dependents. My spouse launched his start-up around 2 years ago called BestInClass.com, and only recently did I go off to do my own projects (mostly to do with writing and internet related stuff). We’re doing fine, given the economic setting we have right now, but is what we’re doing enough to keep us afloat in Silicon Valley, where the cost of living is ridiculously stratospheric? That’s the million dollar question. Well, we continue to trudge on, with just a wee bit of concern about our current income levels. If we continue to bleed green for an extended period of time, we’re going to make a few adjustments (like focus on snaring more service-oriented contracts), but it looks like we’re going to hold on to status quo for now. Cutting Costs….Hard: There Go The School Funds Some major change in attitude though, in our household. If you’re a parent (or maybe even if you’re not), you can empathize with this story: there’s a little kid, one of our sweet neighbors, who regularly comes by to sell stuff to raise funds for his school. I’m normally pretty generous and buy items from him every time he drops by. I do the same and order a load of items from my own kids’ schools to support our school district. Unfortunately these days, we’re now watching our money like hawks and account for everything that leaves our pockets. This means that $25 scented gift candles and various overpriced assorted bric-a-bracs, chocolates and what not are no longer part of our discretionary budget. So for the first time ever, I had to leave our little neighbor boy empty-handed. The sad part of the story is, the rest of the neighborhood had the same idea (I took a peek at his order list, and it was pretty much empty). When times get tough, priorities rule even harder. Carnival Roundup Now for the latest from the carnivals! MoneyNing gives us the Smile Edition of the Carnival of Personal Finance. David Ning just quit his job to be a full-time problogger too, did you know? Congrats to him for making the huge step! Anyway from his list of financial articles, I picked a few neat ones to showcase here: · Free From Broke: Never Mind A New Economic Stimulus Package - Save Yourself! · Cash Money Life: Year End Retirement Plan Moves · The Wisdom Journal: Money Is 100 Percent Emotional Next up, The Festival of Frugality was put together by The Financial Wellness Project. You’ll find these posts among other money saving articles in their awesome list: · Passive Family Income: Turn Frugal Behaviors Into A Game · Shark Investor: How YOUR Saving Advice Caused The Financial Crisis · Money Beagle: Saving Money By Mulching The Leaves Recent Carnivals · Carnival of Money Stories · Investing Carnival · Carnival of Money Hawks · Road To Financial Independence · Carnival of Debt Reduction · Total Mind and Body Fitness Blog Carnival · Best of Me Symphony · Kids and Money Bookmark It [lien] [EN]

Message from Silicon Valley Bank on stability…. thoughts?

Message from Silicon Valley Bank on stability…. thoughts?: ———- Forwarded message ———- From: Ken Wilcox, SVB Financial Group Date: Tue, Jul 9 at 5 PM Subject: Bank Stability: Frequently Asked Questions Bank Stability: Frequently Asked Questions Boards are understandably concerned about the stability of the banking industry. I wanted to offer a few points that might help you reassure your board that your bank is strong and address related questions that they, or you, may have. The most frequently asked questions we receive are below, and please do not hesitate to contact us, if you have any other questions we can Why are you banking with Silicon Valley Bank? SVB Financial Group (SVB), the bank holding company for Silicon Valley Bank, is responsible, healthy and growing its market share Financially speaking, SVB has high levels of capital and liquidity and is well-positioned to support us throughout this downturn and beyond SVB has been working with companies like ours for more than 5 years, and as a result truly understands not only our business but also how to plan for and manage risk though economic cycles Is our money safe? How do you know? Yes. SVB is in a strong financial position SVB has a solid capital position and is participating in the government’s Capital Purchase Program to further strengthen its SVB’s tier one capital ratio was more than double the Federal Reserve’s minimum for a well-capitalized institution at June 9 SVB currently holds investment grade ratings by Moody’s and S&P Silicon Valley Bank continues to participate in the FDIC temporary Transaction Account Guarantee Program Can we count on Silicon Valley Bank moving forward? Yes. SVB’s strategy is tied to the technology, life science and venture capital sectors SVB is realistic about the current economic and banking environment and has positioned itself to withstand expected credit losses SVB is continuing to lend and grow its market share. In Q, Silicon Valley Bank added 4 new, active borrowers Please find more detail in the included simple one-page overview of our financials, and a PowerPoint slide you can put into your own board We want you to know, as our client, that we will remain committed, as we have been for more than 5 years, to the technology, life science, venture capital and wine industries, particularly in these turbulent times. We are here for you and will do our best to help you succeed. Please don’t hesitate to let us know how we can help your company. We thank you for your business. [lien] [EN]

How not to flunk Silicon Valley's bondage academy [Sex Trade]

The first dominatrix to take me under her wing kept her dungeon close enough to the Moscone Center, but the only domina to give me a formal diploma on graduation was Cleo Dubois, founder of the Silicon Valley based Academy of SM Arts. Having a discreet, private place to indulge in SM has drawn out a decent number of Valley guys over the years, says Cleo — men who want to play, but need to keep a low profile about it. "There was the systems analyst who came to me with his girlfriend," Dubois told me, who had been begging him to spank and tie her up, but he didn't know where to start. Read on for how to get schooled yourself — the stern headmistress fantasy is hot, sure, but you don't want to actually get thrown out of SM class. · Don't go overboard in your introduction. Pick three really hot fantasies that you want to realize, and phrase them concisely, in a sentence or two each. In a private consultation with Cleo, she'll work with you to flesh them out. · Don't show up, unannounced, without a girl. Be honest if you don't have a lover to bring to class. Cleo won't take kindly to students who expect her to bottom for them, but in a guided play session, Cleo can partner you with an experienced submissive, usually a very cute girl wanting to learn SM herself (which is how I met Cleo). She can also connect you to places where you might meet a new kinky girlfriend. · Don't try to take charge of the class. The standard geek response, when threatened, is to start telling other people how to do their jobs. If you try to prove your dominance, you'll get eighty-sixed fast. Sure, you might feel like an actual dork with a whip in your hand for the first time. Don't freak out — that's why you hired Cleo. Just think of her work like any other kind of troubleshooting offered by a consultant with over 20 years of experience — only she has really keen taste in leather. [lien] [EN]

Obama Green Talk Is Gold to Silicon Valley

UPDATE: Adding that Daniel Kammen is an adviser to the Obama campaign. Senator Barack Obama today proposed that the federal government spend $150 billion over 10 years to promote alternative energy and create several million jobs. The investment plan was mentioned in a speech delivered in Michigan aimed at voters frustrated by the region's disappearing manufacturing sector. But his words reverberated in Silicon Valley, which has been lobbying hard for more federal investment in clean-technology projects. As part of his plan, the Illinois Democrat pledged that, if president, he would invest $10 billion a year in creating what he called a “Clean Technologies Deployment Venture Capital Fund.” Such a fund, he said, would help finance companies involved in the alternative energy sector. Just what that might mean is not entirely clear (more on that below). But even in the abstract, it was met with enthusiasm by some Northern California venture capitalists. “This is great news,” said Josh Green, an alternative energy investor at Mohr Davidow Ventures, a venture firm. “It would be an incredibly helpful thing for clean-tech.” Then, after a bit of thought, he slightly tempered his enthusiasm. “I don't want to be rosy about this,” he said. “It won't be determinative about whether clean-tech will work or not.” But it would provide the right kind of momentum, argued Daniel Kammen, an adviser to Mr. Obama on energy issues and the director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at the University of California at Berkeley. The Obama plan “is the real thing,” Dr. Kammen wrote in an email. “I am very encouraged by it.” Dr. Kammen, an authority on alternative energy policy and investment issues, said what he finds compelling about the plan is that it mixes research and development spending with an extension of tax credits that have helped spur alternative energy investments. He said the plan is encouraging in that it incorporates the latest tools from ongoing state, university and business efforts. Dr. Kammen also noted that Mr. Obama’s proposed level of investment is roughly three times that of a rival plan from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is battling Mr. Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination. How such investment could affect Silicon Valley would depend on precisely how the money is deployed. Typically, the government doesn't act as a direct venture capital investor — a labor-intensive role that involves picking which companies to invest in and then nurturing their development. But the government can play a significant role in seeding research at places like the University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University. That research ultimately leads to ideas that become companies funded by venture capitalists. Also, the government can provide grants or financing for companies that already have venture capital or other seed backing, Mr. Green said. Such financing can be crucial because it can be used to help a venture-backed company get to maturity. It's been no secret that Silicon Valley's venture investors are eager for government support when it comes to the alternative energy sector. They argue that the playing field has favored oil, gas and coal concerns, and subsidies and government policy are necessary to level it. This has struck some industry observers as as self-serving. After all, Silicon Valley investors see plenty of green — as in dollars — in clean-tech ventures, and they are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into alternative energy startups in the hopes of making billions down the line. On the other hand, a thriving clean energy industry could ultimately mean millions of new jobs — which was why Mr. Obama unveiled his proposal in Michigan, where workers have been battered by the troubles in the auto industry. [lien] [EN]

Have a Question? Ask Aida!

Have a Question? Ask Aida! · Posted by Editor · August 4, 2008 Posted by Chris Arpante on Edible TV. I don't know about you, but I have been known to do whatever I need to do around the house while having the television on in the background, set to the Food Network.  In fact, my foodie friends and I talk about the chefs and the shows as if we know them personally, much like our mothers did about their soap operas.  So you can imagine my excitement when I was presented the wonderful opportunity to speak with Aida Mollenkamp, host of the Food Network's new show, Ask Aida. Aida was simply lovely, and her responses to the questions presented were both personable and easygoing. (Unless otherwise “noted,” the responses below have been paraphrased.) Q: Can you tell us a little about you and how food has played an important a role in your life? A: I grew up in a family huge on food, including Sunday meals.  Food was home cooked and junk food not an option.  When I went to college, I was originally interested in Science.  And, since science and food are relatively connected, and cooking became a great way to “express myself creatively.” Q: Ask Aida is an opportunity for viewers' to receive answers to their culinary questions and unknowns. How is this different from some of the other Food Network shows that broach culinary inquiry? A: “All the Food Network programs try to educate their viewers.  Ask Aida does the same, only in more of a direct manner.  Viewers are able to upload videos that we can show in the episode,” which brings a more personal approach. Q: How did Food Network approach you about Ask Aida? A: “As the Food Editor of Chow.com, I am also in several instructional videos on the site.  Representatives for the Food Network were frequent visitors to the site and approached me about the possibility of a show, so I said, ‘Sure!'” Q: How long was it before the show went from concept to taping? A: “Food Network has a whole development team that has been doing this for a long time and who is very good at what they do.  I guess talks about the concept began in the winter and it continued from that point on.  The  Food Network did a fantastic job putting the team together, from the producers, to the Food Tech, everybody.” Q: Is it live at all? A: “Not in the way we think of as a live show. If someone has a question we want to include on the show, we will call that person and tape the conversation as it happens and air that chat.” Q: How are the viewers chosen? A: The producers have themes in mind and when videos and questions come in that fits one of those themes, an episode is sculpted accordingly. Q: Have you ever been stumped? A: “Actually, yes.  I was stumped by the difference between grades A&B of maple syrup.  I knew Grade A was used for pancakes and Grade B was used for baking.  But, I didn't know the difference came about after the syrup is made.  I thought maybe it had to do with the tree or something to that effect.”  But, after researching the topic, I was able to find out the correct information. Q:  I understand you are very green conscious.  Are you planning on incorporating green consciousness into the show, like in the tips and guidance? A: “I am green conscious and very aware of where my food comes from.  And, I will incorporate tips and information when I can without telling others how to live their life.  I refer to it as a head fake, teach people through something else. Whenever possible, I will offer information about taste, what's in season, organics, and I will have a compost bin nearby.” Q: Before we wrap up, what's your favorite food? A: “Hmm as far as type, I would say cheese and chocolate.  I can never get enough.  In terms of cooking?  I love fish… eggs when it comes to breakfast.  And, since I come from an Italian family, doughs and pasta are always great.” C: What about dinner? What's for dinner tonight?  A: “Probably the Cookshop.  It's not so new, but it fits my mentality, using ingredients local farmers. Hmm, I have a hankering for some fish, now that I just mentioned it.”  Q: I appreciate the time you've taken to speak with me.  Before we end, is there anything you'd like to make sure I get across to the readers? A: “Most of the shows are just cooking and I am most excited about the show being that and more.  And, it's great having Noah as the Food Tech.  He is an advocate for living to cook and helps to explain things really concretely.” Q: Thank you again; it was  pleasure. A: “Thank you.” For more of Aida the Food Network, click here.  For more of Aida on Chow.com, click here. Photo courtesy of Food Network. [lien] [EN]

The Silicon Valley VC Disease

Yesterday at the Mobile Web Wars event (here’s video of that), held right before the TechCrunch party, David Hornik, partner at August Capital (he’s the host of the TechCrunch party) told the audience that he would not invest in pure iPhone apps because the iPhone had too small a market share and that anyone who wanted to get big in the mobile space should go after all phones, not just the iPhone, which, while it’s hot with early-adopter types and is seeing people waiting in lines to buy around the world, hasn’t yet made a dent in, say, Nokia’s market share of cell phones overall. Let’s call this the Silicon Valley VC Disease. This disease has been going on for a long time. Seagate’s CEO Bill Watkins told me a few months ago that Seagate almost didn’t get started because they couldn’t get funding from VCs who didn’t see a potential market for hard drives. UPDATE: See the comments below where I learned that August Capital is one of those who funded Seagate. It’s a corrosive disease, too, and is why we get tons of stupid Facebook apps and tons of easy-to-make and likely-to-go-viral iPhone apps. Quick: explain why we don’t yet have a really brilliant travel app or even a single political app for the iPhone, despite lots of interest in those topics (especially in this political year). Not to mention many brilliant apps like Evernote (my favorite app so far)? What is the disease? That you must make bucketloads of money (or at least have a shot at doing that) in the first two years of business. If you have a plan to make just a reasonable amount of money, or if it will take decades to make a big amount of money, don’t come to Silicon Valley. Walmart would NEVER have gotten funded by Sand Hill Road. It took decades to make bucketloads of money. That kind of business plan would never fit in here. Why? We have the Silicon Valley VC disease. I imagine that if we went back in time to 1977. Imagine a small group of geeks wanted to get funding to build apps for the Apple II. It didn’t have much market share yet. But imagine those developers wanted to build just Apple II apps. Would they have gotten funded? Probably not. And types like David Hornick would have told them “you gotta build apps for mainframes and DEC’s, because that’s where the market is, not in that Apple II toy.” So, is Hornik wrong? No, he’s exactly right. The much bigger market is with regular-old-single-chip-cell phones. You know the type. They are the kinds of phones that make phone calls and maybe do SMS texting. If they have a Web browser it’s a small tiny black and white one that can only look at WAP-style text-centric sites, not the full-blown Web that the iPhone has. But while Hornik is right, he also has the Silicon Valley Disease. He forgets that the small, seemingly unimportant platform today that gets early adopters excited will become the large, dominant platform of tomorrow. It might take 10 years, though, which is too long for VCs to care about. How long did it take Visicalc to happen on the Apple II? Or Aldus Pagemaker to happen on the Mac? A few years at minimum. iPhone is only one year old. But already we’re seeing the writing on the wall. If you can get past your Silicon Valley VC Disease. First, our society’s most valuable audiences are getting iPhones. Last week when I was in Los Angeles, both of the famous architects I interviewed already had 3G iPhones. Those two guys are HUGELY valuable for advertisers. They are representative. They aren’t the only ones. But even better than the demographics that the iPhone is getting is the usage patterns. See, I have two Nokia phones and a Microsoft Windows Mobile phone too. They all suck for using the Web. Fine for email and for texting, but really suck for using the Web. Go see Google’s Vic Gundotra (he’s Vice President and runs a bunch of the teams that build things for mobile phones). He told me that usage on the iPhone is “off the scale” when compared to other phones. Simply translated: people who have non-iPhone phones simply aren’t using them for anything other than email. This is easily verified. Sit next to a Blackberry user and watch what they do. I do that all the time. All you see them doing is email and light Web use. Now sit next to an iPhone user and watch what they do. Much more heavily used on photos, maps, Web, and video. An iPhone user is easier to reach and is easier to get to try new things. Plus, the iPhone app store makes it very easy for an app to be tried out and loaded. But back to the Silicon Valley VC disease. It’s the same disease that Microsoft execs have. Or, really, most big company execs, or worse yet, our government workers, have truth be told. They won’t adopt anything until “it’s safe” and until there’s a HUGE business reason to do it. It’s why huge parts of our government are still run on paper. Why there isn’t a database anywhere of all of our elected officials in the United States. Why Microsoft didn’t compete with Google until too late. Why General Motors won’t build great all-electric cars until after Tesla or Toyota beats them to the punch. Etc. Etc. Luckily the Silicon Valley VC Disease is having less and less effect lately. You can startup a company with very little cash, because you can build it on cloud-based services like Amazon’s S3, which let you get started and show the world you’re getting adoption even before you go for VC money. And, luckily, not every VC has the Silicon Valley VC Disease. Lots invest in stupid, small, weird, ideas for platforms that only have a percent or two of market share. Go see Jeff Clavier, for instance. He’s been doing that a lot lately. I met him in the office of Tapulous last week, which makes iPhone apps. Why shouldn’t you listen to Hornik and others who have Silicon Valley VC disease? · It’s easier to start a company on new platforms. Why? Because the big money probably hasn’t moved in yet, or at least they haven’t become established. · People who buy new things are FAR EASIER to convince to buy other new things than people who have had the same stuff for years. · It’s easier to build a brand on a new technology than it is to do that on an older, more established one (hey, everyone has a radio in their cars, but you don’t see VC’s funding new radio stations, do you? Why is that?) · The best, most transactional and monetizeable audiences are those that pick up new things. Think about it, would you rather have a customer like Dan Meis, one of the world’s best architects or someone like my dad who still uses the same TV that he bought from me in the mid-1980s?  My dad is a nice guy and very smart, but he’s a horrible customer to have and is going to be very expensive to get to adopt something new. · It’s a lot cheaper to get adoption when influencers (read bloggers and journalists and Twitterers and FriendFeeders) are talking about you. What are they talking about right now? iPhone apps. Look at Summize, the search engine Twitter just bought. What’s one of the trending topics on the home page? iPhone. Get over it. They ain’t talking about Nokia or Microsoft. Anyway, I just find it interesting when VCs start telling people not to support a platform when there’s lines around the world waiting to buy that platform. If everyone listened to that sentiment we’d never see any innovation in the world. So, who is working to prove Hornik wrong? Drop me a line. Oh, and David’s a nice guy and throws great parties. Thanks David for letting me in last night and for giving me something interesting to blog about today. :-) UPDATE: As usual lately a much more interesting conversation about this post is happening over on FriendFeed. Possibly related posts: (automatically generated) · Problem with VCs - Their Back Teeth are Floating - Portfolio Backlog and Gr… [lien] [EN]