“No business we approached wanted to purchase tr.im for even a minor amount.” I appreciate tr.im’s honesty. From what I understand, tr.im’s business model was similar to bit.ly’s and – what increasingly feels like – Twitter’s business model: aggregate and sell statistics on how information is being shared on real-time basis. Measuring word-of-mouse if you …
Category Archives: Web 2.0
Failing to Scale
Years ago, Google did something brave, bold, and innovative. They opened up GMail to a miniscule number of people and gave them a couple handfuls of invites to share with others. At the time, I assumed that strategy was as much about marketing as about scaling the service up. These days – when the tiniest, …
Prepare Your Pocketbooks
“Launching a paytoplay service in the midst of free alternatives makes little sense…But there’s a lot more to the conversation.” – Aaron Mentele Heh. That’s why the next web app I launch, I’m charging. A pile. Get ready cause, I’m looking at your pocketbook. Seriously, if you want to get in on the action early, …
Blurring Identity to Clear It Up
“What if there was an agreed upon microformat…that would telegraph to others our capabilities, experience, strengths, knowledge and, especially, our availability to be hired?” – Steve Borsch Must be something in the warm Janurary in MN air. A lunch earlier this week – unfortunately without Steve (need to remedy that) – was all about the …
First Crack 92. Curbly.com – The Home Improvement Social Network
Bruno Bornsztein, Ben Moore, and I talk about their recently launched project – Curbly.com – a social networking site for sharing DIY projects, tips, and finding help. After we run through the site, we talk about; Using agile web development processes and what Ben calls WWIBAN (What Would I Bitch About Next) to be “one …
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More and Less, More or Less
Overheard in a meeting today: “You’re going to be less recipient and more participant.” Seems like a pretty good description of how this media landscape is changing.
Success Equals Being Acquired and Losing Control?
Check out this one line in ZDNet’s coverage of TechCrunch’s Arrington web winners/losers list: Winners (got acquired) Now, I don’t know if that’s Arrington’s perspective (I suspect so) or ZDNet’s (also likely), either way the sentiment is disturbing. If this is the mentality of the Valley, then I celebrate every project on the “Very Good …
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First Crack 83. Chris Dykstra, Zanby, and Social Networking
As part of my ongoing effort to highlight Minnesota-based internet startups, Chris Dykstra and I talk about the strengths and weakness of various social networks (evite, yahoo groups, meetup, linkedin), and how his Zanby is aiming to solve them. Namely – how a single person easily manage dozen of disparate and related groups. Listen to …
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Garrick Speaking at Civic League’s Future of Policy Making in MN Series
On August 22nd, as part of the Citizens Leagues’ 2006 Summer Policy Series, I’ll be joining Tom Swain, Jean LeVander King, Jen Alstad, and Steve Borsch for a conversation on the Future of the Web and Civic Engagement. Should be an interesting conversation – especially since it kicks off at 7:30am. Here’s my initial thoughts …
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First Crack 80. Robert Metcalf and FlySpy.com to Find Better Airfare
A quick conversation with Robert Metcalf from FlySpy.com on the need to find better airfare and the power of TechCrunch.com as a PR channel (same way Ryan talks about Digg). Drop a message on the First Crack voicemail line: 612-284-4148 Listen to Robert Metcalf and FlySpy.com to Find Better Airfare [12 min]