DISQUS

I used to work for Ross Perot back in 1998 :-)

Ah well - sit back, knuckle down, innovate, keep costs low - all simple stuff :-)

@herve - nope, talking about pure entrepreneurs here. I have 3 businesses I'm heavily involved in right now, one I hired a CEO to run for them and still work on strategy with them once a month, the second I run every day, and the third I took on the Marketing Director role (currently part-time until cash flow grows more) while the other founder runs it as a CEO. I've also got a 4th in the works and looking for someone to run it...

After all - if one of them doesn't work - I've got 3 more to fall back on and haven't wasted 5 years :-)

@herve - I've actually found that 2nd / 3rd time entrepreneurs manage their time better and also want to have many businesses on the go at once (managed by others sometimes) due to that very reason that it takes 5-7 years to make one work. Far better to have three seeds planted on the go rather than 1 by the time that next 5 years is up..

Note: Nick - your anti-spam filter does not work in Safari - rejects everything!

@herve - I've actually found that 2nd / 3rd time entrepreneurs manage their time better and also want to have many businesses on the go at once (managed by others sometimes) due to that very reason that it takes 5-7 years to make one work. Far better to have three seeds planted on the go rather than 1 by the time that next 5 years is up..

Go on - tell us now... Why does Crowdstorm have the most potential for reviews and shopping recommendations? ;-)

BTW: crowdstorm.com is the US version - crowdstorm.co.uk is for us UK peeps.

Interesting... reminds me of that Derren Brown show at the Horse Racing events where he sent thousands of people tips on which horses would win and eventually found the person who had won 7 times in a row (purely because SOMEONE had to have done it)...

This is a real hard thing to quantify statistically as there are so many factors at play. Gut feel of course would agree with you Nick - logically, more experienced people are most likely to ride out the ups and downs with venture help.

In hindsight though, I reckon my first start-up was a big success purely because I was blind to what I was letting myself in for and I was a cocky little sod :-)

Oh stop it Nick - stop it right now!

You can twist the figures all you like CalibreOne but I want someone to actually publish a list of UK internet companies in the last year that have received investment from UK and European VC's...

Anyone dare?

Absolutely - this gives us all a bit of time and breathing space to really grow some great businesses i the next two years. Head down, build it up, resurface again... muahhahahahah

Now they've got some money - reckon Balderton will start investing in the younger companies again.? eh... eh...

and your comments have rel='external nofollow' tags... BOOOOOO

Spot on nick! That interfacing of different services that use the same synchronised social graph will be huge.. You could even add things like: "I'm organising a facebook event about fellow photography experts hooking up" - send the invite to all my friends on Flickr, and show what cameraeveryone owns / recommends in the box below.

Now the real question is how do we keep them all in sync once they are initially imported? If I add a new friend on facebook, and I've already signed up to Crowdstorm - how do I sync the new friend easily into the site again?

So - anyone tried it yet?

btw Nic: I can never submit comments on your blog in safari as the word spam filter throws a wobbly.

It's interesting all this prediction stuff Nic - completely agree with things being considered carefully. In fact, I have never seen any downward analyst predictions in my short working career - but maybe that's because I gravitate to high growth markets :-)

Like with any share - they'll go up and down and no one can really guess it correctly - but believing in the fundamentals and going for it - that's the way to do it (as Punch would say).

Ok Nic - call me daft but hasn't this been happening for years - as in anyone could sign up to an affiliate network and past a wide range of paying media into their site / blog...?

Amazon do widgets for products too.

As for WAYN - any evidence yet to show that people visit each others profile page when thinking of buying a product?

Looks really good - as a powerseller myself - I'm willing to give it a good go.

The thing is - there may well be 10,000 new start-ups created by hackers over the coming years but they won't be 10,000 GOOD ideas. All it actually means is increased competition on the good businesses with good solid ideas who then have to try and out-compete another 15 doing the same thing with the same amount of funding, basically turning into an arms race again. The remaining bad ones go on to fail and reduce the chance of others investing in similar ones again...

I'd still prefer http://www.crowdstorm.com :-)

Wow! As one of the original Kelkoo founders it's strange to see this kind of announcement but actually not that surprising, for numerous reasons:

1: Kelkoo has not innovated since the Yahoo acquisition and spends more time getting them to fill in headcount spreadsheets
2: Merchants can now get traffic from many more sources (adwords, feed aggregators, widgets) at cheaper and sometimes better qualified places
3: Services aren't just price lead anymore - there needs to be a focus on other things
4: All the existing founders left!

I've written a full post on my blog with some good insider info fresh from the source:

http://blog.crowdstorm.com/?p=282

True - but don't confuse that instinct with the feeling you get when lots of people tell you you're wrong or stupid to be doing it. There's a subtle difference - and in one scenario you make the right call and in the other, you ignore the doubters and go on to make your millions to spite them :-)

5423-6345-0789-1234 exp: 07/08 code: 171

oh shit..

Would make a load of sense to open it up and allow sites to let users import their contact details from any other network.

After all, it's not about trying to maintain a silo (AOL anyone?) but rather lock people in by having the best possible product so that they don't "need" to go anywhere else.

yeh - we were a bit peeved Pete, but end of the day - it's only a list eh :-)

If they are my estate agents - then the answer is very little :-)