DISQUS

I wrote a mobile social network once. Took me 3 months, (and another 3 for the web front end), and was designed for use on low-end handsets (WAP 1.0 and up). Could have even been embedded into a handset, the back end and messaging service was that simple (even though it supported both images and video). So Mike42's comment may in fact be prescient. If you build and run a social network as a service and embed it into a handset in an emerging market you could quite easily surpass FB in terms of users very quickly.

And mobile social networks are, by the choice of technology in handsets, and the need to ensure minimal data traffic across low-speed carriers, or carriers who still charge bucketloads for data traffic, much easier to deal with than web-based ones.

You're still using iTunes? :)

Being Linux-based I use SoundConverter when I need to convert audio (which isn't that often really). It can happily read m4p and AAC (and a bunch of other formats too). I tend to store all my audio of OGG or FLAC format, except the stuff that goes on my iPod which I pre-convert to MP3 or AAC. And like some other posters, I tend to buy CDs (and my extractor converts straight o MP3 if I want), and haven't used (nor needed to use) iTunes for more than 4 years (and that includes managing the audio and video content - with covers - on my iPod).

I've always found that if you ring up companies like this and ask where they got your number from, and when you (as a consumer) explicitly opted in to receive such messages, they mysteriously stop. One such company gave me a time & date for an opt-in once - and backed right down once I noted that my mobile account had no such matching entry - a record held by the carrier, not me, so independently verifiable.

I do agree that PhonePayPlus don't seem that efficient at discouraging this kind of thing though - I deal with such annoyances directly, even by chasing through domain registrations to find the parent company, or calling the shortcode provide directly - works wonders.

hmmm should I, or should I not...

Nowt wrong with IMAP or webclients - it's the back-end mail processor that needs looking at - after all, a downloadable client, web interface or IMAP interface are just that - interfaces. What you want sounds vaguely like an extension to something I'm already working on. Perhaps.

*digs around in his stack of unused keywords*

And I tried so hard to get this service launched about 4 years ago - but couldn't get *anyone* interested. Still got the code and database running on one of my servers, but not hooked up to a shortcode. Perhaps I should re-enable it?

I knew there was a reason I refused to touch these services with a REALLY LONG stick when people used to ask me to run them - the potential for abuse is immediately obvious, I'm jsut surprised it's taken ICSTIS this long to notice...

My old business cards had a rocketship on them, along with my name & contact details. The rocketship was my company logo though, so I guess that's kinda cheating :)

The new ones... well, I ran out a couple of years ago and never bothered having more made even though my company is still going strong. I've actually found more often than not that giving business cards isn't much use. I grab those of the people I meet, write my name & number on the back, and give them back, or keep them and email the person that evening to say hello and introduce myself. Helps that my company name is particularly memorable though. :)

Oh, and on the subject of plastic cards - I had some of those made about 5 years ago, and people used to ask for 2 or 3 of those to show around...

In an attempt to redeem myself for not really paying attention, here's a HOWTO on how to get your 360's blog onto your own Wordpress site:
http://cro.alienpants.com/index.php/2006/05/04/...

In an attempt to redeem myself for not really paying attention, here's a HOWTO on how to get your 360's blog onto your own Wordpress site:
http://cro.alienpants.com/index.php/2006/05/04/...

Gah, I really need to pay more attention to things like this and their apparent value as informative things. I integrated this service into one of my employee's blogs a couple of weeks ago using RSS and XSLT so his 'Xbox 360's blog' appears as a category in his normal blog, automatically updated, but didn't really think any more of it.

"Anyone have any ideas of how they’d use Ether?"

Yes. This is, oddly, almost exactly the same business model I use for a service I've been providing for more than 3 years. It's just that rather than a telephone call, we use SMS. Rather than negotiating the cost, we set it as a fixed single low cost up front, and rather than providing a wide range of services, we cover one genre only.

But there's still a real person at the other end, and there has been a real person there for the past 1,155 days (weekends and holidays included).

So yes, I know exactly what I'll use this service for, assuming it's not a US-only one like so many 'groundbreaking web 2.0' companies and will actually let me provide service from where I live.

Take your pick, if you like game news:

www.news0r.com/wap/ (formatted for WAP, looks good on 3G handsets, being redeveloped at the moment)
www.news0r.com/tmobile/ (formatted for T-Mobile's Web'n'Walk handsets - mostly MDAs - and listed on T-Mobile's Web'n'Walk directory)
www.news0r.com/imode/ (formatted for i-mode handsets)
www.news0r.com/psp/ (formatted for PSP users)

All of the above are readable (except the WAP site) using a browser, or *any* mobile phone with WAP/GPRS/3G access to the Internet.

And yes, they've all been checked on those devices. Main site is www.news0r.com - the content is the same, it's just re-formatted for the mobile devices.

Oh, and the Stormhoek wine was actually quite nice. Had a fruity flavour and a nice clean finish.

I can name a few too - but that's cos I used to design winery bottling line and crusher control systems for a living ;)

THis came up the other month and I commented on partial evrsus full text then. My contention? The decision to provide full or partial feeds is entirely dependant on what I'm using RSS for, and who my intended audience is. My commercial games news website only publishes a partial feed - deliberately - as I don't want people reading the stories, reviews, articles and other things I publish through that channel via RSS. The RSS feed (which has been available since we launched in 2002) is designed specifically to draw people to the website itself, to introduce them not to the one story theya re reading, but to the wealth of other information contained on the site that is not made available via RSS (even via a partial feed).

At the same time, my personal weblog where I talk about Identity and other things is availabel as a full-text feed (with RSS ads, if they're working properly...) because it is a discussion site, a 'blog', not a commercial concern.

More here:
http://cro.alienpants.com/index.php/2005/11/28/...

Simon,
"The other option is to turn the tables, and have the VCs pitch you. VCs are always actively out there looking for hot deals."
I have to ask - where do you find these VCs? This is actually a serious question, and follows on from the 'do you know anyone who can pitch?' question.

ALthough perhaps the comments section of Robert Scoble's weblog isn't the best place to ask this one :)

I am finding that being forward is better, despite my natural reticence, so I'm going to pitch the latest incarnation of my weblog for consideration.

I'm writing about my work on Identity Management and Roles Based Access Control, as well as games, gaming, mobiles, mobile games and what we're doing with said technology.

so, without more preamble: http://cro.alienpants.com/

Simon,

"The reason why VCs so often focus on the entrepreneur is because they take the view that this is the most important, and the most scarce resource."

What about entreprenuers who have no pitching skills but are seriously good at what they do? (Speaking of which - know anyone who's good at pitching? :) )

Everywhere I go I see the same comments about VCs investing in entrepreneurs. Which is true, but only in a VERY limited way: VCs invest in entrepreneurs who have *presentation skills*, or who have friends who are VCs (or know VCs).

I've been trying to raise VC funding for almost 4 years, and in that time I've managed to present to a total of 0 VCs, and managed to speak to 5 in an introductory way (none of which went any further).

So, if I had $200million to invest, I'd set up a way for people to present their *ideas* not themselves. There's no ace in the VC environment at present for geeks or technologists - there's only room for geeks & technologists who are very good at marketing themselves, or who know people who can do the marketing for them.

I also dislike the way VCs only tend to invest in entrepreneurs instead of ideas - why is this? What about those ideas that have been proven independantly on the entreprenuer? Do they get left by the wayside for lack of funding?