Digital Tourettes

My friend, Dave, and I were talking about one of our friends who lives in the realm of too much information on his social networks. It's to the point where a person might say:

"Is his wife going to divorce him?"
"What?!?"
"Man, his wife is going to beat his ass."
"Did I really need to know that?"

Dave would classify our friend as having "digital tourettes." This is a syndrome where people uncontrollably cross social boundaries that the vast majority of a society won't cross. It's not simply posting too many details of your life's activities or daily habits, but those activities that people don't need to really know. This involves unnecessary information about bowel movements, flatulence, sexual activities, details about strip club visits, bachelor party escapades, stupid college adventures, etc.

I really hope this doesn't become a growing syndrome due to this new digital era of micro-blogging, 24/7 online presence, and wannabe stardom. Seriously, if you know anyone that might have these symptoms, please conduct an intervention and get him/her some psychiatric help.

Google Launches Real-Time Search... Toast is Burning

Not a big prediction since most people knew it was coming, but here's what I wrote in the comments of my tech op-ed at Mashable, "4 Emerging Trends of the Real-Time Web":

When Technorati, Feedster and others arrived on the scene. I loved their services, but believed that once Google paid attention to this space and developed their own blog search that Technorati and others would be toast. A few years later, Google quietly launched their blog search service and I made the switch within a year once their search results were better than Technorati’s.

So I'm doubtful of any big new companies in this space and expect only smaller exits of $10M-$30M for those trying to be a comprehensive search engine. That's why I think vertical categories have more potential. Of course, I could be wrong but will keep track of this space. Thanks!

In my initial draft, I was more negative and my third emerging trend, "Real-Time Search is Looking Up," was actually written as "Real-Time Search is Toast" since I was referring to the startups trying to be the next Google of real-time search. Unless you like butter and jam, I warned people to avoid this space that Google and other big dogs would eventually conquer. Since it was an op-ed, which was to be encouraging to entrepreneurs, I changed it to a more upbeat title.



Google's official announcement here.

Climate Change 2009 Perceptions

Trendsspotting's Review on Global Warming Public Perceptions: The decline and the rise in interest for the Global Warming Problem during 2009.

Climate Change 2009 Perceptions

View more presentations from Taly Weiss.

News & Links List

"Why entrepreneurs need to understand the route from A to B" London Business School, John Mullins

"Winners and Losers: Internet Search in China" Knowledge@Wharton

"How Google Can Help Newspapers
Video didn't kill the radio star, and the Internet won't destroy news organizations. It will foster a new, digital business model." WSJ, Eric Schmidt

"Huffington To Murdoch: Stop ‘Pointing Fingers’" paidContent.org

"Real-time flight reviews via Android and iPhone" Springwise

"Getting More Out of the Conversation: The Real Real-Time Challenge" ReadWriteWeb, Adrian Chan

"Invisible but indispensable: A host of medium-sized Japanese electronics firms have developed dominant positions in many areas of technology. Can they keep them?" The Economist

"Don't be evil, Craigslist" Startup diaries

"Common Traits of A-Players
An unscientific observation of what A-Players have in common" Summation

"Dubai, Abu Dhabi And Debt" Forbes

"Dubai Credit Risk Falls Most in 9 Months on $26 Billion Workout" Bloomberg

"Some of Dubai World's Major Holdings Around Globe" CNBC

"The 25 Smartest People of the Decade" The Daily Beast

"Why California Is Like France" Forbes

"Searching in Vain for the Obama Magic" Spiegel Online

"Your Life is Perfect" InsideWork, Bradley J. Moore

"Heroic Healthcare" Bully! Pulpit, Dave Dias

"Dirty-Dealing Rationalized
Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain" InsideWork, Jim Hancock
Faith perspective on the Tiger Woods situation

Michael Crow: 10 Best College Presidents

My old graduate school professor, Michael Crow, was recently recognized by TIME as one of the 10 best college presidents in the U.S. Professor Crow is now President of Arizona State University and I believe always destined for greatness in academia. Before ASU, he was Executive Vice Provost of Columbia University and had an incredible record of impact and success. He founded the Columbia Innovation Enterprise (now called Science and Technology Ventures), helped establish the Earth Institute at Columbia University, and helped established In-Q-Tel (CIA's venture capital arm) and currently serves as their Chairman of the Board. Basically, Crow is a stud.

He was an advisor to my first startup, ViewPlus, and another venture I did right after my time at Columbia. During ViewPlus, my co-founders and I had an initial meeting with him at his university office. I remember my close friend and colleague, Jimmy, saying afterward, "He's definitely one of the smartest people I have ever met..."

TED's 2010 Senior Fellows Announced

TED has announced their inaugural class of TED Senior Fellows. Twenty select people from all of the TED fellows around the world were selected for this special program.

A special congratulations to my friend, Adrian Hong, who is the founder of Liberty in North Korea (LiNK).

Here are the twenty:

Taghi Amirani (Iran/UK) – Documentary filmmaker, Amirani Films

Rachel Armstrong (UK) – Teaching fellow, The Bartlett School of Architecture; physician; science-fiction author

Frederick Balagadde (Uganda/US) – Research scientist, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; co-inventor of the microchemostat, a medical diagnostic chip

April Karen Baptiste (Trinidad) – Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, Colgate University

Faisal Chohan (Pakistan) – CEO, Cogilent Solutions; founder, Brightspyre, Pakistan’s largest online job portal

Colleen Flanigan (US) – Fine artist; stop-motion armaturist, coral reef restoration expert

Gabriella Gómez-Mont (Mexico) – Founder, Tóxico Cultura, a Mexico City-based artistic think tank

Jonathan Gosier (US/Uganda) – Founder, Appfrica, a business incubator in Kampala

Peter Haas (US/Haiti/Guatemala) – Founder, Appropriate Infrastructure Development Group (AIDG)

Erik Hersman (Kenya/US) – Co-founder, Ushahidi.com; blogger, AfriGadget and White African

Adrian Hong (US/North Korea/South Korea) – Director, The Pegasus Project; former director, Liberty in North Korea

Juliette LaMontagne (US) – Education consultant; innovation facilitator

Alexander MacDonald (US) – Economist, NASA Ames Research Center

Juliana Machado-Ferreira (Brazil) – Biologist, SOS FAUNA; PhD candidate, Sao Paulo University

VK Madhavan (India) – Executive Director, Central Himalayan Rural Action Group (Chirag)

Naomi Natale (Italy/US) – Founder, One Million Bones, a large-scale social activism art installation

Bola Olabisi (Nigeria/UK) – Founder, Global Women Inventors and Innovators Network (GWIIN)

Alexander Petroff (US/Democratic Republic of the Congo) – Founder, Working Villages International

Juliana Rotich (Kenya/US) – Co-founder, Ushahidi.com; blogger, Afromusing and Global Voices

Mohammad Tauheed (Bangladesh) – Architect; founder, ArchSociety

TIME's 50 Best Inventions: No-Punt Offense (Was Belichick Right?)

I came across TIME's "50 Best Inventions of 2009" from a couple weeks ago and oddly enough it was during the week when many people were criticizing Bill Belichick for going for it on fourth down and two yards from their own 28. One of the 50 best inventions, which I don't believe should have made the list, was the "no-punt offense":

Kevin Kelley, coach of the Pulaski Academy football team in Little Rock, Ark., has called for only a single punt in the past two years. Like a seasoned gambler, Kelley has figured out that punting on fourth and long near your own end zone decreases the odds of the other team's scoring by only a relatively slim amount. So going for it will pay off in the long run: Pulaski won a state championship last year and is in the hunt this year too.

So it seems Belichick was right.

UPDATE: Following up with a search, it seems ESPN's Bill Simmons uncovered more statistics behind the seemingly no-brainer call Belichick didn't make.

"Is America Losing Its Mojo?" or Are We Becoming a Nontrepreneur Nation?

A couple weeks ago Newsweek published Fareed Zakaria's piece:

Is America Losing Its Mojo?
Innovation is as American as baseball and apple pie. But some traditions can't be trademarked.
*photo from Newsweek (from left: Bettmann-Corbis: LOC-Corbis; Alfred Eisenstaedt / Getty Images; Jennifer Corbett / AP; Michael Grecco / Getty Images)


This was an interesting and insightful article that overlapped with my old op-ed, "Coming Soon: Nontrepreneur Nation," that was published at InsideWork and Private Equity HUB last year.

Another timely and overlapping article was last week's cover story in TIME magazine, "The Growing Backlash Against Overparenting".

Zakaria's op-ed continues along his "rise of the rest" theme and focused on Asia's current and future prominence. I believe he missed an important factor in this discussion which is America's declining taste for risk and entrepreneurship. In my opinion, this is driven by overparenting and failures in our education system.



Additional commentary from Forbes' Rich Karlgaard, "Fareed Zakaria on Innovation".

A related post by By Vivek Wadhwa, Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University, "Protectionism vs. the Innovation Nation".

News & Links List

"Numbers Games: Putting A Price On Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn" WSJ

"Mr. Social: Ashton Kutcher Plans to Be the Next New-Media Mogul" Fast Company

"Microsoft News Corp. Deal Is a Google Killer" BNET

"To Sell or Not to Sell: Silicon Valley Acquisitions Market Heats Up" Fast Company

"What your Facebook page says about who you 'really' are" Cognitive Daily

"Leadership Lessons From Google" Forbes, Rich Karlgaard

"OECD Report on Entrepreneurship Reveals Clear Glimpses of Economic Impact on 2009 Firm Starts and Exits" Kauffman Foundation

"The Values Question" NYTimes, David Brooks

News & Links List

"Give thanks for job creators
Instead of vilifying entrepreneurs for wanting to ‘get rich,’ perhaps we should cheer them for doing what government is incapable of: truly employing the masses." USAToday

"Rich Vs. Poor Is Not The Right Debate
The media should instead focus on speculators vs. value creators." Forbes, Sramana Mitra

"Going rate for acquisitions at Intuit: $170 million" CNET's Rafe's Radar

"Eight Ways to Ruin Your Social-Media Strategy" BNET

"Data on Twitter Decline Stacks Up" eMarketer

"Cheating on my iPhone with a Droid" Shawn’s Weblog

"Citadel Investors Shouldn't be Surprised It Struck Out" BNET

"Climategate: the final nail in the coffin of 'Anthropogenic Global Warming'?" Telegraph

"Climate Emails Stoke Debate
Scientists' Leaked Correspondence Illustrates Bitter Feud over Global Warming" WSJ

"Foundation: Encounters with Jesus in the Financial District" InsideWork

Great Lessons From Entrepreneurs

There were some great posts on startup lessons from entrepreneurs last week. First one I came across was Refin's founder and CEO, Glenn Kelman:

"Good Question! The Eight Best Questions We Got While Raising Venture Capital" TechCrunch

Second one was Steve Blank's insights into Cafepress and their pitch for venture capital, "Lessons Learned from our Customers," which was different than most.

"After VC cash? Show ‘em what you’ve learned" VentureBeat's Entrepreneur Corner

An excerpt:
"Fred and Maheesh had started 9 previous companies in 6 years. Their motto was: “Fail fast and cheap. And learn from it.” Cafepress literally started in their garage and was another set of experiments only this time it caught fire. They couldn’t keep up with the orders."

McRib Locator

HatTip to Ralph B. How awesome is this site? I wish they had an iPhone app for the McRib Locator. If I was only 20 years younger, I would make this into a cross country quest.

Turkey Week = Light Blogging

It's Thanksgiving week in the U.S., so there will be slow down across this nation and here. I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow, so there won't be many blog posts or links place here for the week. Have a great Thanksgiving or just a great week!

Korea is Second Tier to Japan for President Obama

HatTip to friend in D.C. Obviously South Korea has secondary status with President Obama. Take a look at these pictures :)

Facebook Cufflinks... Only for Geeks?

I assume only coders from Facebook would love these :)

News & Links List

"A tale of two Diggs" CNET's the social

"The Google Phone Is Very Real. And It’s Coming Soon" TechCrunch

"5 Reasons Why Google Should Not Sell Handsets" PC World

"Salesforce.com’s Marc Benioff: Don’t call Chatter a social network" VentureBeat

"10 Green Startups to Watch" Fast Company

"Jellyfish swarm northward in warming world" AP

"North Koreans escape to cold reality" CNN

"Online churches draw believers, critics" CNN

Shop LiNK This Holiday, Rescue TheHundred

Shop LiNK from LiNK Global on Vimeo.

"The holidays are just around the corner and with it, exorbitant spending. What if this year, we put a small fraction of that spending to work - not only giving gifts but also changing the lives of North Koreans in the process?

This holiday season, we have the opportunity to do more with our giving.

Give a LiNK gift and directly contribute to TheHundred, LiNK's new program to bring 100 North Korean refugees out of hiding from the underground. We want to begin this initiative as soon as possible, but we can't do it without your support. You can buy the LiNK holiday package which includes a scarf, t-shirt and hoodie and ALL proceeds from sales of the package will benefit this rescue.

NEW scarves, hoodies, laptop cases and t-shirts are also available individually here."

"All of Us" TheHundred Holiday Campaign from LiNK Global on Vimeo.

American Express Acquiring Steve Case's Revolution Money For $300 Million (AXP)

Google Image Swirl, Very Cool

I actually liked Bing's image search and have been using it lately, but then Google says "Bam! Back at you MS!" This is a pretty cool twist on image search. More from Google's Official blog:

"Back in 2001, to give people a new, quicker way to find images, we launched Image Search. When you do a search for [eiffel tower] you'll find an array of images of the tower in the daytime, in black and white, at sunset and more. With Similar Images, which recently graduated from Google Labs, you can click "Find similar images" to narrow your search to, say, pictures of the Eiffel Tower lit up at night. Today, we've launched an experimental feature in Labs called Google Image Swirl, which builds on new computer vision research to cluster similar images into representative groups in a fun, exploratory interface..."

Here are my results from "Iguacu Falls":

News & Links List

"Will the Entrepreneur Boom Miss the U.S.?" Forbes, Rich Karlgaard

"Modern Warfare 2 Breaks Unspoken Rule of Game Gore: Just Have Fun" Fast Company


"Google hopes to remake programming with Go" CNET

"A new set of rules for social games" CNET's the social

"Bing Now a Serious Challenger to Google" PCWorld

"8 Gadgets to Make Your Business Trip More Fun" Fast Company

"The Perils Of Outsourcing: One entrepreneur's tale of woe--and the valuable lessons learned." Forbes

"The World's Most Powerful People" Forbes

"The Economist The Obama Administration Should Have Listened To" The Huffington Post

"Officials: Top White House lawyer to be pushed out" CNN

"Obama Ally Code Pink Justifies Fort Hood Terrorist Attack, Cashes in on Massacre in Veterans Day Fundraising Appeal" Big Government

"Thousands of Rape Kits Wait to be Tested" CBS News

Drawloop Integrates with Box.net

Drawloop, a company my CEO invested in, signed a recent partnership with Box.net. If you're not familiar with Box.net, they have over 50,000 customers who are small businesses to Fortune 1000s that looked to simplify online content management and improve team productivity.

This integration with Drawloop allows Box.net users to create PDFs of Box files and combine different file formats into one PDF document. More from the Drawloop blog here.

2010 AT&T Developer Summit in Las Vegas

Just received this notice for you mobile developers out there:

"The 2010 AT&T Developer Summit is a full day event giving developers first access to exciting technology announcements, strategy, guidance, and tools for developing applications on the AT&T Network and devices.

By attending the 2010 AT&T Developer Summit, you will be the first to learn about new developments in our technology roadmaps through a morning of General Sessions including the Executive Keynote by Ralph de la Vega, President and CEO of AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. You’ll also be able to customize your Summit experience through four different tracks of presentations, panels, and demos for developers wanting to build, market, and sell applications and devices."

The event will be on January 6th, 2010 at the Palms in Las Vegas.

Blogger Down, Blogger Down!

It's been a while since I haven't blogged or posted links in two consecutive days, so I apologize. Maybe in over a year? I've been swamped with work and being a recent parent. I'll post something later today.

News & Links List

"Broader Measure of U.S. Unemployment Stands at 17.5%" NYTimes

"Capitalism's Fundamental Flaw: The system isn't rewarding the right people: innovators and creators." Forbes, Sramana Mitra

"Fannie’s Draws From Emergency Treasury Fund Reach $60 Billion" Bloomberg

"Electronic Arts buys Playfish for as much as $400 million" VentureBeat

"Investing in a mobile future with AdMob" Official Google Blog

"Google Looks to Dominate iPhone and Android Advertising With AdMob Acquisition" ReadWriteWeb

"Exclusive: Google Has Acquired Gizmo5" TechCrunch

"IBM’s Steve Mills on RealTime" TechCrunchIT

"Betting on a Metal-Air Battery Breakthrough
A government-funded start-up claims it can make ionic liquid energy storage feasible." Technology Review

"Yes, $2.6 Trillion! A Closer Look at the Full 10 Years of Spending in the House Health Bill" The Foundry

"What the Pelosi Health-Care Bill Really Says
Here are some important passages in the 2,000 page legislation." WSJ

"Bloodless President Barack Obama makes Americans wistful for George W Bush" Telegraph

"Our clueless C in C" The American Thinker


"Fort Hood gunman had told US military colleagues that infidels should have their throats cut " Telegraph

"Newborns Pick Up Language in the Womb" Discovery News

"Where are Food Network's Asian Girls and Boys?" channelAPA

"Goal Obsession" InsideWork 52

From InsideWork 52, a very amusing study. I guess words do not always lead to action:

Marshall Goldsmith with Mark Reiter
What Got You Here Won't Get You There - How Successful People Become Even More Successful!, (p. 102), Hyperion, 2007

One of the most ironic examples of goal obsession was the "Good Samaritan" research done by Darley and Batson at Princeton in 1973. In this widely-referenced study, one group of theology students was told that they were to go across campus to deliver a sermon on the topic of the Good Samaritan. As part of the research, some of these students were told that they were late and needed to hurry up. They believed people would be waiting for them to arrive. Along the route across campus to the chapel, Darley and Batson had hired an actor to play the role of a "victim" who was coughing and suffering. Ninety percent of the late students in Princeton Theological Seminary ignored the needs of a suffering person in their haste to get across campus. As the study reports, "Indeed, on several occasions, a seminary student going to give his talk on the parable of the Good Samaritan literally stepped over the victim as he hurried on his way!"

My guess is that few, if any, of these seminary students were "bad people." ... they probably were ethical, well-meaning people who deeply believed in the value of helping others. But goal obsession clouded their judgment...

They were chasing the spotlight. They were under pressure! They were in a hurry! They had deadlines! They were going to do something that they thought was important! Other people were depending upon them!

These are the classic conditions that can lead to goal obsession.

Luke 10:29-37
The New International Version

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"

30 In reply Jesus said: "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Look after him,' he said, 'and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.'

36 "Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?"

37 The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him."
Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."

Korea's Cyworld Shuts Down US Cyworld

I received this notice today from Cyworld:

"Thank you to all members with Cyworld.

Due to Cyworld shuts down US service, US Cyworld will no longer be able to service.
We sincerely apologize for shutting down the service with unavoidable reason.
Before US cyworld close the service, you will continue to access to US cyworld contents but not purchase items. Also, you will not use your acorns.
If you have unused acorns, you will be given a full refund for paid acorns only."

Obviously, they already let go of all U.S. staff since it's written in broken English along with poor spacing, but this also could be reflective of the overall problem of Cyworld's efforts in the U.S. market. They didn't localize their product. Cyworld assumed they could bring their team that was successful in Korea, target the same market and execute in the same manner. It didn't work out.

I'm focused on their early efforts, which I believe was a critical factor for their failure. Cyworld attempted to target the similar demographic in Korea, but for the U.S. market I thought their avatar-based social network was more suited for a younger demographic of junior high and high school students.

It seems that SK's other entities have made similar mistakes in trying to enter the U.S. market. A prime example is their MVNO effort with Earthlink, Helio, where they invested over $400 million. They tried to target Korean Americans by assuming ethnic affinity would drive consumer purchasing habits not quality of service, pricing, or phones. Hopefully, SK, which is one of Korea's largest conglomerates, will learn from these spectacular failures.

News & Links List

"How Far Will Google Wave Go?" Forbes, Dan Woods

"Interview with Offerpal Media CEO Anu Shukla on the offer 'scandal'" VentureBeat

"Cisco, EMC, and VMware make alliance official" CNET

"Lean startups aren’t cheap startups" VentureBeat, Steve Blank

"Buffett Takeover Reduces Successor’s Need for ‘Amazing Insight’" Bloomberg

"How Capitalism Will Save Us" by Steve Forbes and Elizabeth Ames

"Deathbed Wishes: I Wish I Had Spent More Time Working" InsideWork, David Wooldridge

"Big Picture: The CEO as Diplomat: An Interview with Richard Haass" InsideWork

I Am Korean American, A Barrel Project

The guys at Barrel, a brand and web consulting company, are always doing creative projects whether for clients or on the side. Here's a cool little side project they are doing called "I Am Korean American":

I AM KOREAN AMERICAN is an on-going web project that aims to collect brief profiles of Korean Americans.

Every new profile of a Korean American will be featured on the homepage. A profile will consist of the person’s name, age, location, occupation, and a personal statement that could be a mini bio, a memorable story, a rant, aspirations, or anything else. Our goal is to compile a collection of profiles that showcase the diversity and many interesting personalities of the Korean American population. We hope that our collective efforts will provide a snapshot of the Korean American community at this point in our history.