Any of you SME’s and traditionalists (that’s a polite way to say, “stuck in the past dumbass”) sit up and take notice of this mobile thing that the kids are playing with.
Oh, and Tablet’s are a fad? Think again bucko!
According to the Forrester report, there will be 1 billion smartphone customers by 2016, with 257 million smartphones and 126 million tablets in the US alone. (via 1B Mobile Users by 2016, Apple, Google and Microsoft with 90% share)
Love this clip from Bill Hicks, ripping on the Marketing guys… very funny every time.
I’m sure you don’t deserve it guys…
;)
The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.
- Ingvar Kamprad
It takes a certain type of person to never be satisfied, to always want to improve. I hope I prove myself to be one of those people.
Another fascinating post from Zane @ Life By Experimentation. Really interesting Blog.
I took some time to have a good look at the Duedil app yesterday. These guys have been getting quite a bit of good press in the London scene recently and have amassed a bunch of advocates from London startup community, as well as a number of nominations from the Open Coffee lot as one of the top 3 London companies of the moment, in a recent thread.
So, I signed up and had a look. And was really impressed.
If you’ve never used the Companies House online services (if you can call it that), then you’ll be somewhat forgiven for wondering what the hell all the fuss is about. If you have used it, you’ll think this is the coolest thing since sliced bread.
OK, now this isn’t an app review.
Instead, I wanted to take a minute to mention my experience, because I would call it that.
On Duedil, they’ve got a little chat thing that pops up with a fairly welcoming and open ended call to action. Don’t know why, but I just felt compelled to type something. I think I just put something like
Hey guys, just wanted to say well done on the app. Great design and really well executed.
Following that initial comment, I ended up having a very enjoyable little chatter with some dude called Jasper who worked there. I asked about an API (because it would kick ass for mysparebrain) and the response was positive.
I was informed that they’ve had a lot of interest, they can’t say when it’ll be ready, but it’s coming. Awesome.
I took it a step further to request something a little more technical.
Can I request Auth2.0 protocol for Authentication and JSONP for data exchange?
A little silence.
Then Jasper came back, saying he’d spoken with the development team and that it had been added as a feature / technical request.
Nice Jasper.
Anyway, some general chitter chatter later, I felt very positive towards these guys. There was no sell, no trying to get me to do something, give something, buy something. Just genuinely interested chat.
Very refreshing, compelled to share.
Oh, and the next version of the app is supposedly imminent, so definitely keeping an eye open for that.
I’m really padding out this initial stream. But here’s a look at the faces from a TWiSTldn (This Week in Startups London) meetup last year, held at the shiny posh Orrick offices in Cheapside, London. We’ve had I think 6 or so of these now, the last one in November when JC (@jason) and Tyler (@steepdecline) came across from Santa Monica to London for a live meetup with our illustrious panel, including Sanford Dickert (@sanford) , CTO of Peer Index and Hussein Kanji, ex-Accel and now active investor doing his own thing (@hkanji).
All these guys are well worth following. Peer Index are pretty awesome, Hussein is one of the top investors in Europe and a really standup guy, Tyler is full of insights and well, Jason… you all know Jason.
How Designers can help Developers…
Fellow mysparebrain team member and CTO, one mr Schmerg, cutely dropped this into a gchat today. It happened to be whilst discussing a new epiphany we’d had about further simplifying the UI, getting rid of an area of functionality that is not perfect, which potentially could provide some valuable real estate for some other pipelined features (admittedly, but purposefully vague).
So, question is:
How do I take it?
Thoughts welcome…
P.S. Should I have responded with
?
Hi Tumblr Community and the Wider World.
Well, I’m here. And since you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression, I’ll start with a few thoughts as to why that is.
1. I’m looking for a better solution.
- Better platform for quick and easy posting of thoughts, images (easier than wordpress or squarespace) and longer updates than Twitter will allow and Facebook is useful for.
- To find people who get me, and those who disagree. Either way, conversation. That’s what I like.
2. I need an outlet - regardless of who’s listening.
3. I like to share, especially with those who sometimes appreciate it.
4. I like to be shared with - especially from those who are cleverer than me (doesn’t take much)
So, here we go.
And I thought I’d post my first image of me and my 10 month old son, Rudi. He’s the coolest little boy, such a beautiful character and the light of my life. Here we are down by a stream, running into Glencoe in the Scottish Highlands, one of my favourite places on earth.
