DS4 Design

Ok, so Dave is probably going to hurt me for using the picture at the bottom of this article, but he’s got funny ones of me too, while we sat Sunday at Coffee Society in San Jose (he was in town from the East Coast on a project, and chatted about our respective plights.

David Seah (Dave to humans who have met him for more than 3 seconds) is the mastermind behind The Printable CEO and other amazing time management/productivity/organization sheets and forms. I even got him to autograph(see the pic above) his own form (that reminds me, I should get Tristan to sign an Ionic Breeze!)

I make a point to communicate with people online who I find fascinating, and that generate truly amazing content, Dave’s work is quite singular in this regard. He, surprisingly to me, began to ask many questions of me and my process, as I was curious about him and how he went about things. He has run the gamut from web design to game design, currently experience design. He’s well rounded, well spoken, and will likely shove a camera lens in your face that is about twice as big as you expect. Wait till he posts about the cool little hack on said camera!

Dave and I are both in the position of trying to develop products, sell them, and actually make things that people want (and are useful). We discussed a lot about fulfillment (personal, and places to ship your products from). We discussed virtual products and how to interact with the aspects of rights management therein (a scary proposition) (more on this and the rest of these conversations in later posts, fear not).

Of course we began with the hysterical introduction of getting out our various writing tools and pads, anyone watching would have likely been rolling their eyes. Out came two Moleskines, mine book style, his reporter style, we of course compared our built in hacks, his copiously readable and designed notes, and a filled pocket with tricks galore, mine with volume label, pen holder (on spine) and again the pocket filled

(personal moleskine pocket stash: stamps, $20 bill, post it tabs (mini), prepaid postcard, and a spare biz card).

Having someone to converse with on your projects, especially as removed as someone who has shared interests and goals, yet there is no overlap (his sales will never impact my sales) is such a great type of person to find. I cannot recommend this sort of discussion enough. Each of us is working towards developing products, and generating income while doing what we love. It was great as we both have been researching many of the same things, and it was interesting to see where our knowledge overlapped, and where one of us had found much more information on a particular topic.

We also discussed Linkedin, as we have both been searching for a number of particular answers (that neither one of use knew exactly where to go with) and we noted that it seemed by far to be one of the best places for genuine business knowledge transfer. We also noted that for “old school business info” SCORE (the SBA’s retired executive coaching wing) is a really useful place for knowledge on simple things like getting a business license, which ones we needed, and the like.

Do go and read Dave’s articles please, you’ll be better for it!

He even did a post about our meeting,, cool!

It’s so funny, Dave is so introspective, while I sat there and we talked his pen flowed across the page. I always enjoy watching people who take copious and excellent notes, as it is a wholly different experience from my hideous chickenscratch.

Apparently I should go do things now, but there’s much more to write of Dave’s and my meeting in the near term (as well as enumerating my ongoing projects and how Dave’s advice has helped me.)

Have a great day! Go make an online friend a real friend!

I’ve been reading Brad Feld’s stuff for quite some time (he’s a V.C. in colorado who runs really far, and does cool stuff all the time).

He’s got a great piece related to an article by Josh Kopelman about “Feed Frenzy” and what to do about all our feeds.

Brad accurately distills the info Josh generates in his article (here)

The crux of it is all pretty straightforward. There are feeds for everything. You get tons of email. Why don’t you get a smart dashboard that integrates them nicely?

It’s a simple question, there’s probably a few simple answers, (damn I’ve got to learn to code). My guess is it’s somewhere between a video game interface, digsby, netvibes, and google reader. It’ll be fun to see soon, (hopefully).

This also brings up a bother I’ve had for some time. I’ve always wondered about setting up, as Tim Ferris is wont to say “rules for email.” I haven’t added them (I’m fairly good at weeding out the chaff, but I need to be smarter about them.)

Additionally, I’m web based (ok, at home, not at the office,, it is the land of outlook, I don’t mess with the system). I want a way that yahoo, gmail, (and, shudder,, hotmail) can play nicely together in an interface I don’t want to vomit on. Additionally,, please Gmail,, give me an option to use “regular” style email (no threaded conversations). So far Netvibes and Pageonce (I think that’s the one) haven’t really scratched my itch here yet. Also,, let’s find a way to get plaxo less “flashy” and more integrated with this magical service. Then I can have a “web button” (I won’t even go into my “art button” that’s a combo of all adobe software, solidworks, and painter, but I digress).

Whew,, there’s my diatribe and it’s late.

Tune in again when Fred says something else inane! (wait,, I’m Fred)

Cleverness, and free web tools are what reduces barriers to entry (startup costs). The analog in real life however is totally different.

A great example of a real life barrier to entry being lowered and turning out to be game changing is happening to some friends of mine.

They wanted to drive race cars.
Race cars are expensive, and the safety gear involved, prohibitively so.
A great, great man, Jay Lamm and his associates has created a race that’s perfect for lowering that great barrier to entry.

First of all, it’s a race for cars costing LESS than $500. Yes, that’s right, morons on parade at “race speed” on real tracks (no ovals, actual “road courses”).

What?! You say ? Why would fully capable, able to use their own body parts humans participate in this sort of event?

Well, for some it’s a very low cost way to participate in something they’ve never had an opportunity to do otherwise. Additionally, there are a bunch of safety concerns involved so that the humans participating will only be covered in bruises of their own creation (mainly due to likely cheaping out on getting a real race seat).

The safety costs are “unlimited” while a full fire suit and helmet are required for racing (along with fireproof underwear, socks, shoes, headsocks, and gloves).

The best part is that Jay has gone out of his way to secure low cost (and high performance) driver safety gear kits so that newbies can save over $300 on good gear.

Now you’re asking yourself,, “Self, why is this lowering a barrier to entry?”

A simple, fun sport, previously out of reach for mere mortals without trust funds, personal fund managers, and their own helicopters, now can be participated in by normal humans, with 8-5 jobs, wives and husbands. More than that, once said humans have said safety gear (the main barrier to entry) they say things to themselves like, “gee, you know I have a race suit and helmet, I bet there are other places I could go and race!”

Now realize that Jay is doing this on 6 courses across America this year! Each race has around 40 entrants. Each team has at least 4 and up to 6 drivers. Some quick math says, that if half the teams participating are new racers, then this year, Jay will have created (5*20*6=500) 500 new race car drivers likely to participate in other racing events at another point in the year. Think of what this has done for Jay, his business, and the business of auto racing. Who in that industry isn’t going to bend over backwards to help him, when he is able to nearly Guarantee he’s creating more business each year for anyone in the racing business?!

When was the last time you went out of your way to lower a barrier to entry in your given field?

24 Hours of Lemons