Making Web Applications People Love

Testing Tangler Embedding in Typepad

Moved to Wordpress

wave_goodbye
Originally uploaded by cowdunghands

Byee Typepad, I've moved over to Wordpress.

(and I love it)

Web Strategy Micksup by Mick Liubinskas

See you there!

TGIM Meetup: Monday, Jan 21, Sydney

i love mondays
Originally uploaded by bigmick

Yup, it's that time again.

TGIM (Thank God It's Monday) is for people who love what they do and would love to love it more. We get together, talk about our work challenges and ideas and give constructive advice to each other.

The small group is diverse. A few corporates, a few startups, a few free lancers. Whole buncha different industries.

Feel free to invite other people who rock too.

8.30-9.30 or whenever.
Monday, January 21st, 2008.
Brolga Cafe
Cnr Market and Sussex

Wiki

Let me know if you can make it.

Blogs are Conferences, Forums are Barcamps

Conference Lighting - Vodafone 005
Originally uploaded by On Stage Lighting

NOTE: This is a semi-blatant plug of Tangler who I work for. But it's still true.

Blogging is great. I love it. I'm doing it right now.

It's me having a thought or theory and putting it down on paper for the world to see. You take your time, collect your thoughts (sometimes) and you PUBLISH it. It's done. It's finished.

Then there is blog commenting, where the world gets to tell you what they thought of your thoughts. "Nice." "LOL". "You suck".

But it's a conference. It has it's place, but it's dated. At conferences, one guy gets up since he knows it all and tells the 1,000 people who paid to see him what he wants to say (usually not much). He prepares it, puts it up on the screen and tells his story.

When he's done he opens it up for questions. Audience members get to stand near the mic and ask occasionally insightful questions.*

Barcamps, or open-event conferences like it, are different. There is no one speaker, no schedule and really, no audience. We are all in this together. Anyone can choose the topic, anyone can respond at any time and if you don't like what you see, then switch channels (walk to a talk) - or better still, go start your own talk on something you're passionate about.

That what forums are like too. No centre. No boss. No schedule. Just a loose connection of people with something in common and the desire to connect on it. Anyone can create a topic. Anyone can set the tone. And the community decides what's important and what's not.

So, the great thing is that Tangler let's you create a forum in about a minute. So for your many sites, blogs and groups, create a forum today and get your crowd talking to each other. They can throw video into the discussion, link off, have all your discussions in one place and it's fun.

Be open, create a Forum

:-)

* Boy I hate it when people get up to the mic just to make statements to show that they are smart too, although this is evidence that open-events are what everyone craves.

Web Applications That Fit With Lifestyle

Im not addicted to skitch
Originally uploaded by bigmick

I'm sure you're like me, 100's of cool apps come across your desktop every year and so many of them would actually benefit you to use them regularly, yet you don't. Why is that?

One of the big reasons people miss is that the app just didn't suit your lifestyle. I don't me your sexual orientation, how much you party, or whether you play Warcraft. I mean, does it actually slot into your life as it is today.

For instance, Twitter, Pownce and those 'where are you' apps like Plazes are pretty interesting, but none of them fit into my life. I had to go somewhere specifically and update something just so that a few people would know something about me? Meh! It was a chore.

Then Twitter got more buzz and I had a few more friends using it, so I tried Twitterific. All of a sudden, the app was a seamless part of my life. It had a place. The value was the same, but now the value could be realised for a very tiny cost. Then when I was using it more and finding more friends worth following it was even more valuable. The lifestyle fit actually created value.

So many apps work perfectly and are very valuable but just don't make life easier overall.

Skitch is an app that felt like a brother. I'm a heavy user of screenshots and quick image manipulation so the base value was there. But more than that, Skitch fit perfectly with my life/workstyle. I can drag and drop images into it, I can drag out of it, it worked with Flickr, it doesn't try and do too much. My first use of Skitch felt like a big hug. In fact it's by far the best reason to have a mac. :-)

So when you're thinking about your app and doing some sort of dorky use case or persona thing and you start by saying:

"The Customer opens the app...."

Then you've started too late. Instead, start with;

"The Customer wakes up in the morning."

AppOn!

Me On OnThePod with Duncan Riley

Duncan Riley at TC Ranch
Originally uploaded by bigmick

Did a quick chat to Duncan today about Tangler et al;

Listen To The Mick Liubinskas Podcast Now

We talk about;
Kazaa
My eCoast startup.
Tangler
Social operating systems.
Data Portability Discuss
WebJam
Beer 2.0
Barcamp Sydney
Highway 101
Cultural differences between USA and Australia
Tech Scene in Sydney
Do Australian tech companies need to go to the USA? Why?

Enjoy!

Australia's Top Web Celebrities

  PodCamp Perth 2007 - Perth's Norgs 
  Originally uploaded by quinncd

Wow, looks like someone things Australia is geeky enough to have celebrities. Cool.

There is a poll on the page to vote.

Vote for Australia's Top Web 2.0 Celebrities

Vote now, you have 5 days left. And blog it, twitter it, send it to your mother.

Duncan Riley is winning right now but surely we can make it a tighter race?

Just to see if they are tracking their names, let's see how many of them find this page and make a comment below.

The Nominees.

Duncan Riley
Cameron Reilly
Bronwen Clune
Mick Liubinskas
Phil Morle
Richard Giles
Russ Weakley
Ajay Ranipeta
Lachlan Hardy
Jason Crane
Geoff Bowers
Flex Daddy
Darren Rowse
Ben Barren
James Farmer
Laurel Papworth
Frank Arrigo
Stephen Collins
Martin Wells
Chris Saad
Nick Hodge
Elias Bizannes
Scott-Bradley Pearce
Alex Shiels
Peter Wells
Andrew Sayer
Allan Cockerill
Ange Recchi
Rachel Cook
Cathy Edwards
Matt Voerman
Mark Blair
Damian O'Neil
Miles Burke
Myles Eftos
Paul Montgomery
Megan Bayliss
Meg Tsiamis
Carole Foggarty
Jamie Le Souef
Kesa Marin
NAME DELETED SINCE I WON'T PUT IT ON MY BLOG
Rene Le Merle
Cameron Adams
John Allsop
Kay Smoljak
Nick Cowie
Jess McGuire
Sarah Stokely
Paul Hutton
Tim Lucas
Sue Waters
Des Walsh

Offtopic: Hammertime

Hammertime
Originally uploaded by Afroswede

This is pretty funny, but I'm reading it as I'm writing marketing hay for Tangler. It makes you realise that you don't have to write essays to make a point or to get a response.

Simple is stronger, but of course, very very hard work.

8 Napkin Questions For New Tech Business Ideas

  Podcast Hotel Paper Napkin 
  Originally uploaded by websage

These are the ones I use. These are for when one of the 807 people following you on Twitter ask to have coffee to tell you about their new application which is like FaceBook crossed with Chumby but better...

You get the question, and what I'm looking for thrown in for free.

1. What is it?  Simple
2. Who is it for? Targeted, identifiable
3. Why do they need it? Pain, valuable
4. What is the market like? Validation, gaps.
5. Why will this win? Unique, defensible.
6. How does it make money? Clear, real
7. How big could it be? Huge, high margin
8. Who is the team? Committed, done it before.

Now you have all you need to snap some good questions back and keep writing away on that napkin.

P.S. No matter even if the plan is the suckiest stupidest idea since pets.com always always encourage, support and tell them to go for it if their heart believes in it. Much better a passionate failure than a life of quiet desperation and regret.

Tech Entrepreneurs And The Gambler

1st climb of Mt. Rainier July 2003
Originally uploaded by TroyMason

I've been thinking about two great quotes and the conflict;

"Never, never, never give up."

And...

"You gotta know when to hold em, know when to fold em, know when to walk away and know when to run."

It's a tough call, with no right answer, but I admire the tech entrepreneur for turning up each day and fighting it out.