The Now Network

Like most of us, I typically glaze over ads on tv or hit just fast forward on the dvr.  But this one from Sprint I thought was ingenious.  I especially like the line “233,000 people just twittered on Twitter, 26% of you viewing this have no idea what that means.”

Very creative.  Too bad, nobody uses Sprint anymore.

Why Batman makes a better entrepreneur than Superman

I had an interview with a mypunchbowl.com and the CEO has a very interesting post interview project for all potential candidates called the 24 hour test.   After the interview he ask that you send him something (a writing, photo, etc) that shows the way you think and to see if you’re a good fit for the team.

Superman has everything going for him, super strength, super speed, can melt things with his eyes and freeze things with his breath.  However, if there is only one thing on earth that can bring him down, don’t you think he would be a little more proactive and do something about it?   If you were Superman, don’t you think you would fly around the world a couple million times using your X-Ray vision to find every last bit of kryptonite and destroy it.   Superman can reverse the rotation of the earth to turn back time to save his girlfriend, why not spend a couple of hours making sure he is no longer vulnerable.  As Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler would say “Really Superman, really?”

Batman, on the other hand, has no special powers.  Sure he’s a billionaire and he has enough money he could hire teams of mercenaries to patrol the streets and keep the citizens of Gotham safe.  However in true entrepreneurial spirit,  he sits in his dark, damp cave inventing gadgets, developing technology to turn himself from average Joe into superhero.  At the same time, competition for Batman is much more fierce with the likes of the Joker, the Riddler, the Scarecrow and the Penguin, whereas Superman only has Lex Luthor.  The point being, Batman faces greater odds with far less ability.  In business, who would you rather be, Superman or Batman.

Of the world’s billionaires, who do you think would make the best Batman?

For me its Richard Branson.  Although, I don’t think he could keep his identity secret very long.

The CEO really liked it …. unfortunately they needed someone experience in eCards to they hired someone who worked for Evite.   Regardless, I thought it was a great way to see how well you could measure someone’s fit in a company.   I think I’ll use it when I’m a CEO.

Great looking Online Chrismas Cards

This cool startup out of Framingham, MA called MyPunchbowl has created a killer way to create professional looking online Christmas and Holiday cards.  Much better than those evite we are all use to.  This one took me less that 60 seconds to create using their eCard Studio, then lets me upload my address book from gmail and Outlook.   Cool for sending online cards, but not the same as getting them in the mail and posting on the fridge.  Maybe next year, they’ll have a deal with a card printer, then you can create and mail cards straight from the web.

Sophia’s dance performance

Here is Sophia’s 2nd annual dance performance

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

Good Ship Lollipop

Finale

Lost: in space

A colleague sent me a post to a Lost theory to end all theories – the island is in a timeloop created by Ben, Richard and Jacob.  Here are the key highlights:

• DHARMA initiative was created for the enhancement of the human race. What initially began as a simple research initiative developed into a massive project that was designed to test fate. At some point during DHARMA’S studies, someone managed to leverage the magnetic properties of the island to bend time and space – thus, a time machine was created.
• In 2007, Ben, Richard, and Jacob find a way to hijack the time machine, and go back in time to the year 1996 to wipe out all of DHARMA on the island (The Purge)
• Ben figures out a way to put the entire island into a “time loop.”  This time loop will keep the island suspended in time in the past (in the year 1996)
• Ben is able to suspend time on the island by “resetting” the time machine every 108 minutes (The Swan)
• Desmond, failing to push the button on September 22, opens the island time line briefly, allowing Oceanic Flight 815 into enter the island time/space then causing it to crash.

There is much more to this so check it out: timelooptheory.com

 

WebInnovators Group – Boston

A couple of posts ago, I was complaining about not having good news outlet for new startups in Boston.  Well last night I went with one of my Y2M buddies, Matt Smith (www.matthewcsmith.com) , to the WebInnovatorsGroup meeting and it was pretty good.  There were at least 300 people there from startups, vc firms and a few media outlets.  It was good to see that Boston does have a lot of good innovation happening.  The meeting highlighted three new startups:  Good2Gether (www.good2gether.com) and CMS and content distribution platform for cause-based inititaves; Pic Me Photo Sharing (picme.raizlabs.com) a social photo sharing app for the desktop and Jack Cards (www.jackcards.com) an service that will send you greeting cards before you forget your mom’s, aunt’s, sister’s birthday. 

 Of those three, I actually thought that Jack Cards has the best chance of getting bought by someone like Hallmark or Target.  No one ever makes money off of causes (hopefully the causes will) and photo sharing is way overdone.