Welcome to Smuggle Me

I have a big HUGE MAJOR ULTRA BIG favor to ask that I guarantee I won’t forget.

It will only take five minutes of your time and this isn’t some random request, asking you to spend any money or do anything more then register on a site and click a button to vote for me.

You’ll be helping me and a good friend out a lot and I’ll be forever in your debt.

Click on this link: http://www.youbethevc.com/users/new
Fill out the form. I’d suggest using your name as your username.
Use your real email address and for your bio putting something very short about yourself. You don’t have to get really descriptive. Just one line will do… it worked for me.

In the Do you want to section I’d suggest clicking “meet people” which is the very last option.

Once you’ve registered with YBTVC, I just need you to click and vote for two ideas. One of them is obviously mine and the other is a good friend who I’d like to see joining me in Boston.

Go here to vote:
http://www.youbethevc.com/finalists

Then look for “techguy” (that’s me) and rate it FIVE stars and “moshmobile” and rate it FIVE stars. The winner is determined by average vote, so the more 5 star votes we get the better.

I greatly appreciate your help and let me know if you voted. I will be forever in your debt. I promise you that I won’t forget it either.

Also, if you really love me, then I’d appreciate you asking everyone you know to vote about me. If you blog about it, send a trackback so I know you did.

Thanks!

UPDATE: I made a few correction in my numbers. The point is still good. In fact, the corrections actually make the point even stronger.

Today I was watching my twitter stream and someone posted that they were organizing a BarCamp in Seattle. I’ve read about so many BarCamps on twitter and the other technology groups I’m apart of that I’ve always wondered why Las Vegas didn’t have a BarCamp. I think it would be fun to attend and meet some technology people here in Las Vegas.

I think the answer to my question lies in some comments my friend made to me who was looking at moving from the Seattle area to Las Vegas. He’s a killer Java programmer and some Facebook appFindYourSpot.com said that Las Vegas is where he should move and so he wanted to move here. He decided to go on Dice.com to see what kind of technology jobs were available in Las Vegas. If I remember right he said he only found 150 23 listings (UPDATE: My friend said they were 23 crappy ones at that). Comparing that to the 400 listings in Seattle he pretty much ruled out Las Vegas as a future home. Now I think he’s moved on to Phoenix which had around the same number of jobs as Seattle as I recall 240 job listings.

The point of this story is that it seems like Las Vegas isn’t the best place for a startup unless it’s something around conventions, hotels or casinos. Plus, from my experience it seems like the technology that the Casinos are using is outdated. Sure, they have a project or two that is cutting edge, but for the most part I think they’re still locked and loaded with really cool technology like IBM AS 400s.

I actually asked the CIO from Sands Corporation (own the Venitian) about any sort of Web 2.0 strategies that they were working on. Honestly I’m not sure how familiar he was with the Web 2.0 concept, but the answer was basically nothing. The most he wanted to get out of his website was to help people book rooms as easy as possible. Probably a good strategy, but I can’t help but wonder if there aren’t some really cool Web 2.0 related projects that could be funded by all those gaming revenues.

I should also mention that when I moved here someone told me how progressive Las Vegas was for bringing in technology jobs. They pointed to Zappos.com moving here as an example of Las Vegas being a good place for technology companies. Of course, being a lover of startup companies, Zappos.com is not for me. It’s too big now. Also, one company does not a great technology job market make.

Coming full circle, I don’t think that I should count on a BarCamp every being organized in Las Vegas. I guess I’ll just have to move somewhere else to enjoy such interesting events.

Before someone comes and tells me I should start one myself, let’s just say I have my reasons for not wanting to do so. Not to mention I’ve pretty much said they’re aren’t that many startups here so who would attend?

Google finally integrated previously acquired JotSpot into my beloved Google Apps under the name of Google Sites. Scott Johnston announced the launch on the Official Google Blog. Techcrunch describes the 16 month wait is over.

It took an extra day for Google Apps to propagate it to my Google Apps accounts, but I’m very happy with it. Having a simple to set up wiki is a great addition for a business and something I’d been wanting recently.

I’ve copied the email that Google sent out to Google Apps users, but it seems like they’re selling the wrong thing. Are there really that many people with Google Accounts that are going to want to use this as their main website? I wouldn’t guess that many. Not to mention those people that do want that feature will already have Google Pages doing that for them.

The neat feature of Google Sites for me is that I can have a company wiki at something like w.crashutah.com Easy to remember and easy to access, but not my main site. I’m surprised that the email from google didn’t talk about pointing a subdomain to this type of site. It’s definitely a welcome addition to me. Remember how many things you can do with a wiki? Now you can do it for free on your own domain using Google Sites.

Letter from Google Apps about Google Sites:
Read more…

Today I came across this new website. They sell VC shirts like this one:

I saw it and thought about Mark from YouBeTheVC since his focus has been nanotech.

On the YouBeTheVC note, I’m happy to say that I made it into the Top 100 semifinal round. Now I just need to clean up my business plan.

Time is running out and I’ve been polishing up my application for YouBeTheVC. I’m really nervous, because I really want to win this competition and I know there have been a lot of entrants. I guess in 4 days I’ll leave it in God’s hands that everything will work out for the best. I certainly will know I have done my part. Either way, it’s a very exciting time in my life. I just wish that I would have been able to put together a stronger team. I’m still working on it and I have a couple of possibilities, but it doesn’t look like they’ll work out before the submissions our due. We’ll see what they think.

I must admit that lately I’ve been without too much to say. I think it might be because I’ve been focused on starting my own business. I’ve been evaluating a ton of potential options and it’s been quite the challenge knowing which option will be best. There are a lot of unknowns and I’ve been doing my best to find out as much information as possible. I’ve been really glad that Mark Cuban has dug into some of his best posts from the past on his blog. It really gave me a lot of food for thought when considering the idea of starting my own business.

One thing that Mark has said multiple times is that one of his greatest advantages it that he is going to work harder and be more prepared than his competition. I think that’s what I’ve been trying to do now. I’ve been reading and researching and talking to people in order to find out as much information as possible so that I can make the best decisions possible.

Finding out information isn’t as easy as it sounds. People don’t just show you their cards when you’re playing poker. You have to try and find ways to have people show you their hands. Of course, this leads to a lot of ambiguity in your decision making, because you are making decisions with limited information. However, this is what makes business so interesting to me. There are a million factors that goes into anything and you have to learn to adapt quickly or die.

I’ve often said that I’d love to be a waiter at a restaurant some time, because it’s one job where your pay is commensurate with the quality of work you perform. I think starting your own business can be the same. If you are killer at business, then you’re going to be rewarded. I definitely have confidence in my abilities and believe that I have that killer business skill. I guess time will tell.

A couple more good VC readings that I’ve been enjoying of late. This is a pretty interesting blog and here’s a long list of article written by the amazing Paul Graham. I’m sure there are more so if you have any good suggestions, let me know.

A while back I ran across a blog called Credit Card VC. I thought they had an interesting concept on how you could create a business without having to go and get VC funding. I think a lot can be learned from this concept. I still think that the point is partially missed. This guy still needs some sort of funding to scale the business, but the point that for a relatively small amount of money you should be able to create a simplified version of your site and do a serious market test is a great concept. This is what I plan to do with my idea.