Doing Words

Why I don’t sign NDAs

// September 29th, 2010 // 0 Comments // Industry, people, Startup

Not my lawyer, but a dead-ringer.

I don’t do NDAs, for a few reasons:

• I’ve learned not to sign things without my lawyer reading it first. He’s a great lawyer, so he’s not cheap. Spending a couple of hundred dollars before I’m able to have a coffee with someone isn’t a viable operating model.
• I work with too many businesses every year to be able to manage and abide by the aggregate terms of an archive of NDAs.
• You may be trying to protect the wrong thing. If your idea’s awesome, it’s probably not unique. The value is not in your idea, it’s in your execution.
• If I couldn’t be trusted with your ideas, a quick web search would make that clear, since I’ve been doing this since 1995.
• A big part of the value I bring is my communication skills and the network of people I know. When the time is right, you need me to be able to talk about this.

I have signed NDAs in the past, and I wish I hadn’t, because I have no idea where my copy is now. I take comfort in the knowledge that the other party has almost certainly mislaid their copy too. Making the whole exercise expensive and pointless. Who wants to do expensive and pointless?

Corporates and big brands, that’s who — they specialise in expensive and pointless, many of them devoting whole departments of people to making things more expensive and pointless. I will sign NDAs when I work for corporates and big brands because they will pay me good money and I know I’ll get paid.

Whereas you with the great idea, the back of a napkin and a sharpie pen? I want to like you, and you want to like me. Don’t ask me to sign something that can best be summarised as “we don’t trust you” before we even get to know each other.

I will, however, abide by the terms of a FriendDA.

Last tickets: Lower North Shore Coffee Morning tomorrow

// June 8th, 2010 // 0 Comments // My work, Other news, people

What do you do when you know you should be attending a weekly industry meetup but just can’t seem to get there, week after week?

As the crow flies, the nearest industry meetup to my home is North Shore Coffee Morning (#nscm) held each Thursday morning in Mosman, on Sydney’s leafy lower north shore.

It’s a great meetup: small, interesting, diverse group of people, good coffee, and great networking. According to Google Maps it ought to take me about 14mins to drive there, but I find Google Maps is rarely right about trip durations in Sydney, and typically it takes me between 20-30mins to get there, find a park and lob on in. Since I can only afford to spend an hour at #nscm, I’m taking two hours out of my highly productive morning and spending as much time on the road as I am networking with the regulars.

What to do? Why not create my own ‘lower North Shore coffee morning’ instead? I have a spacious living area with a lovely outlook, a great Italian coffee machine, good coffee beans, and enough cups and seats for about twelve people. I enjoy playing barista. Ticketing can be done quickly and easily in the cloud for next to nothing these days (see Amiando, Eventbrite and Eventarc for starters) and I can use a cheap ticket to (a) cover the cost of coffee, milk and muffins; and (b) give people some motivation to actually attend rather than (as I do) say they’ll try to make it. Any money left-over after consumables will be donated to Oxfam via my Trailwalker Sydney 2010 team. Maybe I can have the industry networking event come straight to me.

So tomorrow, in my home, Lower North Shore Coffee Morning will have its debut. If it goes well and people enjoy themselves, it might make a monthly reappearance. Tickets for this first iteration are limited to 12 and as I write this, there are only three tickets remaining.

If you’d like to come, it’s not too late — just use the order form below.

If you come, please bring passion, enthusiasm, good humour and curiosity. Also, please bring either a book, an artwork or some music to lend/give to someone else. Use of the WiFi, fireplace, comfy chairs, garden, huggy old dog and rope swing are included in the ticket price. The Twitter hashtag is #lnscm.

Our house is 10mins walk from St Leonards station, 3mins walk from the 273 and 274 bus route stops at Naremburn shops, and all-day street parking is available in Dargan St and surrounding streets.

Hope to see you there!

- alan (@bigyahu)

Online Event Registration with amiando

If you’re a geek, be proud of being a geek

// May 12th, 2010 // 0 Comments // Branding, Communication, Fun, people, Social Media, Social Media, Video

Why add polish when in today’s society, being so geeky is so credible? I love this intro video for Diaspora. Now it needs to be mashed-up into a music video for some yet-to-break indie band. Call it “OK Go Make A Social Network”.

The thought for today: when branding, be true to who you are. Customers have a seventh sense for these things.

How to love your nerd

// December 12th, 2008 // 0 Comments // people

Rands is a great writer as well as a true nerd so he writes from the heart and with great insight when he describes in The Nerd Handbook how a nerd thinks, what makes a nerd different to you and I, and how the life partner of a nerd can help create a lasting relationship with a nerd.

I love how he details the nerd’s obsession with the latest project, and how a new relationship can be just like a new project. That can be a problem once the nerd believes he’s got you figured out:

As you discovered when you were the project, your nerd’s focus can be deliciously overwhelming, but it will stop. Once a nerd believe he fully knows how a system works, the challenge to understand ceases to exist and he moves on in search of The Next High.

While I don’t know who you are or why in the world you chose a nerd for your companion, I do know that you are not a knowable system. I know that you are messy, just like your nerd. Being your own quirky self will be more than enough to present new and interesting challenges to your nerd.

More great advice in The Nerd Handbook…

[Cool "I like code" tee from Chezza & Scottie @ Molt:n ]

Peace on earth, good reading to all men

// December 12th, 2008 // 0 Comments // people

In addition to world peace, an actual reduction in global carbon emissions in 2009 (versus a promise to do better) and an end to the Econolypse, here’s a list of things that would surprise and delight me.

Just in case you’ve enjoyed Doing Words this year sooo much that you’d like to show me some lurv.

Wishing you peace, love, and good reading.

“I am 3D and more saturated”

// April 29th, 2008 // 0 Comments // people

Sadly these days most new follower notifications on Twitter are from other self-promoters trying to get their own brand out there. My advice would be to first concentrate on offering something of value, and then the audience will find you – that’s what the interweb is all about. I guess some people don’t have the patience for the organic approach.

Someone who can help you with an alternative approach – Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) – is Marina Feygelman, who was probably marketing herself when she decided to follow me on Twitter. Never mind, I thought her blog was a useful guide for folks new to SEO, so I’ve added it to my bookmarks for later. We’re even.

In my eternal search for new ways to tell business stories, the About page of Marina’s blog makes a great little case study. I laughed out loud when I read her self-description. It reads, “Marina Feygelman is natural intelligence behind Adpuma. I look approximately like the picture on top of my page, but I am 3D and more saturated (color, that is). I am married and have three homeschooling children. ” That, along with her interesting photo, tells us everything we need to grasp where Marina is in her life and how her work relates to the rest of her life.

Her offer right up front is clear as a bell: get on the first page of Google search results tomorrow, call me now for a free consultation. At least, it would be clear as a bell if it didn’t say that in all upper-case. More than a few words of all upper-case encourages the eye to skip that copy and maybe come back later… if there is a later.

She has her phone number, email address and live chat link right there on the page too. Leaving your phone number and email address accessible on the page may be a problem if you don’t like spam and sales calls, but it sure breaks down the barriers.

There are a couple of minor spelling and grammar mistakes too, but that’s not a major problem, since you wouldn’t be hiring Marina to write for you.

Otherwise she has it all totally right: her offer is straightforward, her profile is memorable and has personality in spades, and her contact details are right there.

…but I’m still not adding her to the people I follow on Twitter!

This morning in da house: Yorke Hinds

// March 11th, 2008 // 0 Comments // people, Products, strategy