So, it appears that Google is populating suggestion searches on Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, but apparently not Islam. At first I was very skeptical of Google censoring after hearing a story on CNN, so I wanted to see if it were true on my own. Well apparently it’s true.

My only guess at why they would be doing is is that they’re trying to avoid radical Muslims calling them out for auto populating searches like “Islam is bullshit”, “Islam (terrorists)”, or other potentially offensive searches. I can understand why they’d want to avoid this but I think by being completely transparent and equal across the board they would avoid the issue with less controversy.

What do you think?

This is a guest post by a very early to the game, iGoogle widget developer who turn a small project into a huge profit. Cameron Hall, a co-worker of mine, and a graduate of Cornell University held onto his widget just long enough so he could use the credibility as a resume builder. He ended up (unintentionally) maximizing the widgets monetary value and getting big cash and was able to land a job with a GE management training program with the story.

Enter Cameron Hall…

In February of 2008, I sold less than 100 lines of public code requiring less than 20 hours of work for $28,000.  What started as a personal project to make my Google homepage more personal, turned into a 300,000 user worldwide phenomenon

in less than a year and a half.  My post below takes you through the life of my National Geographic Photo of the Day gadget from its creation in mid 2006 to its sale in early 2008.

I don’t recall when I first created the Google gadget, but it was sometime around May 2006.  I was in college and was testing out Google Personalized Homepages.  Yes, that’s what it was called before it changed to iGoogle.  In classic Google fashion, my homepage was white, clean, and in desperate need of color.  So I did what any developer would do and started to check out the API and what was required for creating a gadget.  Google gadgets are typically HTML and JavaScript wrapped in some very basic XML.  Since I had experience with each of those languages, I decided to give it a whack and develop a gadget.

The first version of the gadget was around 100×50 pixels and simply loaded the thumbnail of the National Geographic photo of the day.  To do so required absolutely no programming logic and literally loaded http://nationalgeographic.com/pod/pictures/thumbnail/pod_thumb.jpg with a link to the photo of the day page.  After a couple of months, I got an email from a user asking if I could make the picture bigger.  I was shocked to find that people other than myself were actually using the gadget and care enough to send me feedback.

I decided to take a little time and see what I could do about increasing the size of the picture.  After a couple hours of work, I had a much better gadget that loaded an image that filled the entire space.  From that point on, the gadget went through incremental changes at the request of users or if I thought of something.  The changes span everything from increasing the resolution to adding a description or caption for the photo.  It was always a hobby and I never took the work too seriously.  I applied the same logic to other gadgets and built a Wikipedia photo of day, Weather channel map, and delicious bookmark searcher.  All of the gadgets were created because it was something I wanted and couldn’t find it out there already.

In May of 2007, I received an email alerting me that they were planning on using the gadget in the Google Developer Day keynote presentation.  Again, I would have never imagined that a little gadget that was built to get some color on a clean page would receive so much attention.  However, the biggest surprise came in January of 2007 when I was asked to sell the gadget for $700.  I freaked out because the thought of selling the gadget never crossed my mind.  At that point there were about 35,000 views daily and a month after receiving the offer I declined the offer to explore other options.  Jumping back to May, I receive another offer except this time it was for $2,000.  However, at that point I was rolling into my senior year and was using it as a talking point on my resume.  That single gadget placed me in the top 5 gadget developers and so I planed on keeping it until I found a job.

Throughout the Fall I received offers from multiple parties all around the $6,000 mark.  Once I accepted my job, I put the offers against one another and received a $28,000 offer from the original requester.  At that point, I wanted to strike while the offer still stood and accepted to sell the gadget for $28,000.  The selling process was really smooth, except for PayPal who will freeze your account when you get a large sum of money.  I filled out a form and Google setup a redirect from my URL to the buyers URL.  It’s important to note that I never sold him the code.  In fact, anyone can take the code from the site and repost it as their own.  As a result, I sold him all my users.  Right before the transfer took place, I had 1,000,000 visits daily.

I continue to develop my gadgets just as I did before.  If I was asked to sell another one of my gadgets I would, because I could always move my gadget to a new address or add ?anything to the end of the URL.  I know that the buyer placed an ad on the gadget once I sold it to him.  I don’t know how much he earns, but I doubt you could make a living from developing gadgets.

My advice to you would be two simple things.  First, take a challenge and build what you want or need.  Chances are other people will need and want it too.  Second, listen to your users.  They will often have thoughts that are different from yours and will help you see your product from another point of view.  Beyond that, I got lucky.  I never looked for a buyer, but I did hold out until the price got too high.  I could have easily begun to loose subscribers and the value of the gadget would fall drastically.

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What side project have you worked on that ended up becoming much more than you originally had intended? Did your project turn into a business that allowed you start a business? Quit your job? Retire?

Share you success stories so that we can all learn and be inspired and bring then dream to action.

]]> http://thedreaminaction.com/2009/05/31/small-projects-big-profits/feed/ 4 http://thedreaminaction.com/2009/01/15/the-sand-hill-road-to-fake-success/ http://thedreaminaction.com/2009/01/15/the-sand-hill-road-to-fake-success/#comments Thu, 15 Jan 2009 14:44:49 +0000 Ryan Graves http://ryanagraves.com/?p=889

People think that winning an awards show like The Crunchies makes them a success…false. Along those lines, SO many people consider getting a solid round of venture funding a success…false again.

Why or how is it that a company can be successful without making money (or, creating value)? If you sell your company to Google or Oracle or whoever, then you’re a success. You’ve created an entity that creates value enough for another entity to spend $$$ for what you’ve created. Similarly, if you create an entity that creates value enough so that consumers or other businesses purchase your product, and the money you make from that sale can cover the costs to create that product, then you’re a success. This is business success, very simple.

The notion of winning a venture round = business success, is still being carried over from the dot-com bubble of 2001 and the sooner it dies the better off entrepreneurs and VC’s will be.

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Google’s new chat service looks to be amazing. In all of my testing of video chat tools for ActionsTalk I’ve found that iChat on the Mac has the best video quality and Skype video chat is the quickest (less delays). Now I’ve tested Google chat against those two tools on those two criteria and it wins both. The video quality is really amazing especially when you keep the view at the default size (full screen is pretty sweet though). Also, the speed of the video is phenomenal! Blake and I use video chat all the time to collaborate on startup projects and I think we’ve found the tool that will replace the others. We used it for about an hour and it did freeze once though…I hardly consider this a FAIL…it’s early.

I’ve not tested out the record functionality yet but it looks like it is there… and the view yourself window if very flexible with sizing (a plus for recording).  I’ll definitely be giving Google video chat my attention over the next few days!

A quick note about Google: They seem to be able to enter a market so quickly and with such huge force. It is very possible that because of the large number of users on Gmail, services like Skype will have significant drops in users. Google is currently and will be for sometime a very scary force for ‘almost’ any startup. A startup can work for months or even years and spend tons of money on developing a product and can be put to rest in a matter of days if Google enters the market, BEWARE. However, startups should also see this as a huge opportunity. Why you ask? Because if Google wants to enter a market and you have a leading product $$$aquisitions bells start ringing$$$. The lesson here is beware and prepare Google ain’t slowin down.

Let me know what you think of the new Google video chat. Better, worse, better in some instances?

This morning I signed a petition for Free the Airwaves that would help the wireless initiatives in the US. Remember the fuzzyness between TV channels, well those radio airwaves are currently controlled by the FCC and in Feb 2009 they are going to decide whether or not they will open up that “white space” spectrum, as it is technically termed, to the public. I’m a huge fan of almost any open wireless initiative. ActionsTalk featured Shaheeb’s project for WireFreeMKE a few months back and as these projects work individually toward the same cause we support less regulation of this potential reality. Free wireless, more internet, happy us.

This is the petition below. Please go and sign this petition!

To the members of the Federal Communications Commission:

I’m writing to urge you to open up currently unused parts of the TV spectrum (the “white spaces”) for wireless broadband and other emerging technologies. I applaud the extraordinary steps the Commission has taken to realize the potential of TV white spaces to date, and encourage you to take the next step at your meeting on November 4.

The potential benefits of freeing up this important public resource, more than three-quarters of which today is unused, are overwhelming.

The white spaces can:

* Pave the way for universal wireless broadband access;
* Extend broadband wireless to rural areas that currently aren’t connected at all;
* Enhance the reliability of public safety communications;
* Enable distance learning for students in remote locations or for whom traditional classroom-based learning is impractical; and,
* Bring high-speed mobile internet access to every high school and middle school in the country.

Opening up unused TV spectrum might be one of our best remaining chances to address the digital divide by creating affordable and truly universal broadband wireless coverage in the U.S.

I urge you to take this rare opportunity to connect millions more people to the Internet.

Now is the time to put the power of better and faster broadband in the hands of innovators and entrepreneurs. At your November 4 meeting, please move forward with rules that make the best possible use of these airwaves.

So, in an effort to grow the global reach of Ryan A Graves.com (currently over 3k/month) I’ve added another widget to blog. I’m going to use the Google Translate widget to allow readers from all over the world read this blog. Currently, there is not a way to translate comments but I know Fred Wilson has made that feature request to the Disqus team. I would just like to thank anyone who has been reading this blog with English as a second language. I hope that the translate feature will help you enjoy even more. If you are one of those people I would love for you to leave a comment so that I can get in touch with you.

I love when new tools like this become popular and even the standard on the web. It just re-affirms that the time and effort we are all putting in to grow the web and help people develop a presence on it is not in vain. Obviously this is a great Google tool but these opportunities are out there for startups! Go out there and make a valuable tool!

Lots of schools have similar programs already.  They just don’t have huge companies.MSOE will pay for your patents, and still rarely anyone takes them up on it.

Why?

Students aren’t fundamentally trained to think about growing a business using their engineering skills.  Initiatives like KEEN aim to change that.

We’ve actually laid a much better framework for the future, but it’s hard to see the benefits in the short run.

We should talk more about the culture that creates this at some point.  There are all kinds of startups around Stanford, so they in turn have students creating new businesses.  The chicken creates the egg, and the egg creates the chicken.  At MSOE (again an example I use because I go there), we’re working hard to create the chicken so that it can create eggs simply by being associated with the school.  A culture of entrepreneurship.

If you go south of the border to IIT (not to be confused with ITT).  They’re a mile down the road already and creating lots of businesses.  Their culture is inspiring MSOE students though.  Cooperation between the schools has been great so far.

What we need in the MKE/CHI corridor is one big win.  Doesn’t even have to be Google sized, but something that really gets the idea going in people’s heads.  Programs like KEEN are already helping to bridge the gaps between institutions so everyone doesn’t need a chicken to get eggs.

A side effect of a successful startup in a city is more startups.  We just need that successful startup.

Originally posted as a comment by Jeramey Jannene on Ryan A Graves.com using Disqus.

Students create interesting idea using university resources. Students create a company and have an exclusive license to use the technology, which they made at their institution. Institution gets bragging rights and extra revenue for the school. For an entrepreneur to promise a large amount of ROI to their university, without even knowing what to promise, I’m not surprised that Marc Andreesen went west.  –from Chicago Tech Report

I have two thoughts on this.

1) Why don’t more schools have this structure set up for companies that are started at the university?

This credibility that Standford gets, especially with a company like Google is huge. Other schools with awesome technology programs like University of Illinois and also University of Wisconsin (Madison) should definitely be taking advantage of this opportunity. A few weeks back Eric Olson wrote about the Midwest brain drain. This is a great opportunity to combat that problem. Here’s what you do, stop the drain even before it becomes a leak, it’s as simple as providing a better opportunity and a better chance for success! That’s the question all ‘smart’ entrepreneurs are asking themselves, what position do I have to put my company in to have a better shot at success? The best position for web startups is still either Silicon Valley or NYC but that could change with the increasing number of VC’s in the midwest and hopefully an increase in investment from universities.

2) Would this structure be a deterrent for entrepreneurs at a university program?

The argument here would be, why would I want to give the university a guaranteed piece of the pie? I’ll tell you why, this model is proven. It’s the same decision a company has to make when taking VC money. We give you a portion of our equity and you give us resources. Sometimes those resources come in the form of cash, sometimes in the form of coaching or advice from a board member. Either way, the return that a company gets from taking VC money and having the opportunity to grow, or taking university resources and having the opportunity to start is usually well worth it.

So, Stanford owns Google. Who does Harvard, U of I, UC Berkley, UW Madison, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, or CalTech own?

*click on the pic to watch live

This afternoon I watch the BearHug Camp hosted by Steve Gillmor.  The event was focused on the progress of the micro-blogging space. One of the main topics of conversation was around live search of the Twitter data. Currently there is nothing that is “real time” and for political purposes among others this service is much desired.

Evan, Biz, and Alex from Twitter came just before lunch and they really took a lot of heat. Many of the comments online stated that it seemed that Steve set this group up to “gang” up on the Twitter crew. My perception is that this is probably true. The guys were put on the spot big time about how they will listen to the developer community going forward. Alex’s response was that his email is an open door for suggestions, comments, concerns (alex@twitter.com).

In attendance from my point of view (online) was Loic Lemeur (Seesmic), Leo Laporte (TwiT Army) who livestreamed the event, Dave Winer (Scripting.com), Ari Steinberg (Facebook), Kevin Marks (Google Open Social), Angus Logan (Microsoft), identi.ca guys, among a group of developers in their respective fields. There was a lot of talk around XMPP becoming just as common as HTTP so that the web can be much more LIVE!

My take-aways: This event was interesting but the stubbornness of Steve Gillmor and the politically motivated conversations took away from the event. The best part of the event that I enjoyed the most was the time that Evan, Biz, and Alex were there. The conversation although tough for them was the most focused that it had been all day. I see a huge push for the web to become more and more “live”. The web used to be static, now it’s updated, next it will be live!

This corporate lesson is a great one for start-up CEO’s. Many times the start-up founders find that they are great at “founding” but not as great at running/growing a company. Many find that they enjoy that starting phases of a start-up but don’t enjoy the growing phases or the process implementation phases. This can be difficult for a start-up founder who is used to having control over almost everything that company does, and now has to begin to give up control and ‘trust’ others with their company. This first starts with the realization that the entity that they have created is now larger than them and that they must act in the best interest of that entity over their own best interest.

Certain leaders are “one trick ponies” in that they can only start, only grow, or only cut costs, but cannot find those other leadership styles needed to lead through multiple business environments. Sometimes that is ok in the corporate world, and sometimes that is ok in the start-up world. After all Larry and Sergey passed Google off to Eric Schmidt when they realized they needed somebody with the business and leadership experience to lead Google into the next growth phases. They made the right decision and it worked. The most important thing is for the start-up founder to be self aware and realize who and how they are as a leader. For a founder to say, “someone else would do this job better than I would” is a very difficult thing, but sometimes it needs to be said for good of the company.