The Network Garden - Mark Sigal's Blog

If you want to see how it ends, then look at how it begins

Once upon a time, I had a business "partner" who regularly over-promised and under-delivered.  Completely intolerant of the concerns and aspirations of others, he was never one to roll up his sleeves and sweat the details with my partners & I. 

Frequently late to our meetings, and often leaving early (if not missing meetings outright), he generally showed a disrespect and disregard for our time and what we were trying to accomplish.  The consummate fair weather friend, he was quick to turn the discussion to “YOU GUYS” the minute the going got tough.

I know, you are thinking, "What a complete bastard and lousy partner," but you know what.  We knew from the very first negotiation that this tiger’s stripes were tilted a specific direction, and we all know that a tiger doesn’t change its stripes so the moral of the story should be obvious:

If you want to see how it ends, then look at how it begins.

Generally speaking, during the set up stage of, for example, a client engagement (think: pitching, demoing, defining requirements, negotiating contract, etc.) a clear pattern emerges.

The client consistently makes, misses or regularly re-schedules meetings. They haggle over minutiae or better yet, don’t sweat peripheral details. They treat you like a trusted partner or they treat you like a contractor. They treat each other with respect and practice honest, clear and constructive communication. Or they don’t. They have a clear sense of requirements, use cases, etc. or not.

My only point is that repeatedly, I have found myself many months down the road looking at a given client’s/partner’s/employee’s footprint with us, only to conclude that everything (good or bad) we know about the client now, we pretty much knew then.

It's the proverbial case of what you sew is what you reap.  So pay attention to how it begins, as that is your likely destiny.

Related Links:

1. Hold a Picture in your Pocket:  Cognitive dissonance and manifesting change.
2. On Intellectual Honesty:  See things as they really are; act on that knowledge.
3. The Five Keys to Business Success: The most important drivers to entrepreneurial success.

Two Minute Warning: A True Sermon

Some years back, I was chatting with my good friend and business partner, Greg Malin, and he asked me if my near-term goal was to sell the startup I was doing at the time.

I proceeded to give Greg a non-answer about it all depending on circumstances. 

There were scenarios where going it alone would be great. 

But, there were also others where the right buyer opportunity comes along and this was your exit.

Greg then said something that has stuck with me ever since.  He said, “It seems that until you decide what your preferred outcome is, you probably won’t get there.”

And you know what.  He was right.  Clarity came about 18 months later, when I knew that the time was right to sell.

Metaphorically speaking, that changed the definition of the (business) game being played from ‘coming out of half time’ to ‘two minute warning.’

Two minute warning was all about scripted plays, clock management and clear decision paths like ‘kick field goal’ or ‘go for touchdown.’

So how did the two minute warning play out in this particular instance?  We focused on execution, which gave us ample ticks on the clock, and worked our way into having some favorable options. 

Yeah, we had to call some audibles, but we got to the goal line, and punched it in when our moment came. 

With the distance of time, I can honestly say that we practiced skillful means.

There is an axiom that John Wooden, the UCLA Bruins ‘Wizard of Westwood,’ once put forth. 

He said that if you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail, adding that failure to act is often the biggest failure of all.

So in what areas professionally or personally are you ‘coming out of halftime’ and which ones is it ‘two minute warning’ time? 

What is your strategy in these respective areas, what are the tactical plays that you want to execute, and how many ticks of the clock do you need to get it done?

Focus on where you want to be, document the specifics, commit to execution-orientation and faithfully punch it in.  Don't be denied.

Related Links:

1. Mandala - There's Order and There's Chaos: A post I wrote about training the mind.
2. On Life as Art, Poetic Truths & Getting Rich: because you've got to be in it to win it.
3. Wooden - A Lifetime of Observations On and Off the Court: A great book on John Wooden's Pyramid of Success.

Inconvenient Truths and The Carbon Curtain

As the credits roll, the human race embraces wholeheartedly the irrefutable truth about global warming, and irrevocably changes its consumptive path for good.

UH, NOT SO FAST…

Peter Huber has written a thought provoking piece in Forbes called, ‘The Carbon Curtain.’  It illuminates the climate versus energy policy paradox that exists on our planet. 

Here is a bite sized assertion-based reasoning model on the core WHAT, WHY and SO WHATs of this topic.

CORE ASSERTION (EXCERPT): To judge by actions, not words, the carbon-warming view hasn't come close to persuading a political majority even in nations considered far more environmentally enlightened than China and India.

WHY IS THAT? (EXCERPT): In developing countries the political survival of the people at the top depends on providing affordable fuel for kitchens, farms, fertilizer plants, steel mills, highways and power plants. Oil and coal are the only practical fuels at hand.

SO WHAT?  (EXCERPT): No serious student of global politics can accept the notion that the world will soon join ranks behind Brussels, Washington and the gloomy computer and its minders (Mark note: i.e., embrace new climate-friendly energy consumption policies).

Dar is surely right when he says, "The U.S. and Japan will not tell Asia and Africa to choose poverty, disease, hunger and illiteracy over electricity."

Adds Dar (Mark note: mockingly): "Contingency planning should entail strategic responses to a warming globe, a cooling globe and a globe whose climate reverberates with laughter at human hubris."

Netting it out: I have really come to believe that success and satisfaction in life is all about learning how to manage the many paradoxes that exist, and this is just another one of the those paradoxes.

Related Links:

1. My blog post on 'the assertion-based reasoning model.'  Think: well-formed, iterated answers to WHAT, WHY and SO WHAT questions.
2. The Tyranny of the ‘All or None’: avoid getting locked into perpetual all or none dramas. Embrace the AND, and become more successful, be happier.
3. On Intellectual Honesty:  See things as they really are; act on that knowledge.

iPhone's Lingering Raspberry

I can't take my iPod touch seriously as a typing/text-based input device until I  can 'save drafts' and do 'copy and paste.'

I see this as pretty binary relative to the aspiration of being able to input fully formed, type-written thoughts.

What's the point if you can not easily edit your words?

For now, this segment of RIM's (Blackberry) business is safe. 

Love the iPhone 2.0 platform and my iPod touch, but my Blackbery 7130 'aint going anywhere.

Related Links:

1. iPhone 2.0 - What it Means to be Mobile: a detailed summary of my experience to date with the iPhone 2.0 platform.
2. iPhone 2.0 - swinging for the fences: an analysis of the WWDC Keynote by Steve Jobs.
3. iPod touch: the first mainstream Wi-Fi mobile platform?

Mission Accomplished. But is it the RIGHT mission?

The photo-op that will live in infamy.  Bush’s proclamation of ‘Mission Accomplished’ proved to be anything but, providing a searing snapshot of hubris, ineptitude, arrogance and confusing platitudes with action.  Coupled with the selfless, heroic nature of our soldiers (and their willingness to run through whatever wall their mission points them to), this became a recipe for the pointless loss of life focused on the wrong enemy.

Flash forward to some great comments last night on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno by Chris Matthews of ‘Hardball with Chris Matthews.’

In talking about the imperative of the electorate in choosing the next president, he stated that we have to hold our candidate of choice to a higher standard (than Bush) by asking in an honest, challenging fashion, “Are you giving these guys (i.e., our military) the right mission?” 

Lest no one die in vain, or worse, for the vanity of others.

When you think about it, in the larger scheme of things the concept of accomplishing the ‘right mission’ is as much a product of clear DEFINITION as it is one of execution.

Moral of the story: be it in your personal life, your career pursuits or the measuring stick by which you judge the performance/leadership of others, having clarity of what’s the mission, and whether it is the RIGHT one is a picture worth keeping in your pocket at all times.

Related Links:

1. Hold a Picture in your Pocket:  Cognitive dissonance and manifesting change.
2. On Intellectual Honesty:  See things as they really are; act on that knowledge.

iPhone 2.0: What it Means to be Mobile

(Note: As past posts of mine have underscored [see below – Related Links], the promise of a caveat-free mobile platform is a game changer on par with the advent of the PC.  I won’t re-state my arguments here.  Read some of the posts below if interested.)

On Friday, after about a dozen hours of trying, I was finally able to upgrade my iPod touch to iPhone 2.0 software (for those who don’t know, Apple servers were completely overwhelmed coping with what proved to be 1M iPhones purchased in the first three days of iPhone 3G availability.  By contrast, the original iPhone took 74 days to reach this same sales threshold). 

What follows are some random observations about the experience from a consumer perspective, how the reality post-upgrade lined up with the pre-upgrade promise/hype, and implications for the mobile universe moving forward.

1. App Store brings the concept of friction-free impulse buying into the mobile realm by making over the air purchase, download and installation of iPhone/iPod touch apps/services one-click (plus password) easy.  I expected as much, but the good news is that I have not been remotely disappointed. It's instant gratification, pure and simple, and an unqualified “AHA” moment.
2. I have bought three gaming applications (Trism – a very cool, highly-addictive ‘touch and motion’ based puzzle game; Crash Bandicoot – an entertaining racing game with excellent graphics and audio; and Motion X Poker – a simple, elegant, beautifully-crafted poker game using dice for $4.95, $9.95 and $9.95, respectively), and can only say WOW!  While Apple has obviously made some trade-offs relative to what dedicated handheld gaming systems offer – most basically, lack of a gaming controller/inputs – iPhone/iPod touch is simply awesome as a mobile gaming platform.  Obvious areas to watch from an innovation perspective here are games that leverage the social and connected attributes of the devices, and games that support multi-player.
3. There are a boatload of free applications accessible via the App Store (plenty of crap, too, I imagine), but so far I have only installed four free applications, all non-gaming apps.  They are: Apple’s Remote Control application for controlling your iTunes library on you Mac/PC/Apple TV (kind of cool, depending on your set-up); Pandora, the internet radio and music discovery service (incredible, a logical extension to your formal library on iTunes); AOL Radio (again, a logical extension, some of my favorite mainstream radio stations accessible wirelessly via my iPod touch); and Twitterific (a nice, but somewhat clunky, front end to twitter).  Given that the backlog of iPhone SDK developers is already in the thousands, it seems clear that Apple will need to come up with better filtration tools to enable consumers to recommend, rank and detail the good, bad and ugly of a given application.  This is the signal-to-noise ratio challenge, as you know the axiom about opinions being like assholes, and adding to the noise is the fact that there are already reports of developers trying to ‘game’ the system.  Apple should learn from Amazon here. 
4. While I have heard some lament that the iPhone 3G doesn’t add a lot of new functionality ‘other than 3G’ that kind of misses the point.  First off, for iPhone 1.0 owners, this is the prototypical early adopter conundrum.  New versions tend to be cheaper AND more powerful.  Get over it. If speed isn’t that important to you or 2G is good enough, the real magic is in the software upgrade anyway, and it runs on iPhone 1.0 and iPod touch devices, so don’t upgrade the hardware if you don’t need the speed.  If, however, you don’t have an iPhone, then faster speed, GPS support, improved enterprise-readiness and the ability to run iPhone SDK powered apps is manna from heaven.  Similarly, some have quibbled that the iPhone 2.0 Software does not add a ton of new features per se, but again, that misses the point.  The upgrade from a software perspective is essentially what enables the iPhone/iPod touch to work end-to-end from app creation (via iPhone SDK) to placement in App Store to the purchase, download and installation of new apps to the iPhone/iPod touch without breaking stuff.  Experientially, this just works in a seamless and simple fashion, no small accomplishment, to be sure.
5. Rumors of iPhone being a Blackberry killer are greatly overestimated, in my opinion.  For one, while Apple has made some serious headway in terms of enterprise-readiness, the reality is that its support for advanced IT functions, is somewhat lacking.  As such, individuals, workgroups or verticals that are pre-disposed to buy all things Apple will likely be the early adopters of iPhone in the enterprise, and yes, this will take a bite of out Blackberry’s business.  But, the lion’s share of enterprises are NOT pre-disposed to all things Apple, Blackberry is rock solid and already the standard in most of these companies, and legacy is hard to dislodge.  More to the point, what Blackberry is best at – being an INPUT device with a real keyboard – iPhone is only adequate at.  Conversely, as an OUTPUT device, iPhone is without peer so it is somewhat of an Apples and Oranges (nee Blackberries) discussion that will play out over time, not in a single act.

Before wrapping up, let me spend a few minutes on the Pandora application for iPhone/iPod touch, as I think that it is suggestive of the real power of mobile applications; they can be media rich, hybrid composites (of a device layer, a web front end and a service layer), leverage the ‘wisdom of crowds,’ easy to customize based on your direct feedback and be integrated with other services.

For example, the first time that I launched the Pandora app after installing it, I was prompted to paste a set-up key into the Pandora web site, which activated the service on my iPhone and provisioned a web-based custom dashboard on the Pandora web site.

From either the web site or my iPod touch, I could now create a custom radio station by simply typing in the name of an artist or song.  Pandora uses this 'seed' data to set an initial context for the type of music I like.  Typing in the band ‘King Crimson,’ for example, led to songs by King Crimson, of course, but also similarly psychedelic bands like early Genesis, Moody Blues, Pink Floyd, and plenty of others that I had never heard of.
 

Moreover, Pandora’s player controls make it easy to give any song that is playing a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, which refines subsequent song plays. 

Also, a thumbs-down automatically ends that song and takes you to the next song.  What is interesting is that while you can forward to the next song without rating it if you don’t want to listen to it, you can only jump without rating six times per hour in a give radio station. 

I am not sure if this is to force the integrity of rating songs you like/don’t like (versus just channel surfing) or if the long-term play is to make fast-forwarding a premium service.

Similarly interesting is the concept that Pandora is not designed to create one über station for you, but rather, a bunch of specialized music channels.  If you think of a custom radio station as an intelligent thread (i.e., a perpetually-optimizing related songs playlist), that would seem to have all sorts of applications relevant to product recommendations, news recommendations and/or social recommendations (people with similar interests). 

The key point is that if you can do the same thing with different information media types as Pandora proves that you can do with music that opens the door to recommendation systems as the next generation beyond search. 

From this perspective, one could very well imagine the day when I can pick a topic, provide some thumbs-up/thumbs-down feedback, and then follow the intelligent threads, archive the keepers and mine it when I need it later.

To be clear, this is not a new concept but mobile seems tailor made for such a model to take root.

A final note on Pandora in terms of other things that I like that are worth emulating:

1. Algorithmic transparency: you are just a click away from finding out why a given song was recommended to you.  A cool add in this regard would be to enable deeper engagement and introspection by allowing you to up-level from the media player playing an individual song to the full album and/or across to the other albums of the same performer.  There may be licensing restrictions that preclude this today, but this could also be the fork between a free service and a premium service.
2. Bookmarking of favorite songs: how many times do you hear a song you like, not know the name of it, and never find it again?  With Pandora, in a click you can bookmark the song for future listening.  Plus, I am a click away from buying the song or album at iTunes or Amazon’s MP3 store, thanks to integration with these services.
3. Sync to Web: Similarly, cool is the fact that all of the actions that you take on the iPhone/iPod touch sync back to your web front end, and vice versa, meaning that the service is a composite of all of your actions.  This is suggestive of an area that Apple can evolve its MobileMe service, inasmuch as if it is sync’ing all of your data, it can give you tools to better categorize and then magically do all of the sync’ing between Web, Mac/PC and iPhone/iPod touch, and provide recommendation buckets to you.

Bottom line: I love the Pandora concept of simply inputting a categorized favorite as a contextual starting point and then thumb-upping or downing your way to a ‘predictable’ recommendation filter.  I also love the fact that it feels like Pandora has found its true calling as a mobile application, as Internet radio is cool but not compelling in a PC environment, but in a mobile environment with a touch based controls, it feels akin to what TiVo did to TV.  It reinvented it.

UPDATE 1: App Store apps not really Apple Tested and Approved - While Apple is ostensibly the gatekeeper in terms of specific applications finding their way into the App Store, in practice it is not testing every app, delving into every nook and cranny.  To be clear, in a more open platform like Windows, MacOS, etc., you have NONE of these controls but the point is that consumers who assume that App Store apps are Apple tested and approved, are sleeping with a false sense of security, as underscored by the recent de-listing of the the multi-player gaming app, Aurora Feint.  The app has a community feature, which if turned on, delves into the user's Contacts List, sends it to the developer's servers in an unencrypted fashion and then uses that data to recommend other friends who might be available to play the game with.  The bugaboos are lack of transparency that the developer was doing this and the fact that personal data is being sent unsecurely.  In this case, more a by-product of an amateur developer working with limited time and resources than something nefarious but it suggests some measure of caveat emptor necessary as a consumer. See 'Network Borders' link below for more fodder on the topic of Apple's governance role.

UPDATE 2: Apple's App Store sees first month sales of $30 million (via AppleInsider) - Users of Apple's new App Store have downloaded more than 60 million programs, generating a total of about $30 million in sales since the service launched one month ago, according to Apple chief executive Steve Jobs.  In an interview with the Wall Street Journal published early Monday morning, Jobs revealed that while the majority of those applications were free, the App Store still raked in an average $1 million a day from pay-per-download programs -- or an estimated annual sales rate of $360 million.  "This thing's going to crest a half a billion, soon," he said. "Who knows, maybe it will be a $1 billion marketplace at some point in time. I've never seen anything like this in my career for software."

Related Links:

1. iPhone SDK - mobile reasons for optimism: why the iPhone Universe is a big deal.
2. iPhone 2.0 - swinging for the fences: an analysis of the WWDC Keynote by Steve Jobs.
3. iPod touch: the first mainstream Wi-Fi mobile platform?
4. Envisioning the Social Map-lication: where all of my stuff (contacts, music, content) converge into the cloud and back to Me.
5. iPhone Universe: Network Borders, Kill Switches and the Core Location: why Apple proactively governing third-party applications via backdoor kill switches and the like is a good thing.

Own It. Own the Outcome.

Something to chew on...

Life is hard. 

Paradoxes aplenty. 

But you own total responsibility

For your own happiness. 

That is not to deny the truth

Of your inter-dependence on others.

But you alone have to own it.

Own the outcome.

It's the path to favorable gravity.

On Life as Art, Poetic Truths & Getting Rich

For me, the process of getting and being rich is simultaneously an aspiration, an outcome and a clear measuring stick of 'success.'

Ah, but isn't success a state of mind, defined by the quality of one's living, the values that one holds and the bedrock of family and friends?

Absolutely, but life is defined by paradoxes and how we reconcile them.  After all, many a brilliant artist starves to death or goes bonkers, overcome by the sheer weight of market failure combined with the psychological isolation and loneliness that comes from failing to realize one's goals.

More to the point, we are not brains in a jar.  We are flesh and blood, and for the limited time that we all have on the planet, few of us aspire to live monk-like existences devoid of material wants. 

Moreover, the field of play that we compete within keeps score in a monetary and asset oriented fashion.

It reminds me of a riddle that we put forth to interviewees in my companies:

You can choose between working with two companies.  At one company, you will get to build the product of your dreams, free of time, market and dollar constraints.  The only catch is that the product will only be used by very few people, and under no definition will it be a market success.  At the other company, you will face all sorts of trade-offs and compromises based on time, dollars, customer requirements, competitive, etc., BUT the product will be used by countless millions of people and be a huge market and financial success.  Which company do you choose?

Of course, few choices are so binary, but the way interviewees answer the question speaks volumes about how they define success, how cognizant they are of team goals, their embrace of the goodness of caring about paying customers and the like, and implicitly speaks to a recognition/maturity that the art versus commerce paradox is not an all or none assessment.

With this as the backdrop, I want to STRONGLY encourage readers that aspire to get rich to read the book 'How to Get Rich.' 

Written by Felix Dennis, chairman of Maxim Magazine (so a bonafide $400M net worth type of rich guy), the book offers sage, simple, clear and actionable truths about the earnest pursuit of getting rich.

It's a quick read with straight-up delivery, including decisions made, outcomes realized and lessons learned.  It's also a joy to read.  And as a wordsmither and lover of good prose, I also appreciate the fact that Dennis approaches his tome with the eyes (and ears) of a poet.

What follows is the opening poem from the book (by the author), a poem that also frames chapter by chapter the topics that the book covers.  Any entrepreneur would be hard pressed to more crisply articulate the path to success:

How to Get Rich (by Felix Dennis)

Good Fortune? The fact is
The more you practice,
The harder you sweat,
The luckier you get.

Ideas? We've had 'em
Since Eve deceived Adam,
But take it from me
Execution's the key.

The money? Just pester
A likely investor.
To get what you need
You toady to greed.

The talent? Go sign it.
But first wine and dine it.
It's tedious work
With a talented jerk.

Good timing? To win it
You gotta be in it.
Just never be late
To quit or cut bait.

Expansion? It's vanity!
Profit is sanity.
Overhead begs
To walk on two legs.

The first step? Just do it
And bluff your way through it.
Remember to duck!
God speed ….

And Good Luck!

Related Links:

1. The Tyranny of the ALL or NONE: embracing the paradox of the AND in life.
2. All In: on getting rich.
3. Brain in the Jar: on maximizing your time on the planet in terms of productivity.