Business

Pixish, Spec Work, and Graggers

In Business, Design, Pixish on 20 February 2008 with 29 comments

This post also appears in Pixish News.
During the Jewish holiday of Purim, we tell a story about a dude named Haman. He was one in a long line of history’s baddies who tried to do away with the Jews. He was so evil that, to this day, every time his name is read aloud, everyone [...]

Paul Graham’s Six Principles for Making New things

In Business on 19 February 2008 with 1 comment

I like to find (a) simple solutions (b) to overlooked problems (c) that actually need to be solved, and (d) deliver them as informally as possible, (e) starting with a very crude version 1, then (f) iterating rapidly.
When I first laid out these principles explicitly, I noticed something striking: this is practically a recipe for [...]

How Pixish Happened

In Business, Life, Pixish, Stories on 10 February 2008 with 11 comments

With some stories, it’s hard to know where to begin. I could start with my obsession with photography and magazines that goes back to when I was a kid. Or I could talk about running a newspaper in college and working at HotWired in the ’90s. Or when I started a photography magazine and a [...]

I Love You, Too, V-Moda

In Bravo, Business, Customer Service, Technology, iPhone on 24 December 2007 with 2 comments

Blogs are so often used for the “I’m outraged at this company” kinda posts, I thought I’d go out of my way to mention companies doing it right. A couple days ago I professed my love for Uline because of their excellent customer service. Today I thought I’d give a little love to V-Moda.
Shortly after [...]

Uline, I Think I Love You

In Bravo, Business, Customer Service on 22 December 2007 with 2 comments

Uline is total packing porn. Anything that needs to go into another thing to go in the mail, you can get there. Uline catalogs are cherished items in our house. Favorite items in the last one: box of rags, air in a can, bogus paper, strapping tape.
I knew I liked Uline for the sheer packaging [...]

Rule 1 for Collaborative Media: Ask First

In Business, Community, Creativity, Crowdsourcing, Internet, Justice, Photography, Technology on 17 December 2007 with 27 comments

Here’s what happened, as far as I can tell.
Lane Hartwell is a fantastic photographer. She recently went full-time with her photography career.
A few weeks ago, an acapella group called the Richter Scales did a parody of Billy Joel’s song, “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” with new lyrics about the internet. They made a music [...]

What’s on Your List?

In Business, Journalism, NaBloPoMo, Writing on 19 November 2007 with Comments Off

So me and six thousand of my friends are participating in National Blog Posting Month right now, which means we’ve all agreed to post to our blogs every day of November. I don’t know about my fellow NaBloPoMo-ers, but today’s the nineteenth day of this and I’m getting to the bottom of the barrel. So [...]

Launching a Magazine the Un-Dumb Way

In Business, Magazines, Quotes on 16 November 2007 with 6 comments

Dave Eggers, on launching magazines:
With Might, we did it the dumb way. We thought we had to do 100,000 circulation and we had to have all this advertising, and it was never going to happen and no one got paid, we were all perpetually disappointed, and it folded. We found out that wasn’t the way [...]

A Geeky Take on the WGA Strike

In Business, Geek, Internet, Politics, WGA Strike, Writers on 9 November 2007 with 15 comments

So if you’re missing your Jon Stewart, you probably know that the WGA is on strike. That means, unless this gets worked out soon, your television is about to get a lot more boring. And that sucks for everyone.
I’m an author. I actually wrote a book that I theoretically get royalties on. I say “theoretically” [...]

NaBloPoMo Q&A 4: The Web Biz

In Business, Geek, How to, Internet, Interviews, NaBloPoMo, Q&A on 6 November 2007 with 3 comments

Zazzy asked:
I’m studying web development. Do you have any tips for crossing that hump between moderately-talented-amateur to professional (or you know, semi-almost-professional)?
I’ve worked in the web biz since 1995. Back then, there were no courses in web stuff. No degrees. So the people who got hired were the ones with “killer homepages” (to use the [...]