All Points West

I just bought my tickets to All Points West. I'll be going on Saturday to see Radiohead, Metric, Animal Collective and The Roots among others. Here is the line up for each day.

Hope to see you there.

The Dangers of Success

Maybe I should title this post: The Dangers of Middle Management, Relative Success and Laziness, but that wouldn't fit in my narrow layout here.

I'm looking back over several years of my career and realizing that I've worked very hard to get where I am today. I'm young and, relatively speaking, I've gone a very long way. This is a good thing, because it means that I'm not only ahead of the curve, but I have much further to go.

This has its benefits. From the satisfaction of belong to, and making an impact on, the shape of new media to the ability to buy a nice seafood dinner when you feel like it without breaking the bank. These are two very different things - I'm proud that I've been able to accomplish them together but, somewhere along the line, this has a make or break point.

It could be argued that if I focused much more of my time on participating in our humble community, volunteering myself to decision-making boards and committees and building the next generation of applications and events with the aim of educating others to do the same that my impact would be greater felt and, in turn, my satisfaction more rewarding.

But then where would I make my money? I like those seafood dinners; if I ate beef I'd probably want to make it a steak. So, the other side of the equation: sell out.

I went to art school where I studied communication and journalism. I have fond memories of wandering campus and seeing painters by the fountain, dancers under the big banyan tree and musicians and actors out by the lake. Today I work in business development and if you ask any current student at my alma mater, they'd likely say that I've sold out.

I'm okay with that, like I said before, I like those seafood dinners.

Now, I'm faced with a dilemma. I don't fundamentally believe that by making yourself an industry expert, or "important" person, that opportunity will follow. I do think it's important to be an industry expert, if you're to be successful, but if your driving reason is business, well then, business is your primary objective.

One needs to make a personal decision on which path to take.

That's where Relative Success and Laziness come in. I'd like to run my own company again and, this time, I'd like to do it successfully. But, in order for that to work, I'm going to have to bust my ass making it reality. Why do that when I can bring home a decent, reliable check each week? Because I have to.

The problem with Relative Success is that it's easy to accept. I suppose that every entrepreneur is faced with this at some point. Taking that leap is a hard thing to do. So my question is, how do you prepare for that?

What Happend to Joost?

Remember Joost? What happened? They were media darlings for ages... now, I rarely hear anything save maybe a content partnership reported in Cynopsis. My theory: who really wants to download an application when so much video is available online?

I use Hulu all the time at Rachel's house. She doesn't have cable, so it's a great way for us to catch up on the latest NBC/Fox shows. However, as much as I watch Hulu while I'm there, I've never thought of downloading Joost.

Ah well. I'd love to see usage numbers since launch.

Remember: you can get to this blog by visiting http://www.ilovejoost.com.

Quick Thoughts

I'm back from Milan and completely swamped trying to catch up with everything, so I've decided to provide some quick thoughts:

• HD video online has a long way to go. Especially in Europe.
• Sales and business development are so much easier when people are calling you. That starts with great product development.
• Silly, public spats between members of the NextNY and/or Newtech e-mail lists are a waste of everyone's time.
• Spending too much time reading RSS feeds isn't good. It's okay to hit 'mark all as read.' You'll find out about this or that news eventually.
• There's no way you can or should participate in every single beta launch out there.
• There is huge market opportunity in Western Europe for providing easy access to online services.
• Don't try to be everything to everyone, you'll end up being useless to all involved; including yourself.
• Networking events are a waste of time unless you have something productive to add.

Back to work.

I Forgot My 1099-R

I did my taxes last night using TaxAct online. Overall, a painless process. But, I came into my office today and realized that I forgot to submit information from a 1099-R form. That's a distribution from a 401K plan that I held shortly while I was at The NewsMarket. It's not a lot of money (we're talking just a few hundred bucks), but I forgot to include it... and already submitted my taxes.

What can I do? I'm choosing to ignore it. If the IRS notices it, I'll man up and do what I have to do. But, here's to hoping that my refund is posted to my account with no questions asked.

By the way, unrelated, but I'm heading to Milan next week for business. What should I see while I'm there?

Can You Claim Yourself As a Dependent?

I thought I'd share a funny dialog over IM with a friend of mine.

Friend: so if you're single
Friend: can you claim yourself as a dependent? like 1 instead of 0?
Me: you can't claim yourself as a dependent.
Friend: that just seems unfair. I totally depend on myself

I think he had a point. What about my poor-ass girlfriend? She totally depends on me.