The $100 Startup is the first physical book that I've actually finished in years, which is very high praise that I give to Chris Guillebeau and also a back handed insult that I give to myself.
The $100 Startup is a book for someone who likes listening to underdog stories or for an underdog who wants to create their own success story but isn't sure how to start. It has a step by step formula that it wishes to teach and despite a broad concept, the steps it lists feel very specific.
When reading, I constantly question the value of my time spent reading, hence the extremely low number of books that I have actually completed. The $100 Startup, provides valuable lessons in a clear list and an anecdotal fashion. One Saturday night I stayed up until 2:30am reading it before bed. I fell asleep with the book beside me. When I woke up it was 11:30am. I picked the book up and continued where I left off.
I am a novice in the world of business and that makes me The $100 Startup's target audience. I wouldn't recommend this book to a more seasoned business person the information contained might seem obvious or not specific enough.
The book seems to hit these elements in this priority.
1) Communicating that anyone can start a business from a salable passion.
2) Reinforcing the possibility that you can do this too. Motivating you to do it too.
3) Here are the steps and tips on how you can do it.
4) Visit my website for more product.
The lesson of, to maximize profit, you should sell to your customers more than once, is explained in the book but feeling it subtly being done to me was slightly uncomfortable. Never the less I continued the book and finished it satisfactorily.
Actually when I bought this book from The Book Depository I accidentally bought two copies. I was a bit "..oh geez" at first because I thought that this was a book that couldn't even easily be gifted, but having read it, I thoroughly recommend this to anyone wanting to change their life monetarily or not.
4.5/5 - Great read for a wanna be small time entrepreneur.
-0.5 points as The $100 Startup seems to promote building a job for yourself as opposed to a business. I want my business to be a stepping stone to my freedom. This book doesn't teach me how to do that, but it does teach me how to start.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Sunday, July 15, 2012
On the weekend I watched Indie Game: The Movie. It really struck a chord with me being a gamer and also and animation graduate.
While the film didn't go into the process of making a game in as much depth as I had hoped, it did show the heart ache and struggles of being a creative. From my experience of making a final year film in college, putting my soul into it and having it up on a screen for strangers to judge every aspect of my work and message, I can relate to the protagonists of Indie Game: The Movie, so some degree. The difference between us is that they risked everything they had and put themselves on a global stage with financial repercussions.
I think that this is a good behind the scenes look of what it takes for the every-man to be successful. They sacrificed their social lives, relationships, security, pride and put themselves out to succeed or fail in massive proportions on a public stage.
In underdog movies like Rocky, The Shawshank Redemption or Forest Gump, the opportunity to become a success in life seems to be granted, a necessity for survival or a result of a special character. In Rocky, Rocky is randomly chosen to fight Appolo Creed at the whim of of the champ's manager. In The Shawshank Redemption, Andy Dufresne never belonged in prison nor would his character allow himself to stay there. He was destined to escape or for his personality to die in that prison. In the case of Forest Gump, he was just an exceptionally unusual character one could not call him an every-man. Despite his low level of intelligence, his high sense of morals and integrity led the way for his success.
These three characters, though fictional, I think are representative of how we view successful people. You either have to be lucky/chosen, be pushed into an all or nothing situation or just different, genius or otherwise.
Where is the real every-man successful guy (or gal)? They weren't chosen or pushed, they didn't have to risk everything and they're not (that) different from us. Regardless, they chose to put themselves into the hard up, stressed out stage of success or failure. Those are the real underdogs. The ones that fought the status quo of life. Their stories are less dramatic and if they quit, no one would notice and no one would die, but doesn't that make the idea of quitting 100 times easier an option and yet they still didn't take it?
Not too many everyday people know that Bill Gates made his first great leap with Microsoft by buying DOS from a programmer and using it to partner with IBM. He didn't invent the computer or anything to begin with. He was a middle man who built a business.
This is a rather long rant about noticing a common theme in a movie I watched on the weekend:
While the film didn't go into the process of making a game in as much depth as I had hoped, it did show the heart ache and struggles of being a creative. From my experience of making a final year film in college, putting my soul into it and having it up on a screen for strangers to judge every aspect of my work and message, I can relate to the protagonists of Indie Game: The Movie, so some degree. The difference between us is that they risked everything they had and put themselves on a global stage with financial repercussions.
I think that this is a good behind the scenes look of what it takes for the every-man to be successful. They sacrificed their social lives, relationships, security, pride and put themselves out to succeed or fail in massive proportions on a public stage.
In underdog movies like Rocky, The Shawshank Redemption or Forest Gump, the opportunity to become a success in life seems to be granted, a necessity for survival or a result of a special character. In Rocky, Rocky is randomly chosen to fight Appolo Creed at the whim of of the champ's manager. In The Shawshank Redemption, Andy Dufresne never belonged in prison nor would his character allow himself to stay there. He was destined to escape or for his personality to die in that prison. In the case of Forest Gump, he was just an exceptionally unusual character one could not call him an every-man. Despite his low level of intelligence, his high sense of morals and integrity led the way for his success.
These three characters, though fictional, I think are representative of how we view successful people. You either have to be lucky/chosen, be pushed into an all or nothing situation or just different, genius or otherwise.
Where is the real every-man successful guy (or gal)? They weren't chosen or pushed, they didn't have to risk everything and they're not (that) different from us. Regardless, they chose to put themselves into the hard up, stressed out stage of success or failure. Those are the real underdogs. The ones that fought the status quo of life. Their stories are less dramatic and if they quit, no one would notice and no one would die, but doesn't that make the idea of quitting 100 times easier an option and yet they still didn't take it?
Not too many everyday people know that Bill Gates made his first great leap with Microsoft by buying DOS from a programmer and using it to partner with IBM. He didn't invent the computer or anything to begin with. He was a middle man who built a business.
This is a rather long rant about noticing a common theme in a movie I watched on the weekend:
- success comes from pushing yourself when no one else is looking,
- working though doubt
- and believing in yourself to finish what you start.
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Invest in Yourself - Learn to Power Search with Google
The best investment you can make is investing in yourself.
Growing up playing computer games I felt a disassociation between the gaming world and the achidemic world. Now, even though I don't have much time to sit around playing computer games (mobile gaming is my only consolation), I have started to see a corrilation between the two.
No matter what you do in life you can learn something from it. My favourite type of games are RPGs - role playing games. You have a character and must fulfil a story. You character always starts off weak, an you have to build him (or rarely her) up, allocating experience points to develope skills, plotting a knowledge destination through the skill tree.
Unfortunately, in real life, there is no set story to fulfil. If you don't know what your story is, you don't know which skill set is the best for achieving this goal. This is my current dilemma. As a teenager I decided I wanted to be an animator. I had one direction for my skill tree to go in, and after eight tough years in education and working in animation, I have decided that I don't want to be an animator anymore.
In a game this kind of decision is basically saying; "Game Over","New Game", "Select Character." In real life, I am the only character. In real life, most skill sets are not straight lines. What was a great skill to have in the past, may not be a great skill in the future, or even currently. All we can do is look at trends and guestimate.
So this is my guestimation for you.
The internet isn't going away anytime soon and either is Google, at least for a few years anway. Google has put up a free online course Power Searching with Google. (Registration ends July 16th)
Its a very short high quality course and you get a coveted certificate from Google at the end of it. I think it's a pretty safe and simple investment decision. I don't think I'm going to stop searching for things in Google any time soon so, the knowledge and future time and frustration saved is worth the time investment I'll be paying now. Also for people interested in having any kind of online business, I think this is a must do. I don't think that I need to explain Googles power on the web, so learning how Google search works is a must!
Growing up playing computer games I felt a disassociation between the gaming world and the achidemic world. Now, even though I don't have much time to sit around playing computer games (mobile gaming is my only consolation), I have started to see a corrilation between the two.
No matter what you do in life you can learn something from it. My favourite type of games are RPGs - role playing games. You have a character and must fulfil a story. You character always starts off weak, an you have to build him (or rarely her) up, allocating experience points to develope skills, plotting a knowledge destination through the skill tree.
Unfortunately, in real life, there is no set story to fulfil. If you don't know what your story is, you don't know which skill set is the best for achieving this goal. This is my current dilemma. As a teenager I decided I wanted to be an animator. I had one direction for my skill tree to go in, and after eight tough years in education and working in animation, I have decided that I don't want to be an animator anymore.
In a game this kind of decision is basically saying; "Game Over","New Game", "Select Character." In real life, I am the only character. In real life, most skill sets are not straight lines. What was a great skill to have in the past, may not be a great skill in the future, or even currently. All we can do is look at trends and guestimate.
So this is my guestimation for you.
The internet isn't going away anytime soon and either is Google, at least for a few years anway. Google has put up a free online course Power Searching with Google. (Registration ends July 16th)
Its a very short high quality course and you get a coveted certificate from Google at the end of it. I think it's a pretty safe and simple investment decision. I don't think I'm going to stop searching for things in Google any time soon so, the knowledge and future time and frustration saved is worth the time investment I'll be paying now. Also for people interested in having any kind of online business, I think this is a must do. I don't think that I need to explain Googles power on the web, so learning how Google search works is a must!
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
FU Money - The Formula.
I always defined FU money as, having an excess of income, so that you can throw money at a problem to say 'F*ck you" without having to say the physical words.
For example, someone being a jerk to you in the bar? Pay them to leave you alone, or walk away and buy them some really expensive drinks, while making it obvious that the money means nothing to you. Or take out a physical wad of bills and slap someone in the face with it. (I'v always dreamed of doing this, but doubt that if I was mad enough to slap someone that I'd be reaching for my wallet.)
Lifehacker.com has a new article out that says FU money is, "any amount of money allowing infinite perpetuation of wealth necessary to maintain a desired lifestyle without needing employment or assistance from anyone. "
infinite perpetuation of wealth. I agree with that! Buy then Lifehacker takes a weird slant on this. They toss in a life time instead of infinite perpetuation. They switch to basically, how much does a retirement cost?
To me, that isn't FU money. Retirement has a deadline, in which you should be dead by. If you're still alive after the deadline, you lose! You've no more money to live off of. So retirement is just creating a lose lose situation for yourself.
Anyway, the article is an interesting read and worth the time. Check it out.
For example, someone being a jerk to you in the bar? Pay them to leave you alone, or walk away and buy them some really expensive drinks, while making it obvious that the money means nothing to you. Or take out a physical wad of bills and slap someone in the face with it. (I'v always dreamed of doing this, but doubt that if I was mad enough to slap someone that I'd be reaching for my wallet.)
Lifehacker.com has a new article out that says FU money is, "any amount of money allowing infinite perpetuation of wealth necessary to maintain a desired lifestyle without needing employment or assistance from anyone. "
infinite perpetuation of wealth. I agree with that! Buy then Lifehacker takes a weird slant on this. They toss in a life time instead of infinite perpetuation. They switch to basically, how much does a retirement cost?
To me, that isn't FU money. Retirement has a deadline, in which you should be dead by. If you're still alive after the deadline, you lose! You've no more money to live off of. So retirement is just creating a lose lose situation for yourself.
Anyway, the article is an interesting read and worth the time. Check it out.
Although being Irish, I am currently residing in South Korea because of work (also I like Korea). Thinking that I'll be spending at least another year here, I thought I'd cancel my Irish credit card that is with Bank of Ireland.
I phoned Bank of Ireland up via Skype and found for the first time they were very polite and helpful. However, they informed me that I could not close my credit card account because there is now a government stamp duty of €30, which is about $36. My current balance can't cover the stamp duty so I can't close my credit card account yet.
Whoever the hell thought up putting a flat tax of €30 to CLOSE a credit card account should be shot! "Rip Off Ireland" is the understatement of the century!
After hearing that news, I popped to the bank here to be informed that it costs about €20 just to send money internationally to my credit card account. So the cost of closing a credit card from abroad has risen to €50.
Feeling slightly defeated, I phoned my mum and asked her to pay the money for me, so that I could evade the international transfer fee. She then began to school me saying how I should keep the credit card because it's really difficult to get a credit card issued to you in Ireland now-a-days. Suddenly the pieces fit.
It's no secret that Ireland is financially f*cked. The banks f*cked us and the government helped the banks f*ck us. Now even in in Korea, the government is reaching half way across the world to still f*ck me.
They say, you can either be milked by us monthly with credit card charges etc for a credit card you don't need. You shouldn't leave the milking parlor for fear of what's outside and also, you mightn't be let back in. If you're determined to leave, you can be sure you're gonna take a slab of that rump roast before you go.
Sure, that's Ireland for you.
I phoned Bank of Ireland up via Skype and found for the first time they were very polite and helpful. However, they informed me that I could not close my credit card account because there is now a government stamp duty of €30, which is about $36. My current balance can't cover the stamp duty so I can't close my credit card account yet.
Whoever the hell thought up putting a flat tax of €30 to CLOSE a credit card account should be shot! "Rip Off Ireland" is the understatement of the century!
After hearing that news, I popped to the bank here to be informed that it costs about €20 just to send money internationally to my credit card account. So the cost of closing a credit card from abroad has risen to €50.
Feeling slightly defeated, I phoned my mum and asked her to pay the money for me, so that I could evade the international transfer fee. She then began to school me saying how I should keep the credit card because it's really difficult to get a credit card issued to you in Ireland now-a-days. Suddenly the pieces fit.
It's no secret that Ireland is financially f*cked. The banks f*cked us and the government helped the banks f*ck us. Now even in in Korea, the government is reaching half way across the world to still f*ck me.
They say, you can either be milked by us monthly with credit card charges etc for a credit card you don't need. You shouldn't leave the milking parlor for fear of what's outside and also, you mightn't be let back in. If you're determined to leave, you can be sure you're gonna take a slab of that rump roast before you go.
Sure, that's Ireland for you.
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
20 Business Fail - Mission
In short, I don't want to have to work my entire life and be left with not very much in old age.
I want to have money.
I want to be able to have a good time with my friends.
I want to be able to take care of myself and my folks in their old age.
I want to have freedom money. I want to have enough money so that I don't have to report to a boss everyday. I want to choose where I live and what time I work at.
Dare I say it? I wanna have f*ck you money! The kind of money that you can slap people in the face with should they deserve it.
Most audacious of all. I want all of this by the age of 40.
As my humble, yoga obsessed, firm owning lawyer of an uncle once told me;
Well, how do I make money?
From what I learned from Robert Kiyosaki's book Rich Dad Poor Dad, there's four ways to make money, and the first step on the route I'm choosing, is to be a small business owner.
BUT they say 95% of all businesses fail. That's 19/20. Only one out of 20 businesses succeeds.
Solution? Start 20 businesses. Work hard but with the expectation that I'll fail. I just need one hit and I'm off to the bank. ^^
20 Business Fail is my log and my accountability to start the task of creating 20 businesses with the goal of creating one success.
I want to have money.
I want to be able to have a good time with my friends.
I want to be able to take care of myself and my folks in their old age.
I want to have freedom money. I want to have enough money so that I don't have to report to a boss everyday. I want to choose where I live and what time I work at.
Dare I say it? I wanna have f*ck you money! The kind of money that you can slap people in the face with should they deserve it.
Most audacious of all. I want all of this by the age of 40.
As my humble, yoga obsessed, firm owning lawyer of an uncle once told me;
"Grace, money isn't everything... but it's everything else."
Well, how do I make money?
From what I learned from Robert Kiyosaki's book Rich Dad Poor Dad, there's four ways to make money, and the first step on the route I'm choosing, is to be a small business owner.
BUT they say 95% of all businesses fail. That's 19/20. Only one out of 20 businesses succeeds.
Solution? Start 20 businesses. Work hard but with the expectation that I'll fail. I just need one hit and I'm off to the bank. ^^
20 Business Fail is my log and my accountability to start the task of creating 20 businesses with the goal of creating one success.
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