Startups


17
Oct 09

“You Can’t Do What You Want By Doing Something Else”

It’s worth a read..

And it’s dense, by which I mean not fluffy but packed with insight. He spent years researching and developing this book, and his own struggle is woven into it. Indeed, it’s not about formulas and answers, but about the struggle itself.

One observation set me back. There are lots of people who wanted to do one thing but then got “practical” and did something else “first.” The idea was that they’d be successful and sock away money doing the practical thing, and after that they could go back to the thing they loved. Bronson was sure that, among the hundreds of people that he interviewed, someone would actually have been successful with this strategy. It sounds so reasonable, after all.

But he encountered exactly zero people who pulled it off. Everyone who tried got sucked into the “practical” career and were never able to extract themselves from it. Too comfortable, too many expectations from friends and family, too easy just to keep doing what you’re doing.

Although we admire when someone can do something unique and creative, society is set up to resist such attempts. Your parents, with all the love and best intentions, will urge you to do something that “makes a good living.” Your friends and coworkers resist behaviors that might take you away from them, and will tell you stories of how this or that person tried and failed. And hardest of all, when you are ready to make your leap of faith, the temptations appear; the tremendous opportunities that for some reason only come out of the woodwork when you are ready to walk out the door.

There’s a quote that appears again and again in various forms: “close one door, another opens.” It seems like magical thinking until you see it happen. And it only happens when you don’t leave the door partially open, but instead firmly close it. For some reason, being certain that you’re ready to move on does cause some kind of magic to happen, and I don’t know why.

This doesn’t mean it will be easy. But your struggles will be towards happiness rather than trying to avoid some litany of unpleasant things as most people do — and most people (over 80% in this country, it appears) are unhappy in their careers. And knowing that you are moving towards something that you love (even if you don’t yet know what it is) seems more likely to make you happy than just marking time in a job, waiting for something to happen so you can start doing what you really want.


7
Oct 09

Stop Waiting For The Perfect Time..

I am not sure about you but a lot of people around me have advice me to wait for the perfect time to do something.

When I was young, I was told to wait for the perfect time to start having fun, and concentrate completely on my studies. I was told that this is the most important part of my life and once I graduate, with that shiny degree I would be able to do whatever I wish.

Once graduated, I was told to grab a job – start saving and once I have saved enough, paid my dues to the society I would be free to do whatever I wish.

And so on, I wonder when this cycle of advice will end and when will I be able to do “whatever” I wish?
The common theme across all the advice that I received was to meet a certain personal set of conditions before I can make the next move in my life. Now think about all the advices you received, the choices you made and realize that those were nothing but excuses. Blaming some outside force that we can’t control, creating obstacles that aren’t actually there. Soon I realized that this becomes a never ending trap. All sort of thoughts start to come to our mind. “I can’t pursue this dream unless I leave my job and I can’t leave my job since I need to pay bills”.

Another scenario is when we start thinking that we have thousand of problems in our life. We start to rant about anything that’s causing us to stress and fail to do anything to correct it. We get overwhelmed by our thoughts and eventually just give up.

The problem is that perfect time doesn’t exist. It’s illusive. It’s misleading. You will end up waiting for it all your life.

There will never be a perfect time to pursue your dreams, to do something valuable, to make a difference. No matter when you make these choices, there will always be a risk factor.

So my only advice to myself and people around me is to stop waiting. Create change in your life; create change in other people’s life. There is no such thing as “perfection” and there certainly isn’t any perfect time.


2
Oct 09

Your great (secret) startup idea — sucks!

Your great (secret) startup idea — sucks!
Even though you may be onto something but your startup idea probably sucks. See the thing is that we get so excited about our idea that we keep it close to our chest, so no one else can run with it and beat us to the punch.
Unfortunately, I have some bad news for you. There are at least 10 other people in this world who thought of exactly (or better) the same idea that you are guarding.
It is a well known fact that it is the execution of the idea that matters and not the idea itself.
So my advice to all you out there is to talk about your idea, talking with others will help you refine your idea, gather feedback and fine tune it for the launch.
So go out there and make that idea a reality. Talk to people, fix it, refine it and relaunch.
I am not interested in “waiting” for your “big idea” to be rolled out after 2 years. This world wants instant results. So build that first iteration with just one feature.
That’s what we did for Mazaydar.

Even though you may be onto something but your startup idea probably sucks. See the thing is, we get so excited about our idea that we decide to keep it close to our chest, so no one else can run away with it and beat us to the punch.

Unfortunately, I have some bad news for you. There are at least 10 other people in this world who thought of exactly (or better) the same idea that you are guarding. It is a well known fact that it is the execution of the idea that matters and not the idea itself.

So my advice to all you out there is to talk about your idea, talking with others will help you refine your idea, gather feedback and fine tune it for the launch.

So go out there and make that idea a reality. Talk to people, fix it, refine it and relaunch.

I am not interested in “waiting” for your “big idea” to be rolled out after 2 years. This world wants instant results. So build that first iteration with just one feature.

That’s what we did for Mazaydar.


27
Aug 09

The more options there are, the easier it is to regret choice.

First watch this:

Very interesting and thought provoking. So what does this mean to us entrepreneurs who are trying to put a solution in front of our customers. If you are making a new social network, does it fall under the same problem? Too many choices for the end user and they might not be satisfied with your product.

I think it is important to consider this question when developing your product. Will your customers be able to identify it as something different, something new? Are you making just another ______ (whatever that is)? or are you creating a whole new product that will make your customers say “Gee I never thought I needed this solution until I saw this..”

It is very easy to fall into this trap. Don’t go for the generic stuff, create a brand. Make yourself unique.


26
May 09

PakTranslations.com – A small redesign

I love cool technology. Maybe it is the nerd in me that gets excited after seeing something awesome but I sure do love cool technology.

One such great technology is powered by PakTranslations.com – To see how awesome the technology is you can see the urdu version of Mazaydar.com!

paktranslations

So what’s this blog post all about? While I love their technology, one thing that bothered me was their UI. I think they can make the site and technology a great hit if can make users life easier. They already have a great way to do it but its sorta hidden.

So I spent about an hour or so last night, while I couldn’t sleep and came up with this small mock layout.

Some thoughts behind the layout:

1. My goal was to keep the focus on the cool technology. I certainly didn’t spend too much time on the logo, which can certainly use some work

2. The “Instant Translation” is a nifty feature. Users need to know that they can place http://www.paktranslations.com/? infront of any url to get it translated.

3. Bookmarklets are also awesome, I have been using them and they are just simply great to translate anything instantly.

I think the whole website is an amazing idea, a much needed innovation coming out of Pakistan. I am sure as they progress the technology will just keep getting better and better. But I also strongly believe that a good technology which isnt’ accessible is not worth much. People need to be able to use the technology easily to be able to provide feedback that is needed.

Note: The design is totally opensource for PakTranslations team to adapt.