This simple idea applies to literally everyone with a driver’s license. The keyword here is “license.” And yes, it involves you. A license is granted once the applicant, typically a spry and eager teenager, passes a written test and the state sponsored or licensed driving test. Permits are issued under certain circumstances, but require a … Read more Redefining the Driver’s License
In 2004, Tom Preston Werner created something huge. His idea was cemented in history as Matt Mullenweg and Automattic acquired the service in 2007. Matt and his team developed WordPress, and integrated Tom’s creation into the code base. What what is creation? Gravatar. The idea was simple really – a central repository for your digital … Read more Free idea: decentralized avatar repository for Social VR
Before we get to Social VR, let’s recap. It’s 2017, almost 2018, and Virtual Reality systems are selling better than ever. The variety of VR hardware is stunning, with prices ranging from a simple $10 “cardboard” system to multi-thousand dollar haptic VR rigs with 360 degree rotation. The individual titles available are getting more immersive … Read more Free idea: An open Social VR API
Virtual Reality (VR) is improving the way humans interact. It’s creating human scale relationships, new forms of work, and opportunity. The early days of VR were research (funded by the military), big business, health, and science. The latest generation is about intense immersive gaming – sweat, fatigue, adrenaline, and anxiety all present. The experiences are … Read more Work in Virtual Reality is a once in a lifetime opportunity
It’s time to come clean: You’ve probably noticed that I’ve been scaling way back on commitments for the past 6 to 9 months. From a hyper-reduced role in the Dallas Startup Community, to stepping down at Launch DFW, to fewer interactions with the City of Dallas, and even fewer within my own neighborhood (currently, The … Read more How I’m overcoming commitment debt
Heather and I are fascinated with the idea of living off the grid in a much simpler, much less “distracting” environment. It’s not just to get away from the noise of the city busses and semis that whiz by just 30′ from our master bedroom window, or the random stranger passing at 3am, singing as … Read more How much does it cost to live “off the grid?”
Recently I spent some time reading, researching, and watching the state of the art in several areas of interest, notably CGI/computer animation, VR, text to voice, and facial pattern recognition. The takeaway is that all of the pieces are in place for an idea I’ve had for several years. Be advised, many of the videos … Read more What do computer graphics, assisted intelligence, Watson, and actual humans have in common?
One of the easiest ways to foster personal accountability is to make others aware of your intentions. Tell a group of cyclist peers that you're going on a two hour ride today, and I'll bet you do it. You may even invite a few just to make sure it happens. If you're a developer, and … Read more What is #1OnMyList
This idea came to me as I was listening to C.C. Chapman's podcast Managing the Gray. Specifically, the episode was Bringing the Social Back – a look at how the face to face aspect of social networking is disappearing. Those of us that live in the social media bubble can relate – the only time … Read more The Global Backyard BBQ. Or, Bring the Social Back!
I wrote this as an email to a good friend of mine shortly after I returned from a 3 week family road road trip. I've tweaked it for public consumption, but for the most part remains the same. We traveled through 13 states (4,500 miles) to see family and just spend some time together. It … Read more The Depressed Southern Small Town Economy
In order to help survive poor business decisions made over the last 40 years, the big auto makers are seeking a federal bailout to the tune of $25 billion. I simply don't believe that it is the place of government to bail out failing companies. If a failing company is to survive, it is the … Read more The Perfect Solution for Detroit
This is an entry I made on the thefives blog. It summarizes everything succinctly. I wanted to give you all an update on the status of thefives.tv. The support for this project has been nothing short of amazing. We have 5 confirmed hosts, and three referrals that I've yet to hear from. Based on the … Read more thefives.tv : Five questions to ask a total stranger
Here's a funny one. Imagine being able to ask a historical figure a question about life. You'd probably start with one figure, then add them as you find experts that want to participate. Of course this only works if you can get obsessed scholars to participate… but if they're that obsessed it wouldn't be too … Read more Ask a dead guy
I was listening to a podcast about a new concept for having news reported. The concept is that people put money into a pot, and when the pot reaches a given amount someone will write a story. The stories, from what I remember, aren't about typical local news, but more about local investigative journalism. One … Read more Where do you get your local news?
I've been AFK for quite a while, focusing my work time on HyperSites exclusively. It is better than ever as a result… but now it is time to spend my off hours building my passion. My passion is called Social Ingenuity. It is a huge project that centers directly in the social networking space. It … Read more Excitement and passion.
I've come up with a term, and I'd like to start a conversation around it. We're all familiar with the word “age.” Typically this word is used to mark a place in something's chronological progression. For example, I'll turn 39 next week. Or a bottle of wine is 39 years old. My americano is ten … Read more A new term, feedback please. 🙂
Someone make textcastr.com please. Yes, the domain is available. The service is simple. A user creates an account at textcastr.com, enters their user names at twitter, pownce, facebook, etc. Textcastr.com provides their SMS short code to the user… messages sent to the short code are then relayed to the appropriate services. The way you get … Read more Someone make textcastr.com please.
If you can dedicate the time, I highly recommend participating in a Startup Weekend. The concept is simple… people gather from all disciplines of business to create a company and product within 56 hours. No one knows at 0 hour Friday what the idea is, yet everyone that participates gets equal ownership in the result. … Read more Startups, entrepreneurship, and user generated content?
I've been giving a lot of thought to the StartupWeekend phenomena. As I and others have mentioned, it was amazing to see such remarkable talent show up, ready to play. There were no rules, and no expectations other than to see a startup launched by Sunday. People got together to do something cool with the … Read more What is Social Ingenuity anyway?
Well under way, Startup Weekend is absolutely one of the coolest things I've been involved in. The company we've created is a web/sms service for making quick decisions. If you want to ask a few friends about a decision you want to make, come to the site, enter their email addresses, or mobile phone numbers, … Read more VoSnap, Inc. – The fruit of StartupWeekend.com
While trying to come up with a usable solution for a friend of mine's mobile lifestyle requirements, it occurred to me that there is an untapped network of temporary living spaces around the world. It is just that the owners, the hotel chains, don't know it yet. If you're untethered (single, no kids, can work … Read more The mobile lifestyle done right, a network of… hotels?
Everyone has heard the term “micro-payment.” It has been associated with monetizing websites for nearly as long as the internet has been commercialized. Here's an outline for a simple way to monetize a site, using modern web technology and micro-payments. The key here is to think in terms of cents, rather than dollars. If you … Read more Micro-payments and the modern web – monetizing the blog
If you want to see the path to a cool company that could provide valuable services to prosumers and executives around the globe, follow this puzzle. Read this then watch this. If you take this combine it with this and this you too can have your knowledge navigator service provider. Today. Anyone interested?
There are several places that let you define a URL and tag it with interests. Is there a service that lets you tag all or part of a web page? Maybe just an image? Why do we trust a Google with that when humans can do it better? Imagine reading an article at BusinessWeek where … Read more Social tagging – user tagged searching
Chris and I came up with a really cool idea for distraction project. We decided to try and build it within 24 man hours… and we did it. http://grillm.com is a simple social networking site… with a twist. You don't know anyone and the way you get friends is to earn their friendship by asking … Read more A fun new project… grillm.com
This idea is pretty simple and involves website authentication and your mobile phone. It is a two factor authentication scheme that relies on the EIMI number embedded in your phone and the traditional user name/password combination, common on websites. Put on your user hat. You go to the login page of a website, enter your … Read more Multifactor website security and your phone
As my friend David says, good ideas are a dime a dozen. Well David, here's another one I had, then found. I hate when that happens. “Data de-duplication, also called data de-dupe, removes duplicate information as data is backed up or archived. It can be done on the file level, where duplicate files are replaced … Read more De-dupe and the desktop
