I want to first start out by venting my frustration with my BlackBerry Tour that I purchased less than 6 months ago. Every single person that I know who has a BlackBerry has had problems with it. Either the trackball breaks, the keys stop working properly, the phone randomly crashes, the phone gets wiped out during upgrades, and or some combination of these problems (and others).

My trackball first showed signs of not working properly within 2 months of getting my phone. As the weeks wore on, it got harder and harder to use. Eventually I got fed up with it and called Verizon. They shipped out a new BlackBerry Tour for me. I restored my backup onto my new device, and when I went to upgrade the phone, everything got deleted. And the BlackBerry software on my computer stopped working. Long story short: after spending a good chunk of my day doing multiple uninstalls-installs, restoring data, and updating everything, I finally got my replacement phone working again. Even with my insane amount of optimism, I am confident that my new device will break down or cause me a headache shortly.

Now on to the business model of cell phones. Right now, in the USA, cell phones are mainly sold through a razor blade model. The carrier gives away the phone (or heavily subsidizes it) and in return, you sign a long term contract with heavy termination fees. And many devices are only available on certain carriers — the perfect example being the iPhone on AT&T. I expect and hope that this model will be disrupted shortly. What we need is more competition between carriers and device manufacturers — no more exclusive contracts on devices or forcing people to sign long term contracts. Competition breeds innovation and lowers prices. I want to be able to buy any phone and use it on any carrier with no contracts required. Some important highlights:

• On January 5, 2010, Google released the Nexus One phone. This phone can be purchased unlocked and can be used on any carrier.
• Rumors are that this Wednesday, AT&T will lose exclusivity over the iPhone

I am hopeful that such developments are the start of a longer term trend where consumers are given more options in devices and carriers become commoditized.

Just a few days away and we are in 2010. It’s crazy to think that this past decade will be my first memorable decade; I’m old enough to remember the later 1990s, but those years do not have the same distinction as the 2000s. I look back on so many significant or memorable events/changes: everything from the September 11 terrorist attacks to the mass scale adoption of smart phones to the long awaited emergence of Brazil-Russia-India-China to the recent global financial crisis of 2007-2009.

I’ve been thinking about time a lot lately. Time has an incredibly unique set of characteristics: everyone has it, you can’t buy it back, everyone spends it differently, it is infinite on a generalized level, it is limited on a personal level, no one knows how much of it they have left, and you can’t stop spending/using it. Given these characteristics, I simply want to maximize the time I have available to me.

I’m excited for what the future brings. I’m graduating college this year. I can’t wait to travel to new places, meet new people, learn about new technologies and businesses, and jump into the world. I can’t wait to see what the coming years have in store for me. I have no predictions other than the fact that human nature will repeat itself in the future as it always has over history: people will make/lose money, people will make irrational decisions, new artists (musicians, actors, etc.) will emerge with new work and performances that captivate us, barriers to entry will drop across various industries, old incumbents will fall at the hands of new emerging startups, political/high profile scandals will unwind, technology will evolve to make our lives easier and better, the world will continue becoming more global/connected, and the clock will keep ticking. Am I an optimist? Hell yes.

Here’s a really cool mashup that my friend Spencer sent to me. It’s a very well done mix of the top 25 Billboard hits of 2009 by DJ Earworm. I think it’s a great way to end my last post of the year:

I recently had the opportunity to attend a talk in one of my classes from real estate billionaire Tom Barrack who runs Colony Capital. His “path” through life has been absolutely non-linear — he started out as a lawyer at a traditional law firm, went broke in Saudi Arabia, found himself in Haiti doing energy deals, before bouncing around in various roles around the US, and somehow ending up as a real estate investor. Now he runs one of the largest private equity real estate firms in the world.

What’d I take away from his talk? The importance of pushing through comfort zones. He emphasized throughout his talk to us how important it is to constantly push yourself beyond what you are comfortable doing. That’s how he ended up pursuing opportunities all around the world. And, as he explained, that’s what he uses as his test for making business decisions where he is in unexplored territory. As always, that’s easier said than done.

Most high achievers grow up with constant external positive reinforcement of their success. When you got an “A” your math test and your teacher gave you a sticker or your parents put the test on the fridge — such actions condition high achievers from a young age to value extrinsic motivation. Furthermore, high achievers develop an avoidance of failure. It’s too easy to stay in a comfort zone and continue achieving without much risk.

What Tom Barrack emphasized is something I have tried to incorporate more into my life in the past few years, although his talk really underlined to me just how important it is. Last year, I signed up for an extremely quantitative class filled with engineers, statistics, and math majors. My initial reaction was one of fear of failure. I wanted to drop the class within 2 weeks because I felt that the material was way above my head and that I could not keep up with other students in the class. But my father convinced me to stick to the class. He put everything in perspective for me: I would just have to work harder than everyone and that I have never in my life backed down from a challenge. Why should I back down now? It made me realize how easy it is to avoid challenges — it’s so much easier to stick to the formula that works. But I faced that class head on and ended up with one of the highest grades in the class. All because I pushed through my comfort zone.

Another recent example came to me in squash, which I only started playing about 2 months ago. I’ve been playing a lot lately, and usually with players who are undoubtedly more experienced than I. I have forced myself to constantly play with people who are better. I get destroyed match after match after match. But I push through it and my game has improved dramatically in the past few weeks. I recently tweeted my approach to squash, which I believe applies to a lot of other things:

If you want to be the best, play with the best…embrace the competition

My serve and court game is decent, but my return game is awful. So what do I do? I always let my opponent serve so that I am constantly under fire and forced to practice my awful return. And it has definitely strengthened my return game.

Basically, I think comfort levels serve as an amazing gut check. Anytime you feel uncomfortable trying something new or difficult — it means that you have to push through it and force yourself to embrace whatever comes your way.

There exist, on a simplified level, two main types of operators in the business world: 1) entities or people who have capital and want to put it to work and 2) entities or people who put that capital to work. Basically, Type 1 has money and Type 2 needs money to run a business, which should generate returns for Type 1. Again, I am grossly generalizing here, but it illustrates a few points.

Until recently, I had only thought of myself as interested in a Type 2 role (running a business), but the current state of the world has opened my eyes to the importance of Type 1.

In a boom, money is loose and easy to find. Capital in essence, becomes a commodity. If you are running a business as a Type 2 at a successful level, everyone is competing over you; everyone wants to invest in your business and put their money to work. Also, in a boom, business is generally good and it’s easier to find customers, charge customers, and ultimately make money. So during boom times, it puts you in a power position to be an entrepreneur putting Type 1 money to work.

In a bust, money is tight and hard to find. Capital is now a rarity. If you have capital (Type 1), everyone is competing over you. Business operators want you to invest in their company. They are willing to take lower valuations and worse terms just for some cash. It’s also harder to run a business when the economy is struggling; customers are harder to find, customers demand better pricing, and everyone tightens up. In such a state of the world, Type 1 sits in the power position.

I constantly hear how right now is the best time to start a business. Conventional wisdom today, at times, feels like it is purposefully contrarian. While right now is a good time to start businesses, especially in areas where incumbents are struggling or out of business, I think it’s a mistake to ignore the importance of having capital.

Right now, to me, seems like a better time to be investing in undervalued assets, investing in startups at low valuations, and putting money to work on much better terms than seen in a long time.

The conclusion is then fairly self-explanatory: I’d rather invest in many businesses at the bottom for cheap than start one business at the bottom. I’d rather operate a business in a boom than invest in businesses at boom prices. In a boom, entrepreneurs are in power. In a bust, capital holders are in power. Be in the power position.

I spent two weeks in August travelling out to Los Angeles, California and Alaska. I had never been to either one before and I spent about a week in each place.

Reflections on Los Angeles:

1) The city is very spread out and decentralized. I spent the first two months of summer living in New York. Los Angeles is eseentially a flattened out New York. So you have the same amenities and offerings, just spread out over a larger area. Just takes getting used to the fact that everything is spread out.

2) There is lots of distressed real estate and it will come back. California had a huge real estate bubble crash. Being on the ground in LA gave me the opportunity to see first hand the condition of the real estate market. There is going to be lots of opportunity in California real estate in the next few years. Having spent time in Dubai (which also had a huge real estate crash), I saw that LA has real fundamental demand for goods and services. Dubai was just built on nothing. Check out this graphic from RealtyTrac which does a good job of showing a snapshot of real estate in California.

California Foreclosures

3) California has water problems. I went to a sushi restaurant and I noticed the following sign posted around the restaurant:

Water Problems

I’ve never seen a sign like that, but it makes sense given the water conservation efforts underway in California.

4) The city is littered with seekers of fame. If I were to generalize about cities I’ve spent time in, I would say New York: Money, Washington DC: Power, and now Los Angeles: Fame. That’s not necessarily bad or good, that’s just how I see it. The culture of Los Angeles seems very predicated on status and fame.

5) The food is out of this world. It should be no surprise given the ethnic diversity found in California, that the food is amazing. I don’t need to say much more.

6) Public transportation is not part of the equation. This summer I took the metro or a bus all over New York. It was so easy and convenient. In LA, that doesn’t appear to be the case.

Reflections on Alaska:

Alaska was absolutely gorgeous. I spent about a week out in the middle of no where (which was a nice break from the buzzing of the BlackBerry) and I got to truly enjoy the outdoors. I’ve enjoyed fishing ever since I can remember, and Alaskan fishing was a true pleasure.

One of the biggest things I learned on this trip was about an environmental issue called the Pebble Mine Project. In a nutshell, the proposed project is to build a open pit copper mine in Bristol Bay which experts estimate has about $500 billion in copper deposits. Bristol Bay is home to some of the largest salmon runs in the world and provides about $300 million in revenue for the local fisherman. This proposed mine, which would be among the largest ever built, poses a significant threat to the entire ecosystem in the area because there is virtually no way to safegaurd the water, air, and land against a mine of this size. I can’t say I’m the biggest environmentalist in the world, but there’s something indescribable and beautiful about the nature of Alaska. It would be a shame to see it destroyed. My friend Kiley has a more in depth post on the issue of the ongoing Pebble Mine Project.

I would love to spend more time in Alaska. Here’s a few pictures from my trip:

Fly Fishing

The Scenery

Alaskan Sockeye Salmon

I have participated in a fantasy football league with my high school friends since 2003. We are now entering year 7. (I posted about my 2008 team here.) We have a trophy that we engrave each year with the winner. I have one engraving on that trophy in the past 6 years, which I’m proud of. Although I was out in California during the draft, I was able to draft via phone through a proxy who was present at the live draft. I’m really happy with the team I ended up with. Just last season we shifted to a keeper league, which adds a nice element to the mix. In a keeper league, you get to keep players for next season in exchange for next season’s draft picks. It promotes you taking agressive risks on young players with high potential for the next year.

Here’s the team I ended up with:

QB (start 1): Ben Roethlisberger, Jake Delhomme

WR (start 3): Steve Smith (on the Panthers), Chad Ochocinco, Roy Williams, Chris Chambers, Earl Bennett

RB (start 2): Clinton Portis, Kevin Smith,  Jamal Lewis, Cedric Benson, Ricky Williams, Michael Bush, Peyton Hills

TE (start 1): Dallas Clark

I’m really excited about my team. At RB, I have 4 guys (Portis, Smith, Lewis, Benson) who are undisputed starters on their teams and the other 3 guys are all very capable backups who could shine if given the starting opportunity. I’m really confident in my WRs, and I’m looking for a big time bounceback for Chad Ochocinco. I’ve been following him on Twitter and he’s got me sold that this will be a big year for him. I’m only half joking. Chambers can put up huge numbers on occassion and I’m hoping Bennett hooks up with Cutler to rekindle the magic they shared in college. I’m confident that Dallas Clark will put up top TE numbers. The only position I’m worried about is at QB. I’m not sold on Big Ben or Jake Delhomme. Neither of them consistently put up big numbers at QB. Luckily, my league doesn’t give too many points at the QB position, but it’s still nice to get good numbers out of that position.

Last year I finished second. The goal, as always, is to win it all this year.

This one comes from the legendary billionaire Paul Tudor Jones; he is considered one of the greatest traders of all time and runs one of the oldest hedge funds in the world. I just started reading “Market Wizards” by Jack D. Schwager. The book consists of in depth interviews with some of the top investors/traders of 1980s. This quote comes from an interview with Paul Tudor Jones:

“Don’t be a hero. Don’t have an ego. Always question yourself and your ability. Don’t ever feel that you are very good. The second you do, you are dead.”

These words apply to many things beyond just investing. Beautiful and simple.

A lot of people in the hedge fund and real estate industries feel that the future is bleak for investors, speculators and bettors. If you talk to them, you’ll hear about how the “golden” years of making money are gone and how the government will continue to bring on regulations.

For an entrepreneur, it’s important to make an attempt at drowning out the noise and really focusing in on opportunity. I see massive opportunities in hedge funds and real estate investing in the coming years.

First off, the space is a lot less crowded. For example, in a June 16 Bloomberg article, Hedge Fund Research reports that of 9,500 funds in existence around this time last year, 1,200 have closed. So for every investment, there are now less people looking at it. That inherently creates opportunity.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, we must look at the players remaining. The average hedge fund lost 19% in 2008, which is the worst year on record since the dataset began tracking in 1990. So of the remaining players, they are now increasingly risk averse. The name of the game is to survive. That’s healthy and appropriate. But it also means that such a recent memory of a near fatal experience can impede the investing decisions of people who made it through the blood shed of 2008.

Thirdly, we must look at history. Investors and market speculators have existed in some form or another since the ancient days of Aristotle in Greece. There have always been bubbles and crashes. Booms and busts. Today is no different. There will be more bubbles in our lifetime. And there will be more crashes as well. Many things come into existence through booms and trends. It is part of our human nature.

And so, I have no doubt in my mind that the future looks very bright for investors. New markets will come. The players will change, but the golden rule will always be the same: buy low, sell high.

I’ve been crazy busy as of late and have had little time to sit down for a meaningful blog post. I’ve also been way more active on Twitter, which is easier and quicker than blogging and way more interactive.

Fortunately, I can be lazy and link to someone else’s writing. My friend Kiley Austin-Young wrote 2 excellent posts recently, which I’d like to share. Kiley has been trading stocks and working at StockTwits (a Twitter based stock community).

The first post is called “On Stops, Sex, & Speculation.” This piece is more philosophical in nature and deals with the emotions/decisions one faces when speculating and or gambling on anything in life. I think this post does a great job of laying out the spectrum of emotions one faces in a life based on risk taking. This really extends to anything from start-ups to poker to trading to relationships. The ups and the downs come unexpectedly, and they’re often hard to recover from. That’s why risk management is vital.

The second post is called “Commission Catastrophe.” This piece is more technical in nature and details just how hard it is to overcome the broker fees in day trading to actually come out ahead. Kiley details his first hand experiences of trading and the role that commissions play. This reminds me of poker — where the “rake” (commission for the casino/house) can really put a huge dent in your winnings. Often, the difference between just staying in the game and calling it quits is the hard line imposed by the rake.

Enjoy.

Everyone always talks about how the model for education in America is “broken.” While I completely agree with this statement, I’ve yet to see a proposal that offers a real solution. The other day, my friend Avinash sent me a cool New York Times article about a new charter school in New York. The article, entitled “Next Test – Value of $125,000-a-Year Teachers”, talks about a new school in New York with “superstar” teachers. For example, the Phys Ed teacher is Kobe Bryant’s former personal trainer. I wish I had that kind of gym teacher in middle school. The point of the school is really an experiment to test what drives success in the classroom:

[the school is] premised on the theory that excellent teachers — and not revolutionary technology, talented principals or small class size — are the critical ingredient for success.

Here is what the teachers were selected on:

The eight winning candidates, he said, have some common traits, like a high “engagement factor,” as measured by the portion of a given time frame during which students seem so focused that they almost forget they are in class. They were expert at redirecting potential troublemakers, a crucial skill for middle school teachers. And they possessed a contagious enthusiasm

There have always been different theories on success in the classroom. What really struck me about this school is that it has a completely contrarian approach: the teachers get paid more, the class sizes are bigger, the teachers work a lot more, and there is no safety net for teachers.

To make ends meet, teachers will hold responsibilities usually shouldered by other staff members, like assistant principals (there will be none). There will be no deans, substitute teachers (except for extended leaves) or teacher coaches. Teachers will work longer hours and more days, and have 30 pupils, about 6 more than the typical New York City fifth-grade class.

Teachers will not have the same retirement benefits as members of the city’s teachers’ union. And they can be fired at will.

This school basically cuts out any excess in the system. The best teachers should get paid a lot and in return a lot should be expected of them. In a sense, this school provides for a market for good teachers. I think an economic model to solve education in America could create significant change. People commonly bring up that teachers don’t get paid much, so there’s not an incentive for people to work in teaching. Imagine if being a teacher paid as much as traditionally highly paid professions like being a lawyer or an investment banker (pre-2008) or a doctor. I have no doubt in my mind that we could develop generations of extremely talented teachers.

The key is incentives. And as of today, it’s very hard to attract the best in the world to teach the next generations of America. That needs to change.

Being a means to someone else’s end. This is an issue that I have faced and one that often comes up when I talk to entrepreneurs who are looking for advice. Now to a certain degree, most things in business are simply a means to an end. For example, on a basic level, when an investor invests in a company, that company is a means to the end of making money for the investor. In that case though, the interests are very clear and hopefully on the same path between the entrepreneur and the investor.

What I think is problematic for many entrepreneurs is when they face a 3rd party who has interests that only align partially. For example, you are the CEO of Startup Company XYZ that designs, manufactures, and sells a special widget. Big Company ABC comes to you with a deal to use your manufacturing facilities to design and manufacture a new type of widget which they will sell. A lot of startups get approached by big companies who want to “outsource” things to them. Do not do this deal. It’s obviously a great deal for Company ABC to skip the design and manufacturing stages by outsourcing it to you and, but this deal leaves you stretched thin and unfocused. Your Startup Company XYZ needs to stay focused on your widget, not on someone else’s widget.

These people want to bend your will to match theirs. That’s why it’s so important to know what you want and go for it. Otherwise, it’s too easy for others to come in and use you for their own purposes. It’s very rare that the interests of both parties align perfectly. When you are at risk of becoming a means to someone else’s end and that end is not what you ultimately want, run the other way. Fast.

Now that I finally have my own laptop (after going almost 2 months without my own computer), I have had to deal with the typical issues like re-installing old programs and clearing my e-mail Inbox. Although I used a public computer to check through my e-mails, I still had an Inbox with 600 unread e-mails. I typically like to clear my Inbox and I decided that I’d invest the time now to save myself time later.

When going through my unread e-mails, I noticed a few trends and decided to setup filters in Gmail to better process my incoming e-mail. I quickly noticed that all e-mails basically fall into “auto-generated” and “personal” e-mails. Basically, “personal” e-mails are any e-mail where someone has to manually e-mail you and often the e-mail is intended for just you or at most a few other people. “Auto-generated” e-mails come from websites I have accounts on or groups I’ve signed up for. My ultimate goal was to create an Inbox where I would only get personal e-mails. These are usually the e-mails that require my immediate attention as I prefer to reply fairly quickly to e-mails. Here’s what I came up with:

1) Some websites/groups send me a lot of e-mail that I don’t read often

I found that sites like Staples, Amazon, Uloop, Skydeck, Mint, and others send me frequent updates. I very rarely read those, but sometimes I do and I don’t want to delete them all. So I setup Gmail filters to filter them into a separate folder that I can check infrequently. This way I can search through them at any time or retrieve them if needed at a later date.

2) Some websites/groups send me a lot of e-mail that I read consistently

A few sites like Facebook and Twitter, send out many notifications and I usually will read these. I still don’t want them clogging up my Inbox, as these notifications are not always that important. For sites like these, I setup individual folders that get filtered e-mails. For example, Facebook e-mails all go into a Facebook folder, etc. This also includes all of the school e-mails I get from Penn and Wharton. I want to stay informed of on campus events and school news, but I don’t always need to see this right away.

3) Some websites/groups send me e-mail that I never read

This was the easiest to deal with. I have signed up for websites in the past that I no longer use and listservs that I no longer read. For these, I simply setup auto-delete filters so I will never even see their e-mails. This was my favorite part and it will surely clear a lot of “noise” out of my Inbox.

4) Personal e-mails get lost in the shuffle

These are the most important for me.  I noticed more than a few personal e-mails that I had missed or replied slowly too because they were in the middle of a bunch of other e-mails. These e-mails are now the only e-mails that touch my Inbox.

Overall, I spent a few hours setting up all the filters and clearing through my Inbox. In the end I am left with a system that should hold fairly well for the foreseeable future and help me keep my e-mail organized.

Since I started this blog nearly two years ago in July 2007, I have not had a month go by without blogging. I usually try to blog once a week on average and I’m posting this as a recap of the past month — a month during which I did not post a single entry to this blog.

This past month, I’ve had a lot to blog about, but my computer broke and I’ve had to resort to a new lifestyle. I actually delayed getting my computer fixed because I wanted to experiment life without a computer. It’s been very interesting to say the least. My cell phone has limited Internet and e-mail capabilities, SMS texting, and AIM capability, but no attachment ability or complex Internet access.Without a computer, I can only use public computers and I have to plan out my usage ahead of time.

The great part of this is that I spend WAY LESS time on a computer in a typical day and usually go over all of my e-mails and TO-DO items in one sitting. This has made me extremely efficient. The only way to really get an instant guaranteed hold of me is through phone calls — I don’t think I realized how little time I spend actually talking on the phone and instead through Twitter/Gchat/e-mail/AIM/SMS texting etc. The personal touch of a phone call is not to be underestimated.

The downside is that this makes it harder to blog something right away when it is fresh in my mind or to write draft blog posts for writing out in full at a later time. Also, my Twitter usage has shifted to my mobile device, which allows me to Tweet easily, but makes it harder for me to interact with others because I don’t get a constant stream of updates to my mobile phone (it’s not a Blackberry or an iPhone.) Also, I don’t always like my delayed ability to respond to e-mails — I try to respond to e-mails as fast as possible usually. Lastly, not having a computer makes it hard for last minute information gathering (i.e. directions, weather, etc.) or sending off some quick attachment via e-mail.

I think I’ll get my laptop fixed soon or get a new one altogether. But this experiment has definitely shown me the value of not being constantly connected by having a portable laptop. The efficiency losses have not been that bad, but the ability to have lots of interaction and the ability to be very flexible is a significant cost.

P.S. I hope to put up slides and video from my talk for PSL’s Entrepreneurs Unplugged shortly. If you missed the talk, you can get a recorded version from USTREAM here:

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/1419673

Philly Startup Leaders has invited me to be the lead off speaker for their new “Entrepreneur Unplugged” speaker series. I’ll share my experiences and lessons learned along the way in building my startup. Here are the full details:

PSL’s newest event series Entrepreneur Unplugged will extend the spirit of Founder Factory by bringing successful Entrepreneurs “on stage” to share their personal stories of risk taking and decision making.  The format will be a 30 minute presentation followed by question and answer.  The series will be streamed live, recorded and distributed online.

We’re proud to have Boris Silver open the series and share his experiences with his startup, Sport Interactiva, which provided fantasy sports games to over 1 million users on social networks.  Boris took a leave of absence from the University of Pennsylvania to grow the business full-time and navigated a successful exit just 9 months later.

Thanks to our friends at the University of Arts for providing an absolutely amazing venue to showcase the series.  The series continues on 6/17 and 8/19 at the same time and place.

When: April 22, 7pm

Where: University of the Arts, Hamilton Hall (map)

Location: 320 South Broad St, Philadelphia, PA

 

Look forward to seeing you there.

I spent my spring break trip as part of a group of Wharton students sent to Dubai from March 6 – 15 to meet with the key companies in the United Arab Emirates, to attend the Wharton Global Alumni Forum, and to experience the culture of the UAE. The United Arab Emirates consists of seven independent city-states: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Umm al-Qaiwain, Fujairah, Ajman and Ra’s al-Khaimah.

So I definitely want to start out by thanking Wharton, the companies I met with, the government of the UAE, the Wharton Alumni, and the trip organizers for hosting me and providing such incredible experiences.

I kept a journal for the length of the trip to keep track of my thoughts, experiences, and questions along the way.

I wasn’t really sure how to write a single post re-capping the entire trip and there are so many things I want to talk about.

Wharton arranged some phenomenal meetings with the CEOs and management of 3 large companies in the UAE. This post will highlight the three companies that we had official visits with. I’ll outline some insights/thoughts I had on the country/region/people in a later post.

Company One: Emaar Properties

The first company that we met with was Emaar Properties, a Public Joint Stock Company operating out of Dubai. Emaar is one of the largest real estate companies in the world and they are responsible for many of the iconic properties of Dubai like the Dubai Marina, the Burj Dubai (tallest building in the world), the Dubai Mall, and many other properties (commercial, residential, and mixed-use). They have focused on building integrated communities that have not only housing facilities, but educational, medical, shopping and other core facilities needed to sustain communities. It’s a unique approach, which allows them to build “start-up” communities anywhere in the world.

What was truly inspiring were Emaar’s plans for the future. They are not looking to become just the biggest company in the Arab world — they are instead aiming to become of the largest companies in the world. Period. They are working towards this goal by having multiple business units within the company to focus on things outside of real estate like hospitality, education, healthcare, transportation, etc. I noticed that everyone in Dubai is perhaps overly optimistic, but they have no qualms about thinking big. I love it. It is truly a city of dreamers and big thinkers.

After the CEO of Emaar presented to us, we were joined for lunch by the Chairman of Emaar, Mohamed Ali Alabbar. He is considered one of the most powerful business leaders in the Arab world and he holds lots of influence as the close confidant of Dubai’s Dubai’s Ruler and UAE’s Vice President/Prime Minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. Mr. Alabbar’s charisma and presence in a room is unlike anything else I have never witnessed. We learned of his growing up from a poor family and his fundamental beliefs in working hard and doing what you love. He told us that right now is the best time to start something entrepreneurial and to follow your passions. Like some others in this time of world crisis, Mr. Alabbar believes that there will be massive opportunities for those willing to take them while others run for cover. It never hurts to hear one of the most successful people in the world voice the key mantras of any entrepreneur.

Company Two: The Emirates Group

The next company that we learned about was The Emirates Group. We had the opportunity to meet with Mr. Maurice Flanagan, Executive Vice-Chairman of the Emirates Airline and Group, who was kind enough to give us a tour of his headquarters and talk to us about the history, goals, and future of the company. We sat with the man who literally built Emirates Airlines up from a startup funded with $10 million USD in 1985 into one of the most well regarded international airlines in the world — employing over 35,000 people, and flying over 20 million passengers a year. The Emirates Group is the holding company which controls Emirates Airlines, as well as other lines of business.

Emirates has had to deal with the massive fluctuations in oil prices as well as the changing economic preferences/attitudes of its consumers. Mr. Flanagan explained some of the technological advancements that they’ve made at Emirates to help keep them cost competitive and to keep them more informed. It was also informative to hear about Emirates’s operations in the cargo transport and the tourism services. Other airlines have actually outsourced parts of their operations to Emirates and Dnata (airline services subsidiary of The Emirates Group.) This puts Emirates in a powerful position.

Company Three: Mubadala Development Company

The third company that we met with was Mubadala. The company is a Public Joint Stock Company operating out of Abu Dhabi, and basically functions as the investment vehicle of the Government of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. Some of the more famous investments that they’ve made are in AMD, The Carlyle Group, and Ferrari.

It is important to note that this is the only company we officially visited with outside of Dubai. There is some rivalry between Abu Dhabi and Dubai: Dubai gets all the flash and hype, while Abu Dhabi really controls the oil wealth of the UAE. Abu Dhabi is the wealthiest emirate of the UAE; the average net worth of an Abu Dhabi citizen is about $17 million USD. In fact, with all the real estate and tourism problems that have hit Dubai hard recently, Abu Dhabi has had to bailout Dubai with $10 billion USD. The Economist has a good piece on this here. Think of Dubai as the fast talking, risk seeking, ambitious, young gun nephew and Abu Dhabi as the prudent, methodical, veteran uncle.

This context is important for understanding Mubadala. The goals of Mubadala are to make not only financial returns, but strategic returns as well. This is interesting to note because their investment criteria differs from that of most Western investment firms. Mubadala is willing to invest in projects that may have low financial returns, but huge strategic returns — like building highway projects or educational facilities in the UAE.

Mubadala made it a point to explain to us that although their only shareholder is the Government of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, they do not want to be considered a sovereign wealth fund. Their creative approach to investing really impressed me. I was also really impressed by the range of investments that they make — they invest in projects ranging from infrastructure to real estate to health care to energy to aerospace. And they are willing to invest globally as much as they are willing to invest in the region. They also employ a very flat organizational structure.

One thing that I made particular note of was their focus on bringing knowledge into the country. They are very interested in transferring knowledge and skills from foreign companies for the purpose of creating jobs and improving the abilities of citizens within the UAE. It is a very humble and mature approach to improving the economic situation of the UAE in the long term. They realize that the oil is going to run out and they are preparing for that very day.

Conclusion

Overall, the visits to these companies were fantastic. They were all incredibly hospitable and welcoming. I also witnessed just how business friendly everyone (government included) is. They are not scared of working with foreign companies and they are not afraid to think big. The governments of both Abu Dhabi and Dubai are very involved with businesses, and make no effort to hide it. There are no taxes in the tax free zones and the rules are incredibly transparent.

This country is a dream for entrepreneurs. The government will bend over backwards for you and give you everything you may need to succeed.  And unlike in America, ambitious dreamers in the UAE are the norm, not the exception. The most striking aspect of all this is that the visionaries see their dreams realized time and time again in the UAE. There are truly no constraints or limits to what is possible.

I’m going to post a longer Dubai entry soon and figure out a way to easily share all the photos from the trip, but I wanted to post a quote that really stuck with me. I was having a long chat with a CEO at the Wharton Global Alumni Forum about his work in the Middle East and discussing various topics with him on life, business, etc. For some quick background, he is an Arabic born entrepreneur who founded and now runs a multi-billion dollar company in the gulf coast and he’s well in his fifties. We touched on the subject of globalization and language learning:

When I was young like you, in my 20s, I learned English from scratch because my masters in the West spoke it. But, you see, I have new masters in the East and they speak Mandarin. So I will learn Mandarin everyday.

I think this quote really touched me for three reasons. Most obviously because I like language learning. Secondly because it just reinforces the shift in power from the West to the East. But most importantly this quote really struck me as beautiful because of who was saying it and the way in which he said it. It was absolutely humbling to hear such a man use the word “master” (not once, but twice) and equally humbling to know that even at his age and level of wealth he is working so hard to constantly improve.

I’m leaving today for Dubai, so if you’re around and want to connect drop me a line. I’ll be at the Wharton Global Alumni Forum on March 11-12. The theme of the Forum is “At the Crossroads for Global Economic Change.” I’ll post more about the trip later, but I’m particularly interested to see the economic difficulties first hand. The Economist had some news about the trouble that Dubai is facing financially. I’m thinking this will finally be my excuse to sign up for Flickr and take lots of photos. Be back soon.

Hearing Professor Linneman (considered one of the top experts in the world on Real Estate) give a guest lecture for my Real Estate Finance class was an amazing experience. Professor Linneman derided the massive use of leverage among many real estate developers and pointed out, “ask any Wharton kid how to increase returns and they’ll all tell you the same thing — increase leverage and borrow more!” [loosely quoted]. Beyond being incredibly entertaining and very blunt, Professor Linneman really drove home the problems that you may face when you expose yourself through even conventionally “reasonable” lerverage when facing awful credit conditions.

Yesterday I read through Warren Buffet’s annual letter to shareholders which he just wrote for Year 2008. You can read it here. To sum it up, his investment firm Berkshire Hathaway had its worst year ever. Their profits plunged 96%. Interestingly enough, Buffet took many positions in derivative instruments.

Now let’s rewind and look at some of the things Mr. Buffet told his investors in his 2003 letter to shareholders.

Derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction 
 

Derivatives generate reported earnings that are often wildly overstated and based on estimates whose inaccuracy may not be exposed for many years  
 

Large amounts of risk have become concentrated in the hands of relatively few derivatives dealers … which can trigger serious systemic problems 
 

But I can point out that in 2008, he took on large exposures to derivatives and that he is now in a position where he may get burned big time. He was right in 2003, yet he didn’t stick to his own philosophy and took on leveraged bets through derivatives. Credit to Buffet of course is his absolute willingness to take any and all blame ”It is my belief that the CEO of any large financial organization must be the Chief Risk Officer as well. If we lose money on our derivatives, it will be my fault.” That being said, his bets may very well payoff, but it surprised me to see him take such positions.

This should be a short note, but I was thinking about the idea of long term business partners and relationships in general. I came to the conclusion that the truest test of a relationship is going through failure together with someone else. I think if a relationship can survive mutual failure, it is not only stronger as a result, but it should be reasonable to conclude that the relationship can achieve mutual success on a higher level. So I come to the conclusion that if you want to work someone to succeed in something, take a moment to think through the relationship surviving failure. If you can run through a burning house tied together, you will have no problem winning together.

Recently, Chipotle opened up at a new location on UPenn’s campus. Qdoba has been at Penn for as long as most people here can remember and there’s never been a real serious challenge to Qdoba’s Mexican Grill store. Until now. Chipotle has been a smash hit by all empirical evidence and they’re showing what true customer service is all about. I’m not surprised that I got an e-mail from Qdoba the other day telling me I can “buy 1 get 1 free” for any burrito at their on-campus location. In fact, just the other night two of my friends were discussing this coupon and decided they’d rather pay full price at Chipotle than split the cost of one burrito at Qdoba. Go figure.

But I wanted to bring forth an empirical example of why I think Chipotle is going to crush and destroy Qdoba. Beyond the fact that their burritos taste better and that their menu is more simply designed. I want to talk customer service. What makes it easy to compare is that I know of the same exact situation, which was handled differently at both places.

Customer Service at Qdoba

Two of my friends went to Qdoba while a third went to the nearby Greek Lady. The third friend joined the first two at Qdoba after they had all received their respective meals. He was quickly told that he couldn’t eat there because only Qdoba customers were allowed. That makes sense in theory, but fails in practice because:

1) The Qdoba store was pretty much empty

2) His friends were paying customers at Qdoba and he was joining them

Customer Service at Chipotle

This past week, I went to the new Jimmy John’s which is a few doors down from Chipotle. Two of my buddies were at Chipotle, but I had eaten there for the past 4 days and didn’t want to make it my 5th day. So I decided to mix things up with some Jimmy John’s. I joined them shortly after at Chipotle and sat down with them in the middle of a really crowded store. The manager at the cash register watched me walk in with Jimmy John’s in hand. She smiled and didn’t say a word. Someone even came over to our table and wiped it down before we started it eating. They didn’t say a word about my Jimmy John’s sandwich either. In fact, the manager even gave us free soda cups.

Conclusion

Beyond the obvious incredible taste of Chipotle, they are going to win because they care about the important things — like not annoying loyal customers who may not choose them on a particular day. Qdoba is completely empty everyday I walk by there and I fully expect that trend to continue.

My friend Kiley Austin-Young gave me a copy of an incredible book which I devoured over the course of my Colorado trip (read about 80% of the book on the flight there/back.) The book is called Fooling Some of the People All of the Time and it’s written by star hedge fund manager David Einhorn (Greenlight Capital).  David Einhorn recently rose to more fame with his public short of Lehman Brothers back in Spring of ‘08, which led to Lehman’s CFO being fired.

The book chronicles David Einhorn’s drawn out battle against Allied Capital, a company that David Einhorn publicly shorted. What starts out as small balance sheet discrepancies turns into a drawn out investigation which results in mountains of evidence of fraud in Allied Capital subsidiaries, government (SEC) incompetency, and an alarming vilification of short sellers. The book is really one mans journey for truth and fairness. In fact, he donates all of the book profits and all proceeds from the short sale of Allied Capital to charity.

It’s truly scary to read about how failure riddled the SEC is, how Allied Capital was able to lure away government lawyers to work for them as lobbyists, how Allied Capital management consistently showed a disregard for the truth and refused to own up to mistakes/problems. Allied Capital even wire tapped David Einhorn’s phones! The sell-side analysts show a complete disregard for mounting evidence against Allied Capital and constantly shove their “buy ratings” to anyone who will listen. I think the part that really got me was the lack of serious investigations at the SEC and the rampant bureaucracy at other government branches involved in the book. He also writes about the financial media’s lack of concern for the truth. Basically, he shows the world the true dark side to the financial world. 

This book reads like a detective mystery book. Only it’s all real and backed up with loads of publicly available documentation. It’s a fantastic insight into the hedge fund world, Wall Street, and the government. And best of all the book proceeds and the killing that he made from shorting this fraud of a company are going to fund some great causes.

I can’t recommend this book enough.

The End of the Season

Tomorrow marks the end of football season. It’s definitely an exciting day, but it’s also a bit sad because I have no more football to look forward too.

It’s definitely been a weird post season for me. I don’t remember the last time that the New England Patriots didn’t make it to the playoffs, so I didn’t really have a team to follow. I must say it’s very rare for a team to go 11-5 in the regular season and not make the playoffs, but things happen and you can’t always win.

I’ve completely stayed away from reading or listening to sports media these past few weeks, as they tend to hype things up too much for my liking. That being said, I’m pretty excited for the upcoming matchup between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Arizona Cardinals.

Game Thoughts

The Cardinals have an outstanding offense with an absolutely dominant trio of Wide Receivers. Larry Fitzgerald is absolutely unreal in the way he goes up and fights for the ball. Anquan Boldin is a fearless receiver who plays with so much heart. And Steve Breaston has developed into a fantastic 3rd threat. It’s unheard of for a team to have three receivers go over 1,000 yards receiving in a single season, but the Cardinals did it this year. [Note: Only 5 teams have ever done this in NFL history according to WikiAnswers]. I’m not sold on the running game, but Edgerrin James didn’t take much wear this season as he mostly sat on the bench or played back up — he’s been playing with a lot of energy and heart lately. I also like the Cardinals defense lately and they’ve been playing exceptionally well. And of course, who can forget Kurt Warner. This guy has been through the ringer of the media and has had quite a rollercoaster ride after the St. Louis Rams. It’s great to see him have another shot at a title. He’s a fierce competitor and can make some incredible throws, despite his age. If the Steelers can pressure him and get him moving outside the pocket, he’s going to have a really rough day, but the Cardinals have had fairly good pass protection this year.

The Pittsburgh Steelers obviously have their famous ferocious defense playing really well. They’re going to pressure Warner all day. I don’t know how they’ll go about covering the receivers, but I imagine they’ll blanket the secondary and force the Cardinals to run the ball. I also think the Steelers will lean heavily on their running game to eat up the clock and slow down the Cardinals fast gunning offense. I’m a bit concerned with Big Ben’s propensity for holding onto the ball for too long and trying to make big plays. He usually takes a beating and puts himself in some bad situations. Their receiving game should do well with Hines Ward back in the lineup and the deep threat Santonio Holmes on the other side. I expect a lot of dump offs to the tight end Heath Miller — Big Ben loves him.

Market Analysis

As always, I go back to my gambling roots and pull up the prediction market numbers on matchbook.com. The line is -7 +115 on the Steelers, +7 -116 on the Cardinals. That means betting $1 on the Steelers will win you $1.15 if they win by more than 7 points. Or betting $1.16 on the Cardinals will win you $1 if the Cardinals lose by less than 7 or win outright. So the market is showing that it expects the Cardinals to either lose by less than 7 or win outright.

In terms of betting on just an outright winner, the lines are -225 Steelers, +222 Cardinals. Put another way, a bet of $2.25 wins $1 if you bet the Steelers to win and they do win OR a bet of $1 wins $2.22 if you bet the Cardinals to win and they do win. Doing some quick gambling calculator math tells us that the market’s Implied Probability for this game is about a 69% chance that the Steelers win and a 31% chance that the Cardinals win.

In big games like this, it’s really hard to find a favorable betting line (too much attention and money go to the game), so the best you can do is check the market action around 5-10 minutes before kickoff. You may or may not see big chunks of money moving into a particular position. That’s often where the sharp money is going, and it’s a decent bet usually if you can catch the line at good odds.

I love rooting for the underdog, the Cardinals offense is really exciting to watch, and I think Kurt Warner is an incredible person to go through what he did and still make it out on the other side.

Go Cardinals!

Thought I’d share this. I’ll be adding more to this wall.

My New Living Room

I’m off in Colorado for a ski trip with some of my close friends to relax a bit before school starts. The scenery is gorgeous, the skiing is top-notch, and the weather is beatufiul. Can’t ask for much more.

Be back soon.

I got into an interesting talk with an international friend of mine where we talked about various cultural perceptions across different groups of people. As the world becomes “flatter” and globalization sinks its teeth in, there has to exist some equilibrium between ubiquitous sets of cultural norms across populations in the world and localized sets. This extends to everything: dining habits to fashion to dating to sports to politics. For example, KFC is known as a greasy fast food chain in the US. However, KFC has dominated in China where it serves an entirely localized menu and is positioned as a premium offering.

Niche marketers and people who are interested in creating products for global consumption need to figure out how to either target products individually to local markets or create products so ubiqitious that they are accepted across all cultural norms.

Reading the Rockfeller biography got me thinking about the portrayal of leaders in society. The number 1 person (aka Rockefeller, Gates, Carnegie, etc.) get nearly all of the press coverage, books, and fascination. And they should. But if we attempt to learn from the past success and failures of great leaders, I think it’s wise to look for information about the #2, #3, #4, etc in an organization. These are the people upon whose shoulders the giants stood. They were often behind the scenes, excellent in operations, and diligent in execution. I feel like not enough attention is given to them. And I definitely have questions:

If we look at these titans of industry, what can we learn from their captains who served under them?

Are most of these captains, people who themselves are driven to eventually be the head leaders or are they perfectly happy with being just captains? 

What makes a great #2 as opposed to a #3? Can there be more than one person at #2?

What makes a great #2 as opposed to a great #1?

How does the #1 deal with a #2 who wants to be #1? Is this to be encouraged or gaurded against?

ESPN recently reported that Bill Parcells might collect $9 million and walk away from the Miami Dolphins at the end of the season. The Dolphins are 11-5, headed to the playoffs, and have one of the best defenses in the NFL. But let’s rewind to December 20, 2007 when it was announced that Bill Parcels had signed a 4 year contract for $12 million to run the Miami Dolphins football operations. The Dolphins finished 2007 with a league-worse 1-15 record, had Cleo Lemon (who?!) at QB, and an aging defense. Bill Parcels came in not to coach, but to bring order to the situation and run a tight ship.

Now here’s the best part of the contract he signed. His contract stipulates that he can walk away in the event that the majority ownership changes. Stephen Ross is expected to exercise an option which would increase his ownership of the Miami Dolphins from 50% to 95% in early January. Bill Parcels gave himself an out. It was widely known that there was takeover interest in the Dolphins and Bill came into a messy situation. If he fixed that situation and built up a great team, it was expected that new ownership could take control. And that means he can opt-out of the remaining 3 years, grab his $9 million, and head on to whatever he wants to do. Bill Parcels captured the upside value of what he brought to the table.

Rockefeller was a master of taking his competitors, enemies, and adversaries and converting them into strong allies. His first resort was to neutralize people/companies by taking them into his fold. If he couldn’t get them to join him, he would just outright crush them.

Always proud of his persuasive powers, Rockefeller took special pleasure in wooing opponents whom he had learned to appreciate by tracking their ploys against him. When a lawyer named Virgil Kline won two lawsuits against him [Rockfeller] in the 1880s, Rockefeller invited him to his office. “Mr. Kline,” he said, “you have given us a good licking. Now I would like to have you come and work for me.” Kline agreed and became a long-standing member of the Standard Oil legal staff.

Looks like Mark Cuban is making moves. Silicon Alley Insider reports that the Dallas Mavs owner has purchased a 9.4% stake in Carmike Cinemas (CKEC), the 4th largest movie theater chain in the US. Cuban also is involved in Landmark Theaters and HDNet. It looks like he’s bullish in re-inventing the uses of the traditional movie theaters and moving beyond just movie screenings which have lagged lately. Here’s the only comment he would give on the CKEC investment:

What i can say is that I think Out of Home entertainment is becoming about far more than movies. HDNet was the first to do a live 3D broadcast to a theater, and we will continuing trying to expand that business, along with 2D out of home. Bits are bits, and just like you can make them smaller, you can make them a lot bigger and more interesting. (from SIA)

It’s cool to think of the possibilities of moving beyond just watching movie showings on the big screen. Imagine going to watch the Superbowl with a group of friends or big boxing matches, etc. This is already being done, but from the surface, it appears that Cuban is trying to make this bigger and more mainstream. It’ll be interesting to see how this develops.

More reading about Rockefeller and it’s starting to get more interesting. I’m really seeing his growth and evolution into an oil mogul. I’m at the part where the early oil boom ends, oil prices crash, there’s large amounts of excess refining capacity, and refineries are facing tough times (interestingly enough, somewhat similar to today’s situation). Rockefeller is executing moves to consolidate the oil industry, create vertical integration with the rail roads, and buy out competing local refineries. Chernow tells us:

As always, the greater the tumult, the cooler Rockefeller became, and a strange calm settled over him when his colleagues were most disconcerted. When pushed, he always stood his ground. The SIC episode showed that Rockefeller was now developing exalted faith in his own judgment. Like all revolutionaries, he saw himself as an instrument of higher purpose, endowed with a visionary faith. He knew that his actions would at first be resisted and misunderstood by the myopic crowd, but he believed that the force and truth of his ideas would triumph in the end.

For my Consumer Behavior class (MKTG 235) last semester I had the opportunity to write a paper about any topic that I thought had successfully used various marketing principles. I chose to write my paper about Twitter. This company has created a new global communication channel. Anyways, I could go on and on about how/why Twitter is awesome, so here’s my paper:

Introduction to Twitter

Twitter started out as an internal communication tool used by staff at a California startup in 2006 and in about two years has grown to 3.2 million registered users. Twitter is a social network based around micro-blogging where users can post and read text updates/messages of up to 140 characters in length to and from other users. The service creates a publically indexed/searchable (although privacy settings can be used) depository of status updates or ‘tweets’ which can be sent and received through the website, through mobile devices, through external websites, and other access points.

The success of Twitter lends itself to excellent analysis under the Rogers innovation framework. Furthermore, Twitter is highly flexible and adaptive to re-invention from within its own community. Despite having many excellent traits which make it spread and stick, Twitter still faces some issues before it reaches mainstream adoption.

Relative Advantage

From a relative advantage perspective, Twitter is a tool for instantaneous blogging or ‘micro-blogging’.  As compared to traditional blogging with longer posts and more up front effort, Twitter updates are fast, short, and require minimal effort. Twitter updates may have less content than regular blog posts, but it’s a lot easier for most people to write a 140 character update than it is to write a 500 word blog article. Twitter also offers up significant social capital incentives. First, users can gain social currency to use outside of Twitter by ‘following’ updates from famous opinion leaders and or trend setters like Dave Matthews or MC Hammer, both of whom are on Twitter, to use for purposes like gossip. Furthermore, this instant dissemination of information means we can learn about news much quicker through Twitter than through traditional news sources. For example, the devastating Chinese earthquake in 2008 broke through Twitter like wildfire before even the US Geological Survey could announce it and about an hour before CNN reported it! This turns Twitter into an instant communication channel.

Social Status Effects

Additionally, users can quickly earn social currency within the Twitter community by sharing interesting links or posting valuable updates. The fact that ‘followers’ can ‘un-follow’ you creates a negative incentive to spamming or sending out high noise updates of little value to your ‘followers’. The ‘follower’ structure of Twitter also creates a hierarchy of social proof on the service. The profile design displays a publically available ‘follower count’, which tracks how many users subscribe to what you say. Psychologically, users want to attract more followers because it builds their social proof and makes their perceived importance higher. This incentivizes users into self-promoting their Twitter page to gain more ‘followers’, which in turn promotes Twitter for free through explicit diffusion. This is why people will add links to their Twitter page on their business card, e-mail signature, blog page, business profile, etc. This turns into a self-repeating process where new users also want to gain ‘followers’, so they continue the cycle of self-promoting their Twitter page to friends, family, business contacts, etc.

Compatibility with Existing Norms

In terms of compatibility with existing ideas and experiences, Twitter blends several concepts with which people were already highly comfortable with before Twitter: public connectivity/blogging, short messaging, and status messages. Regular blogging has been popular since the late 1990s and many people are comfortable sharing themselves publically as well as connecting to others through social networks like Facebook or MySpace. Similarly, in today’s tech savvy era, people are well versed in sending short SMS/text messages or e-mails. Lastly, services from IRC chat rooms to Facebook have let users specify their status with messages as simple as “Away.” Twitter combined these concepts to let people post short, public, messages in the form of status updates, which makes it easier for new Twitter users to feel comfortable right away.

Complexity and Trialability

When examining complexity, Twitter offers bare bones simplicity which lowers barriers of use and focuses users on continuous use. The minimalist design of Twitter stands in stark contrast to feature heavy social network sites like Facebook and MySpace; the users can’t do much beyond updates than posting a profile picture and a couple lines of bio information. This makes it more potent because users are never distracted by alternative functionality other than posting status updates and all interaction with Twitter occurs around this one core feature/purpose.

Twitter’s ease of trialability attracts new users and makes it easy to play with.  Signing up for Twitter is free and takes under a minute. Each update or ‘tweet’ can take seconds. Users can update from multiple access points like from their mobile device, on instant messenger, or through the website. These factors make Twitter very easy to try and come with no real costs.

Observability

Additionally, Twitter’s highly observable widgets across the web have fueled the popularity of the service. For example, users can put a Twitter widget on their personal website or blog or Facebook profile, which will then display a feed of Twitter updates from their account. This lets that user’s friends stay up to date on their updates, but the real benefit here is that a user needs to only update their status in one place, Twitter, and it will be shown across any web service that they choose to integrate Twitter widgets on. This in turn promotes Twitter through implicit diffusion and makes it more observable. Some conferences use large digital screens to display live streaming updates from people who are currently Twittering at that particular conference. This lets users connect to other people at the conference and form communities. By allowing cross-functionality across different mediums, Twitter lets potential users learn about and observe Twitter in action through already popular mediums like blogs, social networks, and conference meetups.

Re-invention of Uses

The uses of Twitter are countless, which leaves it open to constant re-invention from its users. NASA used it to give coverage of the Phoenix Mars landing and California has used it for emergency forest fire information dissemination. Twitter is completely open to re-invention and multiple uses among people. Also, Twitter has built a vibrant developer community by opening their API to any outside developer. There have been hundreds of web applications built on top of Twitter that leverage the core functionality of Twitter, but give users different features. For example, stocktwits.com tracks real time stock discussions on Twitter. This lets thousands of passionate developers act as an outsourced R&D team for Twitter for free. In return for benefiting users with new verticals and re-invented uses of Twitter, developers get free and virtually unrestricted access to the data flow on Twitter’s API. In the end, all of these re-inventions create more individualized benefits for users and add passion that supports Twitter because the innovation comes from within the user community.

Problems and Future

One of the biggest problems that has prevented Twitter’s mainstream breakthrough is that the core users are in the niche geek crowd. Users who initially sign up for Twitter have no followers, which may make the service useless for people who either a) don’t already have friends on Twitter or b) don’t have an outside source for attracting followers (i.e. like a blog or friends who use the web actively). It’s harder to jump in, unless you already know other people because you have to work to build up the community and social proof. Twitter could provide a friend suggester (like on Facebook) or they could promote new users on the homepage to give them exposure. Another problem is that Twitter faces problems with credibility because it’s not always possible to tell if people are who they claim they are and people may try to disseminate false information. Twitter just needs to aggressively keep out spammers and respond promptly to imposters.

Overall, I expect that Twitter will break through to the mainstream as more people outside of the tech scene use it. Twitter will evolve into a new communication channel used across the world that will make public many private conversations that people have on messengers, chat, and e-mail. It will also give us access to instant news and provide trackable public sentiments. I think the power of Twitter has yet to be fully realized and I’m excited to watch it further develop.

I started reading “Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.” by Ron Chernow. I’m going to quote parts of the book that I find interesting. Here’s a description of the typically reserved John D. Rockefeller in his early 20s when he was just getting started in the oil business:

As one early associate remarked, “The only time I ever saw John Rockefeller enthusiastic was when a report came in from the creek that his buyer had secured a cargo of oil at a figure much below the market price. He bounded from his chair with a shout of joy, danced up and down, hugged me, threw up his hat, acted so like a madman that I have never forgotten it.” These isolated joyful outbursts only underscored the usual constriction of his personality.

 

Thomas Friedman has an excellent Op-Ed piece in yesterdays NY Times called “Time to Reboot America.” Here are my favorite parts:

We’ve indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can’t afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating

When you read this list it all seems so clear and obvious. We’re spending money we don’t have, bailing out companies like GM that are absolute FAILURES, and not teaching America’s children the skills they need to compete.

immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world’s best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.

This is something I see at Penn/Wharton all the time and it really bothers me. Some of the smartest people I know at school are from foreign countries. Yet why is it that after 4 years of UPenn, they are not allowed to easily stay in the United States? It makes absolutely no sense. We are shooting ourselves in the foot and sending some of the best talent in the world back abroad.

To top it off, we’ve fallen into a trend of diverting and rewarding the best of our collective I.Q. to people doing financial engineering rather than real engineering. These rocket scientists and engineers were designing complex financial instruments to make money out of money — rather than designing cars, phones, computers, teaching tools, Internet programs and medical equipment that could improve the lives and productivity of millions.

It’s true. The incentives to go into banking and finance have been very large and really smart people have flocked into this field. Yet these institutions create nothing of real tangible value to society.

Generally, I’d like to see fewer government dollars shoveled out and more creative tax incentives to stimulate the private sector to catalyze new industries and new markets. If we allow this money to be spent on pork, it will be the end of us.

Handouts are not the solution. Incentives to build are.

You probably know that I’m a big fan of inspirational sounding rap songs/quotes, as well as the moguls behind the music like Eminem, Jay-Z, and 50 Cent. In 2008, Forbes reports that Curtis Jackson (aka 50 Cent) pulled in $150 million in cash. It shouldn’t be surprising considering that he invests in everything from Vitamin Water (sold to Coca Cola for $4.1 billion) to African platinum mines to real estate to restaurants to video games. If you want to read more about his business dealings, I’d recommend the piece “The 50 Cent Cash Mashine” by Forbes writer Zach O’Malley. Like any entrepreneur, he is described by those closest to him in the following light “He’s got the work ethic of a robot. I think he works 24 hours a day.” It’s easy to look at the negatives in his life (the drug past, the arrests, the violence, etc.), but I think it’s best to take away the positives. This man has built an empire and he started from nothing. American Dream indeed.

Well just yesterday, I learned that 50 Cent has a new reality TV show on MTV and I decided I’d check it out. MTV is with the times and they offer free streaming full-versions of the show online here. It’s a bit cheesy (in a reality TV sense) and the contestants aren’t particularly captivating (that’s probably why the show itself has gotten poor viewership), but it’s cool to see Curtis Jackson show us his business side. Typical storyline: 14 contestants compete for $100k investment from Curtis Jackson into their business plan. Think of it as “The Apprentice” with Donald Trump replaced by 50 Cent.

Each episode has a “lesson” or “code” that Curtis teaches to the contestants on the show.

Here’s a quick run through the lessons so far with some thoughts on each:

1) Choose Your Crew Wisely

The people who you surround yourself with are paramount influences on your success, attitudes, and general outlook on life. At the end of the day, we have a choice on who we spend our time with. The key is to choose good people who you trust and like. Good people win out eventually. Surround yourself with positive, trustworthy people. This isn’t just important for business — it’s important for life.

2) Turn Shit Into Sugar

This episode had contestants literally shoveling horse manure in a competition. Some of them were afraid to get their hands dirty. If you want to win you can’t care. You have to be willing to get your hands dirty and get grimy. Those opportunities that are particularly messy also have less competition. The key is just getting in there and getting it done. In real terms, that means being on the front lines of your business.

3) Truth = Money

I loved this episode. 50 Cent explains to them that the real key is being truthful, honest, and genuine to who you are. His example is that people like his music because it’s real and it’s who he is. This example generalizes very well to the business world where you will run into endless characters who make grandiose claims, tell a lot of stories, and are fake. There’s a fine line between business development/sales and fake behavior. The key is not succumbing to outside pressures to act big/powerful. The real value is staying grounded in who you are and acting truthful in all your actions. People are not stupid. Eventually people will figure out who you are and what you’re saying. Lies and exaggerations will always catch up. Ask Bernie Madoff. 

4) Respect the Hustle

This episode is really about getting out there and selling. 50 explains that if you want people to buy from you, you have to connect with them and put in whatever energy it takes to get your work done. Hustling takes many forms, but it really just boils down to going 110% in whatever you do.

5) The Hustler’s Eye

This rule isn’t as self explanatory as the other rules, but it deals with seeing people/things for what they really are.  In some ways, this is really about being able to spot people who violate rule #3 and try to mess with your perceptions. You need to be able to make your own conclusions and judgments. Don’t let other people shape your reality for you.

6) Use Your Cents to Make Change

Probably something that’s particularly relevant during the holiday times, this rule is about giving back. 50 Cent is involved in various charity efforts and he teaches the contestants about giving back to the community. Pretty straight forward.

A lot of my friends have started talking about internships this summer and I just helped one of my friends setup his very own blog. Why? Because when people Google your name, you want to have control over what’s on that search results page. Having an online presence is absolutely a must in todays world. I don’t care what field you are in or what your goals are, when people look you up online, your blog should be the first thing they come across. A blog not only allows you to show your personality to people, but it allows you to develop yourself around particular interests and connect with other people who share those passions. I must say that I’ve really enjoyed connecting through e-mails, Facebook messages, comments, etc. with my blog readers and it exposes me to a lot of new things.

So if you don’t already have a blog, go get one on WordPress or Blogger. It takes about 30 minutes to setup and it’s a fantastic thing to have. It’s never too early to build a blog and it’s a great thing to build before you really need to use it, because once you do need it (i.e. once someone searches for you), it’s already too late.

I had a meeting the other day with the Managing Director of a large Private Equity/Venture Capital fund and he pointed out some interesting things about current problems in the Venture Capital model that I hadn’t really thought about before. Despite my lack of any direct involvement in Venture Capital or Private Equity, for some reason I found his insights particularly interesting. A lot of people have talked about how it’s taking less and less money to start a company today, so the VC model has been shrinking more and more into early/seed stage. That’s certainly the true, but what I heard during our meeting was something I haven’t heard too many people talk about. Here are his main thoughts lately (while they may seem obvious, I think they are particularly pertinent in todays market conditions):

1) Follow on capital scarcity in these markets kills early stage investing

This is a scary thought. Basically, angel and early stage investing today is extremely risky. And it’s not because the quality of companies is poor or because the management is bad — it merely has to do with runway. Imagine you invest at an early stage in a promising new startup and they are kicking on all gears and really kicking ass. Now imagine they really need to raise more money or run out of business — if the capital markets are extremely tight (as they are today), the company will have to close it’s doors if it can’t find mid or late stage investors. This becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because risk-aversion increases and no one wants to be the first money in. Therefore, early stage $$$ dries up because people fear that follow on capital will be impossible or non-existant

2) Expectations of minority ownership in the Venture Capital model are flawed

The big difference between Venture Capital and Private Equity Buyout firms is that VC is supposed to be minority ownership, whereas PE is supposed to be more about owning most of the pie. Yet VC terms often increase the ACTUAL ownership through things like board seats, stock class, founder earnouts, etc. What this does is it sets up false expectations for the entrepreneurs that they are in control — most often they are not, and this really becomes obvious when times get tough (as in right now.) What’s more clear about PE, is that you can very large explicit ownership of a company and really be hands on with it. As a side note, VC circles often do deal flow trading and risk swapping which creates situations where different VCs do dispraportionate shares of the work in managing the portfolio companies. With PE, there is again more explicit ownership and management roles.

Always cool to hear the thoughts of an insider.

Just wanted to take a moment to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! We have much to be thankful for and it’s an exciting time to be alive. I’m thankful for my family, friends, and the people I’ve met.

Have a great weekend!

I’m proud to announce today that my company, Sport Interactiva, has been acquired by Citizen Sports — the top social media sports company out there. The full press release is here. Here’s a quick excerpt:

Among it’s other sports products, Sport Interactiva, founded by Boris Silver and David Fitzgibbon, developed Premier League Soccer, the largest fantasy soccer application on Facebook. “Sport Interactiva’s fantasy soccer products on Facebook and Bebo give us a nice foundation that we will evolve into a world class experience for the 2009 Premiership season. With the 2010 World Cup just around the corner, this space will only become more and more important,” said Kerns.

“We’re very excited to bring our fantasy sports properties under the umbrella of Citizen
Sports. Their team is excellent and truly understands the sports market. Sports are
inherently social by nature and fantasy sports naturally belong on social networks,” said
Sport Interactiva co-founder Boris Silver.

(For more press coverage, see: Venture Beat, All Facebook, Sports Business Journal, The Washington Post)

There’s obviously way too many people to thank, but I’m going to give it a shot.

My family: I love all of you. You are there to always keep me strong, focused, and grounded.

My grandfather: You know very little about technology, yet more than I could ever imagine to know about people, business, and life. Your wisdom propelled me grow as a leader, businessman, and man in general.

David Fitzgibbon: My partner and co-founder. Great compliment to my skill set and an incredible driving force behind the company.

Wharton VIP: Fantastic program with a wonderfully supportive staff. Great environment where you can find like minded people to bounce ideas off of and dream big with.

Penn/Wharton alumni: So many of you out there, in every industry/vertical. Always helpful and very open to talking to young entrepreneurs.

My friends: Who you surround yourself with is vital to your success. I’m fortunate enough that my friends are incredible people.

Citizen Sports: We’re glad that you will be the new owners. Your team is hooked into sports and social media. It was important that our “baby” moved into an appropriate home. Plus it’s a bonus to say that we got bought out by the Bringing Down the House (book), 21 (movie) MIT blackjack ace Jeff Ma.

In the past 15 months, I learned more than I could put a price tag on. Taking a leave of absence from Wharton was also an incredible time and one of the best decisions of my life. David and I accomplished so many things that I’m proud of, here are a few:

• Grew user base to over 1 million users
• Launched and ran 12 different sports applications
• Ran advertising campaigns with top brands like Time Warner, Adidas, VO5, and EA Sports Madden 2009
• Remained profitable throughout
• 15 months from start to exit

This is why I love America. So despite what you may read in the negative press, I assure you that the American Dream is very much still alive. And very much beautiful.

I’m not sure what I’ll do next, but I know I have a long list of ideas that I was simply always too busy to do while working on Sport Interactiva. I’d like to take some time off, relax, and be a regular 20 year old college kid for a bit. After that, I’m sure I’ll find something to throw myself at again.

This came across my Google Reader today and it really caught my attention: Barack Obama’s longtime campaign photographer David Katz snapped 82 photos of the President-elect with his family/friends on election night. The cool part is he uploaded all of the photos onto Flickr. I don’t care who you voted for; to me, this screams about the power of social media.

Whereas twenty (or even four) years ago, these photos may have made their way to the public through traditional distribution channels like newspapers or glossy magazines, today we are given full access to some of the most intimate moments in people’s lives. Social media rips down the gatekeepers and traditional walls. The photos are very powerful and speak to anyone; it also makes Obama that much more accessible and relevant. This is why I believe in companies like Twitter where you can read minute-by-minute updates from some of the top investors, musicians, writers, etc. in the world. We are now able to get an unprecedented level of access into all levels of humanity. That’s cool.

Last year, Stanford offered a Facebook Application Class literally the Fall after the Facebook F8 platform launched. The class did really well and produced some high traffic applications. This morning I learned (thanks to Brad Feld) that Stanford offered an iPhone Application Development Class for Fall 08 (the iPhone platform only launched in Summer 08) and they’ve been kind enough to put up the full course materials online. It’s nice to see a University on the cutting edge of web technology and I hope the students there appreciate the opportunities that they get to learn this kind of material for credit. It’s also awesome that Stanford is sharing the knowledge with the public and open-sourcing all of the course materials. I’m usually a skeptic on mobile, but I think Apple has nailed the user experience for mobile with the iPhone and they’ve made a believer out of me.

My always colorful accounting professor today:

Well shit, if I had sold all my stocks, gone into all cash last year, and bought a bunch of Bentleys with my retirement fund, I’d still have more cash left over than the value of my portfolio after last week.

The other week I got the opportunity to be a student judge for applicants pitching for acceptance into Wharton’s Venture Initiation Program. The program is an educational oasis for entrepreneurs at the University of Pennsylvania. It seeks to provide students with the resources and network to support them in their early stage entrepreneurial endeavors by providing things like office space, advising, small grants, and a network of support. If you’re a student at Penn with a business that you are passionate about building, I highly recommend reading up on Wharton VIP. (Full disclosure: my company, Sport Interactiva, is an alumni of the program. The program and the staff were incredibly important for our success.)

My purpose on the panel was to answer questions of applicants about what the program is like from a student’s perspective, give feedback to students when needed (I didn’t do much talking, mostly just listening), and provide my feedback to the other judges/staff of Wharton VIP on the fit of each applicant into the program.

I’ve pitched venture capitalists and angel investors before (although we decided not to pursue raising money for the company) and this was really an opportunity for me to sit on the other end of a pitch. Or to clarify, 25 pitches. This experience really ingrained the intensity and hard work of sitting on the other end of a pitch. The day before the pitch session, I read through 42 applications of all sorts of companies and student entrepreneurs of all kinds of backgrounds. While I can’t go into specifics, I was really impressed with the quality of business ideas and entrepreneurs applying to the program.

The next day I arrived a bit early to the pitch sesssion and took my seat at the front for the start of a 3.5 hour pitch session where 25 businesses (17 had pitched the day before) pitched their ideas for Wharton’s VIP. There were a couple of things I really learned or made mental notes on:

• Paper plans are an imperfect first filter: a pitch will put you over the top or sink you. When I was reading through the initial pool of 42 applications, there were distinctly companies that I just wrote off right away for various reasons. Then there were companies that I just loved right away when I read their business summaries and resumes. What happened at the pitch session was very interesting. A few of the companies that I thought were clear shoe ins just didn’t have effective pitches. Similarly, a few of the companies that I had instantly written off based on their paper applications were so killer on the pitches that it rendered the quality of their application useless. It taught me that although reading through applications thoroughly can generally let you seperate the best of the bunch, there will be surprises on both ends and a pitch can really make or break you.
• No one is here to babysit you: people help those who help themselves. It was interesting for me to note that some of the people pitching had pitched the program before and been rejected from Wharton VIP. Yet they returned to pitch again. Based on feedback from the staff judges, these entrepreneurs had often made significant progress on their own since their last pitch. It is noticeable and makes you stand out. The lesson is really one of persistence and determination. But perhaps most importantly it is a lesson that you have to be internally driven to succeed. No program or outside influence should serve as your validation for your continued work on something — it truly has to come from within. Hand holding is over, you have to get moving on your own if you want people to ever help you.
• Entrepreneurs make the idea THE IDEA. There were several instances where the business idea by itself may not have been that great, but the entrepreneur behind the idea was the key. This may seem obvious, but it really re-iterated for me how even the best sounding ideas are useless if you don’t have the right team behind them.
• Stand out and drive your message home. This is probably a corollary to my first point, but I feel it should be seperate. As I mentioned earlier, I had to read through 42 applications and sit through 25 pitches — that makes it harder for the people evaluating the applicants to really keep it all seperate. I took notes beforehand on the applications and I took notes during presentations, but I found that some applicants had very clear, distinct, and simple messages that they kept throughout their applications as well as their pitches — this made it easier to remember the different applicants for me. Consistent concepts and visions aid the person pitching in communicating their thoughts more clearly.

So to summarize: learn how to sell/pitch and kill it, make sure you are internally driven, and pick an idea that is genuine/congruent with who you are and what your skill set is.

I’m really glad I got this experience. I’d like to thank Wharton VIP for the opportunity to be part of the program with my company and for the opportunity to go through the pitching process on the other side of the table. I learned a ton. As always, new experiences in life give you more wisdom and perspective on future experiences or situations; new experiences mean new growth.

Awesome video from the Web 2.0 conference.

“There’s way too many people in this room right now that are doing stuff they hate.  Please stop doing that!”

I watched President Bush’s bailout from last night and then read through the transcript just because I wasn’t sure I could believe what I was hearing. I’ll admit up front that I’m pretty conservative fiscally and very liberal socially (I usually fall into the Libertarian side). I love free markets and capitalism and classic Republican ideals like small government, low taxes, high business incentives, etc. (read: NOT George Bush and Company). I’m not an expert by any means in finance or markets, but I know some things and I’ve tried to keep really up to date/well-versed with the current financial crisis. Here are some parts of his speech that I found particularly memorable in bold with my thoughts written below:

First, how did our economy reach this point? Well, most economists agree that the problems we’re witnessing today developed over a long period of time. For more than a decade, a massive amount of money flowed into the United States from investors abroad because our country is an attractive and secure place to do business.

Massive amounts of money started flowing into the US because the value of the US dollar and US goods has plummeted relatively (thanks for keeping our economy strong President Bush) and as a result, many US investments were very cheap for foreign investors. President Bush’s wording makes it sound like the foreigners just gave us too much money. Shame on those foreigners.

The decline in the housing market set off a domino effect across our economy. When home values declined, borrowers defaulted on their mortgages, and investors holding mortgage-backed securities began to incur serious losses.

Before long, these securities became so unreliable that they were not being bought or sold. Investment banks, such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers, found themselves saddled with large amounts of assets they could not sell. They ran out of money needed to meet their immediate obligations, and they faced imminent collapse.

Yup, they just woke up one day and “found themselves” in this situation. The bum on the street told me he woke up one day and found himself broke, drunk, and homeless. Are you kidding me? No one just wakes up and finds themselves in an extreme state. They were taking risky positions on huge leverage. Lehman even saw the collapse of Bear Sterns, and either through hubris or self-denial (or both) thought they would not meet the same fate.

I’m a strong believer in free enterprise, so my natural instinct is to oppose government intervention. I believe companies that make bad decisions should be allowed to go out of business. Under normal circumstances, I would have followed this course. But these are not normal circumstances. The market is not functioning properly. There has been a widespread loss of confidence, and major sectors of America’s financial system are at risk of shutting down.

This should read “I’m a strong believer in free enterprise, unless it’s affecting my buddies and me.” Or maybe the fact that all of President Bush’s companies failed makes the plight of these mega banks strike a cord with him?

Any rescue plan should also be designed to ensure that taxpayers are protected. It should welcome the participation of financial institutions, large and small. It should make certain that failed executives do not receive a windfall from your tax dollars.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. The plan calls for the Fed to buy up the troubled securities at held-to-maturity prices instead of market prices. This basically puts faith in the valuations and prices that the banks assign to the prices. We could instead buy up the securities at market prices which would be really low, but something is better than nothing for these banks. The US taxpayer is going to LOSE money on this deal. This will be a transfer of wealth from the public sector to the private sector. Maybe some government programs out there make money, but government programs in my mind lose money by definition. Add that on top of the fact that the prices will be too high on these securities, and I see no way that this is not going to end up as somewhat of a windfall for these financial institutions.

In the long run, Americans have good reason to be confident in our economic strength. Despite corrections in the marketplace and instances of abuse, democratic capitalism is the best system ever devised.

Yay. Finally something beautiful is said.

I always talk about how important it is to be close to the consumer — to really live and breath your market. Luckily for me as CEO of a social application company, I currently attend a University and have college kids around me all day. Facebook was born out of a core college demographic. So it was interesting that I just logged into Facebook and here are the 3 most recent status updates from my friends (I’m pretty much exclusively friends with people I know or have at least met):

[name deleted] is hating this stupid new facebook format. I quit! 2 minutes ago – Comment

[name deleted] is unable to figure out how to use new facebook. why is this a good idea? what was wrong with old facebook? 22 minutes ago – Comment

[name deleted] just wants the old one….facebook developers-you know we all do-give the people what they want or we’ll leave. 32 minutes ago – Comment

I agree with them. The new Facebook is annoying as hell to use. From my perspective this is an example of a company going way too much into feature rich, technical development and disregarding usability and user experience.

I know there’s always an adoption curve, but I’ve been getting bombarded with invitations to join groups like

“1 million strong against the new Facebook design” (funny enough this group already has ~2 million members)

I’ve seen other groups like this too just from doing a simple search query for groups on Facebook called “new Facebook”. If I had to estimate it off the top of my head, I’d say there’s probably about 5 million people who have JOINED groups against the new Facebook layout. Facebook has 100 million active users, which it prominently displays, advertises, and brags about. So 5% of people were annoyed enough with the new layout to join groups on Facebook. That means there’s probably a large number of people who despite their annoyance with the new Facebook layout either weren’t invited or were too lazy to join a group.

This video is awesome and he’s got a good lesson: Always Be Closing. Phil Jackson (coach of the LA Lakers), showed this video to his team before the start of Game 5 of the 2008 NBA Western Conference Finals to inspire/motivate them. It’s from the movie Glengarry Glen Ross starring guys like Alec Baldwin, Kevin Spacey, Al Pacino, and Ed Harris.

Remember those tiny little blocks of plastic that came in multiple colors with long detailed instruction manuals? I don’t know about you, but when I was a little kid, I loved playing with LEGOs. In fact, I was never into the other brands of constructor toys (i.e. Mega Blocks which I always thought were a LEGO ripoff, or K’NEX which I thought were awkward to play with, etc.).

This morning I came across an article about Nathan Sawaya. He left his job as a corporate lawyer to become a professional LEGO model builder and now he earns 6 figures building life size sculptures out of LEGOs! That’s awesome. I would assume the demand for an expert LEGO builder doesn’t mean thousands of kids can grow up hoping to be LEGO builders for a living, but it’s nice seeing someone do something they love, that’s fun, and makes them a lot of money. Here’s some cool pictures:

If you want more photos, there’s a whole slideshow here.

If you’ve followed my blog, you’ll know I love inspirational quotes and songs. Last month I wrote a post detailing some of my favorite inspirational rap songs.  Over the weekend I came across a featured article on Yahoo! (it was on the front page) which explored the topic of what music Michael Phelps listens to:

In nearly every camera shot of Michael Phelps on dry land, he can be seen with iPod headphones dangling from his ears. The earbuds are a ubiquitous presence in the ready room and on the starting block; they’re just as much a part of Phelps’ ‘uniform’ as goggles and a swim cap. About two minutes prior to the start of a race, Phelps sheds the iPod along with his warm-ups. So, what is he listening to?…

Phelps listens to hip-hop music on his [iPod]. He says it helps motivate him before a race.

Phelps has said that “I’m Me” by Lil’ Wayne has been on his playlist in Beijing.

Other artists that populate Phelps’ iPod include: Jay-Z, Young Jeezy, Eminem and Outkast….[he] usually keeps things rap-centric. Phelps doesn’t speak much about the specific songs he’s listening to, but he did tell NBC in 2004 that Eminem’s “‘Til I Collapse” was on his most-played list at Athens.

Sweet. So Phelps gets pumped to the same music that I do. And judging by the fact that my last post on the subject is the most read post of all time on this blog, I figured a lot of other people get inspired by rap songs. With that said, I thought it’d be cool to break down some of the songs Phelps listens to. After all, his 8 gold medals (7 world records, 1 Olympic record) in Beijing give him the most golds of any athlete in Olympic history and the most gold medals in a single Olympics. Phelps is now spoken of as the greatest Olympian of all time.

Let’s start with “I’m Me” by Lil’ Wayne. Here’s the my interpretation of what Lil’ Wayne is saying [I have no idea how Phelps would interpret the words or how they make him feel, so this is my best guess]:

“The hottest… under the sun…”

I’m the best and the hottest one around.

“Ain’t nobody fucking with me man”

Nobody is going to mess with me, especially because everyone knows I’m the best.

“Fuck up my dreams, somebody gonna die tonight”

Don’t get in my way. I dream big and there’s only 1 outcome in my mind.

“Yes, I’m the best! And no, I ain’t positive, I’m definite”

I know in my core that I am the best. It’s not really even a question. It is a statement of facts.

“I know the game like I’m reffing it”

I know all the rules. I know everything about what I’m doing.

“Baby I’m me, so who you? You’re not me, you’re not me
And I know that ain’t fair, but I don’t care”

I am me and it’s probably not fair that no one else is on my level, but that’s the way it is.

“I am a missile like a scud”

I hit my targets and goals. Phelps is a missile in the water. Don’t get in his way.

“And you all have witnessed, but I have not finished
So keep your mouth closed and let your eyes listen”

Don’t talk trash to me (good job Team France, he really needed that extra motivation). And even when you think I’m done, I’m still going to keep going. So just sit back and watch me do what I do because you ain’t seen nothing yet.

“I’m rapping when you sleep, I was rapping when you were in jammies”

While you rest, I work. I’ve been doing this since you were still an infant and I put in all the hours I can.

“I’m a monster I tell you”

I’m scary good. I am a beast.

“Ain’t nothing gonna stop me so just envy it”

You’re not going to stop me. Nobody is.

The next song was Phelps’s most played song in the 2004 Athens Olympics, where he”only” got 6 gold medals and 2 bronze medals. That song is “Till I Collapse” by Eminem:

“Cause sometimes you feel tired, feel weak, and when you feel weak, you feel like you wanna just give up.

But you gotta search within you, you gotta find that inner strength and just pull that shit out of you and get that motivation to not give up and not be a quitter, no matter how bad you wanna just fall flat on your face and collapse.”

This is pretty simple: DO NOT GIVE UP. EVER. And when you start feeling like you’re going to quit, pull that deep energy out and push through it. Get it done.

“Till I collapse I’m spilling these raps long as you feel em
Till the day that I drop you’ll never say that I’m not killing them”

Until I die I’m going to put it all out there and no one is ever going to be able to say that I did not give it my 110%.

“Your coming with me, feel it or not you’re gonna fear it”

You might not realize it yet, but it’s scary how good I am.

“Till the roof comes off, till the lights go out
Till my legs give out, can’t shut my mouth.”

My legs need to be falling off and the world needs to be melting down for you to stop me.

“This is your moment and every single minute you spend trying to hold onto it cause you may never get it again.”

Embrace what you are doing, because right now is your moment in life.

“You hate it but you know respect you’ve got to give me”

You might not like me, but you know who I am and the respect that I deserve.

“What is he thinking? How not to go against me? Smart.”

Is he really challenging me? It appears that he is showcasing the worst possible way to try to beat me. Not very smart of him.

“But I’ll never be served my spot is forever reserved”

I earned my spot and it’s going to be there forever.

“I will not fall, I will stand tall, Feels like no one could beat me.”

Failure is not an option. I know who I am and I know I am unbeatable.

It’s cool to think about how inspiring music can be and how powerful words are. It was an absolute pleasure watching Michael Phelps dominate in the Olympics and witnessing all of his electrifying races.

First time is chance.  Second time is coincidence.  Third time is a pattern.

The past 3 times I’ve used public transport (outside of Philadelphia) in 3 seperate states in the US, I’ve run into Penn students and alums all because one of us was wearing something Penn affiliated. You never know who you’ll meet out there, but wearing alma mater gear seems like a good choice on public transport.

I had really hoped to save this post title for a longer post on personal mantras (coming up) and the power of mental thinking, but I came acros a post today that really makes me just think “life is beautiful.” The post is from the current CEO of OLX, Fabrice Grinda. His entry details his transition from a young and socially awkward guy into a socially adept and confident entrepreneur, dater, and all around balanced person. I met Fabrice last year and he came off as a very confident and empowered person as well as entrepreneur — he sold his last company for $80 million a couple years ago. So a post like this was really interesting, because I would have never guessed what he was like before.

I also think on some level I can relate with a transition phase, although I feel like a lot of my growth as a person happened in high school from the ages of 14-17. I without a doubt know I’m going to change a lot as I grow older and enter new life phases. I always feel like I have more room to improve and grow. I think at the end of the day, it’s just truly beautiful to look at how we can grow and develop as people — how we can learn and change ourselves into more complete versions.