garry’s posthaven

Customers seem to really like free as a price point. I suspect they will love “less than free."

Bill Gurley points out that Google's recent moves with Android and their Mapping API's have ushered in a new era of 'less than free.' Windows Mobile, Blackberry and iPhone platforms charge the mobile operators, whereas Google actually subsidizes operators that choose Android through ad rev shares.

Thus far, Google has been able to use its gigantic firehose of profits from ads to make it very difficult for people in other industries to survive. The consumer wins. But can you imagine how deflationary these tactics are for tech as a whole?

Every dollar Google gets its hands on... may eventually extinguish someone else's dollar of profit in an otherwise unrelated field. Crazy!

Great wrapup from a day of insights and great talks.

People who think their startup's success is going to follow from their immensely valuable secret idea are disproportionately likely to have bad ideas.

Some level of secrecy can be good psychologically -- it's been shown that telling *everyone* about an idea that you *want* to do will cause reward centers in the brain to fire as if you had already done it.

For tech in general, and web startups in particular, unless you have some one-time-exploitable loophole that powers your business (unlikely) -- you're better off being a little more trusting than paranoid when talking to people who can help you. You have to give a little to get a little... or sometimes get a lot.

I'm really digging this new album by Cass McCombs... Just really really relaxing guitar ballads and riffs. Cass McCombs adds a retro bassline to a very sweet song on Dreams-Come-True-Girl. Jonesy Boy is like if you dropped a bunch of ice cubes on top of vintage 70's Beatles.

It's retro alt country / indie rock... some songs pick up some of the modern rhythmic repetition of Interpol and others, but still others have a down-home electric guitar twanging away.

Good for a mellow mood. Which we could all use more of these days.

If your goal is to start a company, it is mostly a waste of time to work anywhere but a startup.

I agree. Large company experience prepares you for the rigors of navigating fiefdom and hierarchy and pleasing your boss. Those goals don't align you with creating value in the marketplace. But that's the entire point of startups! Get closer to the metal, not farther away.

Needless to say, design minimalism in action.

I would love to be a fly on the wall at Apple sometime. I'd love to hear what they *really* say behind closed doors. "OK guys, lets really get rid of all the ding dongs..."

I *loved* the visual style of this short film made by acclaimed filmmaker / photographer Vincent Laforet. It was shot with the brand new Canon 1D Mark 4 at 1080p and ISO6400. Brilliant work.

It also highlights what utterly amazing work you can do these days with < $10,000 in digital camera equipment and Macs running Final Cut Pro. You still need the talent, you just don't need the bankroll.

Technology frees the artist to create, ever more unencumbered. That's real empowerment.

EDIT: As of this afternoon, Canon asked Laforet to take down the video. Wow, right as it was going viral? Someone doesn't understand social media.

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won. It exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours."