Archive for the ‘Business’ Category

“Work” continued

Friday, July 10th, 2015

I moderated a panel today at Gather on the topic of "Work".  We had representatives from different types of work: self-employed, salaried employee, startup, and investor. As moderator, my role wasn't to share my opinions. Fortunately, on the Internet I'm also blogger, and my role as a blogger is to share ...

Lighting a Spark Under Telecom

Friday, February 21st, 2014

Telecom New Zealand is changing its name to Spark. Most commentators regard it as a backward move, most recently Lance Wiggs who diagnoses marketing capture, distraction from executive and board, and the death of a valuable brand. I'd like to respectfully disagree. I might be a contrarian, but I think it's ...

I’m Going on an Adventure

Friday, August 16th, 2013

I caught up with Jesse Robbins at Foo Camp, and he gave me a great line that I remember as being something like: "I'm going on an adventure. The outcome is uncertain, there will be setbacks along the way, so I'll surround myself with good travelling companions." I'm going on a ...

Dear Boosted: Surprise Me and Succeed

Wednesday, March 20th, 2013

The NZ Arts Foundation has launched Boosted, a way to crowdfund arts projects. Now, if you're like me, you're probably wondering "don't we already have several ways of doing that? I mean, Kiwi artists have already used Kickstarter and PledgeMe to fund projects." Boosted's key point of difference is ...

Things You Learn

Thursday, January 10th, 2013

Things I learned while I was too busy to write week notes: if you don't do it, it won't get done ("delegate" qualifies as "doing"); learning to delegate is as hard as learning to do the task itself was, and you've got to learn to delegate NOW; (related) setting it up so it ...

Delayed Broadcast of International Programs

Sunday, September 9th, 2012

It's always seemed strange to me that local broadcasters would hold off broadcasting Dr Who, Mad Men, and other high-profile shows. Viewers chatter about it as soon as an episode airs in its country of origin, so regional fans either have the episode ruined by net spoilers or disconnect ...

Innovation is a Moral Good

Sunday, November 20th, 2011

Pondering the New Zealand fishing industry, I had an insight today. Forgive me if it's old news to you. You have three options to make more money: Lower costs. Sell more of the same stuff. Make new types of stuff to sell. In quota-limited systems such as fishing, you can't catch more fish because ...

Questioning University

Wednesday, November 16th, 2011

There's a trend now to question the value of a university education. It used to be that simply possessing a university degree gained you access to a Better Class of Job. That is no longer the case; now you have access to The Same Class of Unemployment Benefit. ...

Career Advice

Sunday, February 13th, 2011

I was honoured to give a talk of career advice to the 2010 Summer of Tech students. I appear to have let a few f-bombs fly, so don't watch if that sort of thing offends you. (In fact, you should probably stop reading my blog if that sort ...

Changing the Demographics of Innovation

Thursday, September 16th, 2010

Text of notes for a talk given at the 50th Anniversary Conference of the New Zealand Computer Society in Rotorua, 17 September 2010. I will link to video when it's posted by the conference organizers. Hello everyone. Thank you for the kind introduction, and thank you to the New ...