Voice transcription service for blogging?

I was introduced yesterday to Copytalk, a transcription service based in India that records up to 4 minutes of voice, transcribes it, and sends it your or any 4 email addresses you want the same day. (It's $50 a month.)

Although I use squarespace to host my blogs, I'm aware and have used email to post remotely to blogs.

This service would allow Paul Allen to forego his cherished blackberry and shrinking thumbs and just speak into his phohe and see a new blog post appear. I'm quite sure that almost anyone can speak faster than they can type.

Searching for the invisible man: Entrepreneurs as a measured value.

The French, according to George Bush, have no word for them, economic theory has surprisingly little room for them, and it is a mystery why anyone would choose to be one of them. Entrepreneurs are the leading men of capitalism, the venturesome protagonists who move the plot forward. But economic theory gives them few if any lines to read.

Translated literally, entrepreneur means one who undertakes—one of life’s doers. To start a firm you need gumption, and to succeed you need an eye for a gap in the market. That in turn demands alertness, as Israel Kirzner, of New York University (NYU), has pointed out.

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Complexity causes 50% of product returns.

Complexity causes 50% of product returns.

Half of all malfunctioning products returned to stores by consumers are in full working order, but customers can't figure out how to operate the devices. Product complaints and returns are often caused by poor design, but companies frequently dismiss them as "nuisance calls.

The average consumer in the United States will struggle for 20 minutes to get a device working, before giving up.

Most of the flaws found their origin in the first phase of the design process.

This last one might be viewed as the most important. During the design of a system program or product, most of the problems with interface or use that are going to crop up are built into the system.

VIPBlogger.com's largest buyer is incredibly good looking.

Since my RSS feeds were full of VIPBloggers posts yesterday I trotted on over to see what all the fuss was about. It seems that Justin Bergener (another of those short haired Junto boys) thought that the million dollar homepage idea was just the ticket to pry a few dollars out of the blogger crowd and buy himself more hair gel. Justin's no dummy. You're only in for a 6 month run.

This little 9 box square is mine and links to a number of blogs I run or businesses I own including:  Fight Club, MedicalSpasOnline.com, Surface Medical Spas, Nimbleit.com, and this blog. I didn't want to have 5 little boxes so I made one icon and split it up 9 ways. Seemed like a good idea at the time. It made me the largest buyer to date but did little to affect my looks as far as I can tell.

I would expect to see a number of these sites pop up much like the 'I'll tatoo your logo on my forehead' auctions on Ebay. Still, I hope it works. Justin wants the money.

When Bloggers say: Hey! There's a lawyer after me!

I am an attorney. First, the legal comments and advice you are providing constitutes the practice of law and, thus, you could be facing criminal sanctions. Second, I have been contacted by one of your readers you wants to take legal action against you for improper legal advice. I suggest that you refrain from providing any further legal advice in your blog or have it reviewed by an attorney before posting it

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Television on a shoe string: Park City InfoChannel

Park City InfoChannel: 30 seconds of TV, 12 times a day, 84 times a week, for three months. Includes production, sound, and editing and you own the ad. How much? $1000 on Nimble. It almost sounds too good to be true.

It's a Boyd!

John Boyd has joined the Nimble team and we're happy to have him. John's purview will include parts of marketing and sales. John's extremely bright and talented and we're expecting great things.

For those of you who don't know John, I'll pass along the synopsis. John is one of these young hot-shot short-hairs that I seem to be running into a lot lately. He's interned in the White House and organized and run a gubernatorial campaign in the last primary in the state. John's also a Fight Club member with a wicked jab.

Old media must embrace the amateur.

Clicking through my regular morning reads from my RSS feeds I came across this article 'Old Media Must Embrace The Amateur'  by Tom Glocer (head of Reuters), on the Financial Times. I have to say this is right along the discussion lines of a lunch we had yesterday with an 'Old Media' source.  Actually, I think these guys get it. Unlike some discussions we've had with local media outlets, there wasn't a 'circle-the-wagons' type mentality. Change is constant and if history teaches us anything, it's the folly of fixed defenses. Here are some of the more interesting snippits but the articles worth a read.

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To VC or not VC, that is the question?

There's some internal debate over here about whether tis nobler to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles and build this baby from organic growth.

Actually I'm tired and the thought of organizing my thoughts for the next hour on the cost of capital is rapidly giving way to a few hours on the LoveSac . I like the headline though and rather than throw it away. I'll see if I can't cowboy up tomorrow and finish this post.

Next RSS subscriber makes 100.

Somebody can make history here. The next person to subscribe to the RSS feed of this blog will be number 100. I'd say that's pretty good since this blog is only three weeks old. Granted, being the 100th subscriber to this RSS feed won't make the 'tell the grandkids' list unless we actually do topple Google. But it will make me feel warm and fuzzy inside and that should make you feel good too.

MWI as a think tank.

Joshua Steimle, MWI's Honcho, is offering office space inside his shop to entrepreneurs or small startups. $500 per month will get you an office  with pickles, onions, ketchup, phone and janitorial services.  There are some cubes to house your grunts in too.  Joshua makes it sound a lot better on his blog.

Woot and the power of limited inventory.

Limited supply + large demand = motivation.

For anyone who doesn't know woot.com, now's your chance. Woot is an online business that takes a single product of limited inventory, discounts it heavily, and releases it every day at midnight.  If the products good it sells out pdq so you have to be quick to the button. Steep & Cheap is backcountry.com's like-concept but offers outdoor stuff.

I found out about Woot from Alan Young when he was working with the University Venture Fund. Allan told me that Woot was changing it's users sleeping patterns since they'd stay up 'till midnight to see what the next Woot was.

Of course it's the limited supply. Limited supply + large demand = motivation.

The problem many businesses have is that they don't really have limited supply, they have lots of supply. It's this factor of being able to offer unlimited supply that exerts a downward pressure on perceived value for internet companies. How much will people pay for email? Nada.

What can a business do to decrease the perceived supply of its offering? Depends. If you're direct competitors also have unlimited supply you're in trouble because your customers will switch. It's only if you're offering is unique enough that the opportunity cost is now perceived by the buyer to be lower with your offering.

It's the perceived value and opportunity cost that buyers use to make purchasing decisions. That's it. It would be really simple if all consumers used the same criteria to judge but they don't. There's slop in the decision making process since every individual use their own criteria. But that's also where the opportunity lies for any business.

Women purchasing shoes are using a very different standard of value and opportunity cost than men. (Way different in my wife's case.)

Woot proves the point. Changing the habits of customers is not easy, but if the perceived value of the offing is there it happens without a second thought. 

Fight Club is ready to rumble.

Fight Club's scheduled for Thursday of this week. You can see all of the exact details over at the Fight Club blog.

Seth Purple Cow's Google

Seth Godin talking about Purple Cows at Google. If you like Seth, this is the stuff. Here's the link.

Fight Club is here.

What's Fight Club?

Fight Club is a monthly event (usually dinner) for entrepreneurs and startup CEOs.

Yeah, there are a number of other events around. The Geek Dinner. Corporate Alliance. Chambers. The CTO Breakfast. But Fight club is for startups to network with each other. (At least that's the idea. We'll see where it goes.)

Why Fight Club?

Geek Dinners taken. Besides, it's cooler to tell your wife/staff/buddies that you're going to Fight Club than have to ask strangers directions to the Geek Dinner. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

Fight Club is about connecting, not selling

Fight Club Members are entrepreneurs and business owners who understand that people are not the sum of what they can do for you. We're organized to build introductions and relationships between entrepreneurs outside the regular business environment. You can sell again on Monday.

How you fit in

Fight Club is small on purpose. We want to offer an environment where people can get to know the 'person' they're talking to, before the business. Anyone can come, you just have to attend with a member the first time.

Fight Club is not an Old Boys Network

We're just a bunch of similarly situated guys who value semi-inteligent conversation and understand that expanding your network and being of service is also good business.