Björn Jeffery

"Why turn down someone who wants to pay you thousands of dollars a month? Good questions. We’re..."

Thu, 31 May 2012 06:56:00 +0200

“Why turn down someone who wants to pay you thousands of dollars a month? Good questions. We’re probably leaving money on the table. But we’re also leaving complexity on the table. And complexity is like a leak in your roof. It starts small. But over time, it does real damage. And once that damage has begun, it’s hard to stop. Best not to let it in in the first place.”

- A lovely piece of strategy there.

Big Customers? Who Needs ‘Em! | Inc.com

Memorable events.

Tue, 29 May 2012 04:34:03 +0200

Memorable events.

"We managed to get most of these (as you know) and after moving into the building there was a..."

Tue, 29 May 2012 01:50:52 +0200

“We managed to get most of these (as you know) and after moving into the building there was a discussion about the facilities on some mailing list where someone said, “Wow, I think I could actually live here!” whereupon I knew we’d succeeded.”

- I highly doubt that productivity, from a quality perspective, increases significantly by just adding more hours. People still get tired, restless, bored or just want to do something else for a while. It’s natural and should be a part of life (and work). Just sitting in the same place, doing the same thing while a massive crew of people cater to you is not necessarily going to foster new ideas or an interesting work culture.

What perks at Facebook have been most valuable for increasing productivity? - Quora

"See why @TocaBoca creates some of the most unique ‪#education‬ apps for children...."

Tue, 29 May 2012 00:31:52 +0200

“See why @TocaBoca creates some of the most unique ‪#education‬ apps for children. http://tw.appstore.com/7Br”

- Very happy about this tweet from the official App Store team. 993 000+ followers!

Twitter / AppStore: See why @TocaBoca creates

"A good leader recognizes that most people won’t feel comfortable challenging authority, so it falls..."

Thu, 24 May 2012 06:11:51 +0200

“A good leader recognizes that most people won’t feel comfortable challenging authority, so it falls upon authority to encourage them to question. It’s easy to say that you’re going to encourage feedback but it’s hard to do, because unfortunately it doesn’t always come in a format we want to hear.”

- Sheryl Sandberg’s Class Day Speech At Harvard Business School | Poets and Quants

"New paradigms tend to start in technologies that are cheap to build, and spread to technologies that..."

Thu, 24 May 2012 03:27:27 +0200

“

New paradigms tend to start in technologies that are cheap to build, and spread to technologies that are expensive to build. They spread from text to software to hardware. (…) To see a further into the future of hardware, we might look at what’s happening with text today. When we look at Twitter and SMS, we still see communication and gift. But more strikingly, we see smallness.

If software follows content, I imagine we’ll start to see lots of APIs that do small things. But they will easily interact with one another to together do big things. And if hardware then follows software, I imagine that we will see lots of small devices that do simple things alone, but complex things together. They might remind us of ants.

”

- Sep Kamvar - Software ecologies (via jonascarlsson)

"Fortnighter provides global travel itineraries customized to your exact specifications. Tell us..."

Thu, 24 May 2012 01:30:35 +0200

“Fortnighter provides global travel itineraries customized to your exact specifications. Tell us about your trip and a professional travel writer with fresh local knowledge will suggest the best experiences for your specific interests.”

- Interesting concept as it raises the question if writing and sharing of information is to be treated as craft and artisanship - thus justifying a higher price since it is custom made.

Fortnighter

notes.unwieldy: The $144,146,165 Button

Tue, 15 May 2012 05:37:00 +0200

notes.unwieldy: The $144,146,165 Button:

unwieldy:

The average New York City taxi cab driver makes $90,747 in revenue per year. There are roughly 13,267 cabs in the city. In 2007, NYC forced cab drivers to begin taking credit cards, which involved installing a touch screen system for payment.

During payment, the user is presented with three…

I’ve often wondered about this, and now I know. It works - very well. There’s a lesson to be learned for media companies here somewhere.

"Swedish developer Toca Boca has passed the 10m downloads milestone for its children’s apps,..."

Wed, 09 May 2012 06:49:52 +0200

“Swedish developer Toca Boca has passed the 10m downloads milestone for its children’s apps, less than four months after crossing the 5m mark.”

- Proud of this.

Toca Boca eyes kid-app acquisitions after 10m downloads | Technology | guardian.co.uk

I never knew this was a thing, but I sort of get it. (via Cabin...

Wed, 02 May 2012 19:08:56 +0200

I never knew this was a thing, but I sort of get it.

(via Cabin Porn)

When I get a cold sales e-mail from a random service, I'm like

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 21:29:53 +0200

runningastartup:

When I spot my two best friends having fun without me

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 07:22:15 +0200

whatshouldwecallme:

I can’t stop laughing at these.

"Cellphone producers worked with a Taiwan company that stands outside of Chinese governance,..."

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 21:23:35 +0200

“Cellphone producers worked with a Taiwan company that stands outside of Chinese governance, MediaTek, to quickly produce affordable and customizable cellphones that could flood markets within and outside of China. Essentially, cellphone producers dreamed of a way to operate outside of market regulations for cellphones and in the end shanzai phones now are estimated to makeup 20% of all cellphone sales within China.”

- Incredibly interesting article on mobile innovation in China.

A recipe for disruptive innovation? Learning from Shanzai producers - Bytes of China - Tricia Wang [ethnographer & sociologist researching cellphones and computers in China & Mexico]

"Education has become a substitute for thinking about your future."

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 07:49:40 +0200

“Education has become a substitute for thinking about your future.”

- Peter Thiel, from Pando Monthly earlier this evening. Although I don’t agree on everything he said it was thoroughly refreshing to hear someone that _actually had clear opinions about things, and not just the default cliché startup ramblings that are so common. He made me think, which I always appreciate.

Waking up for work hungover

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 07:45:11 +0200

whatshouldwecallme:

"A few weeks ago a postdoc in my lab logged on to Amazon to buy the lab an extra copy of Peter..."

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 22:02:36 +0200

“A few weeks ago a postdoc in my lab logged on to Amazon to buy the lab an extra copy of Peter Lawrence’s The Making of a Fly – a classic work in developmental biology that we – and most other Drosophila developmental biologists – consult regularly. The book, published in 1992, is out of print. But Amazon listed 17 copies for sale: 15 used from $35.54, and 2 new from $1,730,045.91 ( $3.99 shipping).”

- Interesting side effect of algorithm based pricing.

Amazon’s $23,698,655.93 book about flies

"When she rounded for the third attempt, however, she radioed down to say she could hear her right..."

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 18:24:56 +0200

“When she rounded for the third attempt, however, she radioed down to say she could hear her right engine begin to sputter. “She knew at that point she didn’t have enough fuel to miss and go around and try it again,” Mr. Kasbohm said.”

- Amazing story.

Learning to Be a Pilot, With Fuel Running Out in Midair - NYTimes.com

Photo

Thu, 05 Apr 2012 20:13:12 +0200

"Speaking in Harrisburg, Pa., Romney told an audience that Obama may have spent “too much time at..."

Thu, 05 Apr 2012 18:27:46 +0200

“Speaking in Harrisburg, Pa., Romney told an audience that Obama may have spent “too much time at Harvard,” according to NBC. Obama, who has a law degree from Harvard, spent three years there. Romney, who earned both a Harvard law degree and business degree, spent four years at the university and was by all accounts a motivated student who was happy with the institution during his time there.”

- Stranger than fiction.

Mitt Romney, Harvard JD/MBA, Says Obama Spent Too Much Time At Harvard | TPM2012

“A hooded sweatshirt can make can make an innocent teen...

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 21:28:00 +0200

“A hooded sweatshirt can make can make an innocent teen look like a criminal. Just like a suit and glasses can make Geraldo Rivera look like a journalist.”

(via The Word - Dressed to Kill - The Colbert Report - 2012-26-03 - Video Clip | Comedy Central)