

Ask HN: Can I help you be more awesome today? (No strings.) - mikegreenberg

Hello HN. I like this community a lot and want to see if there's anything I can do to make you a little more successful. No strings. To give you an idea of what I might be able to help you with, let me tell you a few things I've done to help others recently...<p>- I'm an early-adopter and enjoy seeing new technology and ideas being put into action. If only to get access sooner, I'd be more than happy to critique and share my opinion on all things design, customer development, software, entrepreneurship, family, creativity, or productivity.<p>- I'm participating with a team of other students in the Stanford Technology Entrepreneurship online course and helping people learn to apply the Business Model Canvas along with lean startup methodologies as well as attempt to bring our own product to market. (On the side, our team published an ebook that helped other groups in the course to effectively brainstorm toward creating a viable business idea.) (This course is also the reason why I didn't do last month's "No strings" thread.)<p>- I organize the South Florida Hack and Tell, which is a group for geeks (and those interested in hanging out with geeks) to do interesting events here in South Florida (like learn Arduino, grab a beer, participate as a team in a Hack-a-thon, etc),<p>- I advise a few local single founders who are without technical expertise and guide them toward good long-term technical decisions for their startup,<p>- I write (moderately maintainable) software for a living,<p>- I understand good design from bad design and can push pixels with the best of them (I got a perfect on this color test: http://www.xrite.com/custom_page.aspx?pageid=77&#38;lang=en),<p>- I have a family and juggle a mediocre work-life balance that's gradually improving.<p>If there's something I can help you with, just ask here or @mikegreenberg on Twitter. Be specific about what you're trying to fix/solve/accomplish. The more details you provide, the better I can help you out. :)<p>I also hope this inspires other people to help out even if you don't think you have anything useful to offer. Actions like this will only improve our community (locally and across the net).<p>Cheers! Mike<p>PS: I'll typically reciprocate the amount of effort/consideration that you've shown in your request. If you show me that you're thoughtful about the feedback you want from me, I'll be more apt to give you something useful. I'll accept any requests made before the end of today and will attempt to respond by the end of the weekend.<p>PPS: You can check out my previous submissions if you want to see the sort of feedback I can provide.
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duiker101
Hi Mike, thanks for helping the community, there is actually one thing that i
would love to get some input on from someone more "experienced". If you could
validate my idea, the following: A service that lets you, developer, send
message to the users under the form of alerts/dialogs, not push notifications.
I think this service might have a lot of advantages, most of all, it should
not annoy the user. In my view this service would help developers to keep a
strict contact with the users, something that i think it's very important and
it's usually appreciated the user. I do not want this to be something just to
keep the user engaged.

Some examples of how this could be used:

\- Send notifications about the status of your service/app

\- Get in touch with specific users to provide support

\- Messages directed to specific platforms

\- Fast feedback from specifed users, like if there is someone who uses a
feature more than other, ask why.

\- Give rewards to your most passionate users.

In the end i would say that this is a service to let the users know that you
are there. I have a quite clear view of all of this even if i might not have
expressed it in the best way. I even have already something in my hands. but i
wish to know if this is something that people might actually like/use.

Thanks :)

~~~
mikegreenberg
tl;dr: I think this could be a very useful service, but the execution is very
important.

There are already services which are in this space who are trying to get it
right (olark.com comes to mind). I'm not really sure what the right way is,
but if I had to take a guess, the experience should feel very homogeneous with
the app which offers it. Yes, there's a reasonable amount of value you get out
of a drop-in service that you don't have to configure or think about, but I
think every point of interaction with the customer should be a carefully-
thought decision and not a white-label feature you add as an after-thought.

I think if you were able to figure out how to construct a communication's
channel that could be easily added to an app while neatly integrating into the
existing experience, that would be a major win that I'd give you money to
provide me.

~~~
duiker101
this was a really helpful comment! Thanks! I will carefully think about it!
Actually olark is one of points of inspiration, but i would prefer to point it
more to the mobile world. Thanks a lot for the help!

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keiferski
Hey Mike, really appreciate you taking the time. I recently launched a service
that creates elevator pitches for startups:

<http://pitchremix.com>

Any specific thoughts on the site and the service? Do you think there is a
large enough market (i.e., do you think many startup founders would pay for
this?) And are there any glaring holes to fix? Features that I absolutely must
add?

Thanks again!

~~~
mikegreenberg
This is pretty straightforward. I'm intrigued, but question how someone else
(who has not thought about the problem as long as I have) be able to
communicate the solution more effectively than me? Further, you don't
guarantee anything if I think your pitch sucks. It feels like I might just
blow $25 for entertainment and hope for the best.

Maybe re-position your value prop like so: "For $25, we'll consult with you
for 30 minutes to help you refine your existing pitch or create one from
scratch."

You can still earn your keep but allows your customers to be involved in
shaping a pitch that actually reflects their vision.

~~~
keiferski
Thanks for the feedback. That's actually the exact problem I've been having
with my first customers. I end up consulting with them via email (until the
pitch is perfect) anyway, so I might as well build the site around it. A
30-minute consultation is a great idea too.

Thanks again.

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eranation
Thank you! would you please consider perhaps reviewing FlashIssue? it helps
people quickly create social newsletters / digests / tweetletters from their
blog posts / other blogs / sites / anything in minutes by curating (more like
your facebook timeline than an email...)

Would you please tell us your impression from the user experience?

<http://flashissue.com>

Also we have a very nice chrome extension that makes your gmail emails
"facebook status" like, e.g. you grab articles and put in email more like a
facebook timeline (with title, snippet and thumbnail + source attribution) it
also works with the web app but I think it's the first "curator" clipper for
gmail, here is the link

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cihaednhfbocfdiflm...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cihaednhfbocfdiflmpccekcmjepcnmb)

We use it internally all the time and it saves time and gets the email look
much more professional than just a link... (better click rates as well)

Thanks!

~~~
mikegreenberg
I'd be happy to give this a try. The clipping tool for newsletters sounds
particularly interesting. I send emails to my members as a block of text
(without much fanfare).

I'll give this extension a try this weekend and see how people like a
different format. I'm not sure how soon I'll have results regarding the
newsletter, but will definitely critique the experience. :)

~~~
eranation
Thank you! will be looking forward to hear back

~~~
mikegreenberg
I didn't forget about this. My in-laws surprised us this weekend and I didn't
have the time I originally anticipated. If you'd like to touch bases with me
via email (in profile), I can follow up with you later this week.

Thanks for understanding.

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carlsednaoui
Hey Mike,

I would love to get your feedback on this <http://coursebacon.com/>. The basic
idea behind CourseBacon is to help you identify the best free online learning
resources.

For the "star algorithm" I am pulling backlinks from Google, SEOmoz and
Twitter.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance,

Carl

~~~
eranation
I like it... tip - use embed.ly to get better favicon / image / title / desc
to the course list, will look much more of a list than a search engine
result...

~~~
mikegreenberg
This. Would add a LOT to your experience.

------
alliem
I need to write an engineering spec for what is essentially the robotic
endoskeleton for the terminator arnold plays in the franchise by the same
name.

Help a girl out?

I can write software specifications but this task is beyond me.

My engineer must think I`m the reincarnation of tesla to have asked me for a
spec, but I think I can pull it off, just having trouble getting started with
everything else I have going on (new bf and dog, tcombinator, freelancing, my
adult career, doing nothing, etc).

I was thinking you can talk to your peeps and see if any of them want to help.

Before the backlash, I don't intend for these robots to be used to kill
people. They are for jobs that humans die doing or cannot do, like cleaning up
nuclear accidents like fukishima without suffering the huge doses of radiation
a man would (or at least not dying/becomong non-operational as a result of
it). Thanks

~~~
mikegreenberg
I'm not sure if you're trolling or not, but I would suggest you start taking
some Robotics AI courses (<http://ai.stanford.edu>) and reading some books
before taking this project on. I'm not sure how far you'd have to go but
there's a big different between building a robot that moves and building a
robot that can mobilize itself and perform actions in response to stimulation.

Also, engineering spec is quite vague. If you boss really asked you to do
something like, think twice about taking it on. Loose, vague, and otherwise
overreaching projects tend to not end well for those involved.

I think my peeps will feel similarly and pass on this one. But I'd be happy to
introduce you should you want to come out to a hack night and ask them
yourself. :)

Best of luck to you.

~~~
alliem
I'm the boss (tcombinator.blogspot.com), it's my engineer that is requesting
an engineering specification. I'm assuming that it would essentially be a
software specification document, but for a robot, as opposed to an app. I
recognize the difficulties involved, hence my stagnation and reaching out for
guidance and partnerships to jumpstart the process. I live in Virginia,
otherwise I would be happy to meet with your contacts.

~~~
mikegreenberg
Couldn't find a contact point for you. Feel free to send me an email and I'll
see what I can do to help! :)

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zander1229
Hey Mike,

I had signed up for the Venture Labs course earlier this year and found it
very interesting. Unfortunately, due to time commitments and various other
issues I did not follow through with keeping up with the course.

Could you give me some pro cons of the Venture Labs course itself? How has
your experience been so far? Keep being awesome.

~~~
mikegreenberg
Thanks for the question. The ride has been particularly fun so far and I don't
think a short answer will justify the experience. I've started a blog post
that I'll put up later this week and cross-post here. If you want to reach out
via email, I can drop you a line when it's up. (Or you can subscribe to blog
in my profile.)

Cheers!

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Concours
I'd like to get your opinions about a new tool <http://www.bulkmailapp.com>, a
mass email merging tool to send personaliaed emails en masse to bloggers and
contacts. what do you think about the selling message/product pitch on the
site? Thanks

------
AznHisoka
What are some things/pitfalls I should look out if I'm starting a tech
consulting company?

~~~
mikegreenberg
Disclaimer: I doubt I'm a good role model to be answering this question. The
majority of my experience has been spent working for someone. Granted most of
the projects I've been able to choose, I am not yet a self-made man. I work
with many consultancies and can only relate what I've observed.

The biggest problem is the overhead of managing your finances and business.
It's a distraction that you'll have to learn to deal with one way or the
other. In my opinion, find someone that will help you navigate these decisions
early and often. (Look to your local Chamber of Commerce or entrepreneurial
meetups for qualified mentors.)

Do NOT underestimate how important it is to track your time and money. My
approach was to take things in small bites. I setup a DBA and opened a
business account and tried my best to keep my finances separate. When I paid
for stuff out of my personal account, I made sure I put together an expense
form to track reimbursements. Even though there aren't much tax benefits
running as a sole proprietorship, the taxes are much easier and you do get to
write off a few things. Once you start making 4 figures a month, seek out
assistance again and see if it makes sense to formalize your business into a
corporation.

There are services which help manage your books (such as Florida startup,
<http://lessaccounting.com>). If it makes sense, use them! They are awesome
people and will be a net positive gain for your business. There are also
lawyer services which will probably answer questions you have over the phone.
One such law service I'm aware of (but haven't used myself) is
<http://walkercorporatelaw.com/> and comes highly recommended by Andrew Warner
on Mixergy.

While this is basic advice, it's will set you with a strong foundation to
start off. And having someone mentor you through the process will give you the
best possible advice that will be tailored to your practice's needs.

------
sown
Thanks for doing this. I sent you an email, if that wasn't too, if I may.
Again, thanks.

~~~
mikegreenberg
Perfectly fine. I got your email and I'll respond back as soon as I can. :)

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thiagodotfm
Do you use GTD or any of the kind? What is your opinion on it?

~~~
mikegreenberg
I read most of Allen's book but felt the best takeaway was asking "was it
actionable". This question helps me get through the majority of my planning,
but I don't bother with incorporating much else. The truth is I try to keep my
life mostly in the digital world. I do a monthly cleanup of paperwork and
followup to tie as many loose ends as possible. And I let technology filter
and manage the rest of my information flow.

Allen's system was simple for most, but I found it needlessly complicated.
This is his prescription: <http://cyprych.neostrada.pl/_images/processing.png>

I opt for the very low-maintenance system I described in exchange for a
tolerable amount of chaos. Until I can afford a personal assistant, this will
have to be and have stopped investing time into improving my system in pursuit
of more satisfying improvements for myself.

*I like to leave the bookmark poking out about two-thirds of the way through the book and keep it on my bookcase in the living room for everyone to see.

