Love, Love, LOVE This Bailout. No really. The Auto Industry Bailout Still Sucks!

I love it when I'm right. I do. And it seems that my opposition to this auto-industry bailout is proving smarter and smarter everyday. Rick Wagoner, CEO of GM, just announced he was stepping down as part of the need to restructure the auto company, since... wait... wait... here's the big surprise... they haven't done shit to turn around their flailing business. Ok, some of you will say... "yea, but the economy sucks!". Sure it does, so start laying people off. Start restructuring. Start closing plants. Start actually conserving cash. Start making cool cars.

Instead, you know what they've been doing? They've been bombarding me with advertisements telling me how cool their cars have become. Overnight I guess. All these cool cars are now part of GM's arsenal. Where've I been? Living in a cave? Their cars still suck.

Whenever I advise people how to write their business school essays, I say "show, don't tell". It's that much more believable. Well, that's my advice for GM. SHOW US! I think Americans are becoming sick of people telling them things. Or at least I hope they are. Unless it's the Shamwow guy.

While I applaud Wagoner stepping down - don't think for a second that he wasn't forced out by the Obama administration. I like how he's trying to save face and how they're actually letting him. Fire his ass! He's the CEO. He's responsible for their mess.

It gets awesomer though. Apparently he's entitled to $20M in retirement benefits (here). Twenty million dollars! Retirement benefits. Holy shit is all I can say. Good luck GM.

Wow. Go Grid Did Something Right!?

GoGrid was having network latency issues for that past few days. Yet again. While this was another instance of GoGrid sucking it, at least they owned up to it this time.

I received an email that began:

Hello Marc,

On Friday, March 27 at 11:10 AM PDT, and again today Monday, March 30 at 12:25 PM PDT, GoGrid suffered a series of large scale distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks that affected the network connectivity of many GoGrid servers.

These network attacks were of a type that we had not seen before, and which our automated network attack prevention hardware was unfortunately unable to prevent.

We estimate that up to 25% of GoGrid customers had servers that were either unreachable or had degraded network performance and packet loss during significant parts of both of these attacks, and at times as much as half of you were affected more briefly. We know that many of you rely on GoGrid to run your critical Internet infrastructure, and apologize for the impacts to your business that these attacks may have caused.

It goes on to say what they'll do moving forward. Something about working with Cisco to ensure it doesn't happen again. But the kicker...apparently servers are still affected. So I'm not sure they're in the clear yet.

If you're a GoGrid customer, here's their status page, which is full of outage statuses: http://www.gogridstatus.com/

While I'm definitely happy GoGrid owned up to it...I'm not happy that there continues to be issues with their service. I just hope my incessant bitching got Michael Sheehan and the rest of the people I've dealt with at GoGrid to make things more transparent.

You can check out my past experience with GoGrid:

Go Grid Sucks If You Value Your Sanity
Do You Suck Go Grid? Come On!
Backup Plans A Must - Assembla And GoGrid At Fault

UPDATE: Our servers have been intermittently going offline. So I guess we're affected after all.

The Favorboard - Startup Profile - I Don't Get It?

Another startup sort of spammed me last night. I'm not sure why I got an email from FavorBoard? I definitely didn't sign up for anything so now I'm wondering where they got my email address.

Anyway, might as well let you know what I think about them. They aim to make it easy for students to "find help with class, organize a study group, get a ride to class, get help solving your computer issues, meet your classmates, and more...all from students on your campus!"

I've always thought there needed to be a more social way to facilitate interaction between classmates. At Haas, we used Google Groups to provide a group email that students could subscribe to - that way you could blast your message out to your class. And it was easy for the rest of the class to either listen or ignore what was coming. And it worked.

With FavorBoard - I think they're overestimating the idea that people want to actively help out other students. People will help, but I don't think most students are going to spend time searching for tasks they can assist with. If you simply get an email digest at the end of the day, well, what advantage does it have over Google Groups? Or what advantage does it have over a Facebook group or something like that?

I guess it comes down to this. I don't get their value ad. And, why limit it to just posting favors? Why not create a more specialized class social network or something to actually help a class become more cohesive?

LikeMe and Hunch

I guess it's the week of the personalized search engine. Which bodes well for what we do. It's always good to have competition in the same space, especially as you raise money. If one company grabs some cash from a VC, others VC's tend to want in on a competing technology. They don't want to get left in the cold if something hits. It also adds credibility and publicity to our technology.

We initially called ourselves a personalized search engine - but felt that moniker didn't really capture what we were doing. Personalization is certainly core to what we do, but we consider ourselves more of a discovery tool, something that helps build trust and relationships to other things on the internet. "Things" are relative - it could be other people, objects, services... or really anything that you can define to have a personality.

LikeMe is a "personalized recommendation engine" that "makes it fast, easy and fun for you to discover new places to eat, drink, dance, sleep, shop, ride, relax, primp and explore. It’s a great tool for the city you live in, and an even better tool for when you travel. It’s like having a great network of friendly recommenders all across the country." They "do" what we aim to "do", but we like to think our tool is much more powerful and targeted. While they match you to other people, I'm not really sure how their matching algorithm really works? So it left me with lots of questions - rather than answers.

As for Hunch:

"Hunch is a decision-making site that gets smarter the more it's used.

After asking you 10 questions or fewer, Hunch will propose a concrete and customized result for hundreds of decisions of every kind: What kind of car should I buy? Should I switch to a Mac? Should I dump my boyfriend? Where should I go on vacation? Should I get a tattoo?

Hunch uses machine learning to get smarter in two ways:

* User contributions train Hunch to be smarter overall. Contributions can take many forms, from correcting a fact that Hunch got wrong, to suggesting new decision topics to feature, follow-up questions to ask or decision results to propose.
* The more Hunch learns about each individual user's personality and preferences, the better Hunch can customize decision results for that user. It's like a friend getting to know someone's taste and preferences over time, so they can provide sound and trusted advice."


I'm excited about this space...things are heating up!

Spruce - A Restaurant Review. Totally Off Topic.

I have to write a review for something San Francisco based! Sorry for those outside of SF. But keep this in mind when you come visit.

Yesterday was my birthday and my girlfriend took me out to a nice dinner. As far as nice dinners go, I tend to stick with restaurants I know, such as Boulevard (which I love!), because I know I can trust their food. I've always had a great meal there. I find that all of these 10 star, 14 diamond, 8 Michelin tire rated places are way overrated. They place so much emphasis on ambiance, who the chef is, and presentation, that if you actually just want some tasty food, well, you never know what you're gonna get. Yesterday I finally went out of my comfort zone and went along with something new.

We decided on Spruce - a restaurant in Laurel Heights. At first, I was a bit put off by the atmosphere. It was stuffy. Everyone was over 50, graying, and sipping what looked like expensive wine. I normally enjoy a more hip atmosphere. But then I saw burgers flowing by with great looking french fries and I knew I'd be ok.

I sat down and was greeted by a card from the employees at Spruce wishing me a Happy Birthday. Nice touch. We ordered the scallops and cauliflower ravioli for appetizers. Superb. But it got better. We had the duck and the pork for main dishes. The duck was excellent. Very sweet, but expertly cooked. I can't say much more because I just want to get to the highlight of the night. It was the pork. It was absolutely, without compare. It was the greatest piece of pork I've ever tasted. It was like a filet of beef in both its tenderness and also its taste. I had no idea pork could be made like that. It was also medium rare. While people used to only eat pork that was thoroughly cooked, times have changed.

The assistant general manager (Megan) came over to ask us about the meal. She was incredibly hospitable - and gave us a rundown of how the pork was prepared. It was brined, which I didn't know much about. It was soaked in a salt and sugar bath, which partially "cooks" the meat while tenderizing it. She then offered to email me the recipe - which is highly unusual for a restaurant. But she said, "If you want to eat out, you're going to eat out". Basically - here's the recipe, make it when you're home. When you want to have someone else cook, come here. Very cool indeed - and I told her it wasn't what I expected from a place I thought was stuffy. She also recommended the burger for lunch. I'll be going back to try.

If you like pork - you HAVE to try it! And say hello to Megan - and tell her you heard about the pork from that guy who made her take 100 pictures at dinner.

Cubicle Ninjas - Your Totally Badass Web Design Team

I love Ninjas! Always have. I used to dress up as one and throw Chinese stars at my fence when I was little. I'm still not sure why they're called Chinese stars when Ninja's are Japanese? And they are the only assassins to use those badass weapons! My favorite country is Japan, surprise surprise. Home of the Ninja. And I hold a special place in my heart for the city of Kyoto. Why? Because when you walk around the old town late at night, you can totally imagine Ninjas running across the rooftops or hiding in the shadows, ready to pounce. It's that old and that cool. I'm serious about Japan (and Ninjas). And I can talk. I've been around the world.

So I was super excited when I began talking recently with Josh Farkas, over at Cubicle Ninjas. They're a web design and illustration company out of Chicago. And they produce some damn good design. But what I really like about these guys is that they act like a startup themselves, which means their customers are very important to them - and they ensure their happiness. I spoke with Josh about their process and it's a helluva lot better than what I used for our logo design (I'm still not happy with it!). They work with you, constantly iterating and revising - and while a lot of companies promise that, you need to be aware that most of these companies have no designer continuity between revisions. That means when you resubmit your design for a revision, you may get a totally different designer who hasn't seen your project before. Or they're just interested in cranking out work as quickly as possible, so they don't really listen all that attentively. It created a nightmare when we worked with Logoworks.


Of course, cost is always a concern. In Josh's words: "As for cost, we're very flexible. We can work at an hourly rate or by all inclusive project rate. Or if there is a cost a customer has in mind we'll let them know what we'd be able to achieve in this time. Plus, we give free no obligation quotes.

Finally, we have a satisfaction guarantee. Many agencies are focused on turning around projects quickly, but we measure success by customer happiness. So if that means a few extra weeks making changes (as long as they fall under the original scope) then we're there. As a creative partner their success and happiness is the most important factor in working together."

Finding a good designer is incredibly challenging. Especially on those oDesk type sites which are great for programmers. It's hard to evaluate a designer from a small portfolio. And it's not good to skimp on design. I can't stress enough the importance of smart, intuitive, simple, good looking design. And while this post sounds like an ad. It's not - I really like what these guys do!


Ninja's formal list of services include:
- Advertising Ideation & Design
- Animation
- Blog Design & Promotion
- Brochure & Book Design
- Brand Creation
- Character Design
- Email Design & Campaigns
- Flash Production
- Illustration
- Logo Design
- Presentation Design
- Search Engine Optimization
- Web Design
- Website Content Management Systems

Give the Ninjas a call: 630.940.6337

I Hate Most US Airlines, But I Found One I Like - Virgin America Rules!

I went to Vegas this past weekend for a bachelor party. Of course it was a blast. I won't go into details, I'll let your imagination wander. I flew Virgin America. Simply because I got the best deal. And it was awesome!

The gate attendant was a riot. You could tell he was psyched to be working for VA. And he loaded us on quickly - no delays. Once on board, the very next thing I noticed was the mood lighting. It was this soothing hue of pink and purple. And between sections of the aircraft were tasteful plastic/glass partitions. Much nicer than those aging distasteful curtains most airlines have that look like they belong on your grandmothers windows. And how could you not enjoy the flight attendants? They weren't old geezers like most of the one's I've seen on other US carriers, who look like they'd rather be skinned alive than serving you. They were all young and incredibly friendly. I wonder if this has to do with unions (from what I've found, they're non-unionized - hallelujah!!!)? And if not, then what the hell is the excuse that the rest of the airlines in this country are giving for crappy service? Oh, they even had free soda. I think some airlines are already dropping that perk.

Every seat came equipped with a RED entertainment system in it. It was awesome - I setup a lineup with my favorite artists and songs and passed out. You could play games, watch movies, or whatever. Seriously United. Take note.